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I've never seen it BUT since my daughter keeps singing a half remembered version of a song from it (something to do with letting the north and or cold (depending on the day) wind blow and not letting something or other bother/worry you anyway) I hate it without every having seen a frame of it...

... now then were's The Cosh to quite rightly put me in my place?

Drifting slightly off topic, how does Red Tide read in one go anyway?  I confess that I found it excruciating when it ran in the Meg, doled out in Smartie-sized pieces for what seemed like several years.

Personally, I thought it was fine, but then again I have only ever read it as one big chunk rather than wee pieces in the Meg.

Same here. I've only read the trade and I thought it was paced nicely.

But, having an organised and cared for collection is a different matter.  There is as much serenity in Colin's organised shelves of comics as an empty room.

Its only bloody serene cos I never bloody well get time to go in there!

I'd say it one of those situations were any given title works fine on its own, but you get more from reading the whole bunch.

So you could defo read his 'Batman and Robin' stuff on their own, you could defo read all the 'Batman Inc' stuff on its own, but it does all also read as a complete story.

I suppose the biggest problem with reading all as one is that the start of his run in Batman is for me by far the weakest part (the first arc Batman and Son) and so might be off putting? That's not to say its bad, far from it, just not as good as the rest. I started reading it with Batman and Robin and then eventually went back and bought the trades of his Batman stuff as it goes and that worked a treat for me.

Yeah I have the collected edition and while I normally don't get on with these omnibus type collection due to the size this one I can just about work with.

That said as I'm working my way through it with my daughter who is loving it I am buying the individual books.

I know the commonly held option is that it gets less fun as it goes on I tend to disagree. It changes for sure becoming darker in tone and more like a fantasy epic but it still holds up really well across the piece.

Yeah you do kinda get the feeling that John Smith is so good cos he writes what he wants to write when he wants to write it and doesn't compromise.

The work of his I get on with least (and this is all relative my not getting on with something of John Smith's is like me really liking someone else's work!) tends to be the stuff he does for other people's characters. his Dredd has had its moments but its amongst his weakest for me.

I dream of a world where there's a John Smith story in the Prog every week, but I accept and cherish the fact that what we have is probably what makes him so good.

It will be interesting to see what future generations make of physical stuff.

Yeah that's one thing I'm thankful for with my children. They are still little 'uns (2 and almost 5) and I reckon will be part of the first generation that will live their lives becoming increasingly unburdened by a lot of physical stuff of their own but looking at our (their parents) stuff and wondering what the hell we are still doing with it all!

I'm going to guess its something in the thrills of the future supplement that never actually came to light.

I'm kinda glad I can't be more specific than that as I can't think of a good question!

Leatherjack came out at a formative time for me...

Criminally I missed out Leatherjack out of my list of the ultimate John Smith stories and it needs to be that list.

Yeah as rumour would have it the fact that Karen Berger didn't get on with John Smith's work (how true that is I don't know but somehow that's my understanding) is Vertigo's lose and the Galaxies Greatest's gain. I've said it here before but John Smith is very possibly my favourite 2000ad writer - he is quite brilliant.

When recently(ish) I did a re-read of all his 2000ad (and related) works that I have in roughly chronological order the quality of his material grew and grew until around Firekind it hit a real Zenith (pun intended). At that point he produced the aforementioned Firekind, Devlin Waugh - Swimming in Blood, Deux Machina, New Statemen over a few years. A set of stories that are frighteningly good.

He's continued to produce wonderful work with Cradlegrave and the Sirius Rising trilogy for me joining the above as some of the greatest, if not the greatest stories we've ever had in 2000ad.

I'm tired and emotional so I'll not go on anymore except to say I. LOVE. JOHN. SMITH!

Grant Morrison ...

Anyone a fan of his Batman run?

Very much so. It has its ups and down but there's certain sections, in particular the post Final Crisis stuff, so Batman and Robin and Batman Inc (both runs) that challenge the Grant + Breyfogle run for my all time favourite Batman stories.

They way he played with the whole nature of a long form comic book character, everything has happened and will happen again is quite superb. His handling of the transition between Bruce and Dick was wonderful and the whole Damien story beginning to end just fantastic. Great character work, wonderfully meta and innovative and most importantly damned good fun. 

I seem to recall the biggest issue with Finn was all the characters seemed to have slightly weird noses.

Think that was Finn, if so really annoyed me.

Now normally we shouldn't drag things off topic but well when we're talking '95 Dredd it ain't such a crime.

Anyway this chat has led me to discover there's a directors cut of Excalibur - should have known. Alongside 'Bridge too far' (is there a directors cut of that? Will check in a sec) one of the great films of my youth that I think didn't get the praise it deserves.

Arh a chronological purchase system. Its bold and personalised for which you have my undying admiration.

A friend files his music collection, which consists of several thousand items, by order of purchase. It is bewildering and, of course, even when you stumble across something you want to hear, you have absolutely no idea where to put it back.

Which surely can led to hours of fun. Find some records you know have significance to say relationships etc etc and start swapping them around without him knowing. You know just to play with his head. 

Yeah lets hope its does well so it becomes a regular thing.

Now back to dreaming of hardcover annuals also returning...