Bleeding Cool reporting (https://www.bleedingcool.com/2018/07/25/2000ad-rebellion-solicits-october-2018/) that 2018 is bringing us a second Scream and Misty special for halloween.
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DjBls60WsAAU47S.jpg)
QuoteFollowing the success of last year's fright-filled outing, the Scream & Misty Special returns for 2018! Two of Britain's best loved comics have reunited offering an anthology of brand new tales, guaranteed to terrify and entertain you this Halloween! Featuring more treats than tricks, including the further misdemeanors of Max the computer in The 13th Floor, ghoulish goings on with the undead WW1 pilot the Black Max, zombie and vampire DNA combine to create a brand new horror sensation called Decomposition Jones plus a tomb full of other tales from the realms of the Mist.
In Shops: Oct 31, 2018
There was also a letter in this week's prog (though without the picture). I wonder if there'll be a special edition cover where Misty is written larger?
Nice looking cover and hopefully the special can become a yearly publication going forward
Quote from: sheridan on 26 July, 2018, 11:56:08 AM
There was also a letter in this week's prog (though without the picture). I wonder if there'll be a special edition cover where Misty is written larger?
My prog has gone missing so far this week :(
Is there actually any Misty stuff in this one apart from the boobariffic cover?
Steve Green noted the cover is by Kyle Hotz (https://www.instagram.com/kylehotzcomics/?hl=en)
Great cover by Hotz, he has such an instantly recognizable style.
The man is destined to draw Nemesis the Warlock someday.
Hope the 2018 Scream / Misty special has a bit more bite than the first one did.
Quote from: Eamonn Clarke on 26 July, 2018, 02:25:49 PM
Steve Green noted the cover is by Kyle Hotz (https://www.instagram.com/kylehotzcomics/?hl=en)
Thanks for finding that! It was my guess but didn't see a credit.
Also, ex-boarder Richard McAuliffe has a story in it!
Quote from: Steve Green on 26 July, 2018, 06:45:15 PM
Also, ex-boarder Richard McAuliffe has a story in it!
As long as he's not one of these female wannabes Tharg keeps foisting on us in these specials, eh boys?
Looking forward to this, enjoyed the previous one.
That cover is lush.
Love it.
Quote from: Steve Green on 26 July, 2018, 06:45:15 PM
Also, ex-boarder Richard McAuliffe has a story in it!
A good omen- I've read some of his horror work previously and quite enjoyed it.
And another ex-boarder, Lizzie Boyle!
Glad that word of these two is finally out. Looking forward to seeing what they come up with for the book.
Very much so!
Variant cover available exclusively from the 2000AD webshop...
(https://i.imgur.com/owcFm5H.jpg)
Whose done that cover its fantastic!
That picture has been up nearly two hours and not a single person - not even Tips - has made a joke about Misty having a ginger pussy. What the fuck is happening to this forum?
Quote from: Professor Bear on 15 August, 2018, 10:35:35 PM
That picture has been up nearly two hours and not a single person - not even Tips - has made a joke about Misty having a ginger pussy. What the fuck is happening to this forum?
Speaking for myself, I was too distracted by Ghastly fingering that bird.
Really excellent cover, BTW. Was a bit unsure about buying the previous Misty/
Scream special, but it was solid stuff and I'm definitely on for this one.
Really looking forward to this and also hope that it becomes an annual release.
Was hoping for more of 'The Dracula Files' but hopefully next time. Must reread the first special.
Two great covers to choose from.
Enjoyed the 2017. Will purchase this new one. The Hotz cover is gorgeous.
How the devil did Lizzie and Rich get a story inside!!!! I'm a fan of their both their writing but godammit if there's anyone who deserves a shot, it's me ;)
Like the alternate cover too, but I ain't double dipping this year.
Received mine this morning and spent the next couple of hours giving it a read. On the whole, very good! Standout story for me: Decomposition Jones. Hilarious, y'dig?
Some stories suffer in a couple of places from too much brevity/editing forcing the reader to make narrative leaps and assumptions in order to work out "what just happened"; most noticeably in the Thirteenth Floor and Black Max. A common gripe I have with a lot of strips, especially in recent years. Add a fill-in panel here and there to join things together and it would be great.
Also a couple of typos in the (typeset) text for Bookworm.
Great art throughout though. Especially liked the scratchy b&w of Black Beth.
Looking forward to next year!
Bought the Scream version of this.
Much better than last years imo.
Decomposition Jones being my least favourite funnily enough.
You pays your money...
Out in the wild now, bought a copy in Smiths this morning and enjoyed it.
Hats off to Lizzie and Rich for their high street debuts.
Hope my local whs has this. They often stock the Prog. I just found that out recently! Not an issue as I tend to download the digital version.) If its not stocked I'll likely just go the digital route. They're nice enough, but I sometimes hanker after a physical comic when specials are involved.
Quote from: Mardroid on 17 October, 2018, 11:22:52 AM
Hope my local whs has this. They often stock the Prog. I just found that out recently! Not an issue as I tend to download the digital version.) If its not stocked I'll likely just go the digital route. They're nice enough, but I sometimes hanker after a physical comic when specials are involved.
If not, I can get you one.
Quote from: Eamonn Clarke on 17 October, 2018, 01:36:57 PM
Quote from: Mardroid on 17 October, 2018, 11:22:52 AM
Hope my local whs has this. They often stock the Prog. I just found that out recently! Not an issue as I tend to download the digital version.) If its not stocked I'll likely just go the digital route. They're nice enough, but I sometimes hanker after a physical comic when specials are involved.
If not, I can get you one.
My local whs in Dartford* had them in stock, but I appreciate that very much Eamonn. Thank you.
*I say 'local', it's a bit over a mile from where I live, but I don't mind the trek. Heh. I believe it is the closest.
Enjoyed the Special.
The highlights are the Black Max strip with great art by Simon Coleby and Black Beth.
Been reading through Hallowscream lately, so a Scream! homage that doesn't quite know where to pitch its tent on the Venn of "nostalgia", "accurate evocation of the era" and "I am a grown ass man now and I demand to see graphic disembowelment" holds no fear for me and I enjoyed this plenty overall but HAHAHA I sure hope this isn't a crowded field or anything otherwise those people making their own horror comic anthology for Halloween 2018 that mixes newly-minted talent with old hands might start to feel kinda worried around about now.
13th Floor - entertaining enough, but feels off. Been reading the original lately (as part of my EAGLE read-through) and am currently at the bit where a policeman is looking into the strange disappearances in and around Maxwell Towers but can't prove anything even though he knows summink is amiss, so Max abducts and tortures him and... yeah well anyway, the moral quandary Max experiences here doesn't ring true. Of course, I can put on my Big Boy Writing Hat and see that the writer is putting Sam and Max (LOL) at loggerheads for DRAMA purposes, but again, this doesn't ring true because Max is the controlling, abusive, manipulative one in his relationships with people, it's kind of the central narrative concept of the strip and best illustrated by his relationship with the long-suffering Jerry or the doomed Burt Runch. Well anyway, it feels less like a particularly naughty and subversive comic for kids and more like a later landfill-era 2000ad strip. Competent, but forgettable, though John Stokes channeling Ortiz is a delight.
Decomposition Jones - a utilisation of the trappings of blaxploitation by transplanting them onto a staple of white exploitation cinema of the late 21st century, to wit: the white cop pursuing a serial killer sub-genre of neo-noir. The writer replaces traditional narrative captions and explanatory text with a "song" that is actually the soul funk trappings of the Shaft theme deliberately mis-described as "disco" so as to complete a cunning meta-narrative exploration of cultural appropriation by transplanting white culture onto a noted African American cultural artifact, thus arguably making Decomposition Jones the most satirical work in the special, as it serves as a commentary upon the format of the book itself, which appropriates children's literature and imposes upon it the violent excesses expected by older men. I particularly liked the final scene of the mingling of cultures played out as a fantasy sequence between warring blood types, as zombies (African/Hiatian), vampires (Eastern European) and the paradigm of Caucasian cultural authority and social power, the white police officer, are violently forced together to birth something new, a whimsical metaphor for the urban folklore of the New York melting pot.
Black Beth - very by-the-numbers backdoor pilot for a Xena knock-off. The establishing shots could have been a little more explicit, as the art style is loose and scratchy across the following pages, making some of the narrative jumps in time and place unclear, though the writing does most of the lifting there. Not bad or anything, just not very interesting.
Black Max - not impressed by the cliffhanger ending, but a zombie Kraut gets kickflipped in the face and dammit I am not made of stone. Simon Coleby's art is more old-school than you might expect because of the bright colours, and the tight framing on those first few pages is really great even if the letterer was probably cursing him out. Likewise the old-school dialogue really channels the originating era while matching it with a modern brevity, but like I said, a shame about the ending.
Best Friends Forever - "never mind your dead wife, look at this white gator" if nothing else Boyle really captures how dreadful the majority of the American South seems to outsiders, which helpfully stops you from asking if a school would really let a carnivorous animal HA HA WHAT AM I SAYING their answer to gun violence in schools is to add more guns to schools of course they let children take alligators to school with them why am I even wasting my time thinking about this America is a fucking circus of a country. The Americanisms are the biggest problem for me with this one, as the kind of experience that would make this story resonate with anyone would likely come from second hand exposure to US culture, particularly the teen horror genre from which the story derives a lot of beats, so while it's a departure from the thematic ethos of homaging UK comics, there's arguably a case to be made that it's a good representation of the relatively closed creative cycle of US horror. Hmm that sounds a bit negative but isn't meant to be - I means this is very American oh geez that sounds even more negative - I did like this even if the final page is a little unclear, but I'll stop now.
Mint Condition - the editor has to take the blame for the rough edges on this one as the lettering really needed a more experienced hand and the dialogue could have done with a bit of polishing, but this is quite funny and manages to be cogent despite the seeming importance of the Misty self-reverence. A good one-off.
Bookworm - a decent story, but the restoration makes some odd choices: the lettering could have done with a more aggressive overhaul, and while the colours are good, the melodramatic, gothy subject matter actually seems like it would lend itself better to a black and white presentation, or at least a more subdued palate. I'm more just backseat driving in my crits now, but this is a solid tale and I'd quite like to see a collection of this kind of thing ALA The Complete Future Shocks.
A mixed bag but certainly worth picking up. Best of the bunch for me was "Mint Condition", though the "You're" typo is pretty shoddy.
I liked the old Misty story "Bookworm" (another typo there), interesting that no one seems to know who wrote the comic backin the day for the most part.
Worst stories were "Best Friends Forever" which was just illogical, and "Black Beth", which I found trite.
The rest were all pretty decent, and I liked the idea of Decomposition Jones. Art standout was Simon Coleby, even if the Black Max story was quite muddles.
Quote from: Professor Bear on 18 October, 2018, 02:16:39 PM
13th Floor - entertaining enough, but feels off. Been reading the original lately (as part of my EAGLE read-through) and am currently at the bit where a policeman is looking into the strange disappearances in and around Maxwell Towers but can't prove anything even though he knows summink is amiss, so Max abducts and tortures him and... yeah well anyway, the moral quandary Max experiences here doesn't ring true. Of course, I can put on my Big Boy Writing Hat and see that the writer is putting Sam and Max (LOL) at loggerheads for DRAMA purposes, but again, this doesn't ring true because Max is the controlling, abusive, manipulative one in his relationships with people, it's kind of the central narrative concept of the strip and best illustrated by his relationship with the long-suffering Jerry or the doomed Burt Runch.
Disagree. I do agree it feels slightly off, but not because of Max's qualms. In fact, I was thinking it seemed the most on-character thing he's done so far. Max may be infinitely manipulative and his moral reasoning all over the place, but generally speaking he'll leave people alone unless they pose an immediate and direct threat to either his tenants or the Thirteenth Floor's existence. He didn't torture [spoiler]Sergeant Ingram[/spoiler] so much in the original run just because he was getting too close to the truth, he tortured him because he was directly responsible for [spoiler]the death of an innocent tenant[/spoiler], albeit unknowingly.
However, the way the Thirteenth Floor works in this new story seems a bit weird. It suddenly appears to be drawing upon fears from the victim's own subconscious, whereas in the original stories it was yer standard muddledly nonsensical virtual reality/parallel universe combo, with Max mainly creating the scenario to fit with his warped sense of poetic justice.
Anyone notice any print quality issues with random pages throughout the special? It's as if a couple of them were printed from lower resolution files and so the artwork is very pixilated, such as the last page of Black Beth, although - bizarrely - the balloons and speech on that page suffer NO drop in quality from the previous so I can only assume something happened with the art file at the lettering stage?
I don't have it to hand to point out all of the instances of this but I noticed it on probably 2 or 3 pages throughout.
Quote from: MacabreMagpie on 19 October, 2018, 01:24:43 PM
so I can only assume something happened with the art file at the lettering stage?
No... the EPS file of the lettering is married up with the art in InDesign during the production process. It's possible a lower-res positional version of the art was left in place in error. My comps haven't arrived yet (HINT, HINT) so I couldn't say for certain without seeing the pages. Unless it's happened on Black Max, in which case it's definitely my fault.
Quote from: Jim_Campbell on 19 October, 2018, 01:55:58 PM
Quote from: MacabreMagpie on 19 October, 2018, 01:24:43 PM
so I can only assume something happened with the art file at the lettering stage?
No... the EPS file of the lettering is married up with the art in InDesign during the production process. It's possible a lower-res positional version of the art was left in place in error. My comps haven't arrived yet (HINT, HINT) so I couldn't say for certain without seeing the pages. Unless it's happened on Black Max, in which case it's definitely my fault.
The digital version looks fine. Jim I liked everything about Black Max and the lettering complemented the strip wonderfully.
My print copy (newsstand edition) looks fine too.
I was wondering if it was perhaps an error that was caught at some point into the print run, since I hadn't seen anyone mention it. No idea if that's logistically likely, though.
I'll snap some pics when I get the chance (regret to say I don't own it yet - this was whilst flicking through in Smiths yesterday!)
Quote from: M.I.K. on 18 October, 2018, 11:51:39 PMI do agree it feels slightly off, but not because of Max's qualms. In fact, I was thinking it seemed the most on-character thing he's done so far. Max may be infinitely manipulative and his moral reasoning all over the place
I made my case poorly by pointing out Ingram's abduction and torture, as my intent wasn't to illustrate that Max would
definitely do one thing or the other, because he exists in a state of moral absolutism* - it was to illustrate that he wouldn't
equivocate in the way he does, and that lack of certainty is why the whole "this seems wrong" stuff didn't ring true to me because it makes Max seem like the wrong partner in an abusive relationship, along with - as you point out - Max's new ability to read minds and discover someone's deepest traumas. Wasn't there a story with a local gangster where Max more or less has to go through the motions of throwing him into a sewer full of rats or a graveyard full of skeletons trying to find out what makes the guy afraid? He just seems to know right away what would frighten the copper. I dunno, maybe he read her life story on the internet or something, but that still doesn't explain why he immediately defaults to absolute sadism and psychological terror against someone he supposedly views as blameless instead of something quick and clean like hypnotizing her into jumping in front of traffic or falling off something tall.
*WARNING: subjective opinions to follow - although Wagner and Grant's most famous partnership was on a character who was a noted moral relativist, Max, being a computer, consistently operated in a binary state of moral absolutism, and if your action was to hound someone to suicide over a debt you were trying to collect or turning off a killer computer in an effort to stop it murdering people, if both of those actions resulted in someone's death, then to Max they are equally "bad" acts, because Max doesn't practice any kind of moral reasoning, because he can't.
I would go even further and say that whether it be calling Burt an oaf for being seen disposing of a body or making a frowny/smiley face at an appropriate juncture of a conversation, all of Max's emotional displays are affectations for the benefit of others, as Max doesn't actually care about anyone or anything, he's simply following his core programme to look after his tenants and fake civility or a forceful tone where he deems it necessary - with even his blackly comic narration being an affectation because that's what the reader of a kids' horror comic wants. He's controlling and frightening, but it's all a facade, all a means to an entirely logical and justifiable end.
And yet somehow Max is still unquestionably a bad 'un.
Quote from: Professor Bear on 19 October, 2018, 06:04:01 PM
Max, being a computer, consistently operated in a binary state of moral absolutism, and if your action was to hound someone to suicide over a debt you were trying to collect or turning off a killer computer in an effort to stop it murdering people, if both of those actions resulted in someone's death, then to Max they are equally "bad" acts, because Max doesn't practice any kind of moral reasoning, because he can't.
I suspect this may be true, though it's interesting how Max only deliberately kills one person in the original Maxwell Tower era of the series, namely Mr. Kemp, the debt collector. Kemp is an unpleasant man, but not even close to the worst person Max ensnares. Everyone else – and there's only four other fatalities caused indirectly by Max*, including Wally Skegg, who proves almost immune to the Thirteenth Floor until Max stumbles upon his crippling fear of snakes – is an accident. That said, he is about to kill Mr. Campbell and Trev until he receives news that the tenant who suffered as a result of their shoddy handiwork has pulled through. So dodgy plastering is worse than running a protection racket.
*Not counting Bert and Sgt. Ingram here.
Alan Grant has some detailed opinions on morality and anarchy that don't come up much in interviews, it's a shame he never got the kind of in-depth evaluation of his work that - for example - Colin Smith did with Grant's fellow Scot Mark Millar.
I've certainly never had the impression that sympathy for the police was particularly high on Grant's agenda (thinking of their portrayal in Thirteenth Floor here, as well as his general much-less-ambiguous-than-Wagner approach to Dredd) - though I've read little of his Batman run, so maybe he had time for Jim Gordon.
Quote from: Professor Bear on 19 October, 2018, 06:04:01 PM
I would go even further and say that whether it be calling Burt an oaf for being seen disposing of a body or making a frowny/smiley face at an appropriate juncture of a conversation, all of Max's emotional displays are affectations for the benefit of others, as Max doesn't actually care about anyone or anything, he's simply following his core programme to look after his tenants and fake civility or a forceful tone where he deems it necessary - with even his blackly comic narration being an affectation because that's what the reader of a kids' horror comic wants. He's controlling and frightening, but it's all a facade, all a means to an entirely logical and justifiable end.
There's definitely a case to be made for that, (and he does have repeated stock phrases that would suggest as much, like "the welfare of my tenants is my prime concern"), but there are also hints that something else might be going on. At one point he calls Bert Runch his favourite tenant*. That shouldn't happen. His programming shouldn't allow for favourites, just as it shouldn't allow for virtual reality parallel universes that people can physically disappear into.
Then there's that bit quite a long way into the Eagle run where department-store-running Max gets dangerously moody and starts taking things way too far because he's 'homesick', but you won't have got to that in your read-through yet.
*Seems an odd thing to say, given everything he's done to poor Mr. Runch, until you realise [spoiler]he's been treating him exactly like a pet. Training him to do things, keeping him safely locked away, making sure he's fed and entertained, etc;[/spoiler]
Once he's installed on the Thirteenth Floor, Bert is de facto favourite because he then becomes the ultimate tenant - Max literally has to do everything for him, and Max is programmed to gain satisfaction from this. Of course Bert's his favourite - he's utterly dependent on Max.
(What does Bert think is going on while he's on the Thirteenth Floor? Is he still effectively hypnotised the whole time? He seems to have some free will and ability to make choices, but he also seems to understand that Max can effectively give him anything there.)
That certainly explains why he's Max's favourite, but it doesn't explain why Max is able to consciously decide he's his favourite and express it to someone in those terms, (if that makes sense).
...and yeah, I can remember wondering all that about Bert when I first read it when I was nine. It all seems to be about how much is free will and how much is 'programming'.
Quote from: broodblik on 19 October, 2018, 02:30:15 PM
The digital version looks fine. Jim I liked everything about Black Max and the lettering complemented the strip wonderfully.
Thank you! That's very much appreciated. :-)
I really enjoyed this special. Lots to love!
I wonder, is the demand there so we could go semi-annual? It does seem to be gong quite well.
The back catalogue reprints have been just splendid so far.
This is what I was talking about with the low-res thing. These are from the last page of Black Beth where you can see the difference in line quality between the art and lettering, though it only happens on that page as DaNi's lines are clear on the previous ones.
(https://i.imgur.com/xVHi7iq.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/Vmx9cJl.png)
Not a huge issue or anything, and probably not something you might even notice if you're not looking at it with an artist's eye, just a curious occurrence.
Really enjoyed this year's instalment, I might add. I'd like to see more but, if nothing else, I hope it continues as a Halloween special for many years to come.
I noticed that too. It's not disastrous but looks like the lettering was done on (or post-applied to) a downsampled preview copy of the page. I won't pretend to know the process.
Is Smuzz the artist formerly known as SMS, of ABC Warrriors Black Hole fame?
Quote from: CalHab on 22 October, 2018, 08:13:34 PM
Is Smuzz the artist formerly known as SMS, of ABC Warrriors Black Hole fame?
Yep.
That must be one of the longest gaps between appearances in the prog/specials. Over thirty years?
Bought this, but slightly underwhelmed by it, and its not cheap :-X
My spooky Halloween story from last year - I woke up from a dream about a fascist-style dictatorship with the symbol like a three-armed swastika, then minutes after waking read for the first time the story in the 2017 Scream / Misty special about the dictatorship with that exact symbol.
Anyway, looking forward to this year's, even though the reviews here are a bit underwhelming.
I would love to see the stories given more space to breathe. I've just finished Misty vol 3 and the pacing as the story develops is a real pleasure, something that you just can't replicate across 5 pages in a special.
Having said that, I did enjoy this and definitely want to see more. What's that? A new monthly title? One can but dream! Please though can it be called Misty and Scream, rather than Scream and Misty?
Finally read this last night. My print copy has the cock-up in that last page of Black Beth, which is a pity because I liked the art. In a more general sense, it feels like this comic desperately wants to no longer be a special and instead become a monthly (or quarterly). Unlikely, perhaps, in the current comics climate, but waiting an entire year to see what happens in Black Max is a bit ARGH.
As for BFF, I'm not sure what was unclear about that – the gator [spoiler]is about to bite off her head due to being betrayed – you're either BFFs or you're not[/spoiler].
I thought this was a bit ordinary to be honest. Like a taster for on going series that won't happen.
The Alligator one was entertaining - and self contained - and it looks great.
Quote from: IndigoPrime on 27 October, 2018, 11:10:55 AM
Finally read this last night. My print copy has the cock-up in that last page of Black Beth, which is a pity because I liked the art. In a more general sense, it feels like this comic desperately wants to no longer be a special and instead become a monthly (or quarterly). Unlikely, perhaps, in the current comics climate, but waiting an entire year to see what happens in Black Max is a bit ARGH.
A quarterly would be pretty good, a monthly fantastic but I expect unlikely. I get more out of these than I get out of the Prog at the moment (with all due respect to The Small House and Kingdom). If I was going to find fault it would be by agreeing with Fortnight's comments about having to make narrative leaps - you get a sense that panels are missing in to order to fit a limited page count. However, it's partly this roughness that appeals to me.
The best thing about these specials, though, is that they feel like their own things, not a side-order of more Prog to go with the Prog.
Regards,
Robin
Honour the old school practice of mergers: 2000AD AND SCREAM!
Picked it up yesterday - good turn-out for the signing well up from last year's.
Thumbs up overall - favourite story was Smuzz's Mint in Box.
BFFs - wasn't sure if the SFX on that final panel on the penultimate page was supposed to be like that - seems like it would have worked better as a reveal on the final page.
Also possibly would have liked a darker, black white and red colouring on the final couple of pages - the colouring suited the setup, but something more graphic might have been interesting when it went all Carriegator.
Black Max - really liked the transparent word balloons, Jim did something similar for fainter whispering on Sniper Elite and it works really well. But yeah, I'd agree that having these massive gaps between episodes is frustrating.
Rest of the line-up.
Thirteenth Floor - solid stuff, just picked up the hardback, so getting more into it - the division of artists works well here, but again not quite self-contained.
Decomposition Jones and Black Beth - again two TBC/The Beginning? Stories which could be a year off getting a part two.
Bookworm, yeah OK - *sounds misty equivalent of a future shock airhorn*
As someone who gets narked with the prog leaving things hanging, it gets a bit frustrating.
So overall positive, just a bit hamstrung for me by the format, strips which I think have got great potential like Black Max revived are tempered by the gaps.
It's a bit like when Pat was doing the visible man stuff for the end of year prog, except we're getting even more of the same scheduling.
Maybe it is time for the Scream and Misty special to become something more regular. I agree with most of the people posting here is that it is frustrating to wait a year for the next part of a story.
Finally picked this up from my Nerd Shop and read it... and alas I found it very frustrating. Its a blooming good read BUT as DrJomster says nothing has room to breathe and worse than that once again so much feels like teaser for things that could come.
Please of that the more self contained stories fared much better. Adored Lizzie Boyle and Yishan Li's simple tale of a girl and her croc, especially that final page. Really enjoyed The Thirteenth Floor and Smuzz's story has some merit too. Bookworm was a little forced but looked superb and was fun.
The trouble is the other stories all teased and promised so much in their cramped space and who knows when we'll see more. Decomposition Jones was such fun and looked superb, what a great idea... I'd like to see more. Black Beth was okay and looked great, I'd happily see more... Return of the Black Max, looked superb and had potential given more room I'd happily see where this could... you get the idea.
I know they say leave them wanting more and all that but this is going too far! Maybe we'll get something more in which case this will feel important but I think comics like this might benefit with fewer stories with more room and some sense of the openings going somewhere... somehow.
Still great read and it did want me wanting more so that has to be considered a success right?
Late to the party but just finished reading this - absolutely top drawer. Every artist was knocking it out of the park and the stories had real variety - from silly comedy to action adventure to dark horror. The only story telling mild-muddle was Black Beth where I couldn't really get the role / interactions with the witch / hag / soothsayer. But the art itself was great and the character intriguing. The Smuzz story suffered a bit from not knowing who was who in the first few panels but loved the characters switch up in style and the ending. Minor quibbles overall this was a solid 8/10 outing.
If this was monthly i'd be a subscriber.