Why so little ABC Warriors and Strontium Dog?

[PsychoGoatee]

I'm wondering why there is so little ABC Warriors and Strontium Dog over the years. Especially compared to the mighty Judge Dredd.

I'm in the early-80's era right now, on prog 161.

You've got Dredd, Robo Hunter, The VCs, Blackhawk, Fiends of the Western Front... no ABC or Strontium.

Now, you'd figure in this era we'd have a lot more Strontium Dog and ABC Warriors, since they were relatively new, and popular.

And of course, this problem continued over the years. Why are those titles so on and off? Not everything can be Dredd, but you'd think those are popular enough to be more frequently published.

[Leigh S]

ABC warriors had artist trouble - it was originally meant to be just Kev O'Neill and Mike McMahon IIRC, and I think it eventually led to bad feeling between Pat and editorial.  

Was Stront ever put on hold while Carlos didStront was inextricably tied to Ezquerra eing available I'd assume.  Mestizo?  A character of his own invention - do the dates tally or was that before Stront?  Then the Apocalypse War and follow up strips takes him away again

The gap in the 100s sees Carlos doing Fiends of teh Eastern front and Stainless Steel Rat, so presuambly, the editorial felt he was a safe pair of hands to make SSR a success.    

so one was a case of too many artists the other a case of too few! :)

[Leigh S]

Ouch - this version makes more sense!


Stront was inextricably tied to Ezquerra eing available I'd assume.  Was Stront ever put on hold while Carlos did Mestizo, A character of his own invention? - do the dates tally or was that before Stront? Then the Apocalypse War and follow up strips takes him away again

The gap in the 100s sees Carlos doing Fiends of teh Eastern front and Stainless Steel Rat, so presuambly, the editorial felt he was a safe pair of hands to make SSR a success.

so one was a case of too many artists the other a case of too few! :)

[Leigh S]

checking Wikipedia, El Mestizo was just before Stront, so it must have been either Editorial poaching him for Stainless Steel Rat, or Wagner losing interest in doing more and Editorial finding other work for Carlos

[Leigh S]

Or of course, just not having the time to write it, or editorial deciding that Dredd and Robohunter were enough, and squeezing in Stront as well would squeeze out some of the other writers (some of whom had a kind of "deal" going on where they were guaranteed work)

[Grant Goggans]

El Mestizo ran during a break in Major Eazy in 1977.  Eazy then had its last run from Nov. 1977 to June 1978.  Starlord's first issue was May 1978, which probably accounts for Ron Tiner stepping in and doing three or four of the last Eazy episodes.

Strontium Dog has a few short breaks, the longest one nine weeks, but it appears from May 1978-June 1979.  It returns in prog 178 (Sep. 1980) and runs to 223 (July 1981), only missing five issues.  That's a pretty good run.  Overall, there are 365 episodes, which makes it a distant second to Dredd, but second all the same.  (Well, there have been more Future Shocks, but that's a different case.)

ABC Warriors is a different issue.  IIRC, Pat Mills wanted the series to be drawn by only two alternating artists, but when they could not manage the workload, others (Ewins, Gibbons, Ezquerra) had to be brought in, which aggravated Mills enough to stop writing it.  The Warriors don't return until 1984, when he incorporates them into Nemesis.