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The humour in 2000ad lately all seems to revolve around sex and violence. Ulysses Sweet and Zombo being prime examples.

There was also a whiff of that in the Tharg tale. LOOK! EVERYONE IS INFATUATED WITH BOOBIES! AHAHAHAHA! MILLS WANTS TO GIVE FIVE FEM DROIDS A THOROUGH LUBRICATION! AHAHAHAH! Um, yeah. It's not really satire when you're turning such problems into a nudge-nudge teenage-style gag in a Tharg strip rather than properly lampooning something or — shock — criticising it. (And I know Tharg strips are ultimately just a bit of fun, but with 2000 AD's occasional but overt lurches into sexist territory during 2013, those sections just rubbed me up the wrong way in what was otherwise a decent end-of-year Prog.)

Best Slaine stories are in Warrior's Dawn IMO.

That's pretty much how I feel about it. There's something about that early Sláine, with its energy and imagination, before it got bogged down in cinema-like eye candy and tedious rants about religion and subservience (even though the actual subjects are covered). I did like Horned God, and at the time the visuals wowed me, but on going back and reading older Sláine now, that first collection remains my favourite.

Strontium Dog I think was less fully formed, but really hit its stride with Portrait of a Mutant. The run was then practically flawless through to Rage and still on a decent high until Stone Killers. These days, it feels a bit off, for some reason, and I'm not sure why. Perhaps as Wagner's more mature pen has really paid dividends on Dredd, the same isn't so true for Alpha.

Bhuna: one thing you should do before buying anything is go and see the tablets up close. Pick them up, check out how they feel (something that's far more important than with a PC), check the screen quality, and also figure out what screen size you'd prefer. Ideally, go to a store that actually has the things turned on and with apps loaded. Generally, for comics, I wouldn't go for a 7-inch screen, even an iPad mini; however, if your use-cases are primarily other things, the smaller form factor might be fine, and that can save you money.

In terms of the non-Apple brands, the Kindle Fire HD is a decent enough tablet for the price, but it is designed primarily as an Amazon ecosystem device. On that basis, you should check Amazon's app store to see if it has the kind of apps you'd want to use. Otherwise, my advice would be to spend as much as you can afford, and get the largest storage capacity within your budget, unless the tablet later enables storage to be increased using microSD or similar (once a common feature, but now less so).

Without exception, those people I know who got cheap-as-dirt tablets don't use them now—only those who plumped for iPads or decent Android equivalents (Sony Xperia, etc.) still fire them up regularly; and those Android devices often aren't a great deal cheaper than Apple's (iPad Air starts at £399; Xperia Z is £379 at Argos and £355 on Amazon...), although there are far more ad-hoc bargains to be had in the Android space if you do your research and search around.

(Incidentally, the original iPad mini sneaks within your budget (£249), but I wouldn't recommend that. The screen isn't great, and the guts of the device are dated. The newer model's 70 quid more but significantly more powerful and with a much nicer display.)

Horned God is colour, yes.

The interrogations I liked the Davis one but the Harrison one kind of rubbed me the wrong way he seemed a bit full of himself to me.

I didn't get that at all from the interview. It felt honest and he noted that he was grateful for the opportunities he got, but that they made him understand what was really important was following his own path.

I thought that when I saw the preview over on CBR. Anyhoo can anyone tell me is the mini-trade the early DeMarco stories this month?

Ways to Die (3.70–3.71)
Deep Blue Death (4.03–4.05)
Covers: 3.71, 4.03

Harmony: Homeward Bound (2.62)

Next month: More DeMarco and Harmony, apparently.

Scroll down on this page. The top line is the entirety of the classic run. Get those and you've everything, from the first black-and-white strip, through to Dredd crossover Top Dog. The first four volumes are Dredd-style chunky trades. The last is much thinner and priced accordingly.

The second row is the semi-reboot that then rapidly turned into flashback before pivoting a second time into a continuation of The Final Solution with The Life and Death of Johnny Alpha. These are standard Rebellion colour volumes, although the first three are quite hefty, at over 200 pages each.

The original run's probably best read in order, although books 2 and 3 are, for my money, the strongest. If you do plan on getting these, I strongly recommend staying away from any spoilers. I'd also say that every one of the books is worth owning, but then I'm a big fan of this series.

The coverline argues this one is a "Christmas Knockout", and I must admit, that's pretty apt. The Dredd one-shot did the business pretty well, with Carroll continuing to show he has a decent grasp on the character. Newcomer to Dredd Duane Leslie provides art that felt a little off in some cases (odd scaling and a certain cartoonishness that put me in mind of the likes of Yan Shimony) but was nicely dynamic. DeMarco and Anderson have good starts as well, with Dowling's interpretation of Cass looking suitably grown-up, rather than some 20-something model. Ordinary, to my mind, was well on the way to becoming a modern classic, and the new episode does nothing to counter that.

For me, though, I truly loved the interview with Simon Harrison, whose thinking totally resonated with me. Along with his memories about working for 2000 AD, and the path he took, there's a lot of insight into his thinking from childhood onwards about the creative process and the importance of nurturing kids, enabling them to do what they want as a career. Top stuff.

I'm wondering if this is 'it', too, although the leads reportedly love the series and it's done very well for them, so who knows? Maybe every other year, we might be lucky enough to get an episode or three.

It's in serious need of an update (which I'm aiming to sort next week), but the 2000 AD books site has pages for Sláine and Strontium Dog.

With Sláine, you've really got two choices: the classic run or the Books of Invasions. (The recent—not yet on that site—Book of Scars will make no sense whatsoever if you've not read the classic run, so avoid that.) Personally, I rate Warrior's Dawn; even though it's the oldest, it has some great stories and art. The Horned God also works nicely as a standalone. I'm not sure I'd go for the newer run unless you can get the lot.

Strontium Dog sort of has a similar split of old/new, but if you've already got Kreeler Conspiracy, you may as well continue with the new run. That said, the older Strontium Dog stories (reprinted in the Search/Destroy Agency Files) are some of the best classic strips 2000 AD has ever published. Some of the very early stories in 01 haven't perhaps aged terribly well, but pretty much the rest of the run (and especially 02 and 03) is top-tier 2000 AD.

Clear as mud?

I'm being churlish aren't I

Not really. It's like there's one axe being ground across several series. The sense of fun that pervaded his series in the old days is so often being replaced by student-level grumbling about THE WORLD, MAN. ABC Warriors still has elements of bonkers in it, but it all seems so pi-faced and serious.

A great contrast is Absalom, which touches on world issues, and marries the bizarre with the mundane. The thing is, it's frequently compelling, has a cast I actually care about, and doesn't tend to randomly jerk the plot about.

Anyway, having now finished 2014, I thought Dredd was pretty good (but, in all honesty, wasn't really taken by the GIANT ZIP), Sweet was OK if an odd thing to do (after all, this was a one-joke character that had all of three or so episodes back in the day), Ten Seconders was wonderful, Sin Dex was surprisingly enjoyable, Grey Area was amusing and strangely old-school (a touch of the Alan Moore about bits of it), Tharg was throwaway and meandering, and Strontium Dog was interesting and a touch worrying. Bodes well for next year!

Oh promotional machine, why, why, why!

In hindsight, it's like they wanted to distance Dredd from normal action fare, showing it had some depth. The thing is, the action-packed Japanese trailer was more of a draw, and the UK/US one essentially gave away the entire plot. A pity. Still, we got a great film out of it that finally laid the Stallone ghost to rest, and that's more than I thought I'd ever see.

What's everyone saying about a new Dredd design? Isn't this just one artist's interpretation, which happens to have an absurdly chunky zip, or am I missing something?

Liking the look of the new Dante books chaps, seems like now is the time to get involved! Can anyone point me towards volume 1? Preferably with a cover that matches the new ones?!

As far as I'm aware, your choice is between the old DC/Rebellion Romanov Dynasty or the new Too Cool To Kill, neither of which matches. The latter is a far superior print though.

John Burner

Former artist turned pyromaniac.