Sci-Fi Special 2015

[I, Cosh]

I think the end of year progs do a much more consistently high quality job than the annuals ever did.

This. Can't really see what would be in an annual that isn't in the YE Prog. Even a quiz last year!

[Geoff]

I was amazed to see this yesterday in my local Costcutter - or is it called Nisa now, can't remember.. Anyway I immediately snapped up one of the two copies. 

How could you not, with that amazing cover! Love the old style Tharg on the cover of the boy's comic.

All in all a great special.  Great old-school Dredd, that film director was pushing her luck with Dredd I thought.. and the welcome return of Ace Trucking.  Robo-Hunter also worked well and had some good laughs. 

Beautiful Higgins art - let's have him back in the prog doing some Dredd if possible.

I'd certainly buy a hardback annual. Surprised it can't be done, given the number of other books released, bookplate editions, apex editions, hardback anniversary editions etc..

[Link Prime]

I think the end of year progs do a much more consistently high quality job than the annuals ever did.

This. Can't really see what would be in an annual that isn't in the YE Prog. Even a quiz last year!

No argument about the year-end Prog, it's consistently excellent.
I want both!

[Steve Green]

I was amazed to see this yesterday in my local Costcutter - or is it called Nisa now, can't remember.. Anyway I immediately snapped up one of the two copies. 

How could you not, with that amazing cover! Love the old style Tharg on the cover of the boy's comic.

All in all a great special.  Great old-school Dredd, that film director was pushing her luck with Dredd I thought.. and the welcome return of Ace Trucking.  Robo-Hunter also worked well and had some good laughs. 

Beautiful Higgins art - let's have him back in the prog doing some Dredd if possible.

I'd certainly buy a hardback annual. Surprised it can't be done, given the number of other books released, bookplate editions, apex editions, hardback anniversary editions etc..

All the ones you mention

a) are reprints so don't have as much upfront costs of commissioning new material

b) by their nature, annuals are for that year - I can't see stores being that wowed about stocking something tied to a specific publishing date.

c) whatever Rebellion have decided regards viability is good enough for me. (Could have started with that, really)

[robert_ellis]

Never in love with the old annuals. Except for some lovely covers they seemed like a very expensive way of buying a minimal amount of thrill. Just glue some heavy pieces of cardboard to the SciFi Special and give me an extra tenner!

[Colin YNWA]

I'll pitch in with the idea of the briefly lived Yearbooks. They were beautiful objects, a shame that the content only rarely lived up to that standard.

Now would it be too much to ask for a product as nice as the yearbook, with the content quality of the end of year Prog... it would... oh well...

[Dark Jimbo]

My two penn'orth on the annuals;

What with the now huge GN range (to say nothing of the Case Files alone), of the continuing goodwill of the 2012 film bringing droves of new/lapsed readers to Tharg's door, of the Mega Collection doing the same, of the consistently good write-ups on the big comic review sites, of the healthy online presence on FB/Tumblr/etc, of the latest push to make inroads in the US market actually seeming to be doing some good...

...it feels like a terrible time to dredge the annuals out of their grave. It's hard to think of anything that would quite so clearly announce that 2000AD is mainly about trading off past nostalgia among a dwindling clique of lapsed, aging readers. I mean, it isn't, but that's the message it would send. To be honest, even the Sci-Fi Special is a bit too geared towards nostalgia for my liking. Rather than 'Remember that thing you liked from the '70s? We've tried to recreate it for you.' I'd rather have, 'Remember that thing you liked from the '70s? It's still a going concern, and better than ever.'

[robert_ellis]

I love the way the new Zenith hardcovers feel a bit like the old annuals. I'm with Dark Jimbo - they are a thing of the past. Go and buy Dark Justice or the film tie ins if you want a quality hardcover at a good price. No one can honestly be nostalgic for Daily Star reprints, jokey one-offs and pointless re-treds of old stories at a premium price. The weekly is so strong right now that we don't need to look back.

[ZenArcade]

The end of year prog and two specials is more than enough for this particular squaxx. The special, the Meg and the last 3 progs have really brightened a pretty awful past 3 weeks for men Z

[Buttonman]

Yeah the annuals were always style over substance - who wants 30 pages of 'Phantom Patrol' and some filler word searches? We are blessed with the all original year end Progs and I for one am very grateful!

One of the few benefits of having my licence suspended is that I pass through town every day and I picked this beauty up in Forbidden Planet - anyone noticed how many toys they sell nowadays?

Despite planning to spin it out I read the lot in one sitting and enjoyed it thoroughly. How good was that Rogue Trooper art? Reboot!

[Fungus]

Forbidden Planet the toyshop you mean?  Happily the acres of toy figures don't quite get the attention the lovely paper comics do, but still more than you'd think...

Dark Jimbo and others put it well. I plugged my prog & meg hardback annuals gap a couple of years back. One of each. They suck serious thrills compared to what Rebellion produces these days, leave well alone.

[sheridan]

The end of year prog has filled the void that used to be occupied by a hardbacked annual...these days I would be upset that I have a nice year long run of the prog, all of which fit nicely into A4 wallets and a ring binder to keep neatly organised...and then comes along what is essentially a hardback version of the end of year prog, with some extra fluff, to ruin my nice organised collection...

Sure I'd buy it...wouldn't have any choice there...but I wouldn't be happy about it 

The annuals for 1985 and 1986 were classics (the reprint material didn't have to be taken from pre-2000AD IPC comics) there were odd highlights from most of the other annuals, but those cardboard covers take up half the space!

[SmallBlueThing]

I dunno.  Maybe there is a market for a large format,  hardback reprint books to sit on the shelves around Xmas.  A 'Best of 2000AD: THE 80s' kind of thing.  All reprint,  for the nostalgia stocking filler market.  At the £7.99 price point they'd be cheaper than the standard collections and possibly attract the kind of shopper who doesn't have the time or inclination to wander over to Waterstonea graphic novel section and look for specifics,  but may recognise from their youth. 

What I'd like to see is a series of original hardback graphic novels,  along the lines of Marvel's OGN range currently.  Release them at the end of the year, sure, but they'd have an indefinite shelf life. 
But,  as with anything,  I'm sure it's been suggested and that there's a damn good financial reason they haven't been done. 
But yeah,  a 64page Wagner/ Ezquerra original,  a Mills/ Langley Slaine and an Abnett/ Elson Kingdom would certainly make my Xmas.

SBT

[Spaceghost]

In my fevered brain, I was imagining something more along the lines of the year end prog with a few more pages, hard covers and a 15 quid-ish price tag, although I can appreciate that this would be somewhat redundant given the quality of the current xmas edition.

I just like the idea of having something specifically 2000 AD related to open on xmas morning.

There's usually a beautiful hardback on sale around xmas to do the job though. Daily Dredds last year, Trifecta the year before that and book 3 of the ABC Warriors Mek Files will be out just in time this year.

[Colin YNWA]

I dunno.  Maybe there is a market for a large format,  hardback reprint books to sit on the shelves around Xmas.  A 'Best of 2000AD: THE 80s' kind of thing.  All reprint,  for the nostalgia stocking filler market.  At the £7.99 price point they'd be cheaper than the standard collections and possibly attract the kind of shopper who doesn't have the time or inclination to wander over to Waterstonea graphic novel section and look for specifics,  but may recognise from their youth. 

I remember seeing a load of that type of thing in bookshops a couple of years back for a lot of girls magazines of the 80s in my head defo Jackie and Smash Hits - though my head is often best not trusted - don't know how well they sold but they were everywhere and I bought one for a friend of mine.