ABC Warriors Time line

[positronic]

2000AD chronology only requires one event to understand all the inconsistency's and crossovers.

It's all Thoths fault.

Since I've yet to get to The Complete Nemesis TPs and The Black Hole yet -- I've just ordered a copy of the Nemesis the Warlock Termight Edition (the colorized version of Books 1-3, which I'd already read in the '80s) --

-- is Thoth responsible for the existence of the Time Wastes? Or do you allude to the fact that he's at fault due to Nemesis assigning the mission of finding Thoth to the ABC Warriors?

Just a yes or no is fine, no spoilers required!

[sheridan]

2000AD chronology only requires one event to understand all the inconsistency's and crossovers.

It's all Thoths fault.

Since I've yet to get to The Complete Nemesis TPs and The Black Hole yet -- I've just ordered a copy of the Nemesis the Warlock Termight Edition (the colorized version of Books 1-3, which I'd already read in the '80s) --

-- is Thoth responsible for the existence of the Time Wastes? Or do you allude to the fact that he's at fault due to Nemesis assigning the mission of finding Thoth to the ABC Warriors?

Just a yes or no is fine, no spoilers required!

Two questions there:
Is Thoth responsible for the Time Wastes in the first place?
No.
No to the second question as well.

[positronic]

2000AD chronology only requires one event to understand all the inconsistency's and crossovers.

It's all Thoths fault.

Since I've yet to get to The Complete Nemesis TPs and The Black Hole yet -- I've just ordered a copy of the Nemesis the Warlock Termight Edition (the colorized version of Books 1-3, which I'd already read in the '80s) --

-- is Thoth responsible for the existence of the Time Wastes? Or do you allude to the fact that he's at fault due to Nemesis assigning the mission of finding Thoth to the ABC Warriors?

Just a yes or no is fine, no spoilers required!

Two questions there:
Is Thoth responsible for the Time Wastes in the first place?
No.
No to the second question as well.

Okay, that strikes down my more obvious suspicions. I guess I'll catch on to your exact meaning by the time I get to The Black Hole, and remain spoiler-free in the meantime. Then I'll have one of those "I just got that!" moments.

[EDazzling]

I've just bought the three hard back Mek files. I read the first Mek file last night containing the stories the meknificent seven, and the black hole. I found the black hole quite tricky to follow, not sure why happy shrapnel or the mess weren't included in this one. I've not read and Nemesis stories which might fill in a few gaps I'm guessing. I still really enjoyed it though and I'm looking forward to reading the two other files.

Mek Files 3 is quite bad, but don't let that put you off getting on to the Volgan War

Mel Files 2, however...

Highwater mark for the careers of all involved. The absolute peak of 2000AD's 90s delirious-occult-nonsense-told-through-the-medium-of-guitar feedback stuff.

[positronic]

That's interesting, EDazzling. My experience was the opposite. After reading Mek Files 02, it felt to me like the whole ABC Warriors concept had gone off the rails with this new mission of Deadlock's to spread Khaos throughout the galaxy. It just seemed like an excuse to string together various scenarios of random mayhem, with only the skimpiest of overall plots to hold it together.I breathed a sigh of relief when I'd finally finished it, because it felt like kind of a tough slog to get through to me.

I was quite happy to see the Warriors return to Mars for The Mek Files 03's Medusa War and The Shadow Warriors (you can never go wrong with the idea of creating a team of characters' evil opposites). If that had a weakness it felt like there's something missing between the two stories that needed better explaining, after the President of Mars is transformed into a Martian/human hybrid being at the end of The Medusa War.

[TordelBack]

Could be wrong, but I think the President and senator bits are fleshed out in the Mills & Mitchell prose novel 'The Medusa Wars', but it's been an age since I read it. I think it dates from one of those periods where Mills was fighting with Tharg, so did his 'director's cut' as a text piece.

[positronic]

Could be wrong, but I think the President and senator bits are fleshed out in the Mills & Mitchell prose novel 'The Medusa Wars', but it's been an age since I read it. I think it dates from one of those periods where Mills was fighting with Tharg, so did his 'director's cut' as a text piece.

Thanks for pointing that one out. I'll have to search for that, or if it's not find-able at some reasonable cost, at least a detailed synopsis online somewhere.

EDIT: Okay, located a copy. It's ordered. Can't wait!

[EDazzling]

It just seemed like an excuse to string together various scenarios of random mayhem, with only the skimpiest of overall plots to hold it together.

That's pretty much how I described it myself, isn't it?

It's exciting, it's engaged with the real world, it's funny. The constant humiliation of Hammerstein is a particular highpoint. It's the sense of 3 creators having a huge amount of fun making cynical occult anarchist comics for children that gets my engine humming.

The Medusa/Shadow Warriors stuff is staid and awkward. Mills wasn't happy with the regime at the time, with edits made to his work, and it shows. Nobody's having fun, and his storytelling gets very sloppy - unlike the calculated sloppiness of the plot-free era of MF2

[Dark Jimbo]

The Medusa/Shadow Warriors stuff is staid and awkward. Mills wasn't happy with the regime at the time, with edits made to his work, and it shows. Nobody's having fun, and his storytelling gets very sloppy - unlike the calculated sloppiness of the plot-free era of MF2

Nobody's having fun in The Shadow Warriors?! I've never seen Mills and Flint have so much fun...!

Third Element is indeed a curate's egg, and a lot of that comes from the behind-scenes editorial bickerings. But Andy Diggle had moved on by the time of Shadow Warriors, bridges had all been mended, and Mills wrote one of the ABC's most madcapmental battle royales yet.

[EDazzling]

ah, maybe I'm being unfair on that then. I do normally like Flint.

[marko10174]

After the three Mek files, which ABC warriors graphic novel should I purchase next in terms of chronology?

[TordelBack]

Nobody's having fun in The Shadow Warriors?! I've never seen Mills and Flint have so much fun...!

Mmm-hmmm. For me Shadow Warriors comes closest to capturing the spirit of the original run of everything since Black Hole: just loads of escalating silliness and fabulous imagery.

[Dark Jimbo]

 

After the three Mek files, which ABC warriors graphic novel should I purchase next in terms of chronology?

Volgan War 1-4; Return to Earth; Return to Mars; Return to Ro-Busters.

[IndigoPrime]

After the three Mek files, which ABC warriors graphic novel should I purchase next in terms of chronology?

Follow the order on the 2000 AD shop. Solo Missions plugs some gaps and adds the post-Nemesis Deadlock solo series. If all that doesn't matter to you, skip to Volgan War #1.

Dammit. Beaten to the punch by a DJ.

[positronic]

It just seemed like an excuse to string together various scenarios of random mayhem, with only the skimpiest of overall plots to hold it together.

That's pretty much how I described it myself, isn't it?

It's exciting, it's engaged with the real world, it's funny. The constant humiliation of Hammerstein is a particular highpoint. It's the sense of 3 creators having a huge amount of fun making cynical occult anarchist comics for children that gets my engine humming.

The Medusa/Shadow Warriors stuff is staid and awkward. Mills wasn't happy with the regime at the time, with edits made to his work, and it shows. Nobody's having fun, and his storytelling gets very sloppy - unlike the calculated sloppiness of the plot-free era of MF2

It's a matter of opinion, and someone's personal taste of what they like in comics. "it's engaged with the real world"? Wow, I sure couldn't find a stitch of evidence to support that contention. Nothing reflecting the least bit of reality there, much less so than the average 2000 AD type of story. "The constant humiliation of Hammerstein is a particular highpoint."? Well, I'm sure you must have meant lowpoint - that's exactly how I would have characterized it.

And overall, I'd say "Nobody's having fun, and (Mills') storytelling gets very sloppy" fits it to a tee. Well, maybe not nobody -- artist Kev Walker obviously was, but this reader wasn't -- fun maybe for a very short arc, but tedious when it just grinds on and on, drawn out to the number of pages in Mek Files 02, because the joke never ends. I remember thinking it was too bad Walker's lavish paintings were being wasted on a nothing storyline.

I got the feeling that Pat's mind was completely occupied elsewhere (Nemesis? ... and later on, Marshal Law?) and that he was just going through the motions here, letting the artist have his way with whatever he felt like painting, and by invoking the catch-all excuse of Khaos, there was no real need for him to make any kind of sense out of it, just set it all up with some humorous Khaotic correspondence carried on by Deadlock (very unclear here about how all the random bloody mayhem is supposed to lead to saving the galaxy). Deadlock ultimately comes off the worse for it in these stories, but Blackblood's in his element. The Khaos stories struck me as pretty much a poster child for the worst excesses of 1990s comics -- but if that's exactly what someone likes, then its the ideal avatar of that zeitgeist, so I guess for them it would amount to the best excesses. Very much sort of early 1990s Image Comics-y. If that's a good thing for someone, then I guess it's two thumbs up.

Now, having mentioned Marshal Law before, that is the sort of comic I'd characterize as Pat Mills & Kevin O'Neill having fun with those very same worst excesses I mentioned, because in that particular instance it was being done with a knowing nod and a wink to the ridiculous over-the-topness of it all (this to me was one of the greatest superhero put-downs of all time, putting MAD Magazine to shame) -- but in the instance of ABC Warriors, the series' original characters and concept had become self-parodies in the Khaos stories, which is exactly what I didn't like about it. I guess if The Medusa War and The Shadow Warriors were staid and awkward for someone, then so must be The Mek-nificent Seven, because the stories in Mek Files 03 are pretty much approached on the same level as the original ABC Warriors story.

Having said all that, you're certainly entitled to like what you like, and dislike what you don't. Same goes for everyone.