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Have to say,  I'm glad to see the alternative takes on this movie here (even from folk who believe Robespierre was un Papa centriste). I'm no fan of Snyder,  except as a highly skilled technician, but I do love some Bautista, and so the trailer appealed. I'll give it a shot this weekend.

Is somewhere in existence the theatrical version of BR? It'd work awesome in the noirish atmosphere of the film? Not to mention that I DC version confusing.

It was included in that lovely tin Collectors' boxset a few years back. Personally I enjoy all the BR versions, the Ford voice-over appealed to me as kid and was good quote-fodder (cf SigueSigue Sputnik) in that '80s Schwarzenegger mode, right up to the Final Cut and its rather ponderous unicorn dream.  I even like BR2049, but it is a bit of a slog in the middle.

They all have something to offer.

[as a kid]

... the way you played as a kid ...

Does not compute. Still play this way.

But yeah, truly wonderful stuff, cheers for the link!  The bike one in particular reminds me of the unreasonable number of Death Star Trench Runs I completed on my Grifter, targeting computer fully deactivated, the drain grill of the secondary exhaust port waiting at the end of the cul-de-sac.

[Mick 4 - 1 Jake.]

Unfair!  It had to happen to someone, I'm just sorry it was Lynch, probably the brightest star in the up-and-coming sub-category, an artist whose every page is better than the one before in a terrifying tsunami of quality.

But against McMahon, resistance is futile.

Mick 4 - 1 Jake.

Ah Jimbo.

Interesting both teams are ahead and behind

One of Umberto Eco's lesser-known Features of Fascism...

[Redondo 4 - Taylor 1]

Taylor is brill, with indescribably beautiful and intricate backgrounds and Moebiusque figures, but in addition to the most beautiful women (neck and neck with Gibson) and the hairiest demons, Redondo drew two of my all-time favourite comics (Ring Road and The Time Machine).  Plus I just re-read the magnificent Nemesis Book II last week, so I'm afraid it's going to have to be...

Redondo 4 - Taylor 1

Wow, spicy starting price, but that really is a special bit of Wilson; very hangable.  OTOH if your Tornados go for £50 someone will be getting a great bargain - If I wasn't just as desperate for cash as yourself, I'd be going for those, I have none of those! Best of luck with this and everything, Tjm.

Why should British characters be any different?

There was a time that we said their finite, linear nature was what made them special. Obviously a young man's (or a Kurgan's) conceit, but there was something to it.

I'd happily (not) read CyberLiefield & GregLandClone-37's Age of Strontium summer crossover event of 2050  if I thought it came with the approval and remuneration of the Wagner & Ezquerra estates. And in the highly unlikely event I was alive to (not) see it.

It's not actually about the mortality of creators or creations, it's about the control of creators over their creations: the right to say "nope", or just "pay me". Why do Tolkien's grandkids get creative oversight and a quarter-billion from Amazon,  while John Smith's characters - characters and settings that only Smith could ever have created - rumble on in a grim half-life? 

The only sane answer is "it's a totally different business in a very different time". Well yeah,  but does that make it right?  And purely selfishly, does it make for good stories? Or incentive to create new ones?

No-one is saying Pat's utterances aren't one-sided, abrasive or contradictory*, or that he's frequently egged-on by self-interested or ignorant parties, or even that he's made a decent living that younger creators can hardly dream of from the existing system, if not quite the solid gold house and the rocket car**. But improved creator rights benefit us all (caveats apply), and he's a highly visible and vocal source of pressure in that.direction.

Plus, he wrote Nemesis, Sláine and Defoe, so, y'know.


*Traits that infuse his writing and editorial style.
** Simpsons reference that alludes to the risks of this position.

Good news gents, always very welcome.

(I can live with Skip Tracer on the grounds that I remember all the "how/why is this appearing so frequently?" series of the early 1990s and none of them were as smoothly inoffensive as ST.)

Wise words. I hated Sin/Dex and couldn't see the point of Dante,  more fool me.  And if nothing else ST gives Peaty room to develop as a writer.

Digression: I'd be on record as finding Art Wyatt's early scripts as highly competent but lacking that magic something (thrillpower?), but now Tharg has let him trot around the Command Module paddock a while he's grown into goddamned Arkle in my book: most of my favourite new series have his name in the credit box. Same applies to Eglinton, a lot of early short-distance promise, then nothing that quite clicked for me, until boom, "suddenly" he's winning the Grand National with Thistlebone.

2000AD gets all these plaudits as the cradle of British comics greatness, but that only works if you give strips and creators time. The bright flowers of early thrilldom started as seedlings hothoused in years upon years of anonymous work in war comics and girls comics,  they didn't just burst out of the ground one day, for all that it looks that way (exception to every rule: Alan Moore,  and possibly his enhanced clone Al Ewing). Now that growth takes place in the Zarjaz/FQ arena, or right in front of us.

Skip Tracer and Peaty teeter on the very edge of being something good, and they're certainly not bad, so if Tharg believes they can blossom if left to work on (competently) a bit longer, I'm all for it.

(It appears I've run out of metaphors to mix, so I'll stop)

Wagner pulled off so many of these PJ-in-disguise and mind control drug stories that I'm not even sure that really IS PJ Maybe at the end of Ladykiller.

There was also the theory about the voice in his head relating to his time with the Dark Judges and he'd become some sort of new one of them.

I still liked to believe that John Wagner did what he did at the end of 'Ladykiller' just to underline how dead and done PJ was....

I have a track record of getting this sort of thing wrong!

Moi aussi.

My take on this has been split two ways. First, the end emphasises that's there's no glamour in being a serial killer,  PJ has always been a lucky psychopath, not some admirable rebel genius (unlike Chimpsky!), and here he runs out of road and is simply disposed of as the creep he is. No blaze of glory,  no final scheme.   

Second, the unresolved oddness of it all gives John (and everyone else else) an escape hatch should one every prove desirable.

I also can't shake the idea that John of that period had a notion to do something with dark inner voices, but he couldn't quite find what it was - I'm obviously thinking of Life & Death of...  here, where Johnny's voice similarly goes essentially nowhere.

Willem Sauvage, eternal defender of Albion, wielder of the Black Arquebus, rolling a cigarillo of restorative herbs whilst reading a red topped rune-sheet.

If a 12-episode outline of this isn't on Tharg's desk by Monday, along with Weston's concept drawings, I'll be very disappointed. We'll square it with Pat later.

At my advanced age, I think I'd miss a knee more than me knob.  I'd make an even worse living if I had to rely on the latter instead of the former, and now I come to think of it, given the state of my belly, I've not seen either for a while.

Lots of creators got screwed and continue to get screwed but Mills isn't one of them. 2000ad never stopped heavily commissioning his work and although he thinks he's owed more he gets a back end for reprints...

No argument there, I have an entire bookshelf of luscious Pat Mills reprint. The share of reprint fees and royalties versus revenue generated, I don't have enough info to judge, beyind raising eyebrows at claims. 

Back in the 70's and 80's creators we're definitely exploited and taken advantage of, with massive sales figures and shitty page rates. Now with low sales and being very much a minority interest medium there is a lot less to exploit.

All true, and obviously I'm writing on fan forum as an ignorant fanboy and not someone with any inside knowledge of the industry, but the creations of the 70s and 80s are still being exploited, are still the backbone of the comic and its public identity (such as it is), and the potential value of the IP determines the value of the entire concern.

The whole thing only exists because of those seminal creators. It's not unreasonable to see that as an outstanding issue, or that creators might see little point in continuing to create something they'll never own.

But...

[/quote]

...mean spirited attacks on other creators has probably worn away my sympathies for his arguments which I would normally have a lot more sympathy for.   

...Also this^^^. He makes it difficult, he really does.