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Another 2000AD read thread

Started by feathers, 21 October, 2016, 02:43:12 PM

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AlexF

Oh, you're well past the nadir at this point. For me, Vector 13 provided something of a turning point. Yes, it was amazingly derivative of X-Files in tone, but in fact most episodes are way better than the average Future Shock, and, along with Wagner Dredd, meant that the Prog at this time had at least two reliably thrilling thrills.

Mind, there are some speedbumps ahead, with ParaSites (might be might top contender for worst ever thrill), and of course BLAIR 1 & the Spice Girls (which may have both been improved had they actually combined the two...), but the batting average goes up as the likes of Millar and Morrison are replaced with the likes of Abnett and Rennie.

Can't believe you liked The Clown II! It's terrible, and for a plot dependent on things being funny, it's very not funny. Although presumably you cannot fathom how I really like The Clown I. Hooray for differing opinions!

feathers

That's really encouraging to hear!  I'd assumed it would be a bit later thanks to a couple of the thrills you've named.  I've just finished Prog 980, and yes, ParaSites was appalling.  Felt like a sequel to Wireheads sneaking out under a different title, and with all the same flaws.

Clown II wasn't particularly strong, but I don't know, I just expected worse!  I appreciated it being diegetically funny, if that's possible. And yes, hooray for different opinions!

Colin YNWA

Quote from: feathers on 09 April, 2018, 03:57:40 PM
That's really encouraging to hear!  I'd assumed it would be a bit later thanks to a couple of the thrills you've named.  I've just finished Prog 980, and yes, ParaSites was appalling.  Felt like a sequel to Wireheads sneaking out under a different title, and with all the same flaws.

Clown II wasn't particularly strong, but I don't know, I just expected worse!  I appreciated it being diegetically funny, if that's possible. And yes, hooray for different opinions!

Rough as some bits are at the moment in my read, and even if the 980s have The Pit, that all sounds horrible!

feathers

Tomorrow is the 2 year anniversary of me reading 2000 AD.  This morning I was very pleased to hit my goal or the last year  by reading Prog 1000.  Hooray!

Maybe it's psychological, but ever since AlexF told me I was over the worst patch already, things have been great.  Following the film tie-in relaunch of Prog 950 Dredd has been firmly back to the forefront - and rightly so to. The brief run of double strips was a great showcase for the character's versatility, and The Pit sequence has conversely demonstrated a consistency and depth that it had been missing for a couple of years.

Second to this is the fantastic Sinister Dexter, a thrill which is unusual compared to it's recent contemporaries for not (currently, at least) having an overarching plot, just a world and consistent characters within it.  It's really refreshing, and each instalment has something to delight.  Contrast this to the limp RAM Raiders, which feels by comparison like a leftover from a year or two back.  Talking of which, Cannon Fodder's return did not disappoint - great art, expanding scope, funny, inventive, and the with its straightfaced use of pop culture icons gaining a feeling akin to League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.  I'd love more.

Vector 13 regularly hits the right spot, although a its return was marred by a run of linked conspiracy themed outings that crassly overstepped the mark - happily this now seems to be over.

Slaine is still Slaine, Finn and Strontium Dogs bob along nicely enough with the latter seeing the welcome reintroduction of Middenface McNulty and hopefully reaching the end of the Gronk-led Ferral's mutation storyline.  It's been going nowhere for a long time, but it feels like a corner might have been turned.

In related thrills, Durham Red seems to be getting editorial notes asking for 'more, but sexier' between each installment - surely this has to reach a limit soon as it's getting silly already - but the character is still hugely engaging, enough even to raise interest in the well-worn death match set up she's embroiled in, which has the potential to be a high quality exemplar of the form.

It may be psychological, it may be the pleasure of looking inside the covers of Progs I remember as a 15 year old seeming slightly forbidding in my local record shop, but right now it feels like good times

Bolt-01

Feathers, you've got so much good stuff to come.

Don't rush and remember that TPO is a real thing.

AlexF

that 'more, but sexier' note on Durham Red is going to keep applying btw... :-[

feathers

Quote from: Bolt-01 on 18 April, 2018, 09:15:28 AM
Feathers, you've got so much good stuff to come.

Don't rush and remember that TPO is a real thing.

Thanks Bolt-01!  I am planning a deceleration in future so I can cope with the eventual reality of 1 Prog a week, but can always re-read some highlights to stop the shakes if things get bad.  I'm aware that it's a dangerous game at this rate!

Quote from: AlexF on 19 April, 2018, 10:28:10 AM
that 'more, but sexier' note on Durham Red is going to keep applying btw... :-[

Eep  :-[

feathers

Prog 1018 - So I've decided that this year I'll cut back to aim to read only 400 Progs, so updates may be slower coming, or may be easier to fit in.  In the current run, Mazeworld sees the very welcome return of Arthur Ranson going further in to fantasy than he did with Shamballa.  The leisurely story feels slightly reminiscent of old thrills like Meltdown Man, but I don't mind it being spun out to similar length if Ranson's going to draw it all.  I'm pleased to see Mambo back, and surprised at the return of Time Flies - maybe being in colour suits it, maybe it's the context, but I'm finding this run more enjoyable than the first series.

More surprising still is Rogue Trooper -with Dan Abnett and Steve White writing it's actually turned into something enjoyable again.  It's amazing to see the contrast against the last however many years of never-to-be-read-again stories of this previously most skippable of thrills, and to realise that I'm actually <i>pleased</i> to see it's first page within each Prog.  I hope it lasts.  Unlike the Vector 13 takeover of the Input/Output pages.  Un-fun one note tedium.  Genuinely awaiting Tharg's return.

feathers

Prog 1053 - rattling along at the moment with relatively little to report.  1997 was going great, but the hit of new summer thrills has it stumbling on I Was a Teenage Tax Consultant and the first three episodes of the looked-interesting-when-it-was-trailed Witch World - part 4 has started telling a recognisable story, but it's hard to see what the early parts did other than blunt interest.  One other recent no thanks is Outlaw...madly contrived, and I'm not convinced the tension of who-will-draw first exists the way it's supposed to in the first place - definitely not repeatedly.

Onto success: Sinister Dexter makes comics look easy, and Nikolai Dante is fantastic at gradually revealing extra possibilities in it's set up rather than being constrained by it.  Looking forward to more of this.  Mercy Heights was a slow burn, but worked, Al's Baby didn't outstay it's welcome - and unusually for a Meg crossover didn't feel like it was missing the first half of the story.  I'm less sold on the art for the new Anderson series, but it's good to have her back. 

In other news I'm pleased to have crossed the mid-way barrier, over half down, half to go!

Colin YNWA

Oh you are heading to some rich territory as I recall.

Also over half way is good... but will it be over half way by the time you are home?

My re-read I'm reading in yearly chunks and at such a pace that on my 'To read' spreadsheet (half re-reads, half new material waiting to be read) I've scheduled up to 2020 so far and do wonder if by the time I get there I will need to have included 2021 (almost certainly) and 2022!

feathers

I think 2022 will be when I catch up too Colin. I think this being the point I finished school is probably adding to the sense of the early years being over, but yes, I'll be in the middle for a bit yet!

feathers

Prog 1066 - soooo....what started as a stumble has turned into a full flat-on-face fall as 2000AD seems happy to shed it's recent good form in favour of...I'm not sure what.  Laboured, unfunny comedy (Teenage Tax Consultant, Space Girls), peril-of-the-week, characterless fantasy (Witch World), and diminishing returns on past-their-best thrills (Vector 13).  Against this background, the more explicitly humorous Dredd stories (Mr Cube) lose the edge a contrast would have given them seeming weaker than they are.  (The Fast Food run though was great because it played a bit straighter with emotions of the central characters).

At the apex, or should that be nadir, of this is Prog 1066.  I lightly themed grab bag of one off stories that would have made a weak Summer Special instead masquerading as the real thing.  Only Sinister Dexter, by not rising to the bait of the brief, comes out with it's reputation in tact.  What's doubly galling about this is the increasingly desperate tone taken by the editorial pages, trying too hard in talking up the worst aspects of the current prog and beseeching readers to "tell your friends!" before producing something that's then  labelled as not for sale to children - are they trying to build the readership, or diminish it?

It's a huge mis-step.  Hopefully it's over and done with now for good.

feathers

Addendum - forgot to mention Anderson, whose recent Crusade storyline of kidnapped children was baffling to me.  Was the baby behind it a character from the Megazine?  Either way, a bit more context as to who they were would have been welcome, but the story seemed a bit disjointed (including what felt like rewriting the state-of-play and removing character knowledge between some installments) and then just ended, without having much impact, or me being able to tell what reaction they were aiming for.  I'm not a fan of the artwork either...

Greg M.

Quote from: feathers on 19 June, 2018, 03:25:02 PM
Addendum - forgot to mention Anderson, whose recent Crusade storyline of kidnapped children was baffling to me.  Was the baby behind it a character from the Megazine?

No, Hope was introduced in the Anderson story Engram in 2000AD. Crusade is indeed a spectacularly terrible story though.

Colin YNWA

The thing is this silly thumping of chests started pretty early. Over at my re-read thread Link Prime made the astute comment

QuoteThe main event was of course the beginning of Buttonman- described by Tharg himself as a "real teen sleaze strip".  Old green bonce certainly knew what buttons to push at the time.

Button Man a 'real teen sleaze strip'!

Sigh

In a Prog I've just read tonight (783) a list of bullet point extolls the virtues of the soon starting Judgement Night as follows:


  • Three billion Mega Citizens die
    The face of Judge Dredd's world changed forever
    A villain who can wake the dead
    The unexpected return of a major 2000ad character
    A lot more Mega-citizens die!

I mean that's the very worst Marvel and DC promo material in one go!

2000ad went through a long time of trying to be the lastest cool. Before it relaxed and realised it didn't matter if it was cool as long as it was good. And of course by doing so became cool again.