Prog 1445: Tartan Terror

[The Amstor Computer]

Give me a few hours and I'll translate it for you from the prog when I get home...

[Wils]

I'm probably wrong, but the more blatant caricatures of actors that appear (Robert Picardo as Roffman this week), Dredd and Rico not looking alike, Dredd not acting like Dredd (the comedy door slamming last week) and Guthrie suddenly turning in a grey Wyatt Earp are slowly making me think that this isn't actually 'happening'.

Thinking about things, I think I *am* wrong but there are so many things that just don't sit right about this and are distracting. Mainly down to the art.

[Wils]

Bloody hell. How many bold tags haven't been closed on here? This'll be the second time I've tried to kill it. Let's see if it works now...



Ta-da?

[Carlsborg Expert]

Oh, Guthries definately on my list to get pranging.

[Wils]

Ta-da! :)

[Byron Virgo]

"A painful admission - I don't understand all of Poirot's lines.

Has everybody else understood everything he says?"

If you squint your eyes and concentrate *really* hard, eventually like magic some words can be made out.

You're still Al Ewing's "#1 Fan" though.

[petesbeats]

Enjoyed all this week.  Only thing I have to say is MORE CABS MORE CABS MORE CABS MORE CABS!



not caps!

Loving it since first starting to buy tooth again about a year ago.  Where the fuck is the GN.  I need the back stories NOW!

[The Amstor Computer]

Just for you, Dud:

SINISTER DEXTER: SLOW TRAIN TO KAL CUTTER
PART THREE
PAGE ONE

Porter: Excuse  me, Sir?
Bureau: Oui? What is it?
Porter: Am I correct in thinking I am addressing the famous Belgian detective Achille Bureau?
Bureau: Non, monsieur. In point of fact, you are interrupting the digestion of the famous Belgian detective Achille Bureau. It is a autograph you desire, I surmise?
Porter: Actually, no, sir. The Chief Conductor wonders if you might be able to assist us. There has been an incident on board.
Bureau: An incident? On board?

PAGE TWO

Porter: In here please, sir.
Bureau: Oh, mon dieu. Most horrible. Who found them?
Porter: The lady in waiting of the Countess Bonbon de Hooch. She came in to powder her nose.
Bureau: I will need to have a word with her... Time of death I would say was earlier this morning, or even last night. A very high power weapon was used in the commission of this crime.
Porter: A high-power weapon?
Bureau: Indeed. Regardez, mon ami, the profound accuracy of the wounds. This was the handiwork of a gun-shark.
Porter: Pardon me?
Bureau: A gun-shark!
Porter: Oh. Right. A gun-shark. Shit.

PAGE FOUR and FIVE

Bureau: ...But! Colonel Pickering was not in the dining car at that time. So he cannot be our murderer. There must be another person we have not considered... You, for instance!
Kal: Me?
Bureau: Oui, monsieur Kal Cutter. I deduce that you are the actual culprit. Furthermore, I -
Dexter: Enough of this Belgian waffle.
Bureau: Sacre bleu!
Sinister: It was the gun-shark in the dining car with the funtinormous weapon...

There you go - that should help you out a bit ;-)

[Carlsborg Expert]

I really have never seen such wit in the Tooth as accurately satirising another persons charactor.

Blows the Miss Moople stuff right out of the window. (Although,Dredd was the best charactor to deal with the flagrant busybody.)

I hope Bureau gets a few chirps in, next prog too, before he is iced.

[Max Kon]

Do I count as a kid? if so Al is down with me, i got it.

[Tiplodocus]

Slightly embarrassingly I sent a letter in last week praising the artwork in Dredd and this week it seemed to be purest mince. God, I hope he doesn't print it on a week when the art is as poor. This script really does veer wildly from brilliant to terrible but I'm hooked and enjoying it.

I actually didn't like the FUTURE SHORT but I applaud the idea of shaking things up a bit with different length strips.

ATAVAR had me a bit lost - I'm finding it hard to empathise with any of the machines/ships and we still havn't seen Aty's face.

CABALS continues to delight - particular liked the implication that Ness had to throw somebody else out of the window and got his aim right.

SIN/DEX had a good joke (Bureau's speech) badly executed (it was too mangled and when yoiu have to stop and decode a joke, it loses its power)

SHAKARA has a bit of a plot though some of the art is a tad hard to decipher. Still enjoying it ten times more than the first series though.

[Tordelbach]

Loving Blood Trails, but a terrible confession:  I didn't recognise Guthrie until the super-deformed Giant shouted his name - I felt the art slipped this issued from lively and fresh to sloppy and rushed, which is a shame.  I don't mind cartoony art, but  I did think the character depictions were quite far off - the fact that Rothman seemed to be more muscular than Guth was a bit off-putting, and Giant appeared to be having a warp-spasm on several occasions.  

I only bring it up because this is (by now) obviously Guthrie's last outing, and it's a pity that he looks like a geriatric Hell's Angel.  

[Bolt-01]

Guthrie actually resembles Sam Elliot in my opinion. He's the fella that plays the doomed sidekick..... OH!

Bolt-01http://www.angelfire.com/art/cactussong/SamTake.jpg">

[House of Usher]

I didn't enjoy this Prog as much as the one before. Judge Dredd was neither here nor there. The Judges can't decide whether or not to let the killer get away with it, and the villain can't decide whether to kill or abduct Vienna or just to go on knobbing Judge Dredd's niece and sniggering behind his hand. Maybe his dastardly plan is to give her chlamydia? ("My work here is done!")

Cudos to Al Ewing. "It looks like.... a huge pinball flipper! Aaaaaargh!!" was a touch 'Ultimate Future Shock', but I reckon you got away with it. More of this kind of thing, please Tharg! (Fart was a bit tame though, and a strange number of letters at four. Could have got away with twat or shit. 'Cok' or 'Fuk' might've been funnier. It's good enough for French Connection.)

Sinister Dexter reminded me of a humorous nonsense French translation of English nursery rhymes called 'Mots des Gosses' (words for brats) - sounds like 'Mother Goose, get it? The translation of Humpty Dumpty went something like

un petit d'un petit s'ettone aux halles...

Not sure about the chronology this week. It seems to me they're investigating a killing while Sinister/Dexter are in a helicopter "about the same time", then a while later it turns out the hitmen were already aboard, having carried out the killings. So maybe the caption should have read "a little while earlier" instead.

Atavar - After hating the opening episode and enjoying the second, I'm back to hating it again. What was that Worldbreaker thing again? Is it Atavar's enemy or his ally? And far from there being too much explanation, I'd argue there wasn't enough. Like what happened to that weapon of mass destruction to make it all zombified? Wouldn't it have been quite exciting to actually have seen it happen?

I've not much to say about Shakara except I thought it was the weakest part so far, but I expect the pace to pick up again immediately.

Caballistics was tosh, as others have pointed out, but it was moderately funny and very well drawn tosh all the same.

Maybe 7/10 (but no less), following a month that averaged 9/10.

[Wils]

'Cok' or 'Fuk' might've been funnier

'NOB' or 'POO' being even better.