Prog 1848: Gods and Monsters!

[stacey]

Dredd; great stuff but didn't they have their resporators down when they went in last week?
loving those Lawmasters they must rate high on the Whittleometer

Ahhhhh Mr Proudhuff you know me so well :-D ALL the Lawmasters, so many, at gorgeous twisty angles AND other bikes too! Soooo beautiful!

[Pop Culture Bandit]

Dredd - Loving how this could go either way next week with either Bender or Lock getting killed. Personally, I think that Lock will end up getting framed for Bender's murder, due to his prior trauma.

Slaine - Nice art by Simon Bisley and I quite liked the running gag with Ukko, but I'm pretty much lost when it comes to the story now. Does anyone know if the series is getting rebooted from scratch when Simon Davis comes in?

Age of the Wolf - Wow - a sharp increase of quality in the story here with three neat twists. 1) the bait-and-switch with Rowan disemboweled on the first panel, after her bold challenge last week. 2) the spear in the mouth trick and 3) Rowan has been chasing Keira to kill, not rescue her.

Past Imperfect - This one kind of fell flat for me as I wasn't familiar with the Rue Morgue murders and the artwork wasn't the most dynamic. I think that some of the other strips could have done with those extra four pages to beef up their stories.

Ten Seconders - This is the strongest strip in the Prog and I love the feeling of Armageddon and the heavy body count of the last few weeks. The stakes are raised and the status quo is getting smashed left, right and centre.

For a more detailed review, check out my blog here > http://popculturebandit.blogspot.com/2013/09/2000ad-prog-1848.html

[Proudhuff]

I knew that past inperfect reminded me of sumit:

[Richmond Clements]

I knew that past inperfect reminded me of sumit:

Yes, that crossed my mind while reading it too.

[Spikes]

Now i love me some Mick McMahon, and its a continuing joy to have him in the prog, but i dont think its the greatest cover from the master.
Dredd is a grand episode, and loving Mr Willsher's art. And Lock looks like death, literally. This ends next issue, and im mightly curious to see how it all plays out.
Again, AotW III, makes me think ive missed an episode... But still, if this incarnation hasnt been the best of the bunch, it has grown on me, of late.
Slaine, again, is fun. And its nice to see Bisley back. And doing a pretty decent job. Never his biggest fan, but liking this episode. Past Imperfect, was OK. Not disliking it, but a slight read all told.
The Ten Seconders still grabs, and is still a great read. And poor ol' Damage, 

[ThryllSeekyr]

Steve Bisley back on Slaine for the first time since 1990.

Fully embracing my inner nerd, I'm going to point out that Richard has made the same error here as whoever lettered the credit box of Bisley's first published strip work on The ABC Warriors (555). Since I spent the next week obsessively studying the inking technique and copying individual panels of that strip, the name STEVE Bisley made an indelible impression on my formative consciousness.

It didn't realise the error until I decided to spend the next few weeks drawing a biro pen reproduction of the final splash page of Hammerstein on A1 paper. I noticed the artist has signed that page Simon Bisley '87, and I went back to check subsequent progs, which credited him with his real forename. It still took ages for me not to automatically think of Bisley by that other name, and I had to instantly autocorrect myself before the name travelled from my brain to my mouth for years afterwards.

Well ... I bet that was fascinating for everyone.

Steve Bisley's is a Australian actor.....You should know of him from the original Mad Max......



How he looks these days.....



I once made the mistake of getting their names confused.

My memory might be faulty, but my recollection is he (and Elfric) became prominent, especially after The Horned God. Before then, the Cythron/sci-fi stuff was largely confined to the Time Killer story (with the *shudder* 'leyser' weapons). Crom Cruach, Balor and Slough Feg were the main foes pre-Prog 700.

If you've yet to buy any Slaine, do consider Warrior's Dawn, which remains an excellent book. Although I'm not a big fan of Time Killer/Tomb of Terror, the next three volumes are nonetheless worth investing in (Time Killer, The King, Horned God), and they'll give added context for the current run. (Frankly, they're a hell of a lot better than the current run, in pretty much every way.)

Slaine Cover Lovely Slaine cover even if this is product of his less grand more recent work. Luv the mullet. Though why are we getting treated to Mike McMahon cover while we have Simon Bisley's art-work inside? Not complaining, thought it would have ben nice to see each artist do a full colour cover preceeding their own work on the strip.

It's such shame that Slaine: Warriors Dawn is no longer available from the 2000AD Online Shop here. But then there's always [url =http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Slaine-9781906735975-by-Pat-Mills-Paperback-BRAND-NEW-FREE-P-H-/111133164427?pt=AU_Fiction_Books_2&hash=item19e00d838b ] Ebay!

As for this week's Slaine I was not as impressed with Simon Bisley's art as it used to be. Like with McMahon's and Fabry's I think it has suffere with time or has suffered with the use of new software. Is this the mark of Photo-Shop. I can't even put my finger on why I don't like it as much.
I'm just more in love with the original visuals.

What I do like is the return of [spoiler]Ukko and Nest inserting themselves into the narrative
and talking about........

[spoiler]
THERE'S
THE GOATSKIN
EDITION, THE VELLUM
CALFSKIN EDITION,
AND THE POCKET
SQUIRRELSKIN
EDITION.

Has Pat Mills cottoned on to the new craze?

[spoiler]
WE
ALSO HAVE
A DELUXE
VERSION ON CLAY
TABLETS FOR
SERIOUS
COLLECTORS.

Now, I consider myself a serious collector, where can I order mine?

[spoiler]
NOW
WHAT ABOUT THE
ORAL FIRESIDE
EDITION?

While on the subject of Nest, I have never liked it that Simon Bisley had always illustrated her differently, with her short blowed dried ginger hair and signature freckled complexion. Now I suddenly realise Massimo drew her with long hair as well. Though, the freckles should have stayed at least. Is this because she's more mature now as well?

[spoiler]
Anyway, I'm still puzzled as to why Slough Feg returned as a centaur. Did the Great Guledig run out of human parts to piece him back together with?

I would almost ask why Slaine went full shoggey instead of full warp and had said so on my facebook page....But I guess this.....

I loved how Slaine's Lord-of-Beasts head matched the discarded hero-harness on the facing page

[spoiler]
Almost answers the question. I did quickly reread it again and found that he couldn't warp through Slough feg's spell of binding and perhaps releasing the earth-power to go shoggey was the only way.[/spoiler]

Seeing Nick Percival's Slaine Star-Scan was a nice surprise. Looking more mature here of course, I'm not sure I like the vast amount of hair.

[ThryllSeekyr]

Slaine Double Variant Cover

I've order mine, but it may be another two weeks until I get my physical copy as I have only just got 2000AD Prog 1847 within the last few days.

I must admit I like these variant pieces of art chosen for each cover. Slaine and Moloch!
Like it or hate it! Clint Lanely's photo-shopped magic hasn't changed (Unlike the work of the other artist, but Clint's work has been more recent!) since the Books of Invasions where I first laid eyes on the second issue. After flicking through this random 2000AD prog in an old comic book store down south in Sydney roughly ten years ago to this day. If I remember correctly.

I forget the exact prog number, but it had a picture of Moloch's face in close up on the cover and inside Slaine was a very real photo-shopped person whom I never suspected to be the artist himself. I thought he was an actor and that these were photo stills from a real live Slaine movie being made.   
Not long before I discovered my first Slaine: Book of Invasions prog. I had found and purchased Slaine: Warrior in Time With Slaine: Demon-Killer and Slaine: Treasures of Britain I thought this was the Horned God all over again.

This new Slaine story had rekindled my lost interest in Slaine and since then I had remained hooked and focused on Slaine interesting never waning.  So I saught out the other Slaine progs I had missed and the others that were soon to come.

It was then that I realised that I had actually missed out on a lot Slaine really only having some of the progs back at home. One from Dragonheist with the dragon on the cover, some from Sky-Chariots both with Mike McMahon's Slaine on the cover facing a viking berserk and with Slough Throt. ( Or were they both done by Cam Kennedy?) I had few progs containing some of Slaine: Time-killer and the Best of Edition of Slaine: Tomb of Terror and the Prog with the famous Glenn Fabry drawn and painted in colour of Slaine with the few pages scripted by Angie Kinkaid inside. I also had the original Titan version of Slaine: Warriors Dawn which wasn't as complete as the current version the three volumes of the  Titan printed Slaine: The Horned God! that was it for me. So I searched through old comic book stores and second hand book shops to fill in the gaps. I then discovered 2000AD Online and the free to read version of the very first Slaine episode The Time-Monster, though I was a little disappointed at the time to find it never really illustrated how Slaine met Ukko. I also found old but well conditioned progs completely covering Slaine: Dragon-Heist and Slaine: Bride of Crom. I then found that the entire Slaine: Time-Killer had been reprinted in either the Megazine. So Snapped those up as well as the both the hardback cover editions of Slaine: Time-Killer and Slaine: The King and the double volume of Slaine: The Horned God. There were few progs I had found on this side of the Slaine: Horned God One from Bowels of Hell, a couple from Grail War, Demon Hitch-Hiker and one prog from The Secret Commonwealth all the while finding not quite all of the new progs covering the new Slaine: Books of Invasions. So I wished and hoped that a graphic novel edition of this would come out.

Sorry about that long winded tale, but it brings me all back here now.

Now where was I with this one......

[spoiler] Slaine is instaneously sent back and standing in the presence of Mocloch and a great winged Formorian Dargoand it's not long before we see y=our hero actually crying but only to lure Moloch closer with a vessel to empty his tears as he takes one of his swords and stabs him through the head. As he and the child captives fly away on the back of the huge winged formorian as what remains of Moloch is torn apart by the High Cythron Aten. He then promptly dispatches Dargo driving Moloch's sword up into his skull[/b]

The big let down here, is that just all seems too simple and too easy. There was no protracted battle, but what else could you expect in just one episode. Like a few other have said already, this needs to have longer episodes, it needs to be more epic to be epic at all.

Despite that...... it's been six episodes hinting at the spectacle of their original counterparts and thirty years of slaughter......

SLAINE DIDN'T THINK IT TOO MANY

[ThryllSeekyr]

Damn, I posted in the wrong place

[I, Cosh]

I presume stag-centaur willies don't score as a high on the dodgymeter as human ones, but at least Simon Davis's purplers were flaccid - Feg's rejuvenated nethers are violating that Mull of Kintyre rule and then some, and that's before Slaine goes down on him -cough-.  Anyhow, it was great to see Feg in action again, and I loved how Slaine's Lord-of-Beasts head matched the discarded hero-harness on the facing page.  Also thought Ukko and Nest's chat about reprint fees and revised editions was absolutely hilarious, as well as explaining what's actually going on with this story when viewed from outside time.  While I'm not sure how the (inexplicably green) drunes/skullswords following Slaine will affect the imminent Flood, or the future of the Tribes, I'm fascinated to see if we'll find out in the Davis series.

To be honest, it was Crom Cruach as massive, veined, spurting cock at the top of page 3 which caught my eye first. Either way, Simon "The Dong" Davis has something to live up to now.

Just been giving this Book of Scars a reread. While I did see some of the ideas you'd picked up on in earlier comments this time, particularly in the first episode, the whole thing still seems rather empty. For my groat, Bisley's episode is by far the best. As somebody else mentioned, it's really the only one which stands at any remove from an existing story. The running joke at Thryllseeker's expense is relatively amusing (and reminiscent of some of the stuff I liked in older stories with Nest and Ukko arguing over the narration. Finally, I guess I'm just a sucker for Bisley's lovely, nauseous colouring.

[TordelBack]

Yeah, the series as a whole didn't really bear out any of my rambling theories.  I did like the Bride of Crom and especially the Horned God episode, and felt they had something to say, but despite glorious art the Sky Chariots and Time Killer ones did very little.  Ultimately I'd like to have seen each 'part' run to two episodes, which would have given Pat some space to play at something beyond mere nostalgia, but I'm guessing price and time are the major factor when you're commissioning new strip work from Fabry, Bisley and McMahon. 

The best thing about the project is that absolutely nobody involved took the piss: no returning prima donnas, no insultingly bad Frank Miller sketches, just genuine effort and honest enthusiasm from all concerned, and respect paid to those no longer with us.