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Prog 2270 - 45 Revolutions per minute

Started by Colin YNWA, 21 February, 2022, 08:56:02 PM

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Colin YNWA

Well that tagline almost makes sense...

Always love a bumper celebration Prog and this one has much to recommend it.

Dredd well that's six pages of quiet perfection, even if it has less Dredd than the Tharg story - see below.

Proteus Vex well Vex did try to warn you. Things look bleak for Vex... but then lose lips sink ships... or more accurately get you squished by the star dweller... great episode

Indigo Prime this is deeply meaty stuff and needs a re-read - which it will get as it was aces - though leave Richard Dawkins alone ... and John Smith characters stuff come to that. This one at least makes perfect sense in the context of the story. Be careful with her though!

Kingmaker - FIGHT, then hug... weird hug but arrrhhhhh.

Tharg the Mighty - does it really need 9 pages. I mean it has moments of checky fun, but 9 pages!

The Order - great stuff with journey inward and shadow monsters outwards.

Brink - As with all great things leave the best 'til last. Reflections on past events and a glorious introduction to our new perspective. Just brilliant.

So all the ongoing strips are good to great; one bonus strip is intriguing and wonderful the other is... 9 pages. Overall a treat.

broodblik

When I die, I want to die like my grandfather who died peacefully in his sleep. Not screaming like all the passengers in his car.

Old age is the Lord's way of telling us to step aside for something new. Death's in case we didn't take the hint.

broodblik

When I die, I want to die like my grandfather who died peacefully in his sleep. Not screaming like all the passengers in his car.

Old age is the Lord's way of telling us to step aside for something new. Death's in case we didn't take the hint.

Proudhuff

If it wasn't for Chimpsky that cover could have been from decades ago... maybe that's the point but it hardly seems relevant which was always one of the Progs strengths IMHO
DDT did a job on me

IndigoPrime

Bar the decks being flipped, making menacing Tharg look like he's about to attack the DJ, it's a great piece of Bolland draughtsmanship. But, yeah, it's a pity a couple of characters weren't swapped out for something more recent. Nemesis is long gone. Dante concluded. Stront is done. Sláine is done. Perhaps the first two could have been replaced. Still a nice cover, mind. (And perhaps the nostalgia factor will draw people in? Who knows. That said, there were rumblings on Facebook that people expected to see indie what was featured on the cover.

Colin YNWA

Yeah its always nice to see more current characters featured on these montages. So Gene Hackman, Cyd, Briget Kurtis, Wren etc etc the list can go on of more recent characters that have had an impact and deserve their place ... and might actually appear in the Prog at hand!

The Enigmatic Dr X

That Tharg is the spitting image of the 3A Tharg.
Lock up your spoons!

broodblik

Maybe it is just me but the cover is just too busy
When I die, I want to die like my grandfather who died peacefully in his sleep. Not screaming like all the passengers in his car.

Old age is the Lord's way of telling us to step aside for something new. Death's in case we didn't take the hint.

Jacqusie

Quote from: Colin YNWA on 21 February, 2022, 08:56:02 PM


Indigo Prime this is deeply meaty stuff and needs a re-read - which it will get as it was aces - though leave Richard Dawkins alone ... and John Smith characters stuff come to that. This one at least makes perfect sense in the context of the story. Be careful with her though!


I agree, be careful with Tyranny and her cameo in IP certainly doesn't seem as jarring or out of place as Revere did. What is jarring however is why she appears and then shoots a the beloved character Dwayne (who never spoke like that previously I'm sure...) in an act of... um.. what?  Bit harsh ey? He's dead already though so might make a speedy recovery in time for next week's mash up.

Come to think of it I'm pretty sure Tyranny never spoke like that previously either. What next? Slaine as a Fatty in Dredd or Johnny Alpha as one of the villains in Stickleback?

Richard

Tyranny Rex started as an Indigo Prime character, she was always part of that series.

Colin YNWA

Quote from: Richard on 22 February, 2022, 08:11:34 PM
Tyranny Rex started as an Indigo Prime character, she was always part of that series.

Hence "making perfect sense in the context of the story."

Richard

There were some other comments between mine and yours.

The Monarch

so it remains to be seen but well that next prog line on the order sure seems like i called it....

as for indigo prime i dunno  but the characters are completly in character to me but eh what do i know its not like i am one of the biggest indigo prime fans either smith or kek-w on this board or anything

broodblik

A good celebration prog, enjoyed it.

Dredd – Good to have the old maestro back and he surely pulled me in with this opening episode even if Dredd is only mentioned.

Porteus Vex – The intrigue keeps on building as more of the past is revealed. How will Vex escape and the last page might have given him the opening. Great story with great art, Carroll and Lynch has become quite a dynamic team.

Indigo Prime – This looks an end of era as everything spirals out of control. We will see how and where this new story line takes us.

Kingmaker – This episode is consumed by one thing and that is Battle. An all action-oriented episode and we end with re-introduction.  We will have to see where Edginton takes us from here.

Tharg the Mighty – These Tharg stories has always been kind of a mixed bag and mostly I disliked them. This round well it was alright a little too long for my taste.

The Order – A very good episode. The battle of the shadows did not go as planned. How will our valiant heroes get out of this jar of pickles?
 
Brink – A solid opener here as we are introduced to new characters. Will be interesting to see which angle this story takes but to put it plainly great to have Brink back.

The only real pity for me is that I would have liked this to be a true jump-on prog, but I am sure for practical reasons due to schedule ding it was difficult with new stories starting in the xmas prog to be completed before the anniversary prog. The only thing that really counts is that this was a very good prog. So, it is congratulations on 45 years of thrill power. To the next 45 years!!!!!!!
When I die, I want to die like my grandfather who died peacefully in his sleep. Not screaming like all the passengers in his car.

Old age is the Lord's way of telling us to step aside for something new. Death's in case we didn't take the hint.

IndigoPrime

It must be a nightmare for Tharg to sync these things up, but, yeah, a nostalgic cover that inside has part 9 of some strips is probably not going to keep people around long-term. Oh well. As for the comic itself, a bit of a mixed bag for me, primarily because two strips I suspect are going to be great are at this point setting things up.

Dredd is one such strip. It looks great and builds intrigue, but that's all at this stage. And why are the Mechanismo droids suddenly so susceptible to begin shot? (Because the plot demands it!) Proteus Vex is another talky orange episode that nonetheless sustains itself. Good show.

Indigo Prime... Yeah, I'm not sure about this. Great art, as ever from Lee, and some Smithisms in the vocab. But on recently reading the Tyranny Rex Hachette book, that entry doesn't feel like her at all. Her link with the universe, though, at least means this isn't Kek-W mining 2000 AD's past to randomly drop characters into the mix. So let's see where this goes (and hope momentum isn't lost by part one of the next series rocking up in 2025 or something).

I continue to enjoy Kingmaker, which has great art and I suspect will read very nicely in collected form. Shout out to Mr. Campbell too, for easily the best sound effects I've seen in the Prog for years. They really feel like part of the art—far better than slapping some bright yellow font not a million miles from Comic Sans over the top of whatever needs an effect.

Tharg the Mighty. Hmm. There are some good jokes here, but good grief at how long it went on. Interesting art, veering between classic styles and Smith's current one though. The Order then rocks up for more bafflement. Again, it's full of great ideas and images, but it needs a re-read for me. It lost me weeks ago.

Then: Brink. I've no doubt this will be another classic. Right now, it's stage-setting.

If nothing else, the thing that most stands out about this birthday Prog is that the nostalgia was among its weakest components, and the newer strips for me were the standouts. I know what won't be the same for everyone, but it's great to see that 2000 AD isn't reliant on all the old hits, not least when more than half of the characters shown on the cover will likely never appear in the comic again. (In fact, only the Dreddworld ones are still going concerns.)

Proteus Vex > Kingmaker > Judge Dredd > Brink > Indigo Prime > Tharg the Mighty > The Order