Can we find a character or strip that NO-ONE likes?

[paulvonscott]

Okay here we go, the list as it stands.  Remember all you have to do is give something a spirited and convincing defnce to get it off the list (saying 'Hey!  But I liked that!' really isn't enough)

Survivor
Rogue Trooper(Friday) - Apocalypse Dreadnought
Junker
Robohunter - return to Verdus
More RoboHunter
Chronos Carnival
More Friday
Space Girls
Wireheads
Dead Meat
Babe Race 2000
Mean Team
Harlem Heroes
Kola Kommandos
Trash Para Sites
The Grudge Father
Vector 13
Dinosty
Flesh: the Legend of Shamana
Any Slaine story after (and not including, obviously) The Horned God?
Bad Company 3
Shako?


As has already been pointed out, the defense has been given for Zippy Couriers.  It is Reprieved.  

I'm also taking Helltrekkers off.  

What a bloody great story that was.  A journey to rival Dredd's own Cursed Earth Trip with a great bunch of characters, slowly being picked off one by one as the whole thing getting more desprate.  That Gruddamn awful family that came along.  The crab baby, the tension, the art, the arrrgh!  It was so good.  A story with loads of characters, not just some gun weilding nutters.  In fact I like it so much I'd like to buy the Titan Reprint.

[paulvonscott]

Okay here we go, the list as it stands. Remember all you have to do is give something a spirited and convincing defnce to get it off the list (saying 'Hey! But I liked that!' really isn't enough).  You can't argue over the strips, if someone defends it, it is saved.  Full stop.

(Missed some from before)

Survivor
Rogue Trooper(Friday) - Apocalypse Dreadnought
Rogue Trooper (Fleischer)
Junker
Robohunter - return to Verdus
More RoboHunter
Chronos Carnival
More Friday
Space Girls
Wireheads
Dead Meat
Babe Race 2000
Mean Team
Harlem Heroes
Kola Kommandos
Trash Para Sites
The Grudge Father
Vector 13
Dinosty
Flesh: the Legend of Shamana
Any Slaine story after (and not including, obviously) The Horned God?
Bad Company 3
Shako?
Hendral the Psi Elf (? Wot)
Skizz III
Supersurf 13

[Leigh S]

Obviously my defence of Dinosty wasn't spirited enough! :)

What I'd say on the list is all Fleischer Rogue and all Millar Robohunter, just to make matters clear - Parasites is a follow up to Wireheads, so I'd put those together and the Grudgefather needs to be added as well - I also thought someone said nice things about Dead Meat (although personally i hate the art - this was the Post-Bisley period where they were employing everyone with the name Simon in the hope of repeating the Bisley effect...

[Leigh S]

Dont listen to the Scojo, PVS - Hendral the Psi elf is another one of his flights of fancy

[Leigh S]

And surely the defence has to be sustainable in a court of law.  If I was to say that Millars Robohunter was a sublime pastiche on contempory morality, sprinkled with a smidgeon of ironic gore and classic post-modern anti-heroism, I'd surely be talking out of my arse?

[The Amstor Computer]

Quite right - Steve White made Rogue readable for the first time in years. The series was still a mess, but the individual stories were far better.

Dead Meat... I kinda liked the concept, but the execution left a lot to desire.

The only saving grace of Robohunter - IMO - was Casanovas art. Am I alone on this one?

[paulvonscott]

Defence Counsel

"Obviously my defence of Dinosty wasn't spirited enough! :)"

Sorry Watcher, but it was just a 'oh.. its not that bad' sort of comment.  There's been a lot of this meely mouthed, oh, it wasn't all bad talk.  

You have to mean it!  You have to say, without reservation or shame, 'I LIKE THIS!' and tell us why.  There's no arguement because if someone likes something, they like it (and the posts would trail off forever). Only thus can these stories be saved from eternal damnation.  

Believe it or not, I'm not being negative with this post, I just want to know that every story had a fans somehwere.

[GordonR]

>Shako?

Hey, I quite liked Shako!

In its defence it was...erm....that is, I mean...

Oh hell, I just liked the gore and seeing some big bastard of a polar bear rip peoples' arms off every episode.  I was eleven years old, for crying out loud...

[2000AD Online]

How about dishonourable mentions for 'Night Zero / Beyond Zero' (too cliche-driven) and 'Urban Strike'? Which reminds me, Steve White's take on 'Rogue Trooper' suffered also from his similarly naff characterizations and strained attempts at humour.

[Thread Zero]

I liked Vector 13.

It made a change from the formulaic fs. It was quite intelligently written without silly endings.

Sort of a mature mini x files.

So I vote it should go off the list.

In fact I wouldn't mind seeing it return (for a limited run) in 2k.

Beats some of the recent fs' anyway!

scojo

[Dudley]

Hey - I'll defend Flesh III (The Legend of Shamana)!

I absolutely loved Carl Critchlow's old blurred painted style and Shamana herself was a heroine the like of which we could do with in 2000AD more often.

Particular favourite scene: the bit where she was sniffing her way along in the hovering city.

[Bico]

'I just liked the gore and seeing some big bastard of a polar bear rip peoples' arms off every episode.'

Seconded.

[Byron Virgo]

Shako was excellent! He'd eaten some kind of radioactive pill, and now everyone, including the CIA, the KGB and one lone eskimo (this was before Innuit) are after him. But he's one vicious bastard of a bear, the Great White of the snowy wastes, and he turned the snow white in his trail.
The whole series is clearly a metaphor for our current situation with the 'War on Terror': the Americans and Russians interfering in a sovereign country (Afghanistan in reality), creating a problem (or an angry bear) that will one day come back and bite them on the arse!

What about Rogue Trooper: The Golden Fox Rebellion?

"Just out of curiosity, could you tell me what the Mekon b*ggering Dan Dare with a variety of alien dildos was a metaphor of?"

Perhaps Frank Hampson's financial shafting by successive publishers that eventually drove him out of comics and to later attempt suicide?

[Noisybast]

Wot, no "Dry Run"?

[Demon Chicken]

I'll defend Beyond zero/below zero/etc. zero

I thought it was pretty OK, especially the bit where the feminist robot finds out her real self has turned into an evil bitch woman.

However Trash should burn in the firey pits of hell