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Confession time.

I've been slagging off the Cthulu mythology for some time, based on references to it in quite a few 2000AD stories.  Just because it seems to me that in 99% of cases there's nothing more to it than "ooh look, funny-named extradimensional monsters, and, like, wooo...!"

But I've never read the original Lovecraft myths etc.

So I want 2 things here:

1) Can someone summarise the basic elements of the Cthulu mythos?

2) Can someone suggest further reading for beginners?

Cheers

...Dudley

[tonight!!!]

What with all the announcements from comics vendors, potters and the like, I thought to myself, "Why not have an entire thread, which people can ignore at their leisure, entirely devoted to shameless commercial plugs?"  

And here it is.  Any money-making activities that you as a boarder may wish to promote can be added below, ensuring that the money of this little community is kept within the community at all times.

...Dudley

PS This is in no way a cheap way to disguise my own shameless promotion of Comedy at Madame Jo-Jo's tonight!!!, with the hottest and cheapest comedy line-up in London.  Come & I'll buy you a pint!!!

Link: http://www.underhand.net/jojo.php" target="_blank">London Comedy at its finest

Vodka & Red Bull Christmas Cake

Ingredients:

1 cup water      1 cup of brown sugar
1 tsp baking soda   1 cup of sugar
1 tsp salt      Lemon Juice
4 large eggs      Nuts
1 bottle of Vodka    1 can of Red Bull
2 cups dried fruit

Method:

1.  Sample the vodka to check the quality.
2.  Take a large bowl, check the vodka again.
3.  To be sure it is of the highest quality, pour one level cup and mix with a little red bull and drink.
4.  Repeat.
5.  Turn on the electric mixer, beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl.
6.  Add one teaspoon of sugar. Beat again.
7.  At this point its is best to make sure the vodka is still ok.
8.  Flavour with red bull to taste.
9.  Try another cup - just in case turn off the mixerer.
10. Break two eggs and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit.
11. Pick fruit off floor
12. Mix on the turner.
13. If the dried fruit gets stuck in the beaterers, pry it loose with a drewscriver.
14. Shample the vodka to check for tonsisticitity, flavour with a little Bed Rull.
15. Next ssiffft two cups of salt. Or something ... Who giveshz a shi**
16. Throw a pinch of Bed Rull over your shoulder
17. Pick up the can, mop the floor
18. Check the vodka
19. Now shift the lemon juice and strain your nuts.
20. Add one table.
21. Add a shpoon of shugar, or somefink. Whatever you can find.
22. Turn the cake tin 360 degrees and try not to fall over..
23. Don't forget to beat off the turner
24. Finally, throw the bowl through the window, finish the vodka and kick the dog.
25. Fall into bed.

CHERRY MISTMAS

No, Prog 2004 hasn't arrived yet, and, no, I have no clue what will happen in the Caballistics story.

But I was wondering what people's predictions are as to what will happen in this consistently surpring strip?  Stick yer predictions up here for Gordon's amusement and your own embarrassment.

Just to incentivise, the person to get nearest the truth will win a *very*small* prize...

I know that being on this board kind of indicates we like representational art that tells a story, but what do people think of these proposals for a modern sculpture to go up in Trafalgar Square?

Kind of liking the Sarah Lucas "pigeonshit car" one...

Link: http://www.fourthplinth.co.uk/artist_landing.htm" target="_blank">The Fourth Plinth

Like the title says, no more excuses.  We must have a contestant with "Specialist topic - The World of Dredd" or similar.

I'd go for it myself, but I came near the bottom in the recent quiz ...

Link: http://www.beonscreen.com/user/show.asp?showID=221" target="_blank">Mastermind call for entries

This just came in from one of my clients, thought I'd put it up here as a public service for all you well-off LOTR fanatics.  (I know the charity and it is genuine)

Hello,

Please forgive the direct approach, but I just wondered if you might know of anyone or a company that might like to bid in aid of NCH?
NCH have been given four tickets to attend the exciting celebrity premiere of the final part of The Lord of the Rings trilogy...
The Return of the King. We would like to auction these tickets to raise lots of ???? for NCH.
To do this it would be brilliant if you could offer this fantastic opportunity to your contacts by forwarding the details below...

The Return of the King Exclusive The Lord of the Rings UK celebrity premiere tickets up for auction!!
Be the first to discover the astounding conclusion to New Line Cinema's motion picture adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkein's epic trilogy The Lord of the Rings.
Bid for your chance to meet hobbits, elves and dwarves both on and off the screen! Mingle with the stars... Ian McKellan (Gandalf), Elija Wood (Frodo), Cate Blanchett (Galadriel), Orlando Bloom (Legolas), Liv Tyler (Arwen)... to name but a few! * NCH are excited to offer you the opportunity to bid for one of two pairs of premiere tickets to The Return of the King.
* Date Thursday 11th Dec
* Where Odeon Leicester Square, London
* Timings Doors open - 5.30pm (Film starts - 7pm)
* We are looking for bids from ?2000 per pair. For your chance to
attend the hottest UK premiere for 2003 please submit your bid
together with your contact telephone number to
wendy.daniell@nch.org.uk by 12 noon on Monday 8th December. Tickets
will be given to the highest bidder, who will be notified by 5pm on
8th December.
* All proceeds to go to NCH the children's charity.

[A while ago John Smith gave an interview which showed off his Dredd vision, archived elsewhere on this site. The quotes below are submitted without comment.]

A while ago John Smith gave an interview which showed off his Dredd vision, archived elsewhere on this site.  The quotes below are submitted without comment.   ;)


"[Dredd's world} is like a big toy box that's there for you to plunder. The real challenge is to introduce new elements, new story ideas, rather than just pilfering from what's already there."

"...it's my one big ambition to come up with a major league villain ... I remember disliking a lot of the stories during Garth's run because he just ended up rehashing all these old characters in the same sort of stock situation. That seems pretty pointless to me unless you can bring something new to it but it can obviously be a big temptation to fill-in writers."

"I think Siku's characters can be very inconsistent, as can his colouring, but when he puts his mind to it – especially in those panoramic nature scenes – he can do a pretty good job. I'm glad to see from his more recent stuff that he's improved a lot. At least now the characters look the same from panel to panel and Dredd isn't just this huge chin in a helmet any more..."

Can any of the (few) lady readers of this board help this poor man out?

Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3241138.stm" target="_blank">Help me test "orgasm machine", pleads researcher

Fellow Londoners,

Unfair though it may be, some of our compatriots are unfortunate enough to be forced to live in a place we variously refer to as "the sticks", "the outside", or when feeling charitable "the country".  They miss out on so much in life, in their little Stoneybridges and Birminghams, with only the compensation of occasionally giving birth to sheep (forgive me if I'm a little unclear on some of these details).

And now dear old Tharg in his wisdom has decreed that they shall not receive the genius that will no doubt be the Metro Dredd.  They are probably hurling bones around and howling in front of big monoliths as I write.  Indeed, we may have to double the perimeter guard.

I propose that we unite to save these wretches.  I have a scanner and would be happy to take on the duties of scanning the pages in myself.  but I need a couple of other Londoners to take part to ensure that the Metro is collected on a daily basis.  

Identify yourselves and volunteer: otherwise they might all end up moving in next door, with their country practices and strange accents.  And you wouldn't like that, now, would you?

Dear all,

A suspicion has been festering in me for some time, and it has now come to a head (shows what happens if you don't squeeze it in the bud).

It started (I believe) with the "Ronaldus Magnus" letter in the megazine a few issues ago.  Then there was Keane.  Now Martin Daulby.  I may have missed some examples along the way, but you get the general gist.  Letters expressing outrage from a frankly odd viewpoint about the socio-political viewpoint of 2000AD and the Megazine.  Letters written in a style frankly unlike most of those Tharg gets in his bulging sack every week.  Letters, in short, that seem to bear all the hallmarks of...A SATIRIST.

Yes, somewhere out there - almost certainly reading this board - someone is writing letters in the old Spike Milligan mould.  Parodies of political viewpoints, designed only to stir up trouble.

And, from the fake Keane debate, we know that the person doing it reads this board.

So come on, who are you?

Following on from comments on the "Write my essay for me" thread, what's your favourite vision of the future?

We've been promised nuclear wasteland, ecological disaster, air hostesses on the Luna express, pills instead of meals, robot servants...and then there was Storming Heaven's free LSD for all.

But which imaginary future would YOu like to be living in?

NOT you, Johnnyeyebrows.

This is for those people who would like to use the occasion of Bush's visit to show their disgust at his presidency's foreign policy, but can't make it to the march.

Or for those who like their comfy chairs and alway-on email access...

Link: http://owos.info/bush_visit/bush.php" target="_blank">Virtual Protest

How thick can you be???

Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/film/3272971.stm" target="_blank">Steve Martin to play Inspector Clouseau

Hey-ho, Xmas is approaching, with fat geese and partridges etc...and it's time I wrote my Christmas wish-list.

So, I'm looking for suggestions as to what i should ask Santa to put in his sack.

I own precisely one non-2000ad graphic novel - From Hell - and am on the lookout for more.  

Likes: John Smith, wierd art, non-linear fiction, adult themes.

Dislikes: Superheroes, Americans.

Can anybody help me?

(,i>Please ignore if you still believe that Blair & bush waged war to bring deomcracy & human rights to Iraq)

Just thought I'd ask if anyone else's going along to the demo, and use the opportunity to post details if you don't already know.

UK National Demonstration
Thursday 20th November
Assemble 2pm at Malet Street, Central London (nearest tubes: Goodge Street, Russell Square and Euston/Euston Sq). March to Trafalgar Square where a statue of George Bush will be pulled down. This event will continue until 7pm to allow for people coming from work.
If there is only one STOP BU$H event that you can make - this is the one.

Link: www.stopwar.org.uk

Look at this.  LOOK AT THIS!  The "Nerve Centre" of Scream comic's first issue, courtesy of the fantastic site of ARRISARRIS.  (I've linked it in case of snarled web-fu).

Think back to when the 2000AD Nerve Centre had mini text stories, droid profiles, stupid competitions (not just the product tie-ins), news, reader's suggestions, blah blah blah.

Why are we now reduced to one letters page every 6 weeks, and a Nerve Centre that, apart from Tharg's own amusing scribbles, might as well be a big blue box marked "write own thoughts here"?

C'mon Nerve Centre droids, how hard could it be to have some silly stuff there?  Even if you just gave over half the space to readers' letters and fan-art it'd still be more fun than it is now!  

Please?

Link: http://www.backfromthedepths.co.uk/issues/issue1.1/page2.htm" target="_blank">Scream Issue #1

http://www.backfromthedepths.co.uk/issues/issue1.1/images/B%20PAGE%202_jpg.jpg">

I really wanted to ask priv8eye why he's called priv8eye, but didn't want to bugger up Devon's Daddy's welcome wagon.

So, new thread!  I'm called Dudley because I work for a firm with Dudley in its name and it seemed a good idea at the time.
Plus I'm a great admirer of 5-foot comedy pianists.

What's your story?

(GordonR, garywilkinson, david page, etc - you're probably excused this thread).

Following on from some random observations across various threads, I'd like to ask who people here think is the best Young Turk writer currently working on 2000AD.

Since the "dark days" of the 700's, several people have emerged who have given the comic a new lease of life.  I've picked out some examples (in alphabetical order by first name:

Colin Clayton
Dan Abnett
Gordon Rennie
Ian Edginton
Paul Cornell
Rob Williams
Robbie Morrison

Obviously, there's a wee bit of elasticity in the words "young" and new here, but never mind  ;)

Which of these do you think is the best?  Whose name makes your pulse race when you learn they've got a new strip coming up?  Who, in short, is potentially the New Alan Moore™?

If you want to introduce a writer not listed above, please follow two rules: their first published 2000AD story must have come in after prog 800; they must have more than two future shocks to qualify for consideration.

On all posts, please give a reason for your vote.

Use this one - ignore other one!  Forgot to put SPOILERS warning on!

I always fancied starting one of these. So, anybody seen it yet? Mine's late again.