Winter Special

[Banners]

The Rogue Trooper strip is magnificent! A wonderful expression of the comic form and a brilliant treatment of a character that must surely have become quite awkward to do anything with. Wonderful art of course, but Guy Adams deserves a lot of credit for his script.

[dweezil2]

Good news: My winter special arrived in the post from the future shop(thanks guys!).

Bad news: I can't read it until I get home from work! Bah!!!!!!!   

[The Enigmatic Dr X]

A good read. Did no one think the Dredd and Anderson were very similar?

[Hawkmumbler]

They where, but I did enjoy them even if they where prity much par for the course.

And blimey, can we have The Alienist soon please? Loooovely stuff.

[Mabs]

How good was Darren Douglas' artwork on Anderson? I bloody loved it! So was Lee Carter's on Trooper and Leigh Gallagher's on Defoe, in fact, this whole Winter Special was a great show piece for 2000ad's great art droids.

Storywise,  really enjoyed Rennie and Beeby's Alienist, as well as Pat Mills' Defoe: Frankensteiner. It was a great way to show how Defoe got into the Reek killing business. I for one cannot wait for its return next year.

It's true the Dredd and Anderson story were quite similar in tone, but nonetheless I really enjoyed them, especially the latter.

On this evidence I wish we could have a Special every month! 

[Darren Stephens]

Yes, great stuff all round. Particularly loved Darren Douglas' work on Anderson. Fantastic style and layouts!

[oshii]

I've really enjoyed both specials this year. 

Hopefully the fact that the Winter Special exists is a sign that the Sci-Fi special sold enough to make these viable to do. 

[Recrewt]

No sign of this in my local newsagent today. 
I know I can order this from the store but hopefully this will appear on shelves also.

[oshii]

On this evidence I wish we could have a Special every month! 

Yeah, I found myself thinking how ace a 2000AD monthly of original material in a format like this would be. 

[Theblazeuk]

Can't find this in any of the Smiths. Dave's comics in Brighton sold out the day I went to visit and Raygun doesn't stock 2000AD normally.... Will I have to venture to Forbidden Planet central london? Only to find it's lost as well?

Foolishly hoping Smiths will stock it when they put the Megazine out on Wednesday....

[Jim_Campbell]

Can't find this in any of the Smiths. Dave's comics in Brighton sold out the day I went to visit and Raygun doesn't stock 2000AD normally.... Will I have to venture to Forbidden Planet central london? Only to find it's lost as well?

Foolishly hoping Smiths will stock it when they put the Megazine out on Wednesday....

If only there was some way to get your hands on this fine periodical without running around all the shops in your local area...

Cheers

Jim

[Recrewt]

I'm sure that this must just be a timing thing because my local Smiths had loads of the summer special in.

Part of me knows that it is better to order direct and get the prog via subscription but it seems like the prog has disappeared so much from the shops already and if Smiths give up also then where will the new readers come from. 

[Fontwell Magma]

Pretty solid outing this, although due to the standalone nature of the specials, one-off Dredd stories always leave me feeling a little flat - but I guess this is simply due to the length of the strip and the amount of frames available for a situation to occur and then be resolved. Unless I'm missing something, there wasn't much more to the story than [spoiler]a man possessed by a knife who Dredd then kills.[/spoiler] Great artwork and a good quick read though.

Rogue Trooper - Some great artwork on this too - creepy images. Agree with someone that said that Rogue would know better than to start touching a possibly booby trapped body but there we go. Having missed the Rogue Trooper from back in the day, this is some good stuff but not a patch on the more recent Jaegir.

Alienist - This actually wasn't a bad start. I'm not a Doctor Who fan so didn't click on the similarities so enjoyed this first outing. Not sure it will be a classic strip but interested for what is to come.

Terror Tale - Probably actually my favourite from this special. Horrible, horror ending - this is what a terror tale should be like.

Defoe - I was a fan of the last run of Defoe and this is a nice flashback to get some more background of the main protagonist. I wonder whether it would have been not great if you were a first time reader..

Anderson - Nice artwork again (this special has been great for that). Pretty basic story but a nice little twist at the end.

So overall, pretty solidly worth the £3.50 but nothing that blew my mind! Not as strong as the current lineup in the prog..

[Theblazeuk]

Don't you have to pay delivery though Jim?

I'm sure that this must just be a timing thing because my local Smiths had loads of the summer special in.

Part of me knows that it is better to order direct and get the prog via subscription but it seems like the prog has disappeared so much from the shops already and if Smiths give up also then where will the new readers come from.

Yeah same on both counts. Even the Smiths in Sheen which never stocks the normal progs/zines.

[Jim_Campbell]

Don't you have to pay delivery though Jim?

Yep. Whether or not it's worth it depends on how much you value you assign to your own time, obviously. Whatever value you give it, I'd suggest that it's probably non-zero, so there must presumably come a point where it's more cost-effective to just mail order the bloomin' thing...?

Cheers

Jim