Strontium Dog: Search and Destroy Vol 2

[Leigh S]

Well this is lovely - definitive one might say!

The colour in Journey is very welcome and its all super lovely, but on to insane criticisms...


They really could have dropped last two stories  - Willy Blanko and Shickelgruber - as they are froma  different "era" of Stront.  Instead, pad it a little with "Assault on Trigol 3" It would stlll have been about the same size (lets not forget Assault on Trigol 3 for Vol 3 at the earliest, please?

I'd have also put "The Collector" in this Vol rather than Vol 1 - looks like they are just repeating the Case Files, which is maybe why "Assault on Trigol" was missed? There are also two text stories they should have included here (or in the last Vol) - Night of the Blood Freaks with incredible MacCarthy Art and an earlier one from a Starlord Special I think with wth Steve Kyte art.  Neither has bee reprinted, so I say definitive, but this misordering and omission makes it only "most" definitive, which is a shame when its so close and obviously a very classy product

Vol 3 could then have been Willy Blanko/Shickelgruber/Muties Luck/Doc Quince/Bad Boys for about 20 ish, plus annuals, Vol 4 then Portrait, Gronk and Kid Knee as a slightly bumper one, Vol 5 gets us to the 335 "relaunch" and so on

And final insane gripe is I would have used a Carlos image that was relevant to this era rather than Bollands later version, which would fit perfectly on Vol 3 (or Vol 4, as I'd have used that poster they used on the recent limited edition HB of The Son, whch is lovely, but again a bit "out of time")

[Max Headroom]

Leigh S - Could you list which stories are featured? Is there any bonus material (i.e. stories that did not run in the main prog)?
Thank you.

[Leigh S]

Galaxy Killiers
Journey Into Hell
Willy Blanko (AKA Death's Head)
SchickelGruber Grab


Only extra is the prog 108 pin up of Wulf,but its a bumper book in comparison to Vol 1

[Leigh S]

Which highighted another element that makes it less than definitive - no covers - additionally a shame when they ahve to use a repeated filler page in Journey into Hell to get the double page spreads in the right place...

Vol 1 had a covers gallery as much as the two Carlos Starlord covers count, but theres some beautiful fully painted Carlos covers for JiH that are absent

Honestly, so close, Rebellion...

[Max Headroom]

It looks like Rebellion is going down the route of reprinting everything in the Prog in chronological order. I just hope that it gets to its conclusion and includes all the extra stories that appeared in Annuals, Sci-Fi Specials etc.

[Magnetica]

Didn't think this was out until next week?

[Leigh S]

Well it's chronological for the prog stories, but the ship has sailed on chronolgical for the extra stuff, which to be honest, I'm retracting my characterisation of that as an "insane" complaint. Sloppy is what it is, giving me the distinct impression they are just working through the Agency Files with all the mistakes and omissions in terms of chronology that happened back then.

I'll concede complaining about extra stories is technically insane, though if they had included all the extra stories in their proper place,along with the many covers from Journey Into Hell, there wouldnt have been room for those stories....

If they were being chronological, Vol 1 would have had "Assault on Trigol 3"from the 1979 Sci-Fi Special, bumping "The Collector" into Vol 2

Then Vol 2 would have had "the Kurtis Job" from the 1980 Sci-Fi Special, "Night of the Blood Freaks" from the 1981 2000AD Annual, "the Kroll Affair" from the 1982 annual and the aforementioned "The Collector"

So chronological is out the window, lets see if they can do complete.

It looks like Rebellion is going down the route of reprinting everything in the Prog in chronological order. I just hope that it gets to its conclusion and includes all the extra stories that appeared in Annuals, Sci-Fi Specials etc.

[Leigh S]

Actually, chronologically speaking, swapping Colonel Krulgor to Vol 2  with the Kurtiz Job in Vol 1would be the most accurate, and split the two text stories to one per Volume.

So Vol 1 would be all starlord (93 pages) plus Kasino Killings/Assault on Trigol-3*/Funfair of Fear*/Kurtiz Job(text)* (28ish pages)

the last 3 are technically concurrent with the galaxy Killers/JiH time period, but are clearly in the style of Starlord tales, so not too much of a problem placing them there, and would make the page count about the same (also needs the classic "T-shirt" image from Carlos and the "could you be a Strontium Dog Starlord Quiz)

Vol 2 would be Galaxy Killers/Journey into Hell (118 pages  - actually more than that due to the padding pages) with covers and Colonel Krulgor/Blood Freaks(text) for 12 or so more

Then Vol 3 would be Death's-Head/Schickelgruber/Muties Luck/Doc Quince/Bad Boys (109) plus covers and The Collector/Kroll Affair (12 more)

Volume 4 would be Portrait/Gronk Affair/Kid Knee Caper (146) plus covers

Volume 5 then starts a new run of Stront from  83/84: Moses Incident/ The Killing (106 pages) plus Incident at the Back O'Beyond/In The Doghouse/The Iraldi Job(Text) (another 20?) - similar size to Vol 1 in any case.

Volume 6 is Outlaw! (117 pages) plus Big Bust of 49 (46) plus covers

Volume 7 is Slavers of Drule (51)/Max Bubba (107) covers and Beast of Milton Keynes for 8 more..

Volume 8 is Smileys World/Rage/mayger Minor (152) plus covers Fever for 8 more

Volume 9 is War Zone/Bitch/Royal Affair (166) plus Covers and Complaint (7)

Volume 10 rounds out Carlos era with Sorry Case/Rammy/Stone Killers/Zeta (146) plus Town That Died of Shame and Incident at the Birth of the Universe for 16 more pages

Volume 11 is N0-Go and Final Solution

Volume 12 would be Top Dog and Judgement Day plus Incident at the End of the World

Tada!  Probably missed something, and too late, but there you go - something for the 50 anniversary of Stront in 5 years time!

[Dark Jimbo]

They really could have dropped last two stories  - Willy Blanko and Shickelgruber - as they are froma  different "era" of Stront.  Instead, pad it a little with "Assault on Trigol 3"

Hmm. I'd argue with that - Galaxy Killers is nobody's favourite story, and I personally don't like Journey into Hell much, either. They're both atypical Stront stories that go on a bit too long for their own good. Shicklegruber Grab gives the volume a punchy, action-packed ending that's sorely needed.

[Magnetica]

They really could have dropped last two stories  - Willy Blanko and Shickelgruber - as they are froma  different "era" of Stront.  Instead, pad it a little with "Assault on Trigol 3"

Hmm. I'd argue with that - Galaxy Killers is nobody's favourite story, and I personally don't like Journey into Hell much, either. They're both atypical Stront stories that go on a bit too long for their own good. Shicklegruber Grab gives the volume a punchy, action-packed ending that's sorely needed.

Galaxy Killers was partly responsible for me stopping reading 2000AD and Starlord for 6 months- as a disgruntled Starlord reader I did take to it and the different take on Strontium Dog (and Ro-Busters) were the reason.

[Tjm86]

I'm wondering if the omissions you refer to are due to the writing team involved.  The SF special stories don't seem to have been written by Wagner / Grant.  Whether there is a sense that canonical stories are only those written by them?

[Leigh S]

You could say the same about almost all the extras in Vol 1 - it seems to me theres been no more thought than "where did we put them in the Agency Files?", which missed some material completely and left some out until much later volumes - while these are very nice hardbacks, they aren't definitive editions on the basis they arent trying to do anything different to the Agency Files otehr than upgrade the size/paper, which for as obsessive a fan as myself seems either a bit of a swizz or a massive missed opportunity (or both)

The only one Special/Annual story I'd be willing to bet a small sum of cash on being a Wagner/Grant script is "The Collector" from the 1982 annual, but that really should have featured with the Deaths-Head to Bad Boys stories if we are being chronological.

I'm wondering if the omissions you refer to are due to the writing team involved.  The SF special stories don't seem to have been written by Wagner / Grant.  Whether there is a sense that canonical stories are only those written by them?

Yeah I can see some logic in doing that - Galaxy Killers is a bit unloved and generally a failure, but thats the danger of collecting everything in order - Dredd Case Files 1 is likely to be a bit of a head scratcher to many a potential reader.  If readers have stuck with the Hachette series through much stinkier material, I;d hope that if they'd been selling this as a definitive set, that wouldnt be much of a barrier to the type of person attracted to this in the first place (the Agency Files I assume are still available?)

They really could have dropped last two stories  - Willy Blanko and Shickelgruber - as they are froma  different "era" of Stront.  Instead, pad it a little with "Assault on Trigol 3"

Hmm. I'd argue with that - Galaxy Killers is nobody's favourite story, and I personally don't like Journey into Hell much, either. They're both atypical Stront stories that go on a bit too long for their own good. Shicklegruber Grab gives the volume a punchy, action-packed ending that's sorely needed.

[Leigh S]

Oh and I;m sure theres a Gronk pin-up missing from Starlord/ early merger progs? The badge too!

Just feel that quantity may have a quality of its own, sure... but the feel of a properly curated set of volumes with an eye to the different eras of the strip and the history would feel more like a labour of love rather than a "how can we re-monetize these files we have?"

[Leigh S]

Aha!  Vol 3, now available for pre order seems to have picked up all the missing stories, so credit where credit is due, that at least catches it all up - not sure about not using a contemporary image for the Webship exclusive, but maybe thats a "not the final cover" type situation? 

I;d be using the "Never Surrender" cover myself

[Dash Decent]

Leigh, you keep making me wish you were advising Rebellion how best to compile these.

The listing for volume 3 doesn't include "The Gronk Affair", though that doesn't mean it's not there.