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[The Great Wall]

The Great Wall
Or that white features a "white saviour" trope (it doesn't).
...
a stranger in a foreign land...helps the local population against an impending enemy

I'm having trouble reconciling these two statements but it's Christmas and I genuinely can't remember much about the movie so I'll assume that it somehow cleverly subverts the trope that seems inherent from the set-up

It doesn't subvert it so much as completely replace it with a different one. My memory of the story is that the arrogant foreigner thinks he can walk in and sort everything out by himself and nearly gets everyone killed with his stupidity. Only when he is able to see past his own ego and humbly join the battle alongside the brave Chinese people as an equal, insignificant part of the whole can the evil be overcome.

There's definitely some sort of message in there.

[Don't look up]

Don't look up – a dark satire which felt to close for comfort. This a movie about the end of the world and how stupid decisions are made along to way to facilitate that the world will end. I can highly recommend this movie, funny, witty, and yes twisted dark as well.

I found this pretty dire to be honest. It had that effect where I could tell what the writers thought was funny about each line but it just wasn't. Every attempt at satire seemed lazy and obvious. Given how much they must have spent on the cast, another pass over the script would've been loose change well spent.

To be fair, it did improve in the second half but it's a little strange that the best least worst bit ended up being the small scale last dinner back home on the ranch.

However, a couple of days later we watched This is the End, which was truly awful, so now I'm a little bit more kindly disposed to Don't Look Up. A weird mixture of self-congratularly, faux-stoner improv horror comedy. There are a handful of laughs and a few well deployed FX shots but mostly it's just a bunch of rich dudes trying to one-up each other by talking about jizzing while they wait for the world to end.

[01. Now That's What I Call Justice]

A decent mixture of stuff here. A couple of good, but far from classic, Wagner stories elevated by the chosen artists. A scattergun selection of Niemand styles with his most straight-up serious being the best.

01. Now That's What I Call Justice. Really nice to have John Higgins back drawing something worthy of his talents.

02. Dream of a Thousand Flowers. A very welcome example of the kind of sci-fi short story that doesn't feel the need to explain how because the why is more important.

03. Removal Man. Maybe you can look at this as a story in search of PJ but getting us to root for a very bad dude and then laugh at his failures is a trick not many can pull off. No accident that MacNeil drew numbers 2 & 3 on this list.

Elsewhere, I thought The Hard Way was good fun: that Millar/Morrison cliche about Dredd as action movie but done entertainingly. McConville's Dan Francisco story also suggested a writer getting better at working with the strip and its history.

[Cal-Hab Justice]

I have a soft spot for Calhab, possibly because of the contrasting art styles including the great John Ridgway.

Me too. I don't think it's a lost classic or anything but in its short run it at least tried to copy the most interesting thing about Dredd. Different stories varied greatly in tone: comedy, New Year introspection, action and whatever the crazy Akira ending was all about.

Ant Wars features arguably 2000AD's third or fourth best depiction of people being attacked by giant versions of unpleasant creepy-crawlies.

Cal-Hab Justice.

[01. The Returners - Amazonia]

This list really highlights how backward-looking the writing in the Meg has become.

01. The Returners - Amazonia. Maybe a bit of a sympathy vote this but overall I enjoyed the somewhat different pace and content of this strip so I was happy that it got an ending despite the circumstances. 

02. Angelic - Restitution. One of those backward-looking strips but just about keeps sufficient distance from the inspiration to make it interesting.

03. The Returners - Heartswood. Probably the weakest outing for this strip but at least it was something new.

Mike Dowling's versions of Hell and the Trellick Tower deserve a special mention as the most exciting thing artistically this year. Really beautiful work.

Some of these aren't even thrilling! What a sham.

[XTNCT]

Most of the first 250 Megs I read once in a big catch-up. An awful lot of stories slipped past without making an impression.

XTNCT bucked the trend. Easily in the top three stories to appear in the Megazine. It's a unique piece of storytelling and was my first real exposure to D'Israeli. The hardback collection is also a thing of beauty.

Sprltv.

[The Dead]

The Dead is a classic. Two of the Prog's best creators working together.

Really sorry to read this. Thinking of you.

I remember my dad strimming a frog once. He didn't recommend it. Funny story as long as you're okay!

I lost my Dante badge last night. A little good crest I've had on my winter jacket pocket for ages. Can't even remember where I got it. Bah.

[Dan Fran]

Voting for the least worst here, unfortunately.

Dan Fran

[Shadows]

Haven't read it for a very long time but I remember absolutely loving Shadows. An unnecessary TS Eliot reference works wonders for appealing to pretentious teenagers. I assume that's why Ian Edginton is using the same one in the new series of Kingmaker.

[No vote]

Two stories which take different approaches to explaining the unnecessary.

Hunted is a rare misfire from Rennie's Rogue canon..

Armageddon is an uninspiring prologue to a story that never actually happens.

No vote.

[Mechastopheles]

The first couple of Mechastopheleses were a lot of fun.

[London Falling.]

Love a good riff on English folklore, me. Plus I'm not sure I've ever read Apocalypse Soon.

London Falling.