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That would be quite a stretch alright (although it goes without saying that Mezolith is beyond wonderful). And Leigh S is correct, Pat's social media following is heavily invested in creating argy bargy.

I should probably add here that I hate seeing Pat knocking/dismissing other creators/editors and comics, trotting out somewhat, err, singular recollections of events, or even being vocally angry with the folk that unquestionably saved 2000AD and gave it a new and wonderful second wind.

But I also hate having to walk home because a protest march has blocked the tram line, or seeing irritating people going to Unite workshops in Mexico City on my hard-earned dues, or having to take time off work because of a teachers' strike. But like Pat's rants, I accept them as a necessary evil in an unfair world. 

And unlike my Union Rep's account of the free bar in Acapulco, Pat actually has done something for me lately.

[you don't ever get]

"Look kids, Big Ben,  Houses of Parliament". Perhaps, and I realise this is crazy talk, the issue here is that creators should retain control of,  and be appropriately compensated for, their creations, as they would if they had worked in many other creative fields. In this instance Pat (for it is he) would have an incentive to allow me or Grant Morrison (it's a toss-up really) write Nemesis Book XI, rather than seeing the fruits of their genius make someone else money; or indeed to write it himself if he was arsed to instead of trying get his own comic going against all reason; or say he didn't want anyone to write it at all, in the Moorish manner, and all original scripts should be burnt on his funeral pyre.

Maybe we'd be on Moore & Gibson's  Halo Jones Book VIII by now,  maybe Al Ewing would be doing revolutionary things with Zombo, maybe Rick Remender's ABC Warriors would be the greatest thing ever: who knows. What I do know is that none of us would be here without Pat Mills.

We all understand the realities of the contracts that weren't or weren't signed with open eyes or otherwise, the concept of work-for-hire that most of us that type stuff for living experience, and the production/promotion costs and likely marginal profitability of 2000AD that would be affected by retrospective creator deals and IP ownership. We're not babies.

But if you don't ask,  and piss and moan,  and make yourself an irritation you don't ever get, as anyone who has ever had a weekend off, a hardhat or paid leave must surely know.

[Johnny 3 to Chris 2]

Weston is astonishing, and I love his earliest stuff (e.g. Worms and Crazy Barry, the Rogue Trooper annual) just as much as his magnum opus Killing Time and later (latest) fully formed masterpieces with their insanely crisp detail. Writes a decent story too! However I remain of the opinion that his very best work lies outside the prog, which is actually scary considering,  but leaves an opening for...

I didn't fully appreciate Hicklenton when we had him. Now I regularly seek out his work on my shelves and in my piles and try to drink it in, engrave it onto my eyeballs page by page. He was a truly unique artist, and we should be marvelling at his triumphant final Sláine story today instead of wondering what might have been.

Johnny 3 to Chris 2.

But imagine a story where Dredd has to arrest Vienna.

He already arrested his brother, and subsequently killed him. He also killed Kraken, and Nimrod. Next to that, anything less would be an anticlimax. (And the same thing would be samey.)

Fair point.

Wagner was clearly thinking about similar questions as Jayzus: we do almost get that story in the Dolman-kills-a-guy one, where Joe and Vienna fight over Dredd's attitude to his clone's conviction. And the answer is that Joe acts in a most unjudicial fashion to get Dolman off the hook. If there's a thread in the larger Dredd story that still needs teasing out, it's just how far today's Dredd will bend/break the law to protect his 'family'.

This is getting closer now and all fairness to the current artists is that they will always fight against the nostalgia factor and also that the classic artists was the first to show use some of the most awesome characters ever to appear in comics

Yeah I completely agree. The classic artists were also drawing as we were growing (for many of us any way) and learning and shaping what we like in art and what art impresses us. It will be interest to look back when we are done and see how many of the Current winners are artist who have worked through from earlier days?

Do I see a far future three-way poll taking shape? Paroled; Lifers; New Fish.

[Colin 4 to Bisley 1.]

Bisley is one of the most important artists in the history of the comic,Black Hole and Horned God tower above all in their era (even Colin's early, brilliant, work is in their shadow), and he set a perhaps unfortunate but ultimately crucial target for many who came after - including Colin.

Colin debuted about a year before Bisley, with the very funny (to me) Ulysses Sweet, and has never stopped. I've spent ages in these various poll threads singing Colin's praises, his parade of ever-evolving disparate styles, his complete understanding of storytelling, his peerless bullet wounds, his crazy jagged shadows, the purely ludicrous number of pivotal stories he's been tasked with drawing (and whether their hallowed place in the canon owes just as much to how he drew them as the stories themselves)... I could and have gone on.  It's a measure of just how good Bisley is that he's managed to claw back even a single point against this force of nature.

Colin 4 to Bisley 1.

[The Long Walk]

Did you notice (from memory) that the outfit which Nem is wearing when he visits Great Uncle Baal is the same outfit he's wearing when he arrives on Britannia?  Which we never see anywhere else...

I did indeed, though only this time!  This is exactly the kind of thing I hoped to see by going carefully at it and looking at the evolution of Kev's art in particular, but also Pat's words. The Great Uncle Baal episode is particularly interesting because it's the introduction of Grobbendonk, who we know was actually created "in" the Gothic Empire episodes: the same episode that Nemesis wears those stripey pauldrons. 

However, O'Neill's Gothic Empire opener is in what I think of as his "small figure" style, characters that seem a bit lost and disconnected in their busy panels, while the Baal episode, at least in theory, is from several years later and features his "cropped figure" style, where characters seem almost too big for their panels, big half-head shots and large silhouettes. Nemesis has also begun his transition from darkly shaded sleek head (which Talbot eventually runs with until Nem resembles a Polaris missile) to the gnarlier more open version that characterises Book III in particular. So while the elements suggest it's connected to Gothic Empire, I'm guessing that's a product of O'Neill going back to check his references for Grobbendonk, and picking up the travelling cloak at the same time.

The Baal episode is also 4 pages long. A character that has lived in my head for almost 40 years, whose voice I can still hear, and his debut (and really the bulk of his screen time) amounts to 4 pages. Those men knew how to make comics.

In the world of prose I read Stephen King's Richard Bachman's The Long Walk for the first time, courtesy of enthusiastic discussion on this very thread. I think it's the most purely horrific thing he's ever written, it consumed my dreams for over a week, and not in a good way (but also in a good way, because that's what I look for in horror). It may be the best thing I've ever read by him, not least for balancing complete nihilism with the qualities of an extended parable.  Safe to say the sexual politics are of their day, but beyond that the humanity is extraordinary.

With an invigorated enthusiasm for the man, I disrupted my carefully-ordered to-read pile and seized on Hearts in Atlantis, which so far feels like unused notes from It, but I have faith. 

Pretty sure he was in his own spin-off series in Smash!, as well... 

If he's not in use does that mean he's on the dole, man?

Clearly something in the water this evening.

He was part of Dredd's team at the end of Every Empire Falls...

Was he indeed!  I'll have to arrange a re-read, because I've no memory of that at all. I suppose I should have guessed, since I think only Mike has used him (or any of the Dredd clones, other than Rico?) since before Chaos Day.

Complete aside, but do you think Kek-W is going to throw clones into the mix in Deadworld at some point? We have the not-Judge Child, not-Booth, not-Lopez, not-Spikes, the actual-Sovs etc etc... could there be un-corrupted Sidney clones out there to challenge him? (I still insist on reading Death as the Deadworld iteration of Dredd, not Ava Eastwood, despite the very obvious parallels and the name).

More importantly, my test results came back earlier than expected, and they're negative!

Complete tangent but I think the second or third time I'd had to skip work to attend A&E I'd probably be taking photos while I'm there in case there's any doubt at a later date.

It was going that way!  I'm normally working for myself, but that was a rare spell of direct employment and while they were decent about it (I took it as leave, and made up the work on my own time, so from a certain point of view they actually benefitted...) and gave no impression they thought I was pulling a fast one, there was a general feeling of "isn't there someone else who could do it this time?". The answer being of course "no", or dear lord I would have used them - a day and night with (for one example!) a confused 75 year old with undiagnosed appendicitis on a trolley in a hospital corridor is something anyone would want to delegate. It didn't help that I'd been taking my Dad to (scheduled well in advance) consultants' appointments in prior weeks.

We parted company soon after, and while while nothing whatsoever was said, I couldn't shake the feeling that they were glad to be rid of me and my inconvenient elderly-support role.  That, and some convenient scapegoating by a partner company, and the fact that exhaustion and anxiety tipped me over into one f my trademark spells of deep prolonged depression, none of which helped my employee-of-the-week standing much. 

Sometimes even the real life needs of employees just conflict with the needs of the employer, especially in a small business environment where there's no slack or cover available. They may have to grin and bear it, but even the decent ones don't have to like it, or offer you more work after your contract finishes.  That's just how it is, you're there to make someone else money, not play happy families.

Not quite the same thing but I'm simultaneously amused and annoyed by the fact that the 1994 Judge Dredd Mega Special ran a readers poll to choose a new series for the Megazine and the results were completely ignored in favour of two pre-commissioned strips instead.

Proper order. Give the people what you think they need, not what they think they want. The latter way of thinking leads to Angel Family resurrections and boobs on the cover.

I remember the giant Meg survey that was pages of insert. That one I did complete and return, BTW, although I would stop getting the Meg shortly after, and it can't have been cheap!

Ooof, Jade Falcon, you really get knocked about. To see someone so negatively affected by a system that should exist only to help them through exactly these situations is upsetting. It's not right. 

As the Shark says, you are a being of worth irrespective of how you are made to feel by your material circumstance, things can get better that this for you, even if you can't see the path yet. I wish I could offer any useful advice, but know at least that there are a lot of us on a similar road and we understand.

[Burns' 3 to Doherty's 2.]

Have I told you lately that I hate you, Colin? WHY YOU MAKE ME CHOOSE.

I am always thrilled to see either of these artists in my prog. Doherty and Burns are both absolutely masters of supremely atmospheric colour and affecting gore, Pete having the edge with his crystal-clear action, backdrops and believable SF tech, John with his contemporary backdrops, Rubenesque women, Rococo costuming (and generally great drapery) and twinkling eyes. I love them both. 

I think it just has to be Burns by a whisker, really more because his body of work takes in more strips that I truly love: Tsar Wars & the Pirate Arc, Scorpion Dance and Chief Judge's Man, The Order, even Bendatti Vendetta, Angel Zero and Black Light make the cut largely because of his real-world art.  Even with Breathing Space and Young Death, Doherty has never really seemed to have 'that' single strip or run that he can call his own, just phenomenal contributions to so many (the best bit of Judgement Day, Justice 1, Innocence & Experience). Sort it out, Tharg.

So with real regret,

Burns' 3 to Doherty's 2.

That's a good one, Funt!