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I must be alone in finding that The Order has become too much of a straightforward adventure strip in its recent outings.

I miss the timey-wimey stuff from the first four serials, with the sense that we're watching cross-sections of a history-spanning conflict in different time periods. The more recent chase-chase-fight stuff has been a bit more sedate to me, and puts me in mind of Tharg telling Moore and Gibson to tone down the future-slang and tone up the action for Halo Jones Book Two.

Is it just me, or does the end of this week's Dredd suggest we're unexpectedly about to drop back into the various subplots about Judge Maitland that have been chugging away in the background for years?

I wasn't expecting much, as it was never planned as a swan song, though the stuff about the robots freeing themselves from Howard Quartz's control did feel like a middle finger to Rebellion, and to the mainstream comics industry in general.

In the past decade it's felt like Mills was building towards a final reckoning with Quartz in both 'The ABC Warriors' and 'Savage' so having him pop up here should have been more substantial that it turns out to be.

A series where Joe and Ro-Jaws mope around in a non-plot for weeks before a rushed action bit in the finale isn't just unsatisfying, it feels like Mills has forgotten the rules of comics storytelling that he drummed into a generation of creators back when he was in charge.

With the exception of the judges' uniforms, the costumes aren't in the least bit futuristic, and that takes me out of the story.
All 22nd-century characters should wear street couture by House of Ezquerra.

Max Normal's retro fashion tastes have finally caught on.

Have we been told at any point why Midnight Indicating Shame is so damn kick-ass not even her own people can stand up to her?

She has the potential to be a queen - and the Hive Regalis queen we've already seen looks quite formidable. And we've already see how go very effectively on the rampage against her own people before, at the end of 'Desire Paths'.

Can I nominate the Hive Regalian doing the "hands covering a gasp" gesture in the bottom right-hand panel of the penultimate page of Proteus Vex as this Prog's Most Valuable Supporting Player?

PAGE 1: Joe Pineapples moping because he'll never see the ABC Warrior again.

SUBSEQUENT PAGES: Inconsequential flashbacks showing us stuff the ABC Warriors did in more consequential, less mopey stories.

I like Tharg bigging up "the extra-length finale to Hope" when it gets two more pages than usual and is the same page count as this week's Joe Pineapples.

But... it still feels like a re-run of all the things I didn't like in that dark period of 1990s 2000 AD.

In a way I quite like the "someone hid this down the back of the planning chest two years ago and we've paid for it we've got to run it" aesthetic of it all. It feels authentically Millsian in a way that Slaine suddenly stopping at random didn't. So at least he departs 2000AD sounding like himself, albeit in a mid-1990s-wanging-on-about-Khaos tone of voice.

"My greatest fear - nanobots eating my brain!"

Bonjo Jones for the win.

Fiends feels a bit like it was planned as a one-off for an end-of-year prog but Tharg let it out two weeks too early.

The big issue around Luke Kirby might be that by licensing publishing rights to an external publisher, Rebellion could be opening an exciting new legal avenue by which McKenzie could claim ownership. But then I thought that about Zenith and Morrison and now that might be happening so I'm probably dead wrong.

update - I have received my Hardback Edition ( Number 29 of 400 - all sold out before publication ) of
The Trigan Empire Volume 4 . This is the last book (1/2 of the Volume 4 is of the art of Don Lawrence ) that will feature the artist Don Lawrence

Not quite. Lawrence returned for another stint of about 14 months immediately after the strips collected in this volume, so Book V should complete his run.

Maybe with 'The Order' coming back in February next year for its final run we could have another Hachette book compiling all the outstanding material as part of the extension. I'm hoping!

This is my hope also!