Meg 359 rookie move

[ZenArcade]

My opinion on the Meg has always been that it should be a vehicle to display the world in which Dredd lives. Cop and Angelic have utterly achieved this in the space of a few months; little else has over the past years, but I will happily forget that if they pump out more like these two tales. Z

[Ghost MacRoth]

The Meg seems to need dragging back to the core subject material from time to time. That time is definitely now.

Yup.  I know some of the Dredd-verse strips didn't work so well, (Red Razors immediately springs to mind!) but I really would prefer a poor 'other city' strip to a dull strip that has bugger all to do with Dredd.  I always thought the purpose was to expand the tales of Dredd's world...and it doesn't really do much of that anymore, more's the pity.

[Fenscape]

It's only a matter of time before Dynosty turns up as a floppy - then you'll all be begging for Ostriches lol!!

[ZenArcade]

Ach sure Dinosty wasn't all bad....it was never a good as Junker, but what was. Z

[Fungus]

Read 'Dinosty' the other day and in a nadir 90's line-up where I'm finding the progs a chore, it's huge fun. It has cropped up in people's hoped-for floppy contents. I can now see why.

[I, Cosh]

... the thing that REALLY worries me is when people start believing their hyperbole to such an extent that we might end up with a publication that looks and feels like Crisis did at the very end of it's days - when I leaf through the last 10 or so editions I can see a bunch of people who got so focussed with the direction of the brand that they totally lost the interest of their readership because it just turned into gibberish and nonsense...

Any chance you can explain what this swivel-eyed raving actually means? What hyperbole? What gibberish? Sure, I think Reaper is tedious shite as well, but it's one strip and it'll be over soon.

From Dead Zone to The Cop, Meg Dredd's been consistently head and shoulders above anything in the Prog for almost a year. In the same time, we've had the best Anderson story in a decade and a couple of debutantes - Angelic and Lawless - which were both entertaining and full of potential.

I guess we're not likely to agree: two decent stories out of four is break even for me, I've always preferred an even mix of Dredd/non-Dredd stories and New Adventures of Hitler was the second best strip in the whole run of Crisis.

[Fenscape]

Any chance you can explain what this swivel-eyed raving actually means?

Erm, when you put it like that, No. Go figure instead of trying to discount my posts in such a fashion. If you want reference material for Crisis then you can buy the complete set off me for £100 - it'll all soon come flooding back.....

[The Monarch]

Dinostys pretty damn fun i'ld certainly take it over harlem heroes anyday

[NapalmKev]

I like Reaper, I'm sure a lot of people feel the same otherwise it wouldn't be returning!

I try to avoid being too negative about strips, it's all about personal taste. Nothing I've read recently (Prog and Meg) could be considered awful.

Cheers

[Bolt-01]

I like Reaper too, and I am very aware it's not to everyones tastes, which is why anthology titles like the Meg and prog are to be applauded and supported. I'm also glad that Reaper will be moving out for a while soon as well. Having any single strip in for such a long residency can start to grate on anyone. Remember how well received Tank girl was when she first appeared in the Meg? Compare that to the shameful events that lead to Rufus saying goodbye...

Do I like everything that Tharg does? Nope, but I respect his authority. If Tharg was reduced to listening to the percentage of Squaxx here to make his decisions then it would be time to eat that cyanide poly-cup.

The message board is (in 'my' opinion) a good sounding board for the fans to share beefs, likes and thoughts. When we start to feel so entitled as to think we know better than Tharg we should take a break.

[Spaceghost]

I really do not like Reaper at all, but I think, other than that, the Meg has been on fine form for a good while now.

As has been said above, the recent Dredd stories have been some of the best material we've seen in the past 12 months in prog or Meg, the most recent Anderson story was a blinder, Angelic is a bold and fearless take on characters that were previously somewhat mono-dimensional and the Tales of the Black Museum story featuring Mean Machine was excellent.

Not to mention Lawless, which, for me, is the best non-Dredd Dreddworld strip outside of Low Life.

Admittedly, I haven't read the floppy in months as it's either stuff I've read before and didn't enjoy or stuff I have no interest in reading. I don't mind too much though, as I tend to view the floppy as an extra. I would still pay the same price for the Meg without it.

I thought it was a bit of an odd choice to fill 8 pages with an extended ad for the Mega Collection, but I wouldn't have been any happier with another 8 pages of Reaper to be honest.

Despite my distaste for Reaper, I remain very much in favour of the creator owned slot in the Meg. Numbercruncher was fantastic, as was Lilly MacKenzie (more of that please), and I'm really looking forward to Demon Nic.

With regards to Fenscape's points: I'm very sure that our comments on this forum ARE read and taken into consideration by the editorial team to a certain extent, but to suggest that because you're a paying customer, your specific demands need to be met immediately is somewhat ludicrous.

Over the last 13 years, Matt Smith has shaped 2000 AD and the Judge Dredd Megazine into their best ever incarnations and heralded in the comics' best stories since the 'golden age'. Along with Molch-R who has raised the profile of the comic and characters to unprecedented levels of popularity and worldwide exposure, and Robo-Keef's fantastic work on the graphic novel line, I can confidently say that 2000 AD and the Meg have never been in better hands.

Apologies for the cringe inducing creep-fest, but that's just how I feel.

[IndigoPrime]

I think the main problem with Reaper for me has been its dominance combined with its lethargic pace. As those numbers I posted showed, it took up to a third of the Meg's entire page count, and that's just too much for any one strip, and especially one that's so divisive. (I do wonder how people en masse might have responded to it had the strip been pulpier rather than attempting to be a movie on the page. Six-page bursts, without the cinematics, and with, I dunno, Willsher or someone on art.)

(In terms of criticism in general on this forum, I'll echo Spaceghost, in that Matt Smith has been—and continues to be—a great editor.)

[UncleBaal]

I like Reaper, it's different to pretty much any other comic out there and things like Lawless are great Dreddworld stuff. I also like the randomness of the floppy! Some of it is great, some terrible but always worth a read...

[sheridan]

Read 'Dinosty' the other day and in a nadir 90's line-up where I'm finding the progs a chore, it's huge fun. It has cropped up in people's hoped-for floppy contents. I can now see why.

I wonder how it would have fared if it had been judges on its own terms (instead of as a 'must use this material' when the comic it should have appeared in didn't materialise).  Personaly I'd be happy not just to see it in the Floppy but for a sequel to appear (in the same format - painted art, around the 60 page mark and not
widescreen comics

[staticgirl]

I think if Reaper had been much more compressed it could have been a fantastic cyberpunk tale as I liked Mills' concepts. The main middle-aged dad character pushed into terrible choices was great and apart from his 'son' and daughter, the other men and women were mostly interchangeable, which is a shame in a story of this length. Clint is an illustrative artist who produces works of great beauty (especially when they're robots - I love his work in the ABC Warriors) but I would have rather he provided the pin-ups and someone who packs in more storytelling and gestural drawing (as Clint does when he is working in pen and ink, now I come to think of it)  handled the script. I got lost towards the end because I couldn't work out who everyone was and what they were doing.

This issue's biggest likes: Dredd Story, Anderson story, the fabulous Angelic story, the pinups (one beautiful and one of them funny - although I would have preferred just one pinup per issue to keep them special), the interviews (I've always liked them) and the floppy (I've enjoyed Black Siddha more than expected, there was a lot of humour in it and I liked that Harlem Heroes back in the day).

Not so liked: The cover (only because it features a female doing that comics crouch which annoys me, her face was cool and I liked the rest of the painting and design); the reprint Holocaust squad thing which didn't seem to be a classic (to put it kindly) and certainly didn't have me yearning to go out and spend more money on it and Reaper Files - I quite liked the Reaper Files in the past as they are shorter and more packed with incident but I just want a new story in a new setting now. It's all going to look extremely handsome when it is bound together, I'll wager.

Also. That Lee Carter. Years ago when I first saw his art I thought it was a bit stiff but now he is one of my bestist, most favouritist artists going. He does lovely sad eyes and amazing atmospheric landscapes (whether urban, rural or inter-dimensional). If he illustrated Dinosty II it would still be brilliant (but please don't).