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Over at Comics Should be Good they have a feature called 'Comics Legends Revealed' dispelling or confirming comics stories many of which are Urban Myths. Anyway in honour of today movie release they are running a Dredd special. Not much new for many here I suspect but nice to see either way.

http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2012/09/21/comic-book-legends-revealed-385/

Part of Marvel Now see Richard Elson's next project at Marvel, that being Morbius the Living Vampire, which seems a very good fit. From Bleeding Cool

That a new Morbius: The Living Vampire series will be published in January, by Joe Keatinge and art by Rich Elson and will follow on from Amazing Spider-Man #699.1

Of course the selfish part of mean curses his much deserved success as it probably means new Kingdom is still a while off.

Full article.

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2012/08/25/morbius-the-living-vampire-1-for-january-from-marvel-and-more/

Has anybody else read any of this?

http://theomencomic.wordpress.com/

I got the first collection available from the above website and its bloomin' great. There's a few times in the early issues when the dialogue made me wince and it does wear its influences very much on its sleeve, AND one of the characters I found cliché (and another a little bit, the rest mind are very refreshing and well developed) that said that's all the negatives out the way. Its a well constructed, well plotted story with great characters. The 'action' sequences are pretty lo-fi but all the more exciting and enjoyable for that.

For many people (and I include myself here) at first look the art is very rough, rudimentary and simple, but as you read the book you realise quite how strong it is. Okay there are a few storytelling issues as Martin Eden learns his trade, but they are few and far between and while the art is basic there's some wonderful character moments and all the characters genuinely look different and are recognisable which is something a lot of professional arts can't claim. Its stripped to its essence but in doing that the essence of what the art wants to achieve really shines through.

Its bloomin' great stuff and I'd heartily recommend it. Volume 2 is being released at Thought Balloon which I'm hoping to get to and really looking forward to picking it up.

Well according to Bleeding Cool anyway?

http://www.bleedingcool.com/forums/front-page-comic-news/61802-andy-diggle-write-action-comics-after-grant-morrison.html

Good luck to him. My first thought is he's the polar opposite of Grant Morrison which may be what they are after. After his DD run I'd need to hear good things before giving this a whirl though. We'll see.

A solid if not outstanding Dredd aside we're as we were really.

Lenny Zero does this thing as the job kicks off, hi-octane but nowt new. In fact everything seems fast paced this Prog. Aquila (still have silly niggles about facts being wrong, which makes no sense given the premise - sigh such is they way of my head) and sets up a thrilling conclusion. Even a change of artist can't kill Ichabod's momentum. Antonio Fuso does a passible impression of the missing Mr Reardon (I assume this is the reason for the delay in the series?) but lack a little of the flair and ability to capture the scale of things, still good job.

A new 3riller has a great opening, packing a heck of a lot in what on the surface looks like a typical action number. Really enjoyed this one, great stuff.

Overall while the line-up for 1800 is very tempting I'm quite happy with the appetizer thank you very much.

Well not quite yet, but he's going to. This sounds really interesting.

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2012/08/17/philip-bond-to-draw-doctor-who-comic/

Whether Phil Bond will be enough to make me give this a go, after being very disappointed when I took my last IDW Doc Who dip, I'm not sure... but it sure is tempting...

Apologies if this is old news as I know Dandy's been struggling through relaunch to relaunch for a while, but now it seems its on the brink of cancellation, well according to The Beat

http://www.comicsbeat.com/2012/08/13/the-dandy-faces-cancellation/#more-56850

The original Guardian article here

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/aug/13/oldest-comic-the-dandy-faces-closure

Its hardly a surprise but at least The Beano seems to be doing okay at 38,000 a month... a month being the key I guess (and does Beano come awash with free gifts like most comics these days?)

Well so I recently picked up a copy of 'Ground Zero' (the second half of Peter David and Todd McFarlanes' run on the title from the late 80s) and that got me thinking I have never really had a good run on the title that fits with the Hulk I'd kinda like to read. What I mean by that is I had the first half of the Peter David run first time out and it was great fun and all but I'd really like to read a good run on the Hulk that is more a monster book. That's the Hulk book I'd like to read.

So my question is does anybody here know much about the Hulk and if so could they recommend anything. A quick search tells me Bill Mantlo and Sal Buscema's run has recently been collected (or will be) but I'm not Mantlo's biggest fan. The first Byrne run is available but that's a tiddler. The Bruce Jones issues seem to be exactly what I'm after but are they any good? Any other suggestions? The Essential Rampaging Hulk? Something else I don't know about?

Any suggestions?

Wonderful stuff, much as we were with Dredd as a highlight, Aquila great but starting to have history issues... but my daughter wants to practice typing so more later.

Well if anybodies interested over the next month or two the next stage of downsizing my collection (or making room for all the bloody new stuff I buy as call it when my very patient wife isn't about) will be taking place.

I've got a few items up this week, mainly 80s and 90s indie stuff (and Nu52 Nightwing to get a boost as I'm starting, they sell like hot cakes!). From Peep Show to Love and Rockets via Ralph Snart.

If you fancy have a nosey.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/colin-at-home/m.html?item=261074656867&sspagename=STRK%3AMESELX%3AIT&rt=nc&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649&_trksid=p4340.l2562

Just finished a re-read (first time in 14 years, yike!) and while so much has been said its unlikely I'll add anything, that's never stopped me before.

Its kinda hard to review Watchmen objectively these days, after the movie and the non storm in our comics microcosm teacup that is 'Before Watchmen', trying to read the comic as just that, a comic, is very hard. To be fair it doesn't help itself and sometimes it reads as a textbook in how to do comics well, how to place nice, neat little narrative tricks in your 4 colour wonders (which at times become a bit repetitive to be honest and lost their impact). Its so multi-layer but ultimately that's often so self-referential that that too became almost cliche...

... and there you have another problem, that assessment is probably unfair. I make it as the story has become so embedded in the fabric of the mainstream comics we read today, that its hard to remember quite what it was like to read it when it came out, or as I did in about 88, when the trade was released (was it? That's when I think it was?). Like The Beatles in pop music its been so ingrained in the consciousness as the best example of the form, and therefore the biggest influence on the form, its becomes a self fulfilling prophecy, in a positive feedback cycle. It'll be awhile yet, I suspect, until a more balanced reassessment of the book can take place. I think that's starting to been seen with The Beatles, though that might be more to do with Macca getting on more people's tits these days??? Arh parallels, hey, parallels. Anyway I digress, its good, its very bloody good, but its far from perfect and far from the best example of comics out there.

Was it the best example of comics out there when it was released. The answer is still no. Was it the best example of mainstream comics out there when it was released, well maybe. I'd disagree with that, but then I can see an argument for it being so. Technically and as a piece of craft work maybe. The books I feel are better are all to do with the subjective desires I bring to what I'm reading, so that's a harder one to untangle.

Its does some things very successfully. I love its use of time, not just in its beginning and end, but the way we are unable to see the world as Jon does, with every event happening at the same time. That's a bit of genius right there. Its central plot however is very simple and issue 10, for example is pretty poor, as Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons realised that they'd better get on with sorting out the story that is meant to be driving things forward. The plot isn't the most important thing, the wonderful work on the characters is, but still it needed to be handled better than that I'd dare to suggest. Reading it today I was amazed how apparent it seemed that Adrian Veidt was the big bad. He's really underdeveloped prior the the 'big reveal' and so there was little impact when its made. Though fair to say that might be a victim of having read the thing 4 or 5 times already!

The character work is fantastic, just the characters aren't that engaging, on one level at least. Yes they are fantastically realised, yes they are real and rounded, but they are in so many ways completely unsympathetic. We're talking about a book here were for many the stand out character is Rorschach, that defines a great deal about the mood of the piece.

Failings aren't usually a word associated with the comic, but that fact (Rorschach being it most celebrated character) is an example of its biggest failing. In the beautiful text piece 'Blood from the shoulder of Pallas' Moore discusses the fact that the more you examine something of beauty with a clinical eye, the more you lose sight of that beauty that first drew you to the thing you are studying. I always read that as Moore's ode to the books objectives, he's warning us to be careful about how we look at the superheroes he (we - in my case) love. The Watchmen has been said, by both Moore and Gibbons to be a work of affection, just with a clinical eye, a real evaluation. On this level its an utter failure. In no way does Watchmen show any love for the genre and the consequences that it reaped are to be utterly expected, even if they weren't the aims the creators set out with.

As for clinical and realistic, well in some ways it is, but in other ways its not. Well its certainly clinical, but realistic? On one level yes, on another level in its attempts to seek realism it only proves that trying to do so is ridiculous. Serious, yes superhero comics (or films, whatever) can be serious and mature, but realistic, not in the way that term is normally used, in the Grant Morrison way of viewing realism, well yes, but in the way I believe this comic was attempting, no. The minute you bend reality to accommodate the archetypes the creators were looking to use, you have failed in a realistic evaluation. Its a none starter.

That said 'Blood from the shoulder of Pallas' shows one of the comics great strengths. Its so deep and rich that each reading gives you more and more, something many modern comics (often imitators of this work) could really learn from. On this reading I got an additional insight from the text piece I'd missed before, that of the relationship between Rorschach and Niteowl from Dan's perspective. Oh and from a purely practical point of view it was great to read a 32 page comic that takes 30 minutes plus to read, rather 10 minutes!

I made a comparison between Watchmen and The Beatles before, ultimately, since I'm doing the silly comparison thing, I think in reality its more like a post Syd Barrett Pink Floyd. Technically astonishingly accomplished, just sometimes rather letting that overshadow what rock and rock should be about, even, dare I say it, lacking soul. 

So there we have it Watchmen is great, but presents a great danger of being placed on a pedestal (well it did that 35 minutes ago). Its far from perfect, though I'm not sure anyone has seriously gone as far as to say it is? It certainly didn't single handedly start a revolution in the ways comics can be used, ever mainstream ones. It was part of a movement towards the maturing of comics that was already underway, but became the poster boy for that movement. I truly believe therefore it has had it significance raised over and above what it is. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE don't read that as meaning I don't think its is significant, it is, it clearly is, I just believe that significance has been overestimated and comics, including the mainstream, would be pretty much where they are now with or without the Watchmen. Some specifics might have been different (as I said its massively influential), but the mediums progression in America would have carried on unabated. It draws on so many things that were already happening, so many comics that had already been created, and just happened to be one of the first two that really pulled it all together.

Its good, even great, but its not divine.

(I've started a new thread for this rather than put it in either the 'Before Watchmen' thread, or the 'What's everyone reading thread' to avoid either of those being derailed... though there is of course ever chance that my random wittering the most discussed comics ever will, would quietly slip into ignored oblivion wherever I put them!)

Over at Bleeding Cool they have a linkie to a video of an interview with Dave Gibbons shot at some videogame conference. Only 20 minutes in but its very interesting from a couple of perspective, as its not got a comics audience it starts as a conversation about heroes in general. Its also as interesting view of the way a sympathetic but not home audience deals with the subject.

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2012/07/27/dave-gibbons-dismisses-before-watchmen-as-really-not-canon/

So 2000ad stuff at about 8 minutes and a lot of Watchmen stuff so far. Good stuff.

Over at CBR Andy Diggle has done a big old interview celebrating 2000ad.

http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=40035

Not had a chance to read this fully yet and might not until the morning so can't comment BUT there seems to be some interesting answers to Pat Mills and his oft heard option on Mr Diggle and his time as editor.

We can never mock Kickstarter again, never I tell you.

It took me two years and £20 is track down a copy of 'The Wild shall wild remain' and I got it only a few months ago (and was amazed how cheap). Now this a 'Kickstarter' appeal (is that the right word?) to produce a new shiny signed and number hardcover editon, with a new 8 page story. $50 gets the book, but there are of course loads more options.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/592668574/flaming-carrot-hardback-and-digital-comics#

Come on people get behind this the more money we throw at Bob Burden the more likely we are to get more Flaming Carrot and that is the only way to escape this Global recession... at least I'm pretty certain it is...

...well whatever Flaming Carrot is one of the greatest comicbook creations ever so who cares.

Every 4 or 5 years this comes but, but you never know it might happen this time.

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2012/07/23/blakes-7-reboot-on-the-cards-with-james-bonds-two-time-hero-at-the-helm/

If nothing else this linkie has a fantastic compilation of Avon's insults. Genius!

Well since we have reached the end and it'll be in the shops tomorrow, I've been thinking a lot about Nikolai Dante and the impact its had on The Galaxies Greatest.

I've just finished a re-read, which I've done over the last few months in three chunks and while you have to be a little careful saying stuff like this, it might well be my favourite ever 2000ad strip. Okay so when the dust has settled a little more I'll have a much clearer view on that, but its certainly in the mix. It now stands as a complete story with a beginning, middle and end (what a wonderful end), something Dredd will never have. Every action and event in the series has had a consequence and things have reverberated throughout its history, again something Dredd struggles with at times. Its been the work of just one writer, telling one tale and is so strong for that, in a way Dredd by its nature will never quite manage.

On top of that it had the epic scale, just look at Monarch's 'Too Cool to Kill' series over at ECBT to get the idea of quite what a saga its been. Its vast and yet intimate and focused. That scale probably puts it ahead of the best of John Smith's various works of genius for me (well probably, just wait 'til I read one again to see me flip flop over that one!). So in writing this I'm almost convincing myself that its the best strip the comic has ever had... time will tell.

As I've said before, here and elsewhere, I think it, alongside Sinister Dexter and Wagner's return to Dredd may well have saved the comic in the late 90s. They formed a foundation that David Bishop as Tharg's little helper was able to rebuild the comic from, after the creative nadir of the mid 90s. Its going to be hard to replace, but then the beauty of 2000ad is it variety and versatility and there are so many strong strips fighting for a place in the comic at the moment that hopefully its absence won't be felt too keenly overall. Well assuming the Kingdoms, Sinister Dexters, Zombos, Indigo Primes (and numerous others) of this world don't have too prolonged a rest.

Looking forward I really hope that the marketing and trade folk find a market for this series to stay in the spotlight. Under other publishers you'd think the past trade collections wouldn't have floundered so long out of print (though of course I have no knowledge of the economics of this) and there'd be a big push to keep them in print and accessible for all to get hold of. I've no idea how the first American trade did, but the lack of a pre-listed 2nd in series, a year after the first was released worries me a bit. Mind that might be paranoia on my part, or a focus of Dredd for the time being for obvious reasons, who knows (Well Keith Richardson I imagine if he'd like to chip in!).

Personally I'd absolutely love to see a shiny set of posh oversized hardcover cover collections, maybe fitting the series into say 5 volumes (the logistics of story breaks I've not even approached there). That would be fantastic. Something like the DC absolute editions, just perfect, but possibly the stuff of fantasy, I don't know. Think about how many times a series like Sandman can be repackaged! I just think Dante deserves this kind of treatment and hopefully if the world ever starts to take real notice of what seems to be our best kept secret, it'd certainly find the market.

To that end its a shame that the world at large doesn't seem to be aware of Dante. Where are all the articles on the big news sites discussing the fact that this classic series is ending. Where is CBRs interviews with Robbie Morrison and Simon Fraser discussing what the strip has achieved. Why hasn't Newsarama run one of its endless top 10s on the greatest moments in the series, I can't find a panel at San Diego spotlighting the work etc etc. How have we managed to keep Dante hidden and too ourselves for so long?

Maybe it'll take the much dreamed of TV series, or movie to get that sort of thing started... but I've gone on quite enough and that's the inevitable whitterings of another time for now.

I'd personally just like to thank Robbie Morrison, Simon Fraser, John Burns, Annie Parkhouse and all the various other talents that have created this wonderful series for making what I think (see above) is probably the best single series ever in the Galaxies Greatest Comic!

(Which I assume makes it the Galaxies Greatest series... coh who knew!)

Not seen a thread for this but apologise if I missed it. Anyhoo

Aside from having a great title I didn't release the mighty Brendan McCarthy has had input on this.

Production on the film has finally kicked off in Namibia. Bleeding Cool understands that Brendan McCarthy's early input is still making up a good part of Miller's plans for the film and from what we know of those plans, this is big, brash but still very inventive and smart stuff.

That makes it sound very exciting.

Full story.

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2012/06/29/mad-max-fury-road-to-be-shot-in-2d-after-all-then-converted-to-3d/

Okay I'm going to try to keep this general, though the specifics that have motivated it are pretty clear, but its also something I've been thinking about for some time, well a few years in fact.

When Hollywood picked up on the superhero thing big time I remember when each new film was announced, so X-Men, Spider-man etc I'd get very excited, really excited. I'm a big Daredevil fan and so when that was announced I was over the moon, look how that turned out! Now I rarely bother with comic book based films.

The thing is the vast majority of comic book adaptations aren't going to be that good as the comics and certainly not the story we as fans have come to love, as by its very nature adapting a comic to film wil,l by and large, be about compromise. Taking the elements, from all fronts, look and design, feel and tone, story etc etc and using what fits, manipulating what you can get to work and rejecting the rest. Sometimes this works, some times its doesn't (its the same with book adaptations but I'm sticking to comics here), as with all films.

The thing is, because of this its always going to be a compromised, almost always reduced, product. Over the years two film have really made me think about this in particular and they are both films I enjoyed. 'Mystery Men' as I understand it started out as a Flaming Carrot adaptation, which was soon dismissed as never going to work and so Flaming Carrot was moved to the role filled by Captain Amazing, but again it was decided that a mainstream audience just couldn't handle it and so he was cut altogether. The film is still fun, it still has a little of the sense and tone of the comics, but unless it was shot by John Waters that was never going to happen completely. Its so compromised why make it an adaptation? I guess its just the way these things develop over time, but still did anybody from the outset really think they'd make a Flaming Carrot film that'd sell?

The 'Watchmen' film for all the debate around it, my biggest problem with it was the best bits were when it lifted straight from the comic and was like watching the comics on screen. A compromised, compressed version, that just made me think I'd have been better off re-reading the comics again rather than watching the film.

Okay so why do we get excited? We seem to still need to get the acceptance of 'mainstream' media. Like little ol' comics are some how validated by big ol' Hollywood. But in getting that acceptance the product we love is often so compromised as to be far from what we as fans would like. Which doesn't make for a bad film sometimes as I want to repeat.

There is the hope that the exposure will led to increased sales and greater stability in the industry, this is a fantastic aim, but one that after what, ten years or more of movies, hasn't really seen happen (???), at least as far as I can see.

So why as fans do we continue to get excited about comic films? Why don't we embrace the enjoy the fact that they are there and hope that that will bring benefit to the industry and thus longevity to the characters we love, while accepting that the film themselves are very likely going to be not as enjoyable as the comics that inspired them?

Or am I wrong, do people think there are comic adaptations out there that are better and more entertaining than the comics that inspired them?

(Little note at the end here to make a point that might become distracting clear, I like the Dredd trailer, I think it looks like a fun film, but I don't think spending 2 hours watching it will leave me with as good a story as two hours re-reading say 'Day of Choas')

This is loads of fun.

http://ohotmuredux.blogspot.co.uk/

I used to love these Handbooks and the art on these reprises is fantastic.

Well Johnny Rotten advertises marg, Iggy sells insurance and now Grant Morrison accepts an MBE for services to literature. Cool recognition for the industry, but man oh man.

Apologise for no linkie but on my mobile. News over at Bleedingcool.com