2000 AD - The Ultimate Collection

[sintec]

Yeah 2nd extension should begin in Jan by my reckoning too. The Hachette web team have been pretty tight-lipped about the exact contents beyond the initial list they dropped and that section of spine image. I suspect that's probably because they (the web team) have not been given a full list tbh.

[sintec]

Just finished Mercy Heights. Definitely the weakest book we've had for a while imo. Probably the weakest of the 1st extension so far I think. The first story was the best of the 3 but still wasn't really anything to write home about. There are some good ideas in there, the setting/concept is sound but it seemed more interested in the bigger space opera storyline than exploring that. The one off Dead of Winter was pretty atrocious; it was basically just an excuse to draw a female character in the buff and set up a "do the curtains match the drapes" gag, uh fuck the 90s. Then the 2nd long arc pretty much abandons the ER in space concept for a high stakes destruction of the galaxy by ancient alien tech story. It's serviceable enough but I didn't really care enough about any of the characters to feel like any of it really mattered. I also didn't get along with Trevor Hairsine's art on the first few episodes either which didn't really help matters. The four Tor Cyan stories at the end really showed up the earlier material. Nice little concise tales that didn't outstay their welcome. A little bit of world/character building and a conclusion and move on. Also Kev's art on these is lovely (as were his early episodes of MH).

Reading MH I couldn't help but compare it to Abnett's Grey Area. Both have a team of characters working in a dangerous environment with alien races. Grey Area takes it's time to introduce the world and the characters though. That run of short tales do so much to build the relationships between the characters and the background of the world (and the aliens) they interact with. MH just seemed to go straight in for the epic storyline - the hospital-ness is just a convenient plot hook rather than an interesting setting.

Last book of Red Seas was great though. Fantastic swashbuckling fun. Gonna have to schedule in a re-read for those at some point.

[Dark Jimbo]

The four Tor Cyan stories at the end really showed up the earlier material. Nice little concise tales that didn't outstay their welcome. A little bit of world/character building and a conclusion and move on. Also Kev's art on these is lovely (as were his early episodes of MH).

Yeah, I'm not sure I would hang on to this book if it weren't for the Tor Cyan stories, which I love (and Kev's art is glorious). It's a real shame we didn't get the conclusion.

Like you say, half the problem is that MH jumps straight for the epic multi-part storylines without any build-up or introduction of the characters. I'm also not sure about the fact that Lilla Ferro (one of only two female characters of any note) is, variously, the love interest of Lydecker, Kintry and Cyan.

[IndigoPrime]

Mercy Heights was an odd one for inclusion. Out of two 'ER in space' strips in the Prog, it's the inferior option. And it's a great pity half of the Tor Cyan strips—which are objectively great—likely won't show up now (unless they end up in War Machine).

As for the next extension, I think I'll can my sub at 111/2 unless a full list is published—and even then, I'm fairly likely to. This first extension has—mostly—been really solid. It plugged holes that needed filling (notably, Red Seas and John Smith strips) and has had few mis-steps. I suspect there will be the odd post-111 book I'll pick up, but what we know so far finds the run delving into strips I don't care for (Blunt), runs I already have HC collections for (Leviathan; Ro-Busters; Brass Sun) and stories I'll be quite happy to never read again (Finn).

I suppose the contrast here is that on seeing the 80–111 list, I was hugely excited about what we'd be getting. Firekind and Red Seas won that out for me, but some of the other stuff was great too. But I'm not getting that feeling now, and my bookshelves are essentially full. If I'm going to have to start doing 'one in, one out', I'm not giving up a great book for Finn!

[Dark Jimbo]

As a cherry-picker since the beginning, I'm just happy to wait and see what comes up. Looking forward to Leviathan, Cradlegrave, Ro-Busters, and (surprisingly) more Sinister Dexter* - hoping for Machine Law/Guatemala, a 2nd Stickleback, a 2nd Kingdom, maybe Armoured Gideon.



*I wasn't even going to bother with the original three S/D books originally, but I really enjoyed them. There should be material for at least two more great collections before it all starts getting a bit navel-gazing.

[IndigoPrime]

I've started rereading mine to see what I'd have ditched with cherry picking. It's interesting so far. I liked Ace Trucking a whole lot more than I remembered, but could happily live without Robo-Hunter. Yet had I cherry picked, I'd have likely flipped those. That said, I now paid ten quid for Greysuit, so...

[sintec]

And it's a great pity half of the Tor Cyan strips—which are objectively great—likely won't show up now (unless they end up in War Machine).

Yeah it will be a real shame if we only get half of the Tor Cyan strips. It feels like those were the only good argument for including Mercy Heights in the first place.

I'm also not sure about the fact that Lilla Ferro (one of only two female characters of any note) is, variously, the love interest of Lydecker, Kintry and Cyan.

Yep she also gets a shower room scene (another connection point with Grey Area). Not the progs finest hour in terms of female characters.

I've started rereading mine to see what I'd have ditched with cherry picking. It's interesting so far. I liked Ace Trucking a whole lot more than I remembered, but could happily live without Robo-Hunter. Yet had I cherry picked, I'd have likely flipped those. That said, I now paid ten quid for Greysuit, so...

I first joined the forum because I wanted to get some info on the contents of the series to try and gauge the value proposition in subscribing. Both Ace and Robo-Hunter were on my "probably junk" list so I'd have skipped them if I'd cherry-picked. I really enjoyed Ace though it's good sunday morning cartoons fun (with stunning art). On the other hand I could have lived without reading any of Robo-hunter (although the art on Verdus is great.

Tbh those 3 Robo-hunter volumes are probably the only things I'd drop from the original run. The middle of Slaine was a bit meh and tbh I didn't really get on with the first volume of Stront but in both cases I'm glad they were included so that we got (mostly) complete runs on the 2 characters. The fact we got 95% of some of these runs (Slaine, Stront, Dante) is more annoying than the inclusion of the weaker sections for me but that's clearly a ymmv kinda thing.

Greysuit and MH are the only books I'd drop from the current extension (although I'd want to find an alternative home for the Tor Cyan stuff somewhere, preferably with the rest of the run).

5 shit books out of 102 is better than I was expecting going in. But yeah I do worry the next extension is going to be a bit more hit and miss and start to drag that ratio down.

[Swerty]

Funny you say that I cherry picked Mercy Heights

[Bad Andy]

I've only read about 30% of the collection so far but I am struggling with Nemesis so much. I remember really enjoying it when I was younger and now I pick up Book 3 and see that John Hinckleton is a main artist. Ugh.

Books 19 - 28 - Nemesis/ABC Warriors and then 80 odd books of Slaine. I'm going to struggle there.

[IndigoPrime]

I'm not up to those yet. I suspect I'm going to thoroughly enjoy Nemesis up to Gothic Empire and then get frustrated by diminishing returns. I'll like ABC Warriors through Black Hole and the initial B+W semi-reboot, but won't care for the colour strips. And then Sláine... Tomb of Terror aside, I recall that being great through Horned God, pretty variable for years, and then having a return to form during Invasions. Here's hoping, because otherwise that is going to be a horrible slog.

[leethomson]

Does the Absalom book have Graduation Day in it?

It does, making it another series complete in the collection.

Does it have Sick Note, 'cos that wasn't in the Cabbalistics volume? Trying to figure out if I should hold onto the paperbacks or give them to my brother. This collection has been a godsend to him!

[abelardsnazz]

Does the Absalom book have Graduation Day in it?

It does, making it another series complete in the collection.

Does it have Sick Note, 'cos that wasn't in the Cabbalistics volume? Trying to figure out if I should hold onto the paperbacks or give them to my brother. This collection has been a godsend to him!

Full contents of Absalom are:

Sick Leave
Dirty Postcards
Old Pals' Act
Under a False Flag
Family Snapshots
Terminal Diagnosis Books 1 & 2
Graduation Day

[leethomson]

Fantastic!

[sintec]

Oh that's some interesting facting there sintec. If you ever get bored - and accepting I could get off my lazy arse and do this BUT also accepting that lazy arse is VERY lazy would be great to see this data by year and see if I can tally it with with my favourite years in thrill-power.

Had some time off work so finally got around to organising the data by year. Graph includes everything up until the Absalom book (thanks for the contents list abelardsnazz).



Going from this it seems the curators thinks the first golden age is 82-85 and the 2nd golden age is 2008-2012. Saying that it's worth noting that most of the rest of this first extension is going onto the right hand end of the graph. Only the Tyranny Rex and Tales Of Telguuth volumes break the trend with earlier material. Defoe, Brink, Grey Area, The Order, Dredd: Small House are all 2013 onwards. Not sure if there's enough content to get any of those years up towards the 75% line though - have to wait and see.

Also shout out to 1999 which was apparently an excellent year (helped out by the inclusion of the recent Mercy Heights volume but also Dante, Sinister Dexter: Eurocrash, Dredd: Doomsday, Devlin: Chasing Herod, Nemesis: book X)

Next time around I might try and do the different UC extensions in different colours. Feels like this one has focused a little more heavily on the newer generation of strips/writers. Would be interesting to see if that's true.

[davidbishop]

1999 was definitely the peak year of my time bearing the Rosette of Sirius - everything commissioned by us, no leftover fillers, no misguided attempts at being newsworthy, just lots of killer trills and a real sense of building up to the year 2000. Lots of credit to Andy Diggle for helping drive that, obvs!