Messages

31

General / Re: Sideshow Vote: To be, or not to be? That is the question

« on: 04 May, 2022, 11:55:11 AM »

One of the things that has helped a bunch of kids comics become massive sales smashes is, of course, TV (ok Netflix) adaptations: Hilda, Captain Underpants, most recently Heartstopper.

Are there any Regened stories that may ever entice some animation comapny to have a go, I wonder?

Sadly it's still much easier to get animation made when it's aimed at kids/youf, miuch as we're all still waiting on that (presumably more grown-up) ABC Warriors thingy.

32

General / Re: Forum’s Favourite Thrill - Mean Machine vs. Storming Heaven Round 2 Heat 125

« on: 04 May, 2022, 11:49:27 AM »

I agree there's much to admire in Storming Heaven, but overall it's a bit of a misfire for me, I guess I'm just not that into stories of super-powered evil people (see also Ten Seconders). That first solo Mean Machine series, though, with Richard Dolan art, that was just proper hilarious. Some of the one offs were good for a few jokes, including those mini Robert McCallum strip cartoons. Agree that Son of Mean was only OK.

But still, Mean Machine is one of the all-time great comedy villains, and he was actaully well-served in his solo efforts, better even than some of his Dredd outings.

Mean Machine for me, but it's looking like a close contest today!

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General / Re: Forum’s Favourite Thrill - Alienist vs. Skip Tracer Round 2 Heat 126

« on: 04 May, 2022, 09:08:15 AM »

Seems we've spent a bit of energy talking about Skip Tracer lately; it's enough for me to say that I'm a big fan of, and will heartily vote for the Alienist.

(It's long overdue a return, hope that is indeed on the cards)

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General / Re: Sideshow Vote: To be, or not to be? That is the question

« on: 04 May, 2022, 09:03:13 AM »

I wouldn't buy the Regened Progs if they were a seprate thing, and even though they do aim at younger readers and as such don't often appela to me, I do massively appreoctate the fact that they force creators to try new ideas, and to some extent encourage Tharg to take a chance on new creators, and that injection of innovation has been as successful as e.g. the early 1990s Megazine.

So yeah, I vote to keep on going with the current version of a handful of Progs per year interrupting the regular Prog, and good luck to the trade collections!

35

General / Re: Forum’s Favourite Thrill - Pandora Perfect vs. Creep Round 2 Heat 124

« on: 03 May, 2022, 10:54:44 AM »

Creep was for me the epitome of annoying 1990s comics characters who were cooler and more powerful than anyone else just because the writer willed it so, with no explanation but more annoyingly not enough of a reason why such a character is interesting. But, you know, the art and setting genuinely were creepy.

Pandora Perfect is not my fave charming heist caper 2000AD thrill, but it is at least a very good version of that form, so it's gettin' my vote.

Closer so far than I would have ever imagined!

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General / Re: Forum’s Favourite Thrill - Brink vs. Mercy Heights Round 2 Heat 123

« on: 03 May, 2022, 10:49:43 AM »

I mean, Mercy Heights I'm sure sounded like a great concept and it filled a nice niche in the Prog for a bit - but it just never went anywhere. Too much spacewar, not enough soap opera.
Brink is all those things and so much more, can't get enough of it.

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General / Re: Forum’s Favourite Thrill - Durham Red vs. Return to Armageddon Round 2 Heat 122

« on: 03 May, 2022, 10:47:40 AM »

Big fan of Return to Armageddon, but it is certainly one of those long-running stories that ran aground a bit, can see a lot of people really hating the ending (it gets better the more you re-read it, for whatever that's worth). It's never going to be an all-time classic, even though the best bits are proper weird, and the art is an amazing showcase for what 2000AD can be. Look, you've got a man who is more or less melting in front of you who is in constant pain but who can't be killed and is sort of on the run from his twin brother who is literally the Devil. Also it's set in space.

Durham Red is an all-time great character, but for me has never had an all-time great story, even including the times she's appeared in Strontium Dog. I like Island of the Damned quite a bit, and I like a lot of the ideas Abnett put into his trilogy, but think Harrison was maybe 10 years too early on it. The art surely IS spectacular, and unlike anything else at the time, but if it didn't grab you it pulled the whole strip down with it.

It's tough, but I'm going with the weird but self-contained charm of Return to Armageddon.

38

General / Re: Sideshow Vote: We all are going on a summer holiday

« on: 03 May, 2022, 10:35:55 AM »

I loved it and loathed it, I think.
It can't be undertstated how much teen me would be led by Tharg's own words. Every time there was a new jumping on Prog, it was a big deal, and I'd get hyped for the new stories, and assumed that if they weren't good it was somehow my failure as a reader. The Summer Offensive wasn't just a big deal, it was a BIG DEAL, and Tharg and co kept on telling me how much silly fun it all was, even more silly and more fun than anything since the Prog went full-colour.

And for all that this sounds like some sort of gaslighting, I kind of miss the youthful feelings of getting excited for something new, no matter the actual quality of said new thing. I'd say this pattern kept going for me until around Prog 950, when I was perhaps at last mature enough to form my own opinions. By this point the Prog was more competent than the 800s had been, but also rather more dour and boring - up until the Pit and Nikolai Dante came along to energize the whole thing.

So yeah, the stories in the Summer Offensive are not good, barring Slaughterbowl, the art is more or less great, and the hype factor remains sufficiently immense.

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General / Re: Forum’s Favourite Thrill - VCs vs. Citi-Def Round 2 Heat 121

« on: 03 May, 2022, 10:24:10 AM »

Got to be the strongest shut-out yet, given how good VCs is (and I'll agree the Dabnett stuff is BETTER, although the Leach art is best), and conversely how forgotten / really rather bad anyway Citi-Def is. Again, elevated a bit by Jack Lawrence art, but he's more suitable to Regened fare than a gritty Megazine artist if you ask me.

Anyway, VCs forever, I can see them troubling the semis if they get some decent draws.

40

General / Re: Dredd strip in UKCAC 1987 brochure

« on: 03 May, 2022, 09:41:32 AM »

This strip is kind of amazing, a real window on how Wagner and Grant c. 1987 were thinking about Dredd, somewhat more actively nasty than he maybe is now. But also that much more of a comedy strip, too.

41

General / Re: Forthcoming Thrills - 2022

« on: 29 April, 2022, 03:01:40 PM »

Ooh, fun game!

Judge Dredd: I love a Man in Uniform

Anderson, Psi Division: The Windmills of my Mind

Sinister Dexter: Hit me with your Rhythm Stick

Judge Death: ...And Justice for All

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Prog / Re: Dredd: The Citadel

« on: 29 April, 2022, 02:56:35 PM »

Deeply impressed by your analysis and line of questions, Tjm! I tend to read Wagner stories with an eye mostly to the surface level, because he's a world class entertainer. But I think you've hit on something not so far below the surface when you talk about us long-term readers being stand ins for both Winterton and Chopra, where we look back on what Dredd used to be like, is like now, and 'should' be in either time period.

There's another thread going about if Dredd is hero or villain and this story is a classic example of him being both, not least because we get to see two versions of Dredd behainvg slightly differently. 'Our' Dredd is heroic in the straight reading of the story, where the clone was a Sov, Dredd intuited it, then it was confirmed moments before his accidental death. But he's also a villain because his treatment of the cadets and Cit-Def alike is SO very harsh we can't quite bear it - even if we might sneakily think that it's justified in a war setting.

And Dredd is arguably a villain even more clearly in how Winterton is treated. Whether Winterton's version of the story is true or not, they chose to lock him away for 40 years for spurious 'mustn't do anything to upset the power of the state' reasons.

But also there's nothing specific to this story that challenges Dredd's world as such, it's more of a ripping yarn with a reminder that the Judges like to control the narrative as much as any given Totalitarian state.

43

General / Re: Duplicate stories: The Mega Collection (TMC) vs Complete Case Files (CCF).

« on: 29 April, 2022, 01:11:43 PM »

In terms of quality of story, basically everything up to and including CF11 (the one with Oz in) is GREAT (Well maybe not CCF 1). However, the print quality + the heft of the CCF books for that era mean it's not the best way to read lots of those stories, especially when giant double-page scenes get lost in the gutter. If you've worked out which specific Dredd tales you're missing, I'd recommend buying some original Progs rather than using a Case File, especially if it's only a couple of stories in that Case File. But of course they don;t sit so nicely on a shelf.

Once the CCFs get into the full-colour era with CCF 12, those problems disappear - but then you have to deal with the reality that most of the stories not picked for Mega Collection treatment are perhaps not the best of Dredd. Although there are no Case Files that are ALL bad, always some John Wagner goodness and great art to savour.

44

General / Re: Space Spinner 2000AD

« on: 29 April, 2022, 01:03:17 PM »

So now that the show is done with the Summer Offensive, and our beloved hosts have expressed clear opinions on it, I've been desperately trying to remember what it felt like at the time. Bearing in mind that I was 15 years old (just), and the only opinions I had access to were my big brother + Tharg's input page. Big Dave may have been "shocking" but it didn;t make the news or get the comic discussed in Parliament or anything.

Both of us loved Slaughterbowl, which got zero love from Tharg at the time, glad to have that vindicated!

I had a vague feeling that we at home thought Inferno was just a bit silly, but that plenty of readers liked it, only to find that in the last 20 years it has become perhaps THE most despised Mega Epic. Really & Truly I've an idea people kinda thought was cool at the time? Maybe it was just that Rian Hughes's art was so unlike anything else in the Prog, and the concept of a drug-fuelled road trip itself felt novel. I wanted to like it but didn't get it - and now it turns out it's just smug and dull. No one then or now has any opinons on Maniac 5. Sure it's violent enough but it's neither clever nor stupid enough to stand out in any way.

Which leaves of course Big Dave, and I'm pretty sure the vibe at the time was 'if you're one of the cool clever kids, you think this is GREAT.' If you don't like it - and plenty didn't - you're just not getting it. Mostly I remember not understanding the joke, although I'd side with Conrad vs Fox in that at the time I was definitely aware of the 'Sun' style speech and got most of the topical/political references, even if I didn't find them funny. I think the only joke that landed for me was teaming up Big Dave with a steroided version of Terry Waite. In hindsight, it feels like Grant n Mark new what they wanted to do, but didn't really know how to do it. At least it actually WAS offensive. And I will say that the way Tharg hyped the whole thing, combined with the utterly non-serious tone of all the strips, did kind of work to make the Prog feel more vital and fresh for those 8 weeks.

Very tempted to vote for the whole lot as the year's MVP, it's still a focal point for discussion. Go on Tharg, dare you to do a special Regened 'totally offensive' Prog for the 30th anniversary next year...

45

Prog / Re: Prog 2279 - Past Crimes

« on: 29 April, 2022, 12:44:33 PM »

That final Future Shock panel of the mushroom cloud made of skulls... one of the best single panels in AGES.