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When did 2000ad get good again.

Started by BPP, 04 July, 2019, 11:38:40 AM

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BPP

Reading the excellent prog slog that ended in the low 700s made me grimace that it ended around the time 2000ad got....hummm.... pretty poor. I stuck with the prog till the low 900s then bailed till around 1450. It struck me recently that the odd strip aside 2000ad has been pretty awesome since then (2005).

I've started a re-read from 1400 (Wagner / Cam Dredd (Drekk City). Caballistics Inc, Flint on ABC Warriors, Strontium Dog and Bec and Kawl) and it's all (mostly) great stuff that stands up 15 years later. Even the megazine (still in the era of charley's War / hell trekkers reprints) is excellent with Wagner / Weston Dredd (Six), Ranson Anderson, cursed earth Koburn, Simping detective and Black Siddha.

So the question is - given 2000ad definitely had a low period (you can argue when)... when did it get good again? Properly good. Four out of five strips if they were new next week you'd lap them up good?
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IndigoPrime

I suppose everyone will have their own opinion. For me, the 800s and 900s were rocky, albeit with glimpses of greatness. The Pit was of course towards the end of that time. And there were other crackers fighting to be seen among the dross. Many of them were John Smith efforts, but also you had the likes of Button Man 2 and Luke Kirby. (I also still personally rate a lot of Armoured Gideon, even though I know it's not quite so widely loved!)

Rummaging around Barney, the rot continued into the 1000s though. Early post-1000 Progs had Wagner Dredd but some so-so Sláine, Steve White's divisive Rogue Trooper, and the forgettable pairing of Black Light and Outlaw. 1034's reboot, though, is interesting, bringing with it a run of Al's Baby, Dredd, Mercy Heights, Nikolai Dante and Sláine. It dips again around 1060 (A Life Less Ordinary; Spacegirls), but from 1100, you're on pretty sold ground again.

Jim_Campbell

Per Colin's re-read thread, I think you can probably say that the prog was on a solid footing again by '98/99 — the odd mis-fire and occasional stinker, but reliably more good than bad strips for the vast majority of the time. As I said on Colin's thread, it's remarkable to think that, although there have certainly been periods which have failed to enthuse the Squaxx since then, we haven't seen a bad year* in 2000AD for about twenty years.

*For the sake of argument, let's call it a whole year where you've thought there were more bad stories than good pretty much every week. There's often been a gem or two lurking in an otherwise turgid spell.
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IndigoPrime

Yep. Matt Smith's spell as editor in particular has been quite something, given that creators keep buggering off to the USA. He's helmed a remarkably solid run, and I suspect most people griping about 2000 AD are just jaded, or have rose-tinted glasses for the good old days. The amount of crap he gets from some quarters just astounds me.

(Going back to re-read old Progs, there are some genuinely classic runs. But even in the so-called golden age of 2000 AD, there's a lot of shit to wade through. And even many of the series people cite as great don't actually read that well these days – they need a shot of nostalgia, to say the least.)

Dandontdare

Agreed, I'd say it was around 1999 when the norm became "several top thrills plus a duffer or two", as opposed to "the occasional gem in a sea of mediocrity"

SmallBlueThing(Reborn)

I couldn't possibly point to a period when 2000AD came out of an "extended bad patch" and into fresh pastures. I've consistently enjoyed the prog throughout its lifespan so far- even in the 90s, when all common sense tells me it "wasn't very good", I remember buying it weekly and loving it. Even if it was merely a quick twenty minute distraction from whatever the week had thrown at me.
I suppose it can't be argued that it amped up the thrills when Matt Smith took over- and while he receives some stick, I have immense respect for the man. The comic has to be exciting and relevant, after 42 years. And it bloody is.  Yeah, it's not always on point- I am less with impressed with the current Anderson story for example, and not looking forward to more Indigo Prime. But! Lots of people really like them! And we have HOPE... just around the corner, which wouldn't have been commissioned ANYWHERE ELSE.  We have more BRINK coming,  more Scarlet Traces, some very very exciting new Slaine, Dredd is still moving forward, not stagnating (even though I hate seeing his face in 'The Samaritan') with an exciting "new" writer, or maybe an old one, who knows?
Yeah, I wish Matt would change the format and design a bit (a lot, a whole lot) but that's because I want the prog to LEAP off the shelves and hit people in the face, mugging them for their groats and forcing them to the counter.

So I guess maybe I'd have to say the new golden age started when Rebellion took over. It may have stumbled a bit at the beginning, but they made up for it and then some. "A shot glass of rocket fuel" is more than just a clever soundbite, it actually did set out the plan for the future, and for the most part they've achieved it.

SBT

broodblik

For me personally the prog has been solid since 2003 (I got all the digital progs over time).  You get some mini dips but that does not last for the long where the stories do not feel as solid, especially when the theme of the stories are very similar.  Currently the prog is very strong.
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Funt Solo

I've always loved 2000 AD and only stopped reading for a few years when it became economically out of reach: an error (in the universe) that I'm steadily rectifying.  So, from about 1980 (when I started) to 2014 (where I'm at now) - I can't say there's an entirely bad prog.  Usually, there isn't a 100% great prog either.

Even in the case of clunker stories, often the art is great: and so at least you have something to admire as you go through it.  And then things land sometimes in the realm of curiosities, or reader Marmite.  But in amongst all of that opinion and conjecture there sits me being entirely correct about everything. 

Here's a snapshot of the first half of the 80s:

Prog 178 (1980) scores 91%:
ü Strontium Dog: Death's Head
ü The Mean Arena: [Tallon]
û Dash Decent
ü Judge Dredd: The Judge Child - Fallen Angels
ü Meltdown Man
ü Killer Watt

Prog 225 (1981) scores 80%:
ü Strontium Dog: The Gronk Affair
ü Nemesis the Warlock: [Book 1]
ü Judge Dredd: Judge Death Lives
û Tharg's Future Shocks: Seeing is Believing
ü Meltdown Man

Prog 277 (1982) scores 100%:
ü Robo-Hunter: The Killing of Kidd
ü Rogue Trooper: All Hell on the Dix-I Front
ü The Mean Arena: [Mother Vlad's Vampires]
ü Judge Dredd: Fungus
ü Ace Trucking Co.: Too Many Bams

Prog 329 (1983) scores 78%:
ü Robo-Hunter: The Slaying of Slade
ü Tharg's Future Shocks: Dad
ü Skizz
û Judge Dredd: The Weather Man
ü Rogue Trooper: Eye of the Traitor

Prog 382 (1984) scores 50%:
ü Strontium Dog: Outlaw
ü The Ballad of Halo Jones: [Book I]
û Tharg's Future Shocks: Class of '65
û Judge Dredd: Dredd Angel
ü Rogue Trooper: Death Valley
û Ace Trucking Co.: On The Dangle
++ A-Z ++  coma ++

Richard

I agree with everything Indigo Prime said.

However, while the recovery was gradual, and didn't happen overnight, I did think at the time that the comic had made it through the mire and was finally going to be alright when I read the first episode of The Pit in prog 970.

Jim_Campbell

Quote from: Richard on 04 July, 2019, 06:36:13 PM
However, while the recovery was gradual, and didn't happen overnight, I did think at the time that the comic had made it through the mire and was finally going to be alright when I read the first episode of The Pit in prog 970.

Yeah... The Pit definitely brought with it a feeling of the corner being turned.

Checking BARNEY, that's not really a bad prog. On top of a Wagner/Ezquerra Dredd, there's Walker painting up a storm on ABC Warriors, the generally-not-awful Steve White stint on Rogue Trooper and a Vector 13 of which I have no recollection, but which is unlikely to be terrible with Abnett and Ridgway and only a double-length Wireheads finale as the fly in the ointment.
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BPP

See I'd say 970 is still not great. Kev Walker's painted stuff was always not great for me (and I love his later style on Dredd), Wireheads and Vector 13 weren't great and I can't recall that rogue at all save to say rogue never recovered from looking like it was in the same universe as Chronos Carnival.

Plus I hate that cover design - easily the worst in 2000ads History.

I can appreciate people saying The Pit is turning a corner but you wouldn't hand 970 to someone and say 'start here'.
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Jim_Campbell

Quote from: BPP on 04 July, 2019, 07:04:18 PM
See I'd say 970 is still not great.

No... that's why I said it wasn't bad. Certainly in the context of some of what we'd slogged through to get here, which was often great long stretches of progs with nowt but an occasional John Smith gem to relieve the tedium.
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Tjm86

IIRC the Pit was my return to Tooth after an extended hiatus.  I do recall having picked through a selection whilst down the Falklands in 92/3 but steering pretty clear for a long time after that.

I wouldn't call it a true return to form at that point and I would agree with the argument that actually the early days were not amazing, nor were the Golden eighties that golden at times.  They were still a long way though from the true depths of the nineties.

Thinking about it, prog 2000 seemed to be the start of the new golden age and a couple of times over the last two decades (ouch!) we've been blessed with some absolutely superb runs of outstanding proggage.  Arguably we've been spoilt at times and I do think that comes across in our assessment of current output.

Mind you, here's a challenge for you: name an equivalent US comic that has been able to match tooth for quality of input over such a sustained period.  I'm willing to acknowledge that they may be out there and I just haven't been fortunate enough to stumble across them.

Leigh S

Due to the oil tanker nature of turning a comic around where fleischer has been carpet bombing the editorial desk, just having Wagner back (just before the film?) was a massive relief.

It is hard to know how much my sense of improvement was based on the reduction of Millar/McKenzie vs my knowledge that the latter had moved on from editorial

Colin YNWA

To be honest Jim has more than ably nailed down my view of this. 1996 and 1997 start to pick the Prog up from its nadir, but there's a LOT of problems still there, but the good stuff is coming back at a decent rate.

You can certainly make a strong case that we on fine form again by 1998, in large part by the triumvate of Wagner Dredd, Sinister Dexter and Nikolai Dante, normally two of which appeared in any particular issue.

By 1999 David Bishop has nailed it and the Prog is on absolutely astonishly good form. Now I've not got much further in my re-read but 2000, while not as strong as 1999 I'm pretty sure is pretty good and I doubt we'll have a real stinker of a year from then until now. Its not necessary NuGoldenAgeTM I'd suggest that comes later, but I'll see as my re-read progresses but its safe to say the Prog has been good since 1998.

Which again as Jim points out is astonishing when you consider the terrifying fact that 1998 was over 20 years ago... christ I was a different beast in 1998. The Prog was too but we'll both find stability soon enough.