2000 AD Online Forum

Very nice Colin Wilson cover - another classic.

Clive Barker interview - I'll be interested to read this although I've liked a lot of his stuff, I think he's never been better than 'Weaveworld' and Abarat was a bit below par despite brilliant illustrations throughout. There's no arguing with his horror/fantasy genius though.

John Cooper interview looks good too - I'm hoping for some pearls of wisdom from him - he's a bit of a legend from the early days of 2000 AD, so it should be pretty cool.

Having only flipped through only one other thing caught my eye - a lovely DPS by Nick Dyer - top notch!

Hoo-ray I got my first letter of the year published. The joy was short lived however when I realised that I was under Tom Proudfoot - eurgh, never a nice place to be!

That Black Museum is brilliant, gorgeous artwork (great double page spread) and a great little, fun story...

-pj

Your rightful place butt man!

fine cover  

Dredd: what great layouts bled right off the page in every sense of the word.
Big Bugs taking on robots and Dredd there to tidy up... loverly.

Interrogation: John Cooper, fine interview, lots of excellent references to the comics I read as a lad too. Seems like a very nice chap.

Tankie: heehee, must be linked to the Astronauts wee thread , non?

Capt Britian: not my bag of chuickies, so skimmed it, didn't know The Mighty Mr Moore worked on it at one point.

TOTBM: This is the first TOTBM that I've really enjoyed, mining the back progs seems to be in vogue just now and why not? if it delivers outstanding stories like this? brillant  double page spread/salute

You should be watching: hmmm, yet again the first series of this (CSI) was great but it has become so formulaic its lost its edge.

Mr Barker: I've never been a horror fan, but I imagine this is a major coupe  for the Meg, must admit he looks nothing like I imagined him too.

Film review: normally I'd go off on one about this but as its ripping T4 to bits tis welcome!!

Armitage: I must say the soap opera element of this is a bit wearing, and as much as I've  liked Mr Cooper work from my sprogdom til now, I prefer his work with painted backgrounds.

Now the best bit: The letters page...

Good interview, but I'm pretty sure that One-Eyed Jack was set in 1970s New York, not 1960s London.

D'oh ...

mm

QuoteArmitage: I must say the soap opera element of this is a bit wearing

Whereas I thought the family scene at the beginning was the best thing about it!

The TotBM was superb. Brilliant explaination of the Death Belt from Art, and incredible art as always from Nick.

Quote from: "His Lordship rac"[
Whereas I thought the family scene at the beginning was the best thing about it!

 

Fair enough, its just i like a bit of escapism, i read comics to get away from that stuff, which could be just me as I can't stand soap operas (except The Archers).

Doesn't seem as there are many boarders reading the Meg and commenting here, is it just there's nothing to moan about?

QuoteFair enough, its just i like a bit of escapism, i read comics to get away from that stuff

Yup, I share your hate of the soaps. I'm not a big fan of Armitage, but this scene was something actually happening to someone, rather than Armitage being surly.

Did anyone else think that the last part of Dredd... didn't really read like Wagner? Some really over-ripe dialogue - "A monstrosity - with the shreds of cube uniform hanging to it! What kind of lunacy has been going on here?" And then that last panel - "You're a sick little degenerate who deserves never to see the light of day again." I'd have expected something subtler and more deadpan. Something more like "Yeah - don't count on it."
If there had been another name in the credit box I'd be writing now about how writer x clearly doesn't 'get' the character, but as it's Wagner... don't really know what to say. Great tale for all that, though. More Colin Wilson!

Tank Girl... meh. Wee and poo jokes? No thanks, I'm not three years old. It's Beano-esque humour with none of the charm, twice as immature and only half as funny.

There are not enough superlatives to do justice to Black Mueseum. Awesome, awesome stuff. A cracking tale in its own right that shows a sensitive understanding to Dreddverse history, and manages to satisfyingly tie up the loose ends of some hokey old continiuity problems.

Armitage is pretty good stuff, but I don't like the way they all talk like Americans, and I don't like the way the Judges are all shown as slack-jawed simpletons in order to make Armitage look good. Intrigued to see where it's going, though.

I'll moan!    As usual, on first glance, nothing much in The Meg for me- only this time I foundly it oddly satisfying.

Dredd was okay- I liked the story, but Wilson's art was a tad confusing. This is the kind of Dredd that will benefit massively from a reread all in one go, whereas in episodes it just seemed to be hacked into three simply due to the format. Armitage was alright- but then I read the John Cooper interview and immediately felt bad for not liking it more, went back, read it again and thoroughly enjoyed it. Black Museo felt a bit like a stretch- I dunno, like an attempt to rectify the blatant decades-long ignoring of the Death Belt, that didn't really convince. And Tank Girl still doesn't work for me- though since Mr Dayglo became my friend on Facebook, I'm at least reading it now!

CSI- no thanks.

Reviews: Waste of space, again. And the Drag Me To Hell review was borderline insulting! I see very little point in reading a reviewer whom I so obviously disagree with, other than to make myself cross, so yet again I resolve to skip this in future. But I won't. I must like being cross.

John Cooper: If only the Meg's feature pages were ALL interviews with comic creators. Lovely stuff, and I appreciated the style in which this was written. Such a shame then, that it's not possible to tie the interviews in with the freebie floppy- a 60 page collection of classic (non-2000AD AND Dredd/ Probe) Cooper strips would have been lovely... if, obviously, not within Rebellion's powers. Cooper seemed a genuine bloke and it's great to hear that he's still busy. Always liked his foreheads!

Captain Britain: What? Are Rebellion pimping Panini/ Marvel now? I love CB from years back, but this stuck out as something that really should have been in Deathray. Which is odd, as Deathray always has features that should be in the Megazine.

Clive Barker: Another phoned-in interview with the arch-procrastinator. Has any creator ever been more over-rated? Although it did give me my biggest chuckle of the whole Meg: "Each weekend I photograph nude men for a magazine called Imagining Men. I have 23,000 nude man images now." Christ Clive, at that rate, by this time next year you'll have run out of nude men to photograph, and will be phoning me. The answer, by the way, is "no".

The freebie was excellent- Dredd strips that I read and then forgot about. Thoroughly enjoyed it- in the abscence of a complete reprint of all the covers/ Lawman of the Future strips, I'd be happy with it collecting these somewhat passed-over strips, with loose-or-strong-connections. Passed a happy 45 minutes, that did.

So- a mixed bag, then. As usual I expected not to like it and as usual I liked it more than I thought I would. That's got to be positive, surely. It still seems to be a very unattractive package- not helped by ugly cover-designs and unremarkable cover-art, but it's improving, I think. Just wish they'd ditch the film/tv reviews, promo crap and use the feature pages to interview people of direct linkage to the comic's subject matter.

But... y'know. Not bad.

Steev

Ach, I forgot to mention the Bad Manners freebie. Lovely stuff (whatever happened to Wayne Reynolds, I was a big fan?) and I'd rather have mores story-centric collections like this than artist-themed collections. Makes for a more satisfying read.

Seconded. I really enjoyed this, despite having read the individual strips fairly recently in the eternal re-read. I'd like to re-state mt request for a Mrs Gunderson collection.

Quote from: "Proudhuff"Capt Britian: not my bag of chuickies, so skimmed it, didn't know The Mighty Mr Moore worked on it at one point.

*SPLUTTER* What??? The Moore Captain Britain stuff is fantastic - I heartily recommend the collection, there's some amazing stuff in there (a Rag, a Bone and a Hank of Hair is just glorious).

-pj

What PJ Said. I think that Moore/Davis delivered a superhero series every bit as solid as Marvelman with that series. Awesome work.

okay, okay,    anyone know if the Moore stuff is collected in a trade?

That article gives me a goo, as they say here in Dublin, for Captain Britain. Wouldn't mind a look at the Moore ones. Mind you, I just had a read of "Whatever happened to the Man of Tomorrow'  - Moore, but not my bag at all. I'm just not familiar enough with the DC Universe.

Rufus - Good work! I wanted more little jokes in the borders and you have delivered!   Tank Girl is as good as it's ever been, except for that classic Kevin Keegan episode that I'll never forget.

Quote from: "Proudhuff"okay, okay,    anyone know if the Moore stuff is collected in a trade?

Marvel collected it all in a trade a few years ago- slighly buggered about with and coloured, because it was reprinted from its American packaging in some X-Men limited series or other. It's not a bad package, though.

Steev

Quote from: "Proudhuff"Doesn't seem as there are many boarders reading the Meg and commenting here, is it just there's nothing to moan about?

Personally, I was keeping quiet on the uncharacteristic "if you haven't got anything nice to say.." principle as I really can't think of a single positive thing to say about this month's Meg, but now you've gone and tricked me into moaning in public. However, when you can easily spend fifty quid on a Friday night out and not really enjoy yourself, a fiver for a 75% chance of a good Dredd story doesn't really bother me.

I was just thinking the other day that Wagner's quite keen on this whole insect DNA thing (that was the Chief Judge's Man's secret origin too) so I wonder if it's going anywhere or just something to hang a story round from time to time.

Quote from: "Dark Jimbo"Ach, I forgot to mention the Bad Manners freebie. Lovely stuff (whatever happened to Wayne Reynolds, I was a big fan?) and I'd rather have mores story-centric collections like this than artist-themed collections. Makes for a more satisfying read.

Agreed. I read this this morning and it was superb. I've only the vaugest memories of the strips in question, but it was a great little story arc.

Dredd: I have enjoyed this particular tale.  A little too short, but lots to say about how we treat teh mentally ill and, as another poster put it, in the Big Meg most mental illness seems curable by Anderson giving you a head-massage for 10 minutes..  I leave you all to make your own off-colour remarks.  

Interrogation: As ever, this is excellent.  Very welcome.

Tank Girl: If I'm honest I never bother.  I always hated the character and never found it was nearly as funny as it thought it was.  But the diversity it brings, to say nothing of the character recognition value it brings (and possibly new readers) it's a welcome addition.  So long as the other strips are up to the mark, of course.  Were everything other than Dredd to suck particularly hard one month, I'd confess to feeling cheated that one of the few strip slots were, in my view at least, wasted on a one-trick pony who'd long ago been flogged into it's grave.  Rufus has a lot of charm to his art though.

Captain Britian: Never liked superheroes, least of all anything Marvel, but I'll confess this has rather made me reassess.  Not just because of Moore's involvement, but because of the general ambience.  Although seemingly the longer the strip went on, the more it kept being "Marvelised" (noun - meaning to invest with unnecessary backstory and continuity that nobody writing it seems to give a damn about until they run out of ideas).

TOTBM: I flat out LOVED this.  That whole justification for Dredd doing the Big Meg equivalent of taking a Greyhound bus never really worked for me anyway.  Nice to see a creative story grow out of it (and tie up a completely ignored piece of continuity into the bargain.  Arguably the highlight of this month's meg for me.  I read it three times, just because I was that impressed.  Nicely done.

You should be watching: No.  I really shouldn't.  There's quite enough derivative proceedural police drivel on television.  I don't want to give the makers any more encouragement than my mother already does (what can I say?  She loves shows where people meet grizzly ends).  As if I needed any confirmation beyond the episodes I've seen that it really isn't my bag, the reviewer (who, you'll remember, is trying to plead the case FOR watching the show) tells me all three major developments in the main character throughout the entire series.  One of which was leaving.  No thanks.  Good try though.

Clive Barker: Never been a fan of him or that sort of fiction at the best of times.  However I found this interview to be quite illuminating.  Maybe I'm missing something.  

Film review: I'll confess to not having read it yet.  I eventually get round to it, but usually only after a week or so...

Armitage: I've always loved the character and setting.  Dave Stone's Brit Cit always appealed more than Wagner's version - which always felt like a cut-price Mega-City One rather than something peculiarly British.  I'm presuming that while Treasure is inside she'll come into contact with the rather unpleasant lady we met last month.  Am I wrong in thinking she's the "culling crew/wetworks" character?  I think Armitage has suffered what Dante's "pirate" era stories suffered from and perhaps if we'd had more regular Armitage it'd be as popular as I always thought it deserved to be.  Fun, but far too short.  More.  More.

Quote from: "Dark Jimbo"Ach, I forgot to mention the Bad Manners freebie. Lovely stuff (whatever happened to Wayne Reynolds, I was a big fan?) and I'd rather have mores story-centric collections like this than artist-themed collections. Makes for a more satisfying read.

Yes, I forgot to mention that too.  All three stories appearing during my period of unfaithfulness, this is something I'm looking forward to tomorrow afternoon.  

I'd also appreciate the collections being more themed according to story or character elements rather than creators.  Although there IS a place for both.

QuoteDave Stone's Brit Cit always appealed more than Wagner's version - which always felt like a cut-price Mega-City One rather than something peculiarly British.

Wagner's problem is that his MC-1 is so British that there's nowhere new for his Brit Cit to go.  I too rather prefer Stone's version, even if I wouldn't be a big fan of Armitage.

QuoteAm I wrong in thinking she's the "culling crew/wetworks" character?

I was thinking the same thing!

Perhaps Mr Stone, if he's reading, could pop up and let us know...

Please Mr Stone, we'll be ever so grateful!?

John Cooper's art on Armitage is an excellent fit by the way, and I really enjoyed that interview too.  Well done to all concerned.  Nice to have him back in the fold.

By the way, does anyone know whether those are up-to-date photos of Clive Barker? If so, he's doing very well for a guy of 57 or something.
Seems there's a lot to be said for the rejuvenating properties of a twisted, degenerate imagination

Quote from: "Dark Jimbo"(whatever happened to Wayne Reynolds, I was a big fan?)

I'm a huge fan, too. He went on to do lots of fantastic work for various role-playing-game companies, particularly Wizards of the Coast's 3rd Ed. D&D (among other things). He did most of the covers for their Eberron setting books, and they are stunning:

http://www.waynereynolds.com/WotCGallery2.htm (http://www.waynereynolds.com/WotCGallery2.htm)


I wish he was still drawing Dredd, or at least doing covers for 2000AD.

Regards

Robin

Quote from: "JayzusB.Christ"By the way, does anyone know whether those are up-to-date photos of Clive Barker? If so, he's doing very well for a guy of 57 or something.
Seems there's a lot to be said for the rejuvenating properties of a twisted, degenerate imagination

I'm not sure- a lot of the recent promo stuff he's put out has been of the 'hugely-muscled man standing by the pool in black tshirt and medallion' variety... but the special features on the recent DVD release of 'The Midnight Meat Train' (catch it, it's really very good indeed) reveal a wizened, very old-looking, gravelly voiced munchkin in one documentary, and the buffed-up stud in another. The discrepancy is alarming- and even made my wife (not one for the European tradition of "cursing") sit up and shout "Fuck! What's happened to him- he looks a hundred years old!".

Amusingly, the docu about his parallel painting career also reveals a man who appears to be going quickly round the bend. At one point- which if memory serves is the end of the piece- he is shown attempting to explain his approach to art and narrative, by painting a black spiral, and becomes almost incoherent.

Now, I remember Clive from the old days- and indeed have met him a few times- and yes, he was always a bit pretentious and prone to rubbing people up the wrong way, but he was always very much "the young, fresh, face of horror" and immensely likeable. The man I saw in the Meat Train extras is distanced from that individual not just by time, but by something else entirely. It's like the intervening twenty years were forty. And forty very trying ones, at that.

All that said- if he can one day "get the keys" to the room with the Nightbreed footage, and comes good on his promise to "do something further" with the Cabal story, then I will be first in line to shake his hand. I'm not holding my breath, Nightbreed is twenty years ago, and he's been saying that since day one.

Steev

First review from me in ages- I liked the cover, kind of reminds me of another cover that I haven't quite remembered yet.

Dredd: This has been a great story- nice artwork on it too. I was never a great fan of Wilsons 'classic' work on Dredd- it was fine, I just preferred McMahon, Carlos, Ron Smith, Steve Dillon etc. I do remember liking his run on early Rogue (was it the Filth Column story with the traitorous nurse?) I liked his Souther battlesuits and things.
This has been really great, though and I must admit I have a new enthusiasm for his stuff.

Interviews: I'm not a big novel reader so I'm not wowed by an interview with Barker, although I can see it's a major scoop for the Meg and they may sell a few extra ad-hoc copies this month, which can only be a good thing. It was an interesting read though, as I have enjoyed a few Barker films. Nice quinceyquonce with the mention of Martyrs as I'd just watched it the night before I got the Meg.
The John Cooper interview was well written, I like the way Mike Molcher left John's accent apparent in the text- Ah'm intae regional accents, ye ken. I think what also came across well was a real fondness for comics and 2000ad. This is the kind of thing I like as articles.
A couple o' photos o' the man would've been good- I like to know whit folk look like for some unexplained reason- a face to the work and the voice. I'd also have liked to see some of his marine paintings and caricature work too. If this board can be taken as a cross section of the 2000ad fanbase, then there are more than a few of us interested in looking at paintings and illustration as well as comic work. Good article.

Tank Girl: Skidmarks seemed to suffer from a lack of confidence on the art, not enough drawing, too much open space which needed filled with tone. This tale and the last have seen Rufus Dayglo seem to grow in confidence (IMO). It's busier, less self-conscious and much more fun to look at. The writing is also getting more nonsense and stupidity in- which is where Tank Girl should be at- Skidmarks was too much of 'a story'. I think the short, one-shot runs are really beneficial for it and should maybe have been attempted before a long tale.

Captain Britain feature: Don't really give two hoots about this, but then it's only two pages and I read it anyway. I do remember the character from Marvel Team up comics I bought when I was younger- I liked the mix of fantasy/ Arthurian mysticalismness but other than that I know bog all about costumed capers.

Black Museum: I'd like to add my voice to the praise of Nick Dyer- I said of his earlier Dredd work that, although I couldn't suffer the huge eyes, there was a lot to like. This was great- amazing what a few published stories can do for an artist and I can see Nick becoming a modern great in the comic- like Jock and Flint have done. That's if he doesn't fuck off across the Atlantic! Good, solid story too.

[rant]
You should be watching: Bleurgh! I'll watch whatever the fuck I want. It's purely subjective. Not a comment on how well/ badly it was written- I never read these. Waste of a page.

Film review: Once again- please stop this tripe. I don't care who writes it, how it's written or even what they think of any film- again it's subjective. It has nothing whatsoever to do with 2000ad or comics. I would rather have seen a two/ three page  showcase of John Coopers marine paintings, or Barkers paintings/ Illos for interest. This is and has always been the biggest waste of space in the Meg since it started. It's been going for ages and it's drivel- it really winds me up now- I have never read any of them. Just drop the pages (and hence price) and be done with it. [/rant]

Armitage: Surely this has to rank as the dullest strip ever in 2000ad history. Nothing ever happens in each episode, the characters are flat and tedious, it really bores the arse off. Reading it is like a monthly exercise in tooth-pulling.
[rant]
I can't stand Treasure Steel- she seems like a ham fisted attempt to tick every PC box possible- an intelligent, tough-talking, black, lesbian, female, arse-kicker with real-life issues, a disadvantaged background, a same gender relationship and an adopted kid to boot. Please! So anti-cliche that she's actually a horrible cliche, if you understand. KILL HER OFF, SHE'S A SHIT CHARACTER.
Anyway- you forgot autism, dyslexia and a wheelchair. [/rant]
The art work is good but not great. Really great figure drawing that I'd expect from someone of Cooper's calibre, though I hope John moves toward a wider tonal range in his work, as I often feel it's too bland with the greyscale being 'stuck in the middle' which takes away from the dramatic impact. (Though Armitage stories IMO lack any drama anyway). 'Mair dark wouldna go amiss, John!'

Floppy Extra Baggage: Filed away- along with most of the others, unread because it's either
a} a load o pish that didn't deserve printing first time round let alone reprinting or
b} (as in this case) it's not old enough to warrant a reprint yet.

I wish they'd do something useful with these extra comics, or else drop them altogether (and hence the price). It's only a good idea if it's utilised properly.
I will continue to support the Meg, despite its usual high cost/ low return situation. I bought every EE despite some of it being hogwash. It's not the cash- I have (a) decent job(s) and can afford to spend a £5 a month, it's the principle.

Really enjoyed this month's Meg, in fact, I think it's been great for a long time now.  Sacrilege, I know, but I quite often prefer it to the Prog!!  I realise that I'm probably in a minority of, errr, one on that, but there you go!!

Armitage: Does anyone else find it a bit odd how little Armitage has featured in his own strip recently? The last story largely revolved around Steele, and it looks as if this one will as well. We've ended up with a situation where the title character seems to play second banana all the time, and I'm not sure why. It's interesting to see an old-schooler like Cooper adapting to new technology, but I wish he wouldn't use the Windows "Impact" font everywhere, it sticks out a bloody mile!

"You Should Be Watching:" Something about these always bugs me, maybe because they all seem to read like revised press releases. I appreciate the Meg has to carry a certain amount of promotional stuff like this to help keep it afloat, but I still think The Heatseekers was a more creative way of dealing with the situation.

I enjoyed the "Bad Manners" collection, there's something about "judges gone bad" stories that Wagner seems to do particularly well. Rebellion evidently have some difficulty finding the right stories to fit the reprint format, but this one worked out fine, I think.

Barker: I remember staying up all night reading "Cabal" when I was in college, but haven't touched another of his books since. I have to admit, this did make we wonder whether I should check out some of his other stuff, maybe crack open the copy of Weaveworld which has collecting dust on my shelf for two years. Those accompanying pictures must be at least a decade old, though. I mean, this was him in 2006: //http://www.sandyauden.co.uk/images/CliveBarkerPortaitR.jpg
Clearly a little more age-ravaged there.

Quote from: "Dog Deever"I can't stand Treasure Steel- she seems like a ham fisted attempt to tick every PC box possible- an intelligent, tough-talking, black, lesbian, female, arse-kicker with real-life issues, a disadvantaged background, a same gender relationship and an adopted kid to boot. Please! So anti-cliche that she's actually a horrible cliche, if you understand. KILL HER OFF, SHE'S A SHIT CHARACTER.

Heh, I know what you mean.

Every time she turns up, I get a sense that the writer is almost daring us to have a problem with the fact that she's black and a lesbian. Maybe it was more shocking in the 90s when she debuted, but the problem is that I doubt a great many people do have a problem with it, now. So she feels a little redundant, given that her inclusion feels designed mainly to shock.

In response to some highly considered and insightful opinion:

Yes, Treasure's skin-tone is somewhere on the Pantone-scale somewhere other than those who like in rural Buckinghamshire or wherever consider Flesh. Yes, her sexual orientation of somewhat other than zero on the Kinsey bell-curve. And so what? Get over it. What would you have me do, have her running around shouting, 'Lawdy! I sure lub dat riddim! An now I's gonna go an eat me some o'that rriiightious minge!' ??

And yes, incidentally, the Sexy Leather PVC Bitch Who Kills People is the same person from Culling Crew. And rather like Treasure, as a character, is somewhat based on a number of people I actually know. Except for the 'killing people' part.

Quote from: "Proper Dave"What would you have me do, have her running around shouting, 'Lawdy! I sure lub dat riddim! An now I's gonna go an eat me some o'that rriiightious minge!' ??

Thanks Proper Dave.  

It needed saying and you put it far better than I could ever have hoped to.

I, for one, am rather pleased that Sexy PVC Bitch etc has returned.  I liked her enormously in Wetworks.  Indeed, I thought that was easily the best of the Virgin novels.  And not just because we got to "see" (albeit in our mind's eye) Dredd dragged up.  

Althought that was rather fantastic.

Quote from: "mikegloady"

Quote from: "Proper Dave"What would you have me do, have her running around shouting, 'Lawdy! I sure lub dat riddim! An now I's gonna go an eat me some o'that rriiightious minge!' ??

Thanks Proper Dave.  

It needed saying and you put it far better than I could ever have hoped to.

What, you couldn't have done better than a straw man?

The accusation that Steel is just a collection of PC tick-boxes is an easy one to make, but whether it's true or not doesn't really bother me (although on the PC score, I'd be more impressed if the character was a tough as nails black bull, because that really would scare the weedy hetero whiteboys). A far more significant problem is that she's just not terribly interesting in a futuristic police comic.

Regards

Robin

I don't give a toss what colour she is or what she does with her genitals, it adds absolutely nothing to the stories- it's just that it seems to be ALL she is- there's pretty much nothing else. In fact, it takes away from the stories because so many panels are wasted reinforcing her sexual orientation and life issues that it takes any pace out of whats happening. Jimbo hits the nail on the head- it's old, we don't care, get on with the story.
As to the "so what? Get over it" comment... well, it's not me who keeps making a big issue of it- I've only just now passed any comment on it at all. As I say, I don't mind who's fancy she tickles or what pantone shes wearing or the occasional reference to it where it fits with the plot.

I work with people of varied sexual orientation (60% homosexual in one particular place), junkies, crackheads, alcoholics, muggers, burglers, violent psychos who chop people into chunks and bury them, paedophiles, rapists- you fucking name it- I work with them (and get on well with them) and they come from all ethnic backgrounds and religious denominations. So you won't get much joy playing the 'mindless bigot' card with me- I do a job that most average people hold their hands up and say 'No way could I work with them'. And I treat them all like human beings too, because they are.
I have also not made any racist or homophobic comment, nor did I comment on the way she talks- so yer barking up the wrong tree, min- save the stock response for someone who actually says something along those lines. I've personally punched cunts for making remarks like those and the lads in my old job didn't dare tell rascist jokes while I was about.

My opinion is highly considered- I'm not some knuckle dragging, homophobic, rascist cock who's against characters of any ethnic/ sexual persuasion, as your response seems to imply- far from it. I just don't want to read about it in every bloody episode, it should be incidental detail to add colour to a character- I want a story with some action, pace and interesting plotlines.

I'm not knocking you personally, Dave- I don't like the character (as is my wont) as I feel she's a cypher (and a tired one at that) and I'm obviously not the only one who feels that way- there's Jimbo too! Just because I wrote in plain English without any fancy wordiness does not mean I haven't thought about it, or that I'm incapable of- we aren't all writers, some of us have other skills/ jobs.
I already made a suggestion of what to do with her...
:D
Pick the pace up and concentrate less on the personal life of Treasure Steel and I'm happy- or don't if you don't want to, but accept that some people won't like it. We are entitled to dislike it.
More power to you though, Dave- you do a job I can't and at least deserve respect for that.

I'm all for creators coming on to the Forum to tell us about various projects that they're working on but I really don't understand why they come on to forums to defend their work against criticism.  Some of us are going to like their work and some of us aren't.  They're never going to change anybody's mind by taking offence at criticism, it just seems so pointless to complain about it.

They seem to take it personally when it's not personal at all.  It's just a comment about a particular piece of work.

Quote from: "Old Tankie"I'm all for creators coming on to the Forum to tell us about various projects that they're working on but I really don't understand why they come on to forums to defend their work against criticism.  Some of us are going to like their work and some of us aren't.  They're never going to change anybody's mind by taking offence at criticism, it just seems so pointless to complain about it.

They seem to take it personally when it's not personal at all.  It's just a comment about a particular piece of work.

To be fair, this mindset did lead to Dickgate.

Quote from: "Roger Godpleton"

Quote from: "Old Tankie"I'm all for creators coming on to the Forum to tell us about various projects that they're working on but I really don't understand why they come on to forums to defend their work against criticism.  Some of us are going to like their work and some of us aren't.  They're never going to change anybody's mind by taking offence at criticism, it just seems so pointless to complain about it.

They seem to take it personally when it's not personal at all.  It's just a comment about a particular piece of work.

To be fair, this mindset did lead to Dickgate.

Hmmm... here we go again!

So we're all supposed to bow down and say- "Wow, all of the work in 2000ad is utterly fantastic, thrill powered and I love it all regardless of what it actually is."
That's the same as hating something before you've given it any chance and is actually more mindless and less considered an opinion than actually saying what you think. What value does such meaningless buffoonery have?

I pays ma money, I takes ma choice and, as a consumer, I'm entitled to say how I feel about the product I have paid for. I haven't been personally rude to the creator in question (quite the reverse- despite a somewhat spiky response, I gave more respect than I received) and I didn't just say 'THSI IS SHIIT AND I HAET IT, TAEK IT AWAE AND BURN PLEEZ! LOL'. I outlined the reason I felt this way in a coherent and considered way. If a creator doesn't like it, it's their problem, not mine. If anyone wants to read obsequious shite, they should sign up under a fistful of usernames and post praise themselves. Not that I'm accusing anyone of wishing to do that- this post is mainly for Godpleton (though if the cap fits, pop it on at a jaunty angle and wear it by all means).

Exactly what 'mindset' are we talking about? The one that says- 'honesty is the best policy'?

"Dickgate" refers solely to the John Smith incident, separate from the wider "Thin Ice" crisis. I'm actually in agreement with you DD, I was just saying we got some good laughs out of John Smith when he first popularized the trend before everyone else jumped on the bandwagon.

Note to Self: Don't just let rip and post when angry. Trouble is, there's nothing that sets me off quite like the Anti-PC Brigade, who forever seem to moan about any instance of a character who isn't white, straight and male - or at least, isn't white, straight and male and not treated like some piece of exotica for the jazzmag of the mind. It's crypto-bigotry, plain and simple, and I won't stand for it.

That said, whether one finds the quasi-life of Treasure Steel completely and utterly uninteresting or not, there's nothing about the style of it that's being rammed down anybody's throats. Ooh, er. As it were. There's a good person having a bad day, they're having problems with their partner, problems with their work, might be cracking up and so on.

That this character had to be coloured-in on the page instead of left white and that this partner is of the same sex is entirely incidental. There is nothing that would have been portrayed differently had the character been white, and male, and straight, and having problems with his wife. I'd suggest that the impulse to regard it in a manner of, 'OMG! WTF! Theres a BLACK LESBIAN brushing her teeth!! LOL!' is more to do with the responses of a certain sort of reader than the material in and of itself.

This isn't about me responding to criticism, as such, honest - I just think it touches on a larger and more important point than whether some script I wrote is crap or not.

Quote from: "Proper Dave"This isn't about me responding to criticism, as such, honest - I just think it touches on a larger and more important point than whether some script I wrote is crap or not.

And yet your knee jerks in such a predictable fashion, Dave. I'm afraid that this isn't a wider discussion about bigotry, this really IS just a conversation about whether people are enjoying your Armitage scripts and, if not, why not?

I've been a big Armitage fan since his first appearance but have found myself losing interest in the character due to the the increasingly dull stories and defensive responses from you.

Bah.

Jim

Heh- No probs, Godpleton- my apologies min- crossed wires, I don't wanna fall out with God (even if you don't exist, except as a crutch for the needy  :lol: )!

OK, now I'm angry.
Dave- I could understand your reaction if I had come on saying:
"I don't want to read some shit about muff-diving nig-nogs in my comics. Get this crap and all it's British culture eroding pinko bullshit out of my comic before I start posting shit to people".

But I didn't. I object extremely strongly to you trying to paint me as some sort of bigot. I read your stories- at least have the courtesy to read my posts properly before trying a character assassination. I won't stand for it either.
I'm glad you feel strongly about these issues but It's something you don't have the monopoly on strong feelings about and I'd put my 'anti-bigot credentials' (for want of a better term) against yours any day of the week.
I'm not one of the 'anti-pc brigade'- I play in an anarcho-punk band where 'socialist' politics are the order of the day- I started the band and recruited members based more on their views than on their ability to play. I support and have been actively involved in various left wing groups and action all my adult life. Anyone who knows me properly will be laughing about your piss-poor assessment of me as a crypto bigotted (and I quote) 'certain sort of reader'. You can keep telling yourself that- but don't bother accusing me of it, get your facts straight before you start hurling accusations.

The point I was making- clearly, several times over is that it isn't incidental in the story. A point that others seem to understand, and yet somehow you can't.
No-one mentioned the ramming of politics down our throats- I've rammed politics down peoples throats many times and will continue to do so. It's what I like about Pat Mills' work in Savage.

One more time (and in case you're struggling with the concept I'll post it in all caps so you can home in on it like you clearly have done with certain points from my earlier posts)...

I DONT CARE IF SHE'S BLACK, WHITE, GREEN, GREY OR SKY BLUE FUCKING PINK WITH YELLOW FUCKING SPOTS. I DON'T CARE IF SHE LIKES COCK OR TWAT. I DON'T CARE IF SHES BORN IN A BARN OR A MANSION.
THE REASON I HAVEN'T ENJOYED ARMITAGE IS BECAUSE OF THE CONTINUOUS DWELLING ON TREASURE STEELS BACKGROUND- WHATEVER THAT MAY BE- AS IT SLOWS THE PACE OF THE STORIES RIGHT DOWN TO A DULL PLOD- BEING, AS SHE IS, A TWO DIMENTIONAL CHARACTER WHO'S EXISTANCE APPEARS TO BE A CYPHER FOR EVERY KIND OF 'EDGY' (IN THE 80'S) CHARACTER WHO HAS EVER EXISTED. THESE ELEMENTS APPEAR TO BE TO MAKE HER INTERESTING AND GIVE HER A PERSONALITY- ONLY (IMO) THEY DON'T MAINLY BECAUSE THEY HAVE BEEN DONE BEFORE AND ARE O.T.T. IN THIS PARTICULAR INSTANCE.

Yes, I happen to be white, straight and male- but it is incidental in this thread. Just because I am all those things does not make me a white supremacist or a homophobe and your sneering implications that I am are far more bigotted and judgemental than anything posted in this thread so far.

Now, I apologise if you think I'm being rude, but my patience and goodwill toward you are wearing thin due to what I consider to be abusive behaviour. I will treat you like any other boarder on here who deliberately rubs me up the wrong way and tries to paint a distorted picture of me or my posts, without knowing the first thing about me- as I'm not in the habit of treating 'celebrities' any different from anyone else.
I've made myself perfectly clear- if you don't want to take anything on board that's fine, it's your perogative to do as you will with your scripts and characters and I would assume you know more about script writing than I possibly could, having only done it twice (badly) for fanzines.

I've had enough now, because the next response to this type of CRAP that I'm forced to post will be very fucking unpleasant indeed and will probably get me banned- I know when someone isn't listening to reasonable, rational argument and never will. You've certainly lost a fair bit of my respect now- respect is something that's earned, not assumed.  If creators had more respect for their readers, then these flare ups wouldn't happen. It's a two-way street.
 :angry:  :angry:  :angry:  :angry:  :angry:

Breath in, breath out and relax

Thinking about it, you're perfectly right. There's always the danger, responding to points raised by one's own work, of coming across as a partisan leap to its defence - and if I started leaping to defend my stuff from anything that was less than kind, I'd never be stopping. So I'll shut up.

I would like to make clear, though, that my little anti-Anti-PC rant was directed at a general way of thinking, not at any person in particular. If anyone feels that I've specifically called them a racist and a bigot, I apologise unreservedly.

Are the domestic scenes ramming Treasures sexuality down our throats? I don't think so. Would anyone say the same thing if they were between a man and a woman. They seem to serve a purpose, marking her out as different from most Judges we've met and underlining the difference between British and American systems of justice. Are there too many? Different question.

As it is I'm all for including as many different types of character in 2k as possible. Lifes a rich mix and 2k should represent that.

As for the Meg -

Dredd - not a classic but not actually bad. It never took off for me, but I guess that's just a personal reaction. Never really been keen on the artist though, if it had been drawn by...dunno....Cam Kennedy I might have felt differently.

Speaking of Cam Kennedy I was pleased to see him drawing the Black Museum. And then after my first glimpse disappointed. Yon fellow seems so havily influenced by past artists that it feels like a tribute act. Nothing wrong with the art, just not terribly individual. Arts script was as solid as you'd expect. That's a compliment.

Tank Girl enters it's 1000th month of consecutive publication, seemingly appearing in every issue of the Megazine ever. It's a strip that seems content to stay doing the same thing forever, the art looking more or less the same as ever, the script being more or less the same as ever. I hope some people are enjoying this but, you know, it's not 1993 anymore.

Armitage always seems to take a lot of pages to not get very far, but does it in an entertaining fashion. I'll accept any number of domestic scenes as long as they're going somewhere as long as Proper Dave uses them as well as he did the scenes in his audio play The End of the World. Not forgiven him for that. Bastard.

Another month another mediocre Meg. If it weren't in my subs package I suspect I wouldn't have picked it up but, you know, it arrives every four weeks. I get round to reading the strips. I skim the articles. I forget it almost instantly. Nothing was really bad about the contents but nothing in particular made me think "that could only be in the MEG!". It doesn't seem to have much identity anymore, and that's a shame.

Quote from: "Proper Dave"Trouble is, there's nothing that sets me off quite like the Anti-PC Brigade,

For what it's worth, I'm with you pretty much entirely on that score (an the anti=H&S brigade, the anti-Nanny State brigade and the anti-Europe-for-their-straight-bananas-legislation-even-though-it-was-just-implementing-existing-UK-practice-across-the-rest-of-Europe brigade)

Regards

Robin

Oh dear.

It's a sticky wicket, this one. Creators have every right to defend their work or take umbrage when it's unfairly criticised, but saying that, I'd frame all my responses completely differently if I knew as I was typing that said creators were browisng these threads. No reason they shouldn't, after all, but I'd no doubt become so reluctant to post anything that could be taken the wrong way that I'd probably just stop reviewing stuff altogther. And for a long time after 'Dickgate', I pretty much did.

Anyhoo, I wasn't perosnally having a go at you, Dave, and as I've said numerous times before, I quite like the Armitage strip - the more relaxed pace and 'kitchen-sink politics' bring a different voice to the Meg to the other strips. I just don't really like Treasure Steel as a character, I think she slows things down and pushes Armitage himself to the sidelines, because of what I PERCIEVE as her 'let's shock the readers with a stereo-type challenging character' approach. It's nothing to do with the fact that I have a problem with black and/or lesbian characters, it's that I don't have any such problem, so what I percieve as the attempts to confront and challenge just unecessarily hamper the strip.

This may well be an unfair asessment, but I'm just some schmoe on a message board sounding off about a comic, and it's just my personal opinion. Take it on board or ignore it as you see fit, but life's too short to let it get to you.

Quote from: "Dark Jimbo"'let's shock the readers with a stereo-type challenging character' approach.

For the sake of a slow witted fat man, can you point out any of that from, say, the last two stories? I say those because I can remember them. Apart from the fact that she's not white and not straight can you point out any ways the character seems to be meant to shock? It really does seem like an odd reaction to the character and I want to understand it.

Sorry if this has been said before but some of the posts are very long and my attention span is very short. It just seems daft and not a little patronising to suggest that people are crypto-bigots (!) if they don't like Treasure. Does this mean that all black and lesbian characters and indeed people are automatically great regardless of their personalities and actions? Of course not. Black lesbian women can be just as annoying and boring as the rest of us, and to suggest otherwise is plain offensive.

I don't mind Armiatge but it's a bit too dull and slow moving to be a firm favourite. Perhaps Treasure in a wheel chair would add just the right amount of je ne sais pas to seal the deal.

The main thing about this debate for me is that its handily deflected attention away form the maddest panel in the megs history - how in gods name does Armitage leap across a room at the point AFTER Steel has let someone drop, yet still save them? does gravity work differently in the future?

I did think that myself, but I try to keep my nit picking to just the military stuff  

Thinking about it, I think thats my problem with the characters in Armitage- they all seem about as real as that "man not falling to his death" scene.  Bring on any kind of character you want, but make them seem real - the attempts here to paint a "real" picture just seem pretty clunky and unconvincing - These scenes of domestic unbliss don't feel like they've grown out of the characters development, they feel as pasted on as the idea you can attempt to kill a man (and despite all odds failing dramatically!) and the net result is you get suspended.  As for Psycho bitch character.... well, it just seems like the kind of character you'd never ever go near, unless you could subvert the stereotype so well as to make it something fresh - whereas with this un, theres nothing that doesnt just slot neatly into the stereotype.  Maybe thats a double bluff on the writers part - maybe thats why Steel feels similarly 'wrong', and why people see tick boxes rather than a character.

Frankly, I've never been convinced by Armitage, it just never felt like its had a strong enough vision, which is maybe why the characters come across as stereotypes to me, rather than real people.  There are comics writers whose stuff I dont really get, but i get enough to know that they know what they are doing, even if it doesnt appeal to me.  With Armitage, I just dont get that, - it feels like a frankenstein of ideas that havent gelled together at all.  Worse still, it always seems like its following on the coat tails of the general mood of the comics scene at whatever point it appears - only now, it feels like its riding on the coat tails of the general mood of the comics scene as it stood a decade or two past.

Hmmm... nice and calm after sleep.

Anyway, first of all- thanks for being big enough to apologise Dave- accepted, of course.
I'd also like to apologise for any rudeness or bad feeling caused by my comments. It was never intended to stir you up or offend you in any way.

For the record, I am all in favour of character diversity. 2000ad has always led the field in this and I'd like to see it continue this way. Amongst my favourite supporting characters is Shakta from Anderson (visually impaired, female and Indian, I think). I was also a vocal one of only a handful of fans of Black Siddha. I have no problems with any of the numerous black/ asian/ middle-eastern characters from 2000ad past or present. I also think Devlin Waugh is a great character (though I have to admit to not particularly liking many of the stories- but that's because I am frequently lost by the complex stories). Again, this diversity is a strength in the comics- not a weakness.

Anyway- group hug, everyone?

Heh- sorry for the double-post (not).

I just found a more pertinent kitten image...



Kittens and cd from my own personal collections!

Wow.  This thread is like one of those cross-company superhero team-up adventures.

Hero A from Alpha Comics meets Hero B from Beta Comics.

Hero A & Hero B fall out and argue.  There is inconclusive fisticuffs.  Then, just at the pivotal moment before everything goes wrong A and B get together, realise they're on the same side and sock Dr 1 and Dr 2 in the teeth (each OTHER'S nemesis, naturally) before shaking hands and travelling back to their home towns/dimensions.

This is the manly handshake part.  The bit in Judgement on Gotham where Dredd decides NOT to try to arrest Bats and says "bit of a tough guy".

Remember that bit?

Now, do ANY of you remember ANY KITTENS?

ANY AT ALL?

Take your time........

No, me neither.  This is much nicer.  More apologies, more ADF and more kittens.  The world would be a better place if everyone was as lovely as us.  Sorry once more to anyone offended by MY 2 creds worth.  xxx

Quote from: "Leigh Shepherd"Worse still, it always seems like its following on the coat tails of the general mood of the comics scene at whatever point it appears - only now, it feels like its riding on the coat tails of the general mood of the comics scene as it stood a decade or two past.

You say this about Armitage when it's published alongside TankGirl - still throbbing with the heady beat of 1994s indy choons.

QuoteI started the band and recruited members based more on their views than on their ability to play

...Dennis Skinner, spoons.
And looking very relaxed, Dave Nellist on vibes.
(Nice!)
Peter Tatchell on sousaphone.
(Mmm!)...

Etc.

Having finally read the Armitage in question, I wonder what the fuss is about.  The Treasure Steel at-home segment looks to me to be integral to the plot here - it's not some padded domestic aside, it's [spoiler:29t5kc48]establishing her childhood connection with the LaraCroftalike[/spoiler:29t5kc48], no?.  Also, as everyone has said it honestly doesn't matter that she's gay, she's just someone with a wife and kid and emotional problems that are now being shown to arise from her science fiction background, which she is just about to reconnect with in a painful way.  Or am I barking entirely up the wrong tree?

The only problem I have with the episode is the badly fluffed Armitage wrist-grabbing-sequence, which does rather scupper the suspension of disbelief.

see,  I must have missed something here, because Steel's morning seemed like a normal domestic scene to me, certainly not something that would push moi over the edge, and knowing a wee bit about D Dog, that morning (and Steel's job) would be a walk in the park compared with his daily grind...

and yes I think he (and I) would have moaned about it if it was a WASP brushing his teeth, arguing with partner etc for a couple o' pages in the Meg, nothing to do with orientation,social background, ethnic origins but simply once a month we're looking for Thrill Power jampacked into the Meg, and unfortunately these couple of pages never delivered them, nor IMHO built the character up much (see above) hence the comments.

(Full details of my circle of diverse family and friends along wiith left wing sympathies can be found in both  MI5 and Red watch files   )

Peace and Love, Peace and Love (in a Ringo way)

For what it's worth, I'm quite enjoying this Armitage tale so far, as it contrasts nicely with the more overtly Sci-Fi strips. It's true to say the strip comes of as somewhat soapy, but I can't remember Treasure Steele's sexual or racial orientation as ever being over-emphasised or used as a tool to shock -if that's the intention then it needs to try harder.
It's a factor of the strip I've never given to much thought to and it's certainly never offended me to any degree.

QuoteI must have missed something here, because Steel's morning seemed like a normal domestic scene to me

Well, it's pure speculation on my part, but it seems that the scene exists to show that her nihilistic attitude (fucking nihilists) and aggressive dealings with her family situation arises at least partly from [spoiler:3j8osyrx]her childhood in a MANCUNIAN ORPHANAGE.[/spoiler:3j8osyrx]  Hint-hint?  I'm usually wrong about these things, but I'm guessing [spoiler:3j8osyrx]she's as much a product of secret manipulation as FauxCroft is[/spoiler:3j8osyrx].  It's a somewhat cumbersome way to get there, but I think it works.  And at least Steel has never been just Lewis to Armitage's Morse.  It's also worth noting that the mysterious pasts of the characters has always been at the core of the strip, and TBH it was never better than during Adlard's B&W explorations of Armitage's origins in the civil war.  I'm not a massive fan of Armitage, but it has had its moments, and this current run is well in line with the general thrust of the strip.

I haven't gotten to the Clive Barker bit yet, but I read and enjoyed pretty much every other bit of the Meg this month, including the reprint supplement. Good stuff all round, with a special mention for the excellent Black Museum story.

I'm loving Tank Girl, too. That's a nasty space jobby.

- Trout

Quote from: "TordelBack"I'm usually wrong about these things, but I'm guessing [spoiler:1753ha1x]she's as much a product of secret manipulation as FauxCroft is[/spoiler:1753ha1x].  It's a somewhat cumbersome way to get there, but I think it works.  And at least Steel has never been just Lewis to Armitage's Morse.

You're right, there's no point having a sidekick if they're literally going to be someone for the main character to talk to and Steel has been fleshed out a fair bit - which I'm very much behind.  Not least because she reminds me of someone I know.  Apart from dropping people to their death really slowly so I can cross the room in time to save them, obviously.... *smirk*

Quote from: "King Trout"Good stuff all round, with a special mention for the excellent Black Museum story.

With this thread slowly becoming the "We hate/love Treasure Steel" party, it's so nice to get back to someone discussing the REST of the meg.  I enjoyed the black museum immensly.

I think I'm malfunctioning, as I didn't like the Tales of the Black Museum strip. Nothing wrong with nick's art; (think he's improving steadily now he's getting a bit of work. I'd love to see him do a Sin-Dex piece.) but Art's script did nothing for me. It was when the rats became semi-intelligent dimension jumpers I lost it. Shame really as the series has been quite strong for the last few issues.

I don't read Armitage- Sorry, but I can't get past the way John Cooper just fits the page together in photoshop. It jarrs the storytelling something fierce and I wish he'd leave off the grey too. Use the dot tones to put depth in. If I could get past that I'd be able to read the script and see if it worked.

I could well be wrong but the thing that set Proper Dave off was the fact that people were saying one thing when they purportedly meant another. There's a world of difference between 'the domestic scenes are boring and not needed' and 'her secuality and colour are being rammed down our throats'.

The first is a (wrong) criticism and the other...barking. It hasn't happened in the strip. You can see why it would cause a negative reaction.

The one who first mentioned her sexuality being crammed down anyones throat was Proper Dave himself. Take a look back and see.

I meant what I said- she has too much 'gubbins' thrown into a big grab bag then shaken around and - you still get a flat boring character. Mainly because it's too much overkill on the 'edgy', 'interesting' background which actually is neither 'edgy' nor 'interesting'. I like think to this is because your average 2000ad reader isn't a bigotted moron, plus this is the 21st century. We've seen it before- it really isn't a big deal.
'Life circumstances' are not 'personality' par se- though they cartainly influence a persons character. It's how a person reacts and interacts that shows their personality. Buttonman touched on it when he said that not all black lesbian women have the same personality- some of them will be great and others will not be.
A person cannot be defined entirely by their life circumstances- such a thing would be ludicrous.

As far as Armitage the story goes- it's too slow, because it tends to have too much build up with very little action/ plot twists/ atmosphere. It, instead, focuses on character building with characters who are pretty flat and unintersting anyway.

What appeared to set Dave off was the fact that he thought we did like Treasure because she was a black character and a lesbian chracter. Which was not the case. He even said as much himself.

Where does the perception that it's meant to be edgy material come from though? It seems an odd reading of the material.

Because she is outside of what would be normally described as a 'traditional comic-book hero'.
And it isn't 'edgy'. My point precisely.
Perhaps 'edgy' was a poor choice of word.Not that it matters- what is meant is clear enough.

Just because people don't agree, doesn't make anyone 'wrong' or 'barking'. They just have a different take on what they read.
I can't see why it would cause a negative reaction. Perhaps the creators had not thought that it appeared this way to anyone. Perhaps by looking at it from a different angle, they might look on the averall story arc a bit differently and adjust how they are playing things.
Isn't that what reviews, critiques etc are for? Did I walk into the wrong thread? This is a review column, yeah?

Anyway, I thought this was all over and we'd moved on.

Oh, I didn't get that memo.

I still think that's all sorts of oddness is thinking 'that's not what I'd expect in a comic hero, it must be being done to shock. I am not shocked thoug so you FAIL!'

Remember the kittens everyone.

KITTENS!!!!!

Well... I can't speak for Dark Jimbo, who said it felt like it was being done to shock- but I understood that to mean exactly what he said, though I might be wrong. He was talking specifically about Treasure Steel the character and all her 'issues' at the time. IIRC he actually said he didn't mind the story- it was ok.

It was me who doesn't like Armitage much- and I wasn't really talking about this story particularly- It was just a general, overall feeling about his return to the Meg. I don't hate it entirely, I still read it, I just don't enjoy it much at all- it' seriously lacks Thrill Power (as Huff said) for me.

Our two slightly different opinions are getting melded together to form one opinion that doesn't really represent what either of us said, really.

QuoteHe was talking specifically about Treasure Steel the character and all her 'issues' at the time.

I know I'm belaboring a point, but like them or not I don't think Steel's 'issues' as intended to be seen (and foregrounded in the strip) have anything to do with being gay and/or black, or for that matter 'edgy'.  I see it more as a case of a Detective Judge with a family with whom she has a horribly  disfunctional relationship - the underlying cause of which is not just her job, but  as I was suggesting earlier [spoiler:31jbccw1]her childhood background in some dodgy black-ops programme[/spoiler:31jbccw1] - hence its relevance to a Dreddworld strip whose main focus has always been shadowy cabals and their secret killers.  At least, I hope that's what's going on.

I would agree with Bolt, though - nice as Dave Cooper's art undoubtedly is, the way the pages are composed in PS is very hard to deal with.

Quote from: "pjholden"

Quote from: "Proudhuff"Capt Britian: not my bag of chuickies, so skimmed it, didn't know The Mighty Mr Moore worked on it at one point.

*SPLUTTER* What??? The Moore Captain Britain stuff is fantastic - I heartily recommend the collection, there's some amazing stuff in there (a Rag, a Bone and a Hank of Hair is just glorious).

Indeed. You get to see Alan Davis's art evolve (into a style which nearly killed his chances of working for Tharg but got him snapped up in the US) and Alan Moore's first major grabbing of a superheroes balls and dragging him up to be the star of a glittering multiverse-spanning jewel of a story (//http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaspers%27_Warp).

The character has also been worked on by a number of droids throughout a large part of his history so as well as Moore/Davis you get some Jamie Delano and Mike Collins and on up to Paul Cornell's recent run on CB & MI13 (interesting that he returned to a lot of the magic and that might have been enough to cause the title problems). So it is something that certainly deserves a mention in the Megazine, especially if people haven't given the Moore version a spin, at the very least.

Quote from: "SpookyTheCat"

Quote from: "Proudhuff"okay, okay,    anyone know if the Moore stuff is collected in a trade?

Marvel collected it all in a trade a few years ago- slighly buggered about with and coloured, because it was reprinted from its American packaging in some X-Men limited series or other. It's not a bad package, though.

There are a few reprints doing the rounds now with a big fat Omnibus around (it has slipped a few months from the scheduled release):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Br ... d_editions (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Britain#Collected_editions)

Volume 4 of the Panini collection is out at the end of the year and will contain the Alan Moore run, although we'll have to see if it is recoloured (it isn't a deal breaker). So you could ask Santa for it.

Worth keeping an eye out for the Black Knight reprints from Hulk Comic (which start in volume 3 and continues in Volume 4, as it leads directly into Dave Thorpe's brief stint on the title which started the reboot) as it contains stunning art by John Stokes (written by Steve Parkhouse), I remember being in awe of it at the time and I dug out the old issues when the news circulated that Panini were scanning it in (and Marvel were also interested in it, so there might be a reprint coming from them too at some point) and it is as good as ever.

Quote from: "TordelBack"

QuoteDave Stone's Brit Cit always appealed more than Wagner's version - which always felt like a cut-price Mega-City One rather than something peculiarly British.

Wagner's problem is that his MC-1 is so British that there's nowhere new for his Brit Cit to go.  I too rather prefer Stone's version, even if I wouldn't be a big fan of Armitage.

For some reason, Wagner's "British" Mega-City One really did it for me, probably because being American, it made the city seem even more quirky. As a result, Brit Cit in any form never was quite as cool.

As an aside, I always felt the Judges in Brit Cit shouldn't carry guns!

Anyway, an up-and-down issue for me. I like the Dredd story a lot, and the Black Museum strip was on the level, but I just can't hang with Tank Girl. Armitage is...well, unlike Tank Girl, at least I read it, though that doesn't mean I derive much pleasure from it. Clive Barker is a pretentious wanker as always, Captain Britain is goody-goody boring (don't like superheroes period) and I could take or leave the other features. However, the graphic novel this time round was fantastic. I had never seen this strip, but found it strongly compelling. Great writing, with all of the subplots. Loved it!

I've had a strange reaction to Tank Girl. Skid Marks I just couldn't dig(who does?) but for some reason this latest story just worked for me. Everything seemed to gell and I think I'm beginning to get the joke and the humour. I'm not about to rush out and buy all the old graphic novels, but I'm beginning to accept its place in The Megazine!
Color me kind of converted.

See, for me, it's an odd strip Tank Girl. There's nothing actually bad about it but...it doesn't work for me. It was never the my favourite strip but always had a zeitgeisty energy. Couple the fact that it was always, deliberatley, ramshackle in it's plotting with the fact that it's not 1995 any more...

It feels like watching a weird Land Before Time film with Peter Cushing and Doug McClure exploring a mysterious valley. They cut through the forest and, insted of finding a herd of Dinosaurs, find Menswe@r in concert.

Stil, it's lined up for yankee reprint and it seems to be going down well but for at least one reader it's just sort of...there. In the Meg every month. Neither appalling or appealing. It's pretty and all but it's like the idea of Rob Newman performing History Today with some young comic. I'd rather he didn't.

I dunno, I can't really disagree but on the other hand I actually like that it's permenantly 1995 in tank girl land - happy days! 'course, I kept reading deaddline till the bitter end.

Me too.

Tank Girl's just enormous fun. I hope it stays in the Meg forever.

- Trout

Call me facile, shallow and a pushover if you like, but despite never reading Deadline (the magazine definition of "trying too hard" and "being a twat") and only ever reading TG in passing, AND loathing the initial "Wacky Races" stylee storyline in The Meg, all it took for me to start reading it was a new jumping-in point and, er, Rufus becoming my friend on Facebook.  

It's not my favourite thing in The Meg- ranking somewhere just above all the filler features, but I'm actually enjoying it now. And the art is lovely and funny.

I still have absolutely no interest i tracking down issues of Deadline or old TGs though, but it's earned it's place in my eyes.

Steev

Not a lot in the Meg for me this month - I actually thought the BAD MANNERS free floppy was the best thing about it.

Didn't like the conclusion to the DREDD tale. I should have - it had giant bugs fighting robots. But it also had some terrible dialogue and coincidences and, overall, just wasn't an interesting enough tale to warrant the page count. Well, not for me anyway.

TALES OF THE BLACK MUSUEM was cute but ultimately filler that I wasn't bothered about.  Note that this is far different from saying it was BAD. It wasn't; he art was great and it had lots of ideas chucked in it but it just wasn't the sort of thing that turns me on (in teh same way that I can see why people would find Jessica Alba attractive, I would never argue that she wasn't attractive but she just doesn't do it for me). I like to have a central character to these sort of stories and this didn't.

Not read TANK GIRL yet but I do love the art

I struggle to see the point of ARMITAGE at all. I don't think I've ever liked it - I can't recall anything about the characters (isn't one of them black or a lesbian or something?) and, this may sound bad manners but I do agree with all those editors who said that John Cooper's style just wasn't a good fit for modern comics.  I don't think it is.  And Longman will hate me for this but I find it "too cartoony!".

Incidentally, what is that DVD mag that they advertise on the back about? Is it a titty mag for people too fightened to buy titty mags? (says the man who has posted most on the UNDERWARE thread).


Colour me: UNDERWHELMED.

Quote from: "Tiplodocus"Incidentally, what is that DVD mag that they advertise on the back about? Is it a titty mag for people too fightened to buy titty mags? (says the man who has posted most on the UNDERWARE thread).

Yes, what on earth IS that about.  Deeply childish.  I want every prepubescent who's faintly considering buying that magazine to just man up, walk right into his (or her) local newsagent and profer his money to the proprietor proudly exclaiming: "May I purchase some of your finest grot, please vendor?"

We all had to do it.  These days kids get porn free with viruses on the internet, but the old way was at least character-building.  

Don't buy that mag kids.  Don't even buy the likes of FHM, it's just the rantings of the boring twonks in your local sandwiched between "tasteful" shots of microceleb silicone.  Go and buy some proper porn.  Preferably something that makes you taste a tiny bit of sick.  The world will be a better place.

Quote from: "Tiplodocus"this may sound bad manners but I do agree with all those editors who said that John Cooper's style just wasn't a good fit for modern comics.  I don't think it is.  And Longman will hate me for this but I find it "too cartoony!".

I guess its down to personal preference though. I got a real thrill seeing new work from John Cooper. I grew up reading Battle and action force which he drew a lot for. Pity the story he was illustrating seems dull so far.

Quote from: mikegloady on 07 July, 2009, 11:34:41 PM
Yes, what on earth IS that about.  Deeply childish.  I want every prepubescent who's faintly considering buying that magazine to just man up, walk right into his (or her) local newsagent and profer his money to the proprietor proudly exclaiming: "May I purchase some of your finest grot, please vendor?"

Hang on, isn't that Allan Bryce's mag- that in a previous incarnation was 'Video World'- and which has been around since the very dawn of home video, championing the nasties, running features on the kind of films other UK newsagent mags wouldn't touch, beautifully having at least half the mag dedicated to smut and generally allowing 14 year old boys who's only local newsagent was staffed by people their mum knew to get away with buying, basically, a jazz-mag from right under their noses?

That's proper, working-class video-boom history, that is. And, isn't it the very same magazine that is now giving away Jean Rollin movies on DVD with nearly every issue (I await Les Deux Orphaline Vampires with barely concealed vinegar strokes)

Of course, it may very well be another magazine that I've got it mixed up with. In which case: burn the filth!

Steev