Messages

[quite]

I hope we see him in the prog again.

3 more weeks.

https://2000ad.com/news/the-2000-ad-sci-fi-special-2024-supernova-stories-from-a-sideways-universe/

appreciaite this is not quite a Prog, but a treat nonetheless

[The Pitch]

Good to get a confirmation and a release date on this collection.

Inevitably this will contain The Pitch, The Hagger They Fall and A Batter World. But I am intrigued where Jake Lynch fits in.

Any ideas?

Sentinoid's Big Idea maybe? Seems a bit of a stretch, since Maitland did not feature but it is part of the Williams/Wyatt continuum.

[Cold Wars]

I think you left your white marker pen at PJ's table. He was raving about how nice it was for doodles - including the Dredd profile he did inside Cold Wars for me

Wow, those are amazing, Trooper.

particularly love the very subtle turquoise pencil Simon uses for Dante.

GIVE US MORE SPECTOR, JOHN (please?)

Where's the bloody like button when you need one?

Incorruptible was 100 pages so enough for a (slim) collected edition.

I'd welcome a graphic novel of the first outing or would be happy to wait for a new series and see them both collected together.

Traffic might be a little too slow to keep a determined perp from busting out, but someone definitely read Prog 2 before designing Nanpu Bridge in Shanghai.



Nice video clip here

Ant pictures of the art exhibition????

Quite a few in here, mixed up with other art from the floor and traders' room

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=oa.425317576962121&type=3

Finally left Bristol and while I'm not yet back in the sandpit, I'm still buzzing from Lawless 10. Great reconnecting with some boarders (Eamonn, Stacy, Lee) and lovely meeting some for the first time (Jim, LeFink). sorry to miss the rest of you (is there some kind of secret handshake??)

I managed to escape without buying any original art, though Simon Davis' Thistlebone and Pete Doherty's Ratfink pages almost got me. However I bagged plenty of signatures, bought a handful of collected editions and commissioned these three sweethearts:



Pre convention sketch from Mike Perkins. A5 and helpfully pasted into the bookplate of the Fiends  hardback edition



Crazy Barry and Little Mo by Chris Weston



Judge Maitland my Boo Cook

I would have taken either of these as black and white sketches. In colour they are sensational.

Nik Dante by John Burns

Wow. lucky you.

Get down to Lawless 10, unreal line up of artists to get sketches from this year

[Lawless]

Colin,

if you are deciding between Lawless and Thought Bubble, it depends what you want. Are you looking for a broad comics experience or an intense 2000AD jamboree?

I know you have love for a wide range of comics so you will probably get to meet a broader range of people at TB.

If the Harrogate festival is like last year 2000ad will should have a decent sized presence and should bring along, let's say half a dozen droids. On top of that there will be another 50 or so creators from big publishers through independent, niche presses. However the whole weekend is held inside a very large warehouse-like hall so seems a little impersonal to me.

Lawless is in a very intimate space, moreover Su and the team hit the bullseye with creator : fan ratio. I think they are anticipating around 320 attendees this year...and hosting 35 creators.

The space at the DoubleTree (one fairly large room for droids, another slightly smaller one for traders, an 80ish person capacity conference room for talks, a middling space for the Dave Roach exhibition) is perfectly-sized. I went last year and never felt rushed, never felt like I was going to miss a signing or sketch opportunity, never looked at a queue and thought, why bother? In fact, the very opposite: I chatted to umpteen artists and writers and the longest I waited for anything was a 15 minute queue for a bespoke Henry Flint sketch.


If you want to save a bit of dough

Option One: get an early train on Saturday and aim to be there for 10:30 in time for the first talk, then stay only one night.


Option Two: The action wraps up by 3pm / 3:30pm on the Sunday so if you think you can get everything achieved in one day maybe get a day return and head back home on Saturday night.


My vote is Lawless, and yes, I am defo going.

[Fiends of the Eastern Front]

The original run of Fiends of the Eastern Front, which was otherwise tremendous, has a few of these very clunky Show AND Tell moments. This is one of the worst

[The Outfit]

The Outfit (2022)

A widowed tailor who prides himself on using traditional techniques, gets caught in the middle of an old school gang war. Over the course of the night he must make the Don's somewhat useless son look his best and hide multiple corpses as the bodycount increases.

Now, if you're thinking this sounds incredibly similar to dear old Jacob Sardini from The Taxidermist, you are not alone. Watching on Netflix, I had to pause to look and Google if the writers were a couple of Squaxx sailing just this side of a plagiarism lawsuit.

Overall pretty good and very atmospheric, almost channeling Rope in that every scene takes place within the three rooms of the tailor's studio.

[Kind Hearts and Coronets]

I managed not to hype it up too much for the youngling (11), who was despairing that we were going to see a black and white movie, but left declaring it was one of the best movies they'd ever seen.

That's fantastic, hopefully a gateway to other Ealings.

I had a similar experience a decade back introducing a neophyte to Kind Hearts and Coronets (rainy afternoon in my living room rather than a cinema screening; lucky you).

The first ten minutes were filled with teeth gnashing at the B&W, and the 'funny' accents. When the credits rolled: joyous declarations of love.

Great episode.

I've had the omnibus edition sitting unread on a shelf for about five years. Not sure why as I enjoyed the prequel, Point Blank.

This will finally get me reading.

[The High Window]

And any fav few out of the bunch?

The High Window is my fave Chandler, the prototype Marlowe taking a job then wising up to the fact the person paying him to investigate a crime is at least as dirty as the target.

Best movie adaptation is Murder My Sweet. Powell was excellent in most things he did, but was never better than this.