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https://www.amazon.co.uk/Insurrection-Dan-Abnett/dp/1907992499

That's a shame, lovely stuff. Still think everyone responded pretty appropriately - tongues firmly in cheek.

I just enjoy how quickly you can dry your clothes in those big drums, saving me the most irritating bit of laundry - hanging up the clothes to dry.

It's not so labyrinthine Well at least once you get past the alternating issues of LosH and Legionnaires (Dunno if you ever read Spidey but it used to be like that too... seemed a bit of a 90s thing looking back). They helpfully have a little Legion flight ring with the order to be read in on the front as well.

But otherwise they just follow on from each other and the different titles just served to break up storylines and provide a lot of suspense for readers at the time, not least me at 13 years old.

Long live the Legion! /Fanboy

[Legion of the Damned]

Well, in honesty it built on what was a long and extended run of mostly greatness (though lighter in tone) in the post Zero-Hour Legion of Superheroes continuity. Back when DC continuity had managed to iron itself out a bit better, before they nosedived deep, deep into head ache central. I think they are collected in Legion of The damned, Legion Lost and Legion Worlds TPBs with the follow-up series 'The Legion' harder to get hold of due to being cut before it wound up its major stories.

The Dabnett/Lanning period capped off the long-running LoSH/Legionnaires two-fold comic, which I loved from start to finish but which is probably too big a chunk to bite off. The last few issues of both of these comics brings the fledgling 'Golden Age' of the United Planets to an abrupt end with the Legion of the Damned arc, as an extra-galactic enemy attacks Earth. It's great.

Legion Lost picks up on (spoilers!) immediately in the aftermath, as some of the Legion find themselves lost amidst strange stars, in a galaxy dominated by a murderous race of xenophobes... Then this is followed by Legion Worlds, which is a mini-series of one-offs exploring some of the surviving Legion members as they struggle to deal with a fractured UP and the loss of their friends.

And then you can read The Legion which is the most mainstream of their DC stuff but still absolutely bloody brilliant, which sadly gets axed just before the finish. It features the best DC continuity character surprise, it has a truly excellent space guerrila war against an unstoppable robot army.... it's grand. My favourite aspect of all of this is that the Legion's superheroic idealism doesn't fall apart under the strains of war, betrayal and disaster.

I say it every time but seriously - Dan Abnett's Legion of Superheroes was the best Sci-Fi superhero stuff there has ever been, and built perfectly off the back of the long-running Legion Lost, Legion of the Damned and Legion Worlds stuff, which honestly would slot directly in to Tooth in terms of scope, detail and brilliance.

Of course credit for this has to be shared with Andy Lanning, who I sometimes fear has gotten the short end of the stick in Dabnett's success. I don't think they've worked together since 2013 and it seems like Andy hasn't done anything solo since either.

Not that I'm aware of but I would wholeheartedly endorse such a project.

When do you plan to start?

I have compiled a list of every time it has ever been in Downlode...

Please share Cosh, I love those 'This is Downlode, the city that took your dreams and used them to decorate the shed" bits

[is]

Woolly, that is class. So many great pieces both in terms of creative/funny ideas and wonderfully drawn/coloured art. Just gets better and better!

Not to flog a dead judge even further but I think everyone (else) loves Pete's entries and I am 100% certain Pete does not submit them with any intent of actually winning the competition. And CFM is a lovelier and more mature chap than most of us so I won't pretend I speak on his behalf, but I just went over the Chopper threads and James I think you have really misread and misrepresented what went on with the infamous Choppers piece. Certainly, based on what's readable to all, CFM certainly didn't "call him out" on anything and no one 'turned on him' for doing so. No one ever turns on CFM! He's crazy like some kind of machine fox, you wouldn't dare.

Your stuff is pretty good though James.

It's a very well made action film but it ain't shakespeare  But I agree Cosh it's the rare example of an action movie where you don't have to turn your brain off to enjoy.

Fight Club is great though. Both movie and book. And they take about the same amount of time to get through.

Gun Machine is something else - loved that and crooked little vein

Bangarang!

I love that movie. Through the lens of yesteryear.

I did not know Dabnett wrote Alien Isolation. My love grows ever stronger

It's a great story. Ted Chiang is a brilliant writer - be interesting to see if they can make that work as a movie as most of his stuff is very conceptual.

A lot of his work is available online, including this particular story: https://mathisgasser.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/ted-chiang_story-of-your-life_2000.pdf

The 'flashbacks' are more along the lines of the Tralfamadorian philosophy, for those of you who know your Vonnegut. Though the mathematician who is the main character finds this expressed in a more complex, alien fashion than Billy Pilgrim experienced.

The BBC did a great adaptation of his story 'Understand', which is like the Bradley Cooper vehicle Limitless but far better. Obviously the internal space of narrative is better at conveying a change in perception & intellect than the external narrative of cinema (and particularly popcorn flick cinema at that).

And various SF pods have done versions of his short stories too - all worth checking out I think. http://www.sffaudio.com/features/author-pages/ted-chiang/

I like Black Shuck's idea and the whole gist, but in the actual ep-to-ep it has failed to really stick at all. I kind of skipped over the last couple of bits to be honest.

Brink is my favourite but I am a Dabnett fan through and through. And I'm going to have to get some more of Scarlet Traces... all that backstory I'm missing out on!

Sorry for the double post, but I found some examples of Black (and White) Shuck on this very website; http://www.2000adonline.com/post/465

That's more my cuppa.

Huh! I do much prefer that. Never occured to me.

I think there are a lot of options for doing things digitally.

Conversely you can take my method - resist thrillpower for a month and get four lovely comics in one when you finally get around to the comic shop. Warning: will face disappointment if you are a WH Smiths buyer.