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I have noticed a few non sf or barely sf strips in 2000AD of late, which would probably work just as well with or without any SF.  As 2000AD's format is to remain pretty much the same as it has for the last 25 years, I'd rather keep the content SF too.

Of course the new SF which is in there is largely comic book SF, following or imitating previous strips and for science fiction you are generally just reading action stories with SF trappings.

I would like to see some more comics from rebellion, I know Jason Kingsley mentioned the posibility of more titles a bit down the road.  It would also stem these urges to take 2000AD down a different path (or many paths at the same time which would be a disaster)  I would like to see:

The HORROR of 2000AD, a dedicated horror/weird title
REAL LIFE 2000AD - Normal everday tales in the recent 21st century (within that you could venture into more strange territory).  NOT a comic like CRISIS I hasten to add.
WEIRD WORLDS of 2000AD - Fantasy comic.
SUPERHEROES of 2000AD - Superhero comic (can't think of a good title for this one off the top of my head)

I imagine they would be pretty popular, but you could branch out into Romance, Detective (yeah!), Wild West, whatever.  The beauty of it being that you could have main 2000AD characters appearing in these comics.  So Slaine could appear in the fantasy one (or spin offs from), Zenith and Storming Heaven in the Superhero one, Judge Death in the Horror one.

Of course this is just fantasy, there is no reason why one comic or company should fulfill my fantasies, but it's fun to think about it.  Any other ideas?

Happy Easter

PVS

I've often wondered about that.

As I think I said before, I think crossovers are genereally a bad idea, but if they must be done, I think cross continuity should be treated very lightly.

If people really didn't want them in AD and wanted to preserve the AD format (sfter all it has worked for 25 years), then do it with the megazine.  It would make it even more like a magazine.  You pay the same page rates or half page rates, it gives lots of people a break and costs no more than your average five page strip.  Make them B/W too, for extra cheapness.  Editors could pair up creators (or at leats put them in contact with each other) to make these things more collaborative once a story and artist has been picked.  Could be much more creative.

Someone mentioned it in a nearby thread, but I'm not sure if they were joking or not.  I think the idea of a one page strip might work with Sin Dex and I'm not saying that to be rude.  

I think that it would be good to have a number of one page strips, five in fact to replace future shocks.  Maybe even some half-pagers.  The truth is that many people can't tell a decent story in five pages (me for one by my past record) but I have read a lot of decent smaller strps in comics.  One pagers, half pagers, either silly jokey strips (anyone for THRUD if you don't believe me?) that could be either one off ideas or a weekly strip.  The daily star dredd was a three panel strips about 3"x6", not that big, it did the job.  

I just feel something should be done about these fillers.  With say 5-10 (E.g 2 full page and 6 half page) small strips in an issue instead of a future shock at least you wouldn't be putting all your eggs in one basket.  You could try out a lot of new talent (future shocks no longer bring in new writing talent really do they?), lots of writers and artists and have some fun quirky SF that normally wouldn't get touched.  You could also then exploit, sorry, explore popular ideas.

I'm not sure if this would work all the time but you could consider them trailers or samplers for readers to see what they liked.

Robbie, choose the duelling pistols.  Actually I suspect you'll win whatever you choose.  Except an arguement as Scojo has a logic proof vest on.

"If you don't like it, don't read it!"  That sort of comment gets 20% of my goat.  It means we should have to put up with crap or something half assed in a five strip mag.  Especially as I've paid 28p per episode of it.  If you add all those 28p's up, see how much stories that you don't like cost you at the end of the year.  Would you otherwise use that money to cal up someone you didn't like or buy a magazine you didn't want to read?  It's even worse when they could be strips you enjoy but for the half arsed approach to them.

I have read much less Dante than most of you and enjoy much less than half of that.  There seems to be a lot of lazy sex gags that marr otherwise okay stories.  I appreciate that most people now seem to enjoy something near the knuckle, and quite often, some tits, but just having something rude in isn't really a substitute for humour.  I think the current series is pretty good and stays on the right side of saucy.  A series with a lot of potential and tends to be just 'okay'.  I find that annoying because I think it could be great.

Obviously it's easier to criticise than do it yourself, hence why  we areall here, but making valid comments has to be worth it just in the million to one chance that someone might listen and agree with you and change it.  I don't reckon challenges are a good way of doing it though :)

However Scojo is going to find that one day everyone he has challenged is going to arrive on his doorstep at once and beat him to a bloody pulp.  The Scojo doorstep challenge.

Cheers

PVS

p.s. Disclaimer:  To the person who said "If you don't like it, don't read it!" I'm just replying to the sentiment, not challenging any opinions you hold or assuming opinions to you.  I am as my lawyer points out, drivelling.

Oh no, oh no oh no oh no.  No no no.

I may have one waiting for me when I get back but I've now given up, so I may not even bother to open it, in a casual dismissive way, possibly with a gin and tonic in one hand.  Why waste my time and someone elses on such an unlikely venture that, even should it succeed, will reward you with little else but the scorn of you peers?  Seem like madness to me.  Big flapping winged madness that swoops and glides eagle-like high in the sky just waiting to dive down and scoop out your sanity with its big beak.

Hence my Manifesto I've posted for political office.  Harsh views some might say, but we live in a harsh world. Someone has to tackle soaring crime inflation rates and I propose that we should have an anti-logan's run law which sends anyone under the age of thirty to be retired (disintegrated).

They don't read enough comics.  In my day we had comics and not all this lawless malarky.  Curfews are fine, but what will they learn if they aren't forced to read comics as part of their punishment?  Perhaps they should be beaten with comics for their crimes, or have many comics dropped upon them.  Perhaps they could do a comics national service, having to write or draw comics for a minimum of two years.  Comics on the national curriculum.  A three in one comics jab featuring 2000AD Battle and Scream.  Nu Comics.  Chain them to many comics (protected by mylar bags and acid free boards) and throw them overboard.  Let them eat comics.  Have Westlife and other inispid boybands regularly killed off by favourite comic characters of yesteryore.  Make Gareth Gates into a comic, then burn him, thereby increasing the rarity of him as well as making him largely inaccesable, and too expensive for young children.  We could make a rocket out of comics and go to a different alien world (perhaps made of comics with a comic based lifeform that speaks in speech bubbles) and live in a comic utopia.  Staple comics to our bodies and become living comics.  Make youths get only comic characters tattoo'd on their bodies so we can peel off their skins and read them as comics if they gather in groups of three or more in bus stops or on street corners.  Make-

"Come with me please sir, you'll be quite safe in the nice van"

Vote PVS for a better tomorrow (with comics)!  What's that, a needle?  Will it take me to the land of comics where comic trolls...

In response to that last comment by Scojo.

I am not a vegetarian.  I like neither meat nor vegetables.

I'm off into Bracknell to look for a copy of 2000AD.  

Wish me luck.

I may be sometime

Captain Von Scott

Fancy a FAQ?

A lot of questions seem to pop up again and again concerning characters.  It could be good to have a FAQ for some of these fings.

Cheers Colonel!

I used to reather enjoy the Leopard of Lime Street.  I couldn't remember the name till I read the article.

It makes me pine for those old comics and even a british comics industry.  Just imagine such a thing!

Oh well, I'm off back to my flat in the roof of the local comprehensive.  There's nothing funny about it mind you.  I am the leopard!

PVS

Since it started aeons ago, I suspect this thread will resurface (and rightly so, for tis a good idea) pretty often.

However it seems to me that it won't happen for the moment bevause Rebellion have entered into a venture for physical reprinting of progs in hard copy.  It seems like it would be financial madness for them and the company that is printing them to do a CD set, or even say they will do a CD set in the future, until they have had a suitable reward for their current efforts.

Of course it is a good idea for fans to discuss it anyway, so that if it does ever happen, it may incorporate some of the good ideas they had.

I don't think it's a good idea to expect a free copy in return for these idea's. Idea's are generally free and it would only make the fans and the project seem a bit less appealing, like a sticky bog :)

It could be handy to do a list of all the possible features suggested by fans from among threads 706, 714, 989, this one and I think there were a few others too.  So that if they ever did consider it, it would be easier to see what people have come up with.  You could even vote on conflicting ideas and formats by adding no. of votes an idea has at the end.

Oh well i've slipped into beaurocratic list making mode so I'd better be off.

Cheers

PVS

A Message board thread would be a good way of thrashing out the details.  I'm kind of interested in the idea of a timeline with some reservations.  I think strips should obey internal continuity but shoulde be a bit fluid in relationships with other strips.  Otherwise strips impinge (they do you know) on each other.

I would have thought if someone did it, it would be a good feature for the website.

Wow, glad I read Dredd last, it cheered me up after all the other stuff.  Great!  Vunderbar!  I think it is a classic Dredd story.  I'm off soon to give it an unfeasably high rating soon.

I understand all the faults with the art and I thought the mock fighting fantasy was quite entertaining in it's own way.  For a long time these short one off's whether they be Time Wasters, Farfrom Shocks, Tales of Tedium or Tales of Terrible have given me endless hours of perverse enjoyment in all things filler.  I think the leaky plot hole was excellent and the art was my favourite this year.  The art for all it's faults seemed to have some raw enthusiasm about it I found quite charming.

The SinDex story reminded me of a nemesis story or was it ABC warriors?  Where the robots are sat around the table playing cards and one of them is a known fake.  Not that keen on the whole rummy business and especially as it resulted in another SinDex cover.

Enjoyed Nikki-D, I think it's about time the strip took a darker turn.  Has anyone else ever noted the similarity between Jeeves and Crest?

Atavar's okay.  It's okay, I just wish it was a bit crunchier and meatier.  Crunchy meat, that's what it lacks.  All the elements for a ripping story are there.

Oh well another prog vivisection over.  The Dredd story and the sunny day was worth the walk into Bracknell.

There could of course be a reason for this.  Most of these ideas turn up in the media long before they are used, whether that's a speculitive article in the paper, on tomorrow's world or whatever.  They sound futuristic if a little unfeasable, writers use the basic idea and eventually technology catches up, the things are built and they appear to be prophetic.

Still it is fun looking for them.

On another note, further back down the keyboard, it was quite eerie reading the Dredd when the twin towers were blown up after it had happened in real life.

Oh that stuffs okay...

I agree the megazine is probably a fine read for a kid, classic thrills that he won't have read 12761457345374523974 times already.  Almost envy the little sucker.