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Age of the Wolf is not good. Great concept mind you...

Skimming over Hachette's site, Zenith is brilliant. Stickleback and Leviathan are worth a shot from recent relases imo.

As someone that didn't read it in the Meg, what is the forum verdict on The Returners?

[Dredd]

Monday Prog! I eagerly went through it on my tea break. I wasn't a fan of the cover when I saw it on FB last week, but it's got some cool details and has really grown on me, aside from the font on the tagline.

Dredd Wraps up neatly. I wasn't hugely into this Dredd story and the ending didn't change that. Neatly done with the spin on execs having 'killer instinct' and all that corporate jargon but it wasn't really a funny or exciting tale overall.
That said, the end reveal did feel very old school and I didn't think this was a bad Dredd, just not one I was into.
As various forumites have commented each week, the art is both good and a bit jarring with it's contemporary depictions of things (this week, the manor house). I did like the little medi-droids. Also was the axe guy using Slaines axe?

The Out provides a very wordy and very excellent episode. Stuff is revealed. The art is incredible. The Cheerio bit fell a bit flat, as he was a pretty unlikeable character, but the rest is tremendous.

I enjoyed this Future Shock - it was concise, snappy and had a suitably grim twist at the end, even though thinking about it now the whole thing doesn't really stand up: I'm not actually 100% sure what the deal was with the pheromones or why Hans or Zoe would act as they did. Great art, shows a little of Dave Roach in places? Promising stuff from two new Droids anyway.

The Order is... alright. It manages to be all action and a bit of a muddle all at once - it definitely feels like it's cramming stuff into each episode as it strives to reach a conclusion. "H-How's this possible?" says Clara at one point before saying something pseudo-nonsensical and I'm right there with her: This isn't the best series of the The Order and I find myself hoping it's got a bit more in it after this. You can tell Burns doesn't like drawing the big robots.

Vex ends in a crazy, apocalyptic and very dramatic manner. Tharg seems to imply this isn't the end of the series as a whole, which is good as for me this has been one of the finest things in the Prog for a while. I'm looking forward to going back and reading this as a whole - it's been an epic storyline brilliantly realised.

Regened next week, ho hum.

You had to be quick to get the limited pledges! Aly Fell art went whilst I was trying to back it!

Really happy to be supporting this.

You need to consult the Oreo at Delphi.

My favourite comment on this thread, bravo Shark.

Inspired by this discussion I bought myself some Animal Biscuits yesterday. These were NOT as nice as I recalled. I remembered them being basically tiny, animal shaped chocolate digestives but the biscuit now is all hard and dry and nasty and also there is no longer a squirrel. Essentially I endured the jeers of my colleague for nothing.

I must be alone in finding that The Order has become too much of a straightforward adventure strip in its recent outings.

I miss the timey-wimey stuff from the first four serials, with the sense that we're watching cross-sections of a history-spanning conflict in different time periods. The more recent chase-chase-fight stuff has been a bit more sedate to me, and puts me in mind of Tharg telling Moore and Gibson to tone down the future-slang and tone up the action for Halo Jones Book Two.

No, I agree with this - the first four series are 100% the best of the series. I wondered if there was a move to get away from this to avoid it becoming too close to the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, which is a shame as LoEG goes well off the boil and The Order was doing great.
I'm enjoying (mostly) this run of The Order for its pulpy action, but it's certainly not as good as it was.

That's fantastic stuff Hawk. Huge amounts of respect to you for taking control of the situation like that.

That's perfect.

Definitely backing this. If it's ready for Lawless, will there be an option to pick it up there?

Yeah, I went back and did that afterwards. This playthrough was my 'trying hard to win' one.
It doesn't help in any way to kill him, although it is satisfying.

Yeah. I flicked through and I don't think it's possible to 'save' Foxglove. The best ending she can get is getting the sceptre and taking over the Rift, which is definitely on brand (but also causes you to lose the book). Getting that spider thing off her head at least gives her her own agency back.

Big fan of Foxglove, but also I think there's a lot of redeemed bad guy narrative stuff about, especially if the villain is a bit hot, where within every bad girls heart is a bit of good etc. I quite like Foxglove (and Cassandra) sticking to the darkside.

The stuff at Irsmuncast is great for bringing everything together from previous books. I didn't like Csaky, but really enjoyed having all the advisors back, Lackland showing his true colours etc. And I didn't miss the irony of the imposter being out to kill me because I murdered his grand master in Usurper... a bit of a mirror of my own mission to avenge the grandmaster who was murderd by Yaemon.

The only bits of Bogie Man I've ever read was a little in Toxic. As a kid I didn't appreciate it at the time, but I'm definitely interested in this.

Dreadnoughts & A Very British Affair spoken for, cheers!

An errata to the above - Megatropolis isn't a webshop exclusive, but the standard hardback version. Apologies.

I'm clearing some space at the moment and have a small handful of graphic novels that need new homes, but really aren't worth me listing on ebay.
The below then are FREE if collected from me (near Worcester) or I can meet in Birmingham or Worcester itself. Or, if you're going to Lawless, I can save them and hand them over there!
If anybody further abroad badly wants them and there's no local takers I'll post them but would need postage + a nominal fee for packaging and stuff:

Immortal Hulk Omnibus 1
Complete Ace Trucking Co Vol 2
Complete Indigo Prime
Captain Britain: Before Excalibur
Mach 1 Close Encounters

(not GNs but I've also got a load of Steven Erkison's Malazan books, same applies)

Not going free I have

Dreadnoughts (webshop hardback) - £10 + £4 if posted
Megatropolis (webshop hardback) - £10 + £4 if posted
I've also got a spare copy of Dave Roach's excellent A Very British Affair: The Best of Classic Romance Comics - £20 + £6 postage (it's heavy!)

Here's the rest of my Redeemer writeup.

I think at the time I said what I liked about this book. Typing this lot up, it reinforces how much fun it was. The bit in the Rift is easily the best bit. It does seem, from these notes, like I'm constantly turning a corner and meeting some NPC or another, but that's because I've cut out all the boring bits.
Anyway.

Part 3

So... when I died last time, after setting off for the last of the 4 stooges, I was specifically asked if I'd eliminated Cassandra and having done so led to my death. So this time I restart, follow Cassandra until I meet Thybault but this time do not go after her but instead head into the big prison stalagmite, rescue Glaivas, kill Amin, port out, reunite with Dore and Taflwr etc. I'm convinced Avenger wouldn't leave Eris and Thybault to die, so I still take that route as going after them, and this time we go back down to the seventh level (ffs) to find them and aid them in battle against the dark elves. After Kwons Flail-ing a load of idiots we rescue the besieged pair and fight through spiders, elves and other horrors back up the sixth tier. Good guys reunited! No mention of Cassandra so far (I thought she'd intervene here) so I guess her being dead at this point just closed off going further to avoid timewasting, which is fair enough.

Reaching the sixth level gate, there's a difference of opinion. Dore, as usual, thinks we should just charge in, stating he didn't get down to level six by sneaking about (you did lose a hand though, you dope). Taflwr suggests donning the dark elves gear and passing through in disguise, whilst Glaivas just says I go in alone, ninja-kill the sentries and open the gate. Glaivas has always been helpful and sensible and the other two are clowns, so we go with his plan. The gatehouse is garrisoned by some kind of ant-human hybrids but I'm amongst them like a shadow, killing the lot and getting us through.
More battles await, including a giant tongue and some elves riding huge spiders, and then the Black Widow herself is sighted in pursuit. As we flee headlong we're ambushed by Cassandra, who steps out to block our path. She's badly wounded, but armed with a crossbow whose bolts are tipped with the deadly blood of Nil. With spl;it seconds to act I use my poison needles - as the dart lodges in her face she fires the bow, but with arrow-cutting I knock the deadly missile aside and she collapses into the rocks. There is no time to see if she is finally finished - we need to move and fast. Webbed into a chamber and with Dore covering our retreat, we again encounter Foxglove who again offers to aid us. She claims that with the death of the Keeper she is aiming to assume that position - and perhaps challenge the Widow herself - but she needs the sceptre, both to secure her position and to be free of the Black Widows geas, a curse not even death could free her from.

There's a big choice her and I feel a bit sorry for Foxglove, but I can't give up the sceptre - it's what all the bad guys want to become uber powerful so it seems to be the key object here. I dither and as a sweetener she gives me a silver gauntlet which Dore can wear over his stump to give him a new hand.
Because Eris is with me I have an option to ask for his help, so in a bit of a dick move I ask him to cast an illusion over the torch of lumen so it looks like the sceptre. Foxglove, none the wiser, scoops it up and opens up the way forward for us. "We've both cheated the gods this day" she says, and I admit to feeling a bit guilty for cheating her as we scuttle off.

Things now get a bit weird. We gain the cavern in the Rift thats 'protected by fate' and are enveloped in a sort of warm light which leaves me alone and facing Fortuna, Fates guardian of the Rift. She confirms that I am beyond the reach of the Black Widow, as are my friends, but that we must chase our own fate to leave the Rift. Thus begins a strange dream quest - my ninja skills leave me here, with only my fate modifier remaining. I find myself in a wraithlike landscape of bamboo groves before an edifice of drak crystal. My hands are corpselike and cold as I push through the bamboo, following the sound of a voice chanting the Cachetism of Kwon the Redeemer. I discover a monk, pale and bleeding from a wound, but as I approach him his chant changes in pitch and tone to become one of damnation and evil and I hurry away, crossing blood-soaked rice fields where dozens of damned monks battle each other in endless warfare and following a vision of a  tiger - the symbol of Kwon and surely a good omen - to a dark pagoda where awaits me Aiguchi, the weapon master I encountered back in Usurper. He states he has been called back from the fires of hell to destroy me and avenge his death. Battle is joined: a single hit and Aiguchi dissolves into smoke, the mist coalescing instead into Jikkyu, the Samurai I slew in Assassin, whilst the surroundings transform to that of a battlefield. Once more I fight, and once more upon victory the smoke changes, inevitably, into the form of Yaemon.
Once more we face each other across the windswept ramparts. Yaemon is soaked head to foot in gore: for his failure he has been condemned to a lake of boiling blood for eternal torment, and he seeks to drag me down there with him. We fight and Yaemon absolutely batters me: i need to land three hits on him and with just 5 health left I get the final one: he screams as he is dragged back to his torture in the inferno. The scene shifts again to a simple room, the only evidence of our battle Yaemon's bloodstained footprints upon the floor. Finally I must fight a shadowy image of myself. Here I focus on my training from previous books, leaning into the Way of the Tiger, and the spirit fades away and I return to the real world.

Back in the world, I materialise in a circular chamber, without exit and lit by a glowing orb. Dore and Glaivas appear beside me - they too have conquered their fates, although the others are seemingly lost. Randomly we then have to fight a giant brain, that turns into a giant maggot: the final avatar of Vile sent to block our escape. This is another fairly involved fight, and a pretty squishy one including a bit where I use arrow cutting to catch a smaller giant maggot that's been launched at my face, but the three of us slay the thing. There follows a brief glimpse of heaven, before the chamber fades and I find myself finally upon the surface.

Squinting against the sunlight I realise I am near Irsmuncast, at the battlefield where I routed the Legion of the Sword of Doom. No sign of Dore and Glaivas! My only choice is to head back to the city, several days travel on foot, subsiding on apples and water from streams. Upon arriving I choose to don the garb of a commoner, entering the city humble and barefoot as I did the first time I came here. Feeling grateful to Kwon I head to his temple first rather than stroll up to my palace, where the monks seem agitated to see me. Hengist, the new grandmaster, is not here: he went on a visit to the temple of time but has not returned, and the monks speak of the Overlord (me) who has already returned and warned of 'an imposter' that may come into the city. I show him the sceptre, and walk around the room calling the monks by name, for many of them were trained by me. With my identity confirmed I am able to rest until another old friend arrives: Greystaff from the Temple of Avatar. The priest heals me before performing holy rites to rid me of the taint of Nullaq that I've carried for several books (restoring my inner force and boosting my endurance to beyond its old maximum) and then finally pouring the holy water of Avatar into my ear to drive out the brain spider I still carry. I'm back baby!



I reconvene with Greystaff and my other old chum Demagogue, who has also arrived, to discuss recent happenings in the city. It seems not long after I left "I" returned and sequestered myself in the palace 'in mourning' for my lost friends. Shortly after I mobilised my army - both Shieldmaidens and the regular troops of Nemesis - and sent them off to attack The Rift leaving the city almost undefended. Gwyneth has not been seen since 'my' return, and both Greystaff and Demagogue have been denied entrance to the palace. Antocidas and his mercenaries are lying low assessing the situation, in the Temple of Nemeisis Lackland has ignored entreaties, and Hengist visited the Temple of Time to discuss an alliance against these strange happenings and has not returned. Greystaff and Demagogue will rally to my command but against the remaining combined forces of Dama, Nemesis and Time, we would surely lose in a bloodbath.
It looks like it's up to me to rally everyone once more. I head first to the Temple of Dama in disguise but find the doors barred to me and Gwyneth not in attendance. Next I go to see Antocidas, who greets me with his typical surly manner. He seems distrustful, claiming it is I who may be the imposter. I remind him of the battle we won together against Honoric, and eventually he asks how I escaped the Rift. I tell him the truth, preposterous as it sounds ("Oh, I was teleported out by the goddess of Fate") and he says this must surely be a lie... had he not already heard the same story from a trusted source... Glaivas! The ranger enters, having reached the city ahead of me. We reunite warmly; Antocidas takes the knee and pledges his men and his sword to my cause. Now it's off to the Temple of Time to meet Solstice. I still really hate this guy. He tells me Hengist was wounded by an assassin and is recuperating slowly in this temple because 'time is the greatest healer'. True to form he offers no help at all and I leave in failure.
Back at Kwons Temple, I learn Dore too has returned and of course has been captured and is lined up for execution this very eve. Greystaff and Demagogue introduce me to Csaky, who is also a ninja of Kwon and coincidentally my cousin. I'm not 100% sold on Csaky - she just turns up at this point and seems a bit too awesome and convenient (I wouldn't be surprised if she is there to be the character in a future series that never happened) but she is legit and she also knows a way into the palace. With Antocidas and Glaivas providing a distraction we slip over the wall, through some secret doors and into the servants quarters and finally the dungeons where Dore is held (Csaky has done all the work here btw, I just follow her about)
Dore is in some half-flooded dungeons and as I'm busting her out, in an unexpected twist the gauntlet / magic hand Foxglove gave him suddenly comes to life and attacks him, eventually being severed and dropped into the water where it forms a whirlpool where some horrible thing bursts out of it, like a skinless cyclopean tentacle monster. I put it down and am cursing Foxglove for this final trap, yet Csaky and Dore seem to think this was a ploy of the priests of Nemesis. Dore is also basically dead, so I charge Csaky to get him out and proceed alone, as it should be, to confront the usurper.

At the throne room door Gwyneth stands guard. She knows me not, and draws her sword against me: I tell her exactly what I said when I first came to the city (that I intend to rule according to the laws of my father) and realising who I am, she steps down - but will not aid me against what is within. Finally, I enter the darkened throne room where a brooding figure awaits me. He is the exact image of myself, but as I approach he shifts and the illusion fades revealing a scowling one-eyed figure. He tells me his story - he is a ninja of the way of the scorpion, a man who was present when I slew the Grandmaster and who was chosen to carry forth the orders revenge - as they said they would, all the way back in Usurper. He reveals that, upon the death of Mandrake his belt of disguise was stolen by the treacherous Lackland and gifted to him (hence the disguise) along with his fearsome blade that kills with a single blow. Flipping Lackland! I always knew he was the bad apple!

Obviously we must fight. I dazzle my foe with flash powder and whilst he is distracted launch into the teeth of the tiger throw, following up with kwons flail and expend my inner force as I do so for an enormous, near fatal blow. A single kick fells him and the imposter falls dead my feet. The crown of Irsmuncast rolls from his head to land fittingly at my feet.
All is resolved - or is it? With a crash the gaunt figure of Lackland bursts into the room, his priests and a force of half orcs at his back. With shock he takes in the fallen body of the imposter, the crown upon my brow, the shattered halves of Mandrakes sword. The game is up. With a cry he urges his men forward, plunging the throne room into a deadly melee as Gwyneth and her swordmaidens surge to my defense. For a priest Lackland is a fearsome enemy who puts out some appalling damage and although I am victorious I am left on 2 health.

Lackland lies dead, his priests under arrest, and Antocidas has rallied the army to my cause: order is restored. As Gwyneth, Dore, Csaky and Glaivas join me I look out over the city and resolve to watch over its people as Kwon has watched over me. My journey, at last, is over.

WotT rules!

I've recently re-read that era of Progs and what Alex says is sage as ever - the first bit of Medivac is good but it kind of loses momentum and tails off. Chronos is absolutely appalling and a real waste of Ron Smith.

Zippy is a more interesting one - it's so often cited in revisionist takes on the Prog that I thought it'd be this hidden gem, but a lot of it is pretty poor - I'm thinking about the doughnut storyline especially. Lovely artwork and a really good idea that starts off brightly and I think would have a lot more legs today - the cat, especially, rules. For all my criticism I would like to see it reprinted and I think it would be a really good shout for a reprint if it could tie into Regened or something.
I think Survivor is the best of her work in the Prog and I wish there'd been more of that.