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While i agree that any sense of buying Strip through a 'loyalty' to the uk industry is probably misplaced and doesnt stand up to scrutiny (i feel no compunction to buy Viz or the Dandy, for example- and the latter there definitely needs support or we'll lose it), i cant pretend it wasnt a contributing factor to my picking it up. And yes, i think the criticisms are valid.

However, it's early days. As ive said in this thread, Strip doesnt seem very focused at the moment, and some of the design needs work.

With regards to Hookjaw, I see it as quite simple- the strip has been 'remastered' to such a degree that it no longer qualifies as 'reprint'. It's a new strip, and one that cant fail to engage the supposed target audience... if they get to see it, what with the comic being hidden away in specialist shops, next to the Multiverses and Dodgem Logics, rather than fighting Ben 10 and Scooby Doo for the grubby eyes of ten year olds. Hookjaw is a much stronger pitch than anything else in the comic- which is hardly surprising as it's a much stronger pitch than just about anything in comics since 1976 full stop, and if it helps Strip find a wide audience, then great.

Whether the rest of the comic continues to entertain me or not, i'll keep buying for Hookjaw. Though there's a pleasing number of other things with potential in it, i think it's absolutely right that the shark gets top billing, at least until one of the others is run-in enough for the cover position to inspire recognition in the browser.

SBT

Read it!

Top thrill: American Reaper. Loved it again, and went back and read the two parts consecutively to see how it flows. Great stuff, and I've already mentally bagged me a trade version as and when.

Next: Dredd. Quite touched by the ending of this, and even though I felt the expanded page count was a bit unnecessary and it could've been just as effective at the normal prog amount, I enjoyed it probably a bit more than I have been 'Age of Chaos' in the prog. Did that sentence make sense? Up yours, grammar!

Then: Black Museum. A good story, well told. Can't criticise the story at all, all wrapped up nicely and nothing left wanting. Groovy. Hope we get a collection of these sometime soonish. Even if only as a Meg floppy. Perhaps they could rename it 'Rogues From The Rogue Museum', as they seem to only like printing things from that particular universe at the moment. Arf and indeed arf.

Last: Koburn. Don't ask me how the Ezquerras come in at the bottom, but they do this month. I'm just not feeling this at all- and the [spoiler]old Rico's[/spoiler] comedy reappearance at the end just made me flashback to the likes of 'Helter Skelter', et al.

Not overly fussed about the features this month, and missing the film reviews.

A middling Meg, buoyed by American Reaper and a couple of strong other strips.

SBT

Looks good- glad to see American Reaper getting another huge chunk of the pagecount, and a welcome return for Black Museum. However, two things: Not overly keen on the cover, as for the first time in ages it's a Dredd that, to me at least, doesn't actually look like Dredd. I know that's ridiculous, as he's been drawn a hundred different ways by a hundred different artists, but this is the first time I can remember looking at a picture and thinking "no, that's wrong". Sorry to the artist- it's a personal taste thing, obviously, but I thought it was worth mentioning, as it struck me as so weird that I'd think that after thirty-five years of different interpretations.

And the other thing: Next month Venus Bluegenes? REALLY? I remember now why I am so completely disinterested in the whole Rogue Trooperverse. Seriously, if everything that had ever been printed in he prog was published as trades, RT would be the one series mysteriously absent from my Thrill-Archive. I've not read the floppies for months now, and am beginning to get that reactionary twitch that says "I object to paying for this!", which is never good.

Will read the thing later, I just wanted to "bag the thread for the non-subscribers". 

SBT

Have you picked up any of the trades of the previous Jonah Hex series SBT?

Yeah- most recently the Jonah Hex series that came out at either the arse-end of the nineties or the beginning of the 00s. Was it by Joe R Lansdale? That was really good, and I remember it being a highlight of my "pull list" at the time. That said, a decade or so on, I can't remember a thing about it. Before that, I have fond memories of reading a few as a kid- and finding Hex quite "scary" and the comics weirdly unsettling. That's largely why I picked up All-Star Western, to be honest. It wasn't bad at all, but like I said, the volume of adverts puts me off buying anymore on a monthly basis.

SBT

Because Primeval returns! Yes, the show nerds want dead but that keeps coming back, is coming back, again- as a post-watershed uk/Canada co-production that begins filming in Feb. New cast, 'adult themes, sex and violence', with an existing uk cast member as part of the deal. Thirteen episodes, and i want them NOW.

SBT

Not being a DC reader, I was surprised at how much this thread amused me. Even more surprised when I found myself looking through the racks in the comic shop yesterday wondering if I should try any of them. In the end I picked up All-Star Western #1 and Swamp Thing #1.

Swampy was... okay. The art's a bit shonky, with Superman looking ridiculous in a couple of panels. As a kick-off to a new series, it sort of did its job, but didn't make me particularly want to pick up any more. A-S Western though, I really enjoyed. It did nothing new, and the crowbarring in of assorted Batman locales and characters did nothing for the overall story, but in was quite dense and a nice take on Jack The Ripper, with added Jonah Hex. I'll probably be picking up the trade eventually- but my grud, the sheer amount of ads throughout both comics made me vow not to pick up any more. It was like some mental cable tv channel where they pump ads at you every five minutes.

SBT

Having now read it, i'll definitely be back for Age of Heroes, Hookjaw and Warpaint, with everything else showing promise. Black Ops reminds me of that videogame strip from the prog a decade or so ago, drawn by mick austin, in that it reads like an 'adult' strip that's been 'adapted' for a younger audience. In the prog thing (the name of which escapes me at present) this was a comedic selling point (at least for me, i liked it) but here it seems to be stopping it reach its potential. That said, it's the first part, and it engaged me enough to come on the internets and babble about it, so...

The text features were interesting to me, as a 41 year old comic-reader, but im not the intended audience. But lets be honest here, being sold in comic shops only, Strip is going to be bought predominantly by the likes of us here, and i very much doubt kids unrelated to dads who buy comics are ever going to see a copy.

It didnt read at all like a comic for kids. From the editorial onwards it's a middleaged nostalgic longing for comics past, using the cover terminology of the ipc juvenile group to sell contemporary strips to aged readers. That's not meant to be a damning criticism by the way, merely a mild one. Im pleased i have another comic to enjoy, but am mildly upset it's not the comic i wanted to blow my children's minds.

SBT

Edit: oh, and mine fell apart. The staples dont hold a thick sixty eight page comic printed on heavy, shiny paper together. But how do they manage that volume for £2.99? It's great value.

Picked up two copies today; one for me, one for the eldest boy. Havent read yet, but first reaction: it smells great! i mean that, it's a more pungent Beano, which is a good thing in my book. All strips look great, barring one, and i'll be back for more even if i have reservations after reading. My one niggle at the moment is that it may look too much like a 'dad's comic'- the logo doesnt excite and the number of text features could well be offputting to a nine year old audience, given the geekiness of the content. I doubt many kids give a toss about Action or especially Forbidden Planet, other than it being a big shop of cool stuff.

SBT

Started off with British Marvel reprints (Spidey and MWOM, then Dracula, Planet of the Apes)- I even remember walking down the road to the local papershop with my friend's older brother to buy my first comic and not knowing what they were. That sounds weird now, but I distinctly remember our conversation was based around him telling me they were stories you could read, and me just being excited that they were black and white so were, in effect, colouring books. I must've been five or six, I guess.

It was Marvel's reprint of 'The Night Gwen Stacey Died' in the weekly Spider-Man that cemented my love of comics. No story I'd been exposed to up to that age had ever been as "deep" or "meaningful" or "adult" to my young eyes, and I read and reread it over and again. At around the same time, the first Man-Wolf stories saw print too, and I got scared by comics for the first (but not last) time. The panels of John Jameson transforming and then leaping over things still have an impact for me today, and I could look at them for hours.

I was never really into the IPC humour titles (or the DC Thompsons- above everything else, I didn't like the paperstock of comics like Valiant or Warlord- the raggedy edges were offputting), the exception being 'Cor!'- but I was stopped from getting this after a few nightmares about Dr Rat in 'Rat Trap'. I remember getting a few Actions and not really liking it very much. My dad brought home 2000AD prog one on his way home from my nana's- and I read it constantly up to when it started to have boring old Dan Dare on the cover every week. Picked it up again intermittently, and mostly consistently from prog 179.

Aside from the prog, I've read comics my whole life. The whole gamut of Marvel UK reprints throughout the seventies, the prog, Scream, Tornado, Starlord in the early eighties (I was lucky and allowed up to five comics a week), then I discovered comic marts in 1984 and used to go up each month, buying titles like X-Men, Spidey etc for years. Mid to late eighties discovered Swamp Thing with Moore's second issue, then Hellblazer from #1, Watchmen (which I've never really liked, but bought all the DC issues because it was "the thing" that year), Shade The Changing Man, and a bunch of other Vertigo titles.

Got bored with comics around the 1996 mark (except the prog and the meg, which have always remained at the core of my week/ month) and cut my "pull list" from 24 monthly titles when I lived in Dublin, to two when I moved back to Plymouth.

Around this time they started to release collected editions in bookshops and comic shops, and I started to buy those instead. eventually, I got to the point where 2000AD and the Meg were the only floppy titles I bought.

Dipped in and out of the marvel stuff for a few years, until the Disney takeover and now only buy if a certain storyline interests me- and then only second hand.

These days, aside from the obvious, the only floppy I buy is The Walking Dead (which I literally cannot stand to wait between trades for, and which is the single greatest comic ever produced, bar none), but I do buy a number of trades- mostly Rebellion's output, Pat Mills' back catalogue and euro stuff, and the cinebooks titles that appeal.

SBT

My wife is, apparently, 47.5% geeky. That's more geeky than me. Double suck it, nerd-boys!

SBT

32.5% geeky. Suck that, nerds!

SBT

(Rolls up sleeves, again)

Halloween 2 is interesting, in that its a direct continuation of the first- picking up as the original ends (but count the gunshots at the start). To those of us of a certain age, its impossible not to consider it just the second part of a three hour film. It's nowhere near as good a film, but rosenthal ramps up the gore (to make it compete with its newfound competition in the f13 movies, etc) so watched back to back, it's like it all kicks off in the second half. H2 also introduces all the backstory that everyone assumes was there in carp's film, but wasn't. It's this backstory that eventually sinks the series several films later.

H3 is a whole other topic. Unrelated to the Michael Myers story, it's either a brilliant, beautifully told horror film in its own right, or a waste of time, depending on your point of view. I love it.

H4 is the belated attempt to jumpstart the franchise, and is a watchable, superior slasher pic, that continues with that backstory i mentioned but takes massive liberties with established continuity for the good of the plot. 5 is a direct sequel to 4, except not as good, and 6 is like a fanwank tribute movie- which we've never seen the director's cut of. 6 also sees the end of the myers-plot as started in 2.

Then we have another gap, and H20: Twenty Years Later, which is a taut, jumpy suspense film much like the original and sees the proper end to the franchise... which was then fudged by the makers of the piss-awful H:Resurrection, in the worst entry in the series to date. Then the rob zombie remake and his troubled sequel.

H3D is in development.

SBT

The years being unkind to Halloween is something im acutely aware of, jimbo. It's a great film, no question, but is it my favourite carpenter? Not on your nelly. It's also why i honestly prefer rob zombie's remake these days: it's more psychologically truthful, removes all the mystical shit (at least until zombie shovels it all back into the mix with the sequel) and is more threatening. As a film on its own, it's nowhere near as important as the first, obviously, but taken in comparison with the original i think it comes into its own. It's so patently at odds with the intent and execution of carpenter's film that there's no way the two are even reconcilable, in my opinion.
SBT

If mr large already has this (cant check the rest of the thread while im in the bath!) and no one's pm'd you yet, i'll have it. I cant pm on my phone.

SBT

https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150342278992407&saved

The above link should take you to our Halloween.

SBT