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Unless you're Estonian, of course...

Link: http://www.balticsww.com/eurovision_terry_wogan.htm" target="_blank">"...booze has its affect ..."

I'm surprised Scotland haven't insisted on being allowed to have a separate entry yet.  That way they could lose in the first round and spend the rest of the time voting for anyone likely to beat England, like adults.

Does nobody remember the Ukranian comedy reggae from last year?

We're onto a winner here, folks.  I shall be toasting our Daz in ethnically appropriate liquids at our semi-annual Eurovision ("use up the sickly drinks in the back of your alcohol cupboards that even your kid brother won't try!") party, and fully expect him to lose as badly as every other British entry since 2001.

There are two subtly different uses of the term to consider (not including the religious stuff).

1)   Sci-Fi and other genre fiction use of the term usually means that something is ?official?, part of a particular fictional universe.  Often this will reflect stuff like whether the story under consideration was written by the original author or an approved ghost writer.  It?s a term devised to be exclusionary, keeping fan-fiction, poorly written stuff that?s untrue to the character (e.g. Mark Millar?s Dredd) and pirated versions of the character separate from the proper body of work.
2)   The literary sense, however, dates back to the very start of serious study of English literature (Arthur Quiller-Couch at Cambridge was debating canonicity, and I think the term pops up as far back as Swinburne), and comes to its full flower in the work of F.R. Leavis.  Here the concern is to establish a body of unchallengeable ?great works?, which Leavis does most famously (or infamously) in The Great Tradition.  You?ll find his work there grotesquely misrepresented in many secondary works, so it?s worth seeking out the original book.  Leavis argues that it is worth saying that the works of certain authors (Dickens, Shakespeare, Austen, Conrad & George Eliot from memory ? don?t take my word for it!) are the summit of English literary tradition, and that the student of literature should ensure that they have studied these before moving on to lesser works.  As a manifesto of purely literary studies, by which I mean something that would eschew the cod philosophy, sociology and psychology that infests so much contemporary lit-crit, I have to say I think that canonicity as an ideal still has something to recommend it.  Of course, Leavis ignores non-white authors, and his praise of Eliot and Lawrence seems a bit weird to the contemporary ear, but that represents flaws in execution, not in the ideal.

Perhaps Jonathon Ross should have, I dunno, asked him some questions?

Why break the habit of a lifetime?

[on page 96]

Encouraging people to read the interview on page 96 in the shop, without buying their copy of Empire, is just plain wrong.







Page 96

The 1,000,000th Wikipedian article has been created, and it's...

Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

So what's the answer, spoilerific people?

Nah - if there was going to be a shower dream sequence, they'd have got Ian Gibson in to draw it.

I will give a free copy of the Wicker Man DVD to the first person to provide documentary evidence that they have signed up for Steven Savile's Vampire Street Team.

Link: http://www.2000adonline.com/?zone=fan&page=messagethread&choice=16271&skipto=-1&Replies=41" target="_blank">Vampire Street Team

Slutty Prison Studs III?

[not]

As long as it's not any of these:

- Rico Dredd (don't want him to die.  Ever.)
- Barbara Hershey (Another 3 years, minimum)
- Max Normal (And isn't he due a return?)
- PJ Maybe (the one character I want to see into old age).

...I don't care.  

Much as I love Anderson, I think her death wouldn't be the worst idea in the world.  Well, not compared to a Slaine-like saga of ever-diminishing returns, anyway.

What happened to the death of Judge Logan?

Actively wished-for deaths include: the Snozzburns (let's have them back for some ritual immolation), Shimura.

Oh, agreed.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v201/jamesdudley/Davies_-_Timmy.jpg">

And at the end of this he apologised!

I really liked Simon's work on Slow Train to Kal.

Funnily enough, that?s probably the piece I?ve liked least among his recent work.  It?s not a patch on the Prog 2006 Sin/Dex (the one with the skelingtons), for example.  

I do think that there?s a problem with reproduction of his work.  Certainly the first time I saw it ?in the flesh? was an enormous shock ? the vivid colours and detailed figure work doesn?t really come out on the page.

http://www.2000adonline.com/images/page/simond.jpg>

Am I the only person here who used to think that Simon Davis was a bit rubbish (round about the old B&W Missionary Man days), started to like him more as colour was introduced, and has suddenly realised that not only do I look forward to his lushly painted Sin/Dex and Black Siddha strips as much as if not more than I look forward to any artist?s appearances in the comic, but that looking back I like all his previous work (including the B&W Missionary Man strips) as well?  

How does this work?  Are we ? I know it?s not just me - more sophisticated in our tastes these days?  Or less sophisticated for that matter?  Or does Mr Davis, like the taste of whisky, take time to grow on you?

Also, in a separate question, who else out there is doing work like Mr Davis, with the thick paints n stuff?  What influences do the more comics knowledgeable see in his work?

Link: http://www.2000adonline.com/index.php3?zone=droid&page=profiles&choice=SIMOND" target="_blank">http://www.2000adonline.com/index.php3?zone=droid&page=profiles&choice=SIMOND