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What a chuffing good prog on all counts! It certainly doesn't feel as though it's one of those clearing-the-decks, end-of-the-current-lineup progs.

Unusual cover, but I love it. A rather large lunar mile better than that Durham Red cover the Meg attempted some years ago.

Dredd is bonkers but readable enough and nicely atmospheric - rather this than one of those godawful 'corporate villian' stories - and Bob turns in the good as usual with a tale that's less head-scratching than usual.

Ampney has really turned my opinions around with the last two parts, it's really quite an intriguing little thrill superbly aided by Simon Davis' lush visuals. I do wish the humour was not quite so intrusive though, there's been the potential for some really quite cracking horror vignettes (such as the potentially creepy village last issue) but these moments keep being bludgeoned flat by the humour, which frankly I could do without.

ABCs is stunning, stunning stuff. Love the repeating page layout, and [spoiler]Blackblood's long-awaited coup de grace of a betrayal gave me giddy thrills. I love the character, but I hope that one way or another this is the end for him, going out in a blaze of glory attempting to kill all the others - the longer he remains a member without actually betraying them, the more ineffectual he starts to look.[/spoiler] As much as I enjoyed most of the flashbacks, too, there was a feeling of fatigue starting to set in, and the return to the present day has improved this strip immeasurably.

Dante is equally as good, with the feeling in both this and the ABCs that big, no-going-back shake-ups are just around the corner for both strips. It came home to me this week that we really are seeing the beginning of the end of this strip, once and for all, and I confess I got a bit of a lump in my throat at the thought. I'll miss you, Dante - the only modern thrill that can stand proud with Dredd, Strontium Dog and Nemesis as the best 2k has produced.

CITY OF THE DAMNED is much worse than I remembered, it still manages to outstay it's welcome at about a dozen parts.  And a bizaree mix of artists, none of who manage to stamp a style on it, doesn't help it either.  Is it true that Wagner and Grant got bored and finished it quickly?

Yup, pretty much. I remember reading that one of them said to the other halfway through it, 'I'm not enjoying this. Let's have it wrapped up by tea-time.'

And they did.

Stalag 666 - Not my kind of stuff.  
"I'm going to save you"
"No, don't sacrifice yourself and be a hero"
"No, you are the real hero"
"No, YOU are the real hero"
"No you are"
"No, don't sacrifice yourself, let me sacrifice myself"
"No, I want to sacrifice myself. For you. Because you are the real hero"
"No you put the phone down first"
"No YOU put the phone down first"
etc.

 

Of all the films mentioned in this thread, I have seen exactly... none (although I've seen about ten minutes of Finding Nemo).

Think the last film I saw at the cinema was King Kong. It's a revelation to hear of Buttonman's cinemagoing.

One of the Anderson stories, 'Half-Life' I think, took place in Deadworld before the Dark Judge's purges. It was presented as more of a decayed, low-tech British townscape not dissimlar to something from the 50s or 60s, than an alternate America. The 'Dead Reckoning' story that the others are talking about portrayed it as more akin to something quasi-mediaeval, with the Dark Judge's Citadel towering over poor wattle and daub villages.

No real insight into the Dark Judge's motivations in either, though, which is something I've always wanted to see too - but I'm guessing it wouldn't be all that interesting. Even Death did little more just decide to kill everyone one day, because his dad told him to.

The funny thing is (and I'm well aware this will make me no friends on this board) - Phantom Menace was the first Star Wars film I saw, never having been a fan or seen the appeal of the series, and I found Jar-Jar to be one of the best things about it.

Those embarassing screen-wipes that end each scene, a largely nonsensical plot, a lot of dull characters played by po-faced actors - oh well, the jamacian frog-monster is quite cool. Let's hope he gets lots of scenes.

The Gungan battle at the end was fantastic, too. I watched the second film, whatever it was called, and found it looked very pretty but was utterly dire, and decided Jar-Jar would have improved it no end. So there.

Another thing I wondered about was how come there were any petrol stations that had any petrol left.

Day 1 of the disaster: queues at the petrol pumps as a mass flu epidemic means every business is under-staffed, including, presumably, hauliers delivering to petrol stations.

Day 4 of the disaster: man filling containers on a petrol station forecourt; so, it's lasted well, then.

How very different from the scene at my local Tesco before the delivery tanker comes in, when they have half a dozen pumps closed. If the subterranean tanks can be emptied by normal demand in the course of a normal week, what chance is there of them having anything left after 3 days of panic buying with no deliveries turning up?

Possible answer: Maybe the petrol station was closed during the disaster due to short-staffing? If there was no-one serving, then no petrol could be sold...

If panic buying was going on then most forecourts would be empty within the day, without fresh deliveries. The average underground tank holds between 30,000 and 25,000 litres, and given that HGV lorries with twin tanks can take some 500 or 600 litres in one go, that wouldn't last long.

What annoyed me more was the fact that he was able to use the pumps at all;  given that it had already been well established that there was no longer any electricity, there's simply no way he would have been able to activate them. During a power cut petrol pumps become useless, as for one thing there's nothing to power the internal motor, and no system in place to regulate the flow, or connecting it to the till system whereby the pumps are activated each time someone picks up a nozzle. Even if there had been power, he'd have needed an accomplice inside the forecourt shop to start the pumps, and bypass the automatic cut-off to the pump electrics that would have triggered when the power first failed.

Jeez, never thought my two-year stint working in a petrol station would come in handy...

Bah!

It was a Future Shock called, funnily enough, The Writing on the Wall! by a certain Mr Alan Moore. Couldn't tell you offhand what prog it appeared in, though.

Not bad by any means, but could have been an awful lot better - more grit n' gore, for one thing. Even The Last Train had two people torn limb from limb by a pack of rabid dogs in the opening episode!

Nice to see Paterson Joseph in it though, something about him seems ideal for genre TV.

Told you so.

[AIEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!]

Listen, Batson, there's something important the board are trying to keep from you. Something terrible. Something that will change everything you think you know. Lord knows I shouldn't be doing this, but my conscience just won't let me stay quiet - God knows you need to be told.

I'll have to be quick, though - if they find out I'm about to let you in on this they'llAIEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!

I remember in the Hot Dog Run (Progs 233-234) that Cadet Spode set his Lawgiver in wrong setting caused an accident by choosing and firring Ricochets. So the gun is not Voice Controlled as the Movie Lawgiver (Thanks God!).

Hmm... pretty sure it is voice activated, actually. I think Cadet Spode's mistake was in choosing richoets for an unsuitable area, not accidentally choosing them when he meant to select something else.

I was going to champion a Meltdown Man movie (it'd be a lone voice, I know) but said film made now would probably be 'appropriated' by the furry brigade, which would just be all kinds of wrong.

Downey as Dante would be awsome but he's forever now gonna be Tony Stark ( awsome movie)


Lets try an unknown



russian dude from the TV series OZ.

Are you just casting people with goatees?