Messages

I actually liked the casual introduction of a teleporter for judges.  It makes a pleasant change to have some new technology introduced to a story and it DOESN'T GO WRONG with catastrophic consequences!  At last, the 22nd Century designers and engineers get something right first time.

Other than that I thought the end was a bit flat - Dredd just happened to be "lucky" that he landed on a soft floor?  Mmm - what happened to the hero taking positiove action and/or making sacrifice to resolve a situation?

I did enjoy the art though - McMahon seems to have reined himself in from his worst excesses so that it has a distinctive style yet still catches the eye and tells the story clearly.

Anybody feel that a bit more room for comments would be nice?  

Where I can, I'll expand upon comments in scriptdroids but not all of the readers will be in scriptdroids so won't have that option.

Wake,

probably being a bit petty here but isn't it about time that the screen plays from "You know who" were moved from the main page of the Fan Fiction section.

I don't think it's right that they are featured more prominently than the rest of the Fan Fiction produced by sane and rational people; especially the much more worthy 'zines like "Class or '79" and "ZARJAZ".  They deserve more credit and advertising than him and his screenplays.

If it's a pain for you to move them somewhere less prominent (or even delete them) then don't bother but every time I go into the section they bring back unpleasant memories...

Like I say, it may be being a bit petty but I'm in a particularly unpleasant mood this morning.

And while you're at it, I keep getting a strip called BISON turning up in my Weekly Prog - can you do something about that as well...

Wake,

probably being a bit petty here but isn't it about time that the screen plays from "You know who" were moved from the main page of the Fan Fiction section.

I don't think it's right that they are featured more prominently than the rest of the Fan Fiction produced by sane and rational people; especially the much more worthy 'zines like "Class or '79" and "ZARJAZ".  They deserve more credit and advertising than him and his screenplays.

If it's a pain for you to move them somewhere less prominent (or even delete them) then don't bother but every time I go into the section they bring back unpleasant memories...

Like I say, it may be being a bit petty but I'm in a particularly unpleasant mood this morning.

And while you're at it, I keep getting a strip called BISON turning up in my Weekly Prog - can you do something about that as well...

Romeo Beckham grows up to be a footballer every bit as good as his dad.

It's his first game for Man United and he says "Dad, what number should I wear on my shirt? I'd love to be 7 but that's your number"

David thinks for a while and says:

WHERE 4 OUT THERE, ROMEO.

One of the old IZAL medicated hard rolls could give you lots and lots of paper cuts.  

As top Comedian Tony Burgess says:
My Dad always used to say: "And them are the worst kind of cuts, paper cuts."

So I stabbed him with my swiss army knife, just to prove a point.

If paper cuts are the worst kind of cuts, why don't you see gangs of Neds walking round with sheets of A4...

And apologies for not mentioning a brief chat with that nice Mr Bishop while his umbrella disintegrated (like PVS, I probably enjoyed this more than Mr Bishop did).  He gave some good clues about the fun in store with these PAST IMPERFECT stories that are coming up.

And Frank Quitely was also nice to chat to and gave some good hints on how to make my drawings not as rubbish as whot my writing is.  And it turns out he went to the same school as me.

I had such a good time I forgot to get *ANYTHING* signed (but Cam Kennedy did a great Boba Fett sketch for my son).

I can't recommend this festival enough - Do try and go if it's on next year as it's all for a good cause.

I enjoyed it as well.

Meeting up with PVS was a pleasure and I'm annoyed that I didn't search out Logan.  

I enjoyed the writing and drawing classes as well.  The "Meet The Editors" must have seen me coming with my bag full of scripts for them to review and didn't show up though; can't blame them.

I would recommend it heartily; again the intimacy of the venue means there's probably not an opportunity like it to meet the main men.


I was very lucky and managed to get nice long chats with Alan Grant, John Wagner and Cam Kennedy; I've got about an hour recorded and I'll be transcribing it and posting it on the site as soon as I can.  I was thinking about just storing the sound files but then I wouldn't be able to edit out me being the biggest sycophantic arse in the universe (Your stuff's great, I love it).  This is of course true but I just wish I could have sounded more professional and not so much a mad fan boy.

All three were great interviewee; informative, entertaining and very forgiving about my lack of experience in such matters.

Of course, if I'd been more experienced, I'd have kept the tape going longer - both Alan Grant and Cam Kennedy came out with nice bits of stuff after I'd switched off - I'll do my best to recall them and present them to you.

One last interesting point is that at least one of the three interviewees admitted that he does pop into the board occasionally to see what people are saying.  I won't say who out of respect and so that it doesn't taint people's feedback.

I'm going and I'll be happy to meet up and say "Hello".  After all, you popped my Chat Room cherry (along with Egg On Legs a few weeks back).

I'm tall, slim handsome looking and athletic but I'll be wearing one of those Fat Bloke suits that Lenny Zero wore. I'll be proudly wearing my leather jacket with the Cam Kennedy painting on the back.  

But I'm going to tell my Mum where I'm going.  

Transvision Vamp... Wendy James... you've set me thinking about "My Perfect Halo Moment" again.

I had the good fortune to work with Simon Pegg before he got famous way back in '93/'94.  He's a bloody nice bloke and we spent a long time chatting about Star Wars and 2000AD if I recall.  He'd probably shoot you if you mention Star Wars now though.

I wonder if he'd consider writing a strip? What was he like as Johnny Alpha on that CD thing by the way?

>Why is it acceptable to have a viking speaking in a comedy viking accent, but unnacceptable (to some) to have a psychotic alien menace speaking in a comedy oriental accent?

I thought the "casual racism" thread objected more to the personification of other races as one dimensional, psychotic, baby-bayonetting bad guys with no attempt to add balance or show exceptions to the rule. VCs actually had a positive "Geek" role so I guess that's not as guilty.

I get the feeling Pagan Girl may be on her own with the Wulf's accent being racist.

My tuppenceworth on the prog:
JD: Manners: Good, especially the art where the line of Judges open fire but I thought we might have had more from this particular supporting character.

Rogue:  Good writing (especially the reason why they didn't just nuke the whole area again) and good action. I liked the art in Part one but found this slightly unclear at times.  Out of the strips so far though, I've only found WEAPON OF WAR to be any more than a shoot 'em up.

Bison: Who cares about this guy?

Sin/Dex:  OKish but if they do out and out comedy episodes, I'd prefer them if Mr Abnett pointed out things that I hadn't noticed before rather than retread things that everyone already knows about (e.g. all Brit Films are Period Pieces, Gangsta or it's Grim Oop North).  And the straight lifting of a Scouser saying "Calm down, Calm down" is just about unforgiveable - isn't that the sort of thing we'd see in Bec and Kawl? I usually like Steve Parkhouse's art (Bojeffries was great) but some of the panels seemed a bit lifeless and empty in this.

Strontium Dog:  I think this is the first time that a Wagner script and Ezquerra art has disappointed me.  They do set high standards though.  For me, it fell in a strange gap between funny and serious. I thought the last Stronty Dog story (Kreeler COnspiracy) was a much better retro story - I liked the way it played with storytelling - what people thinks was history to what actually happened.

Thrills of the Future: The description of "The Scrap" sounds interesting (which has suprised me as I'm not usually fan of things Spurious). Hands up who else thought scrap referred to a big fight? - I'm looking forward to it, especially with lovely Richard Elson art.


Wulf's accent racist? This seems a bit OTT.  Is Ben Kingsley's portrayal of Gandhi racist just cos of the accent? (leaving aside the old chestnut about why they couldn't get an Indian actor in the first place)

Many of these questions and others have been asked to Alan Grant over at ximoc.co.uk's current (and first) 20 Questions section.



...And very good it was too.  I have had a look at the interview and hope not to cover too much of the same ground.  Looking forward to the Gibson interview.

Gordon,

thanks for the confirmation that this is not a good question to ask; I wasn't going to ask it (rephrased or not). I don't think I'll ask the one about seeing Dredd's face either....

Sensible and polite are my middle names; and the one time I've met Mr Wagner, he was very polite as well.

Q: Do you like/dislike/don't give a fig about Garth Ennis' strips?


I think I'll skip this one, if you don't mind.  I get the feeling it might be bad form to ask one artist his opinion of another.