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[Scarlet Traces]

I was cataloguing the Complete Future Shocks books for Barney the other week and something quite fascinating happens around Prog 200 if you fancy tackling that.

I'm a little embarrassed, but I actually just had this data lying around (as Future Shocks against anthology totals*):

Brilliant! I always think of the first ten years as being full of Future Shocks. I guess you're including annuals and specials so it's not immediately apparent but there's a gap of about a year and a half (Prog 135 - 203) where there aren't any. There's hardly any in 1983 either but that's because they're replaced by Time Twisters for the most part.

I issue a challenge: all the Edgiverse strips on one graph/chart, page totals cumulative.

Ha! And you have to visualise it as a pie/donut chart with the segments corresponding to the doors in the Temple of Mithras.

*ahem*



*First person to mention Scarlet Traces gets sacrificed to Horus!

Wonderful stuff. That big gap between Helium & Stickleback is especially interesting but, you know, there are actual Martians in Red Seas, so...

Obviously I take no pleasure in nitpicking over tiny details but surely your Rogue Trooper overview isn't missing the Bland & Brass strip from the Villains Special?

Aw, I'm sorry to hear that. Funny, that grebo scene, of which Deadline was a champion, barely gets a mention these days compared to things like Britpop and obviously grunge. But the Senseless Things, Neds Atomic Dustbin and PWEI were a massive influence on youth culture at the time. R, indeed, IP.

One of those things that fell between the fashionable cracks of Madchester and grunge I guess. Mega City Four were probably my favourite from that sort of scene. It must be more than ten years since their singer died too.

I'm still bitter about having my Neds T-shirt stolen at the Reading festival.

Mark Keds from out of Senseless Things has died at the age of fifty. The band are probably most notable around here for having most of their early record covers done by Jamie Hewlett but they were a lot of fun.

I issue a challenge: all the Edgiverse strips on one graph/chart, page totals cumulative.

Ha! And you have to visualise it as a pie/donut chart with the segments corresponding to the doors in the Temple of Mithras.

Ro-Busters?

*Throws a tomato at Cosh*

Haha. Savage is linked now but it's easier to ignore for me as it's all about the production line whereas it's explicitly the same characters of Ro-Jaws and Hammerstein in Ro-Busters. Of course Starlord should be included. Don't tell me you're planning to start Strontium Dog from Galaxy Killers.

I was cataloguing the Complete Future Shocks books for Barney the other week and something quite fascinating happens around Prog 200 if you fancy tackling that.

Lovely work but I think a bar chart would look better for the page count when your dataset has so many natural gaps.

Ro-Busters?

Image Humble Bundle

Latest version of these and by Toutatis I'm so tempted! I've not even looked at an of the books I got earlier this year but this collection includes a massive wedge of Savage Dragon if you go for the higher tiers as well as what looks like the complete Descender and some MAGE too!

Not sure whether to be annoyed that I forgot to back and actually buy this after looking at it several times or relieved that I haven't added another fifty books to the virtual unread pile.

[Future Shocks: Journey to the Edge of the Earth]

01. Future Shocks: Journey to the Edge of the Earth. Not a shock but it definitely made me laugh and I really like Burnham's art.
02. Time Twisters: Time Hygiene. I don't agree with including a Prog with a 2021 cover date in this list but what are you gonna do? This was a great lauch that played with the conventions of the strips themselves and their history.
03. Shako's Kingdom. A great synthesis.

[Cold Case]

Strange to think the only Wagner story of the year is struggling to break into my top 3.

01. Cold Case. Niemand wrote the lion's share of this year's Dredd and this was his best. Combining Mega City history (the Apocalypse War) with a keen eye for the current situation (Mechanismo judge Patsy becoming an integral part of the team) and without a happy ending.

02. The Immigrant. Great to have Al back, if only for a one off. Slightly broad Brexit comedy but still laugh out loud funny in places.

03. The Victims of Bennet Beeny. Who am I trying to kid? Of course Wagner makes it. Found parts of this a little hard to follow first time around but it's another intriguing slice of the Beeny pie. Might've made it a place higher if Colin had been able to draw the whole thing.

Carry the Nine just missed out. A fun idea which plays much more to Williams strengths than the very weak epic it forms an epilogue to.

[Full Tilt Boogie]

I've also ruled out Brink for being last year's best story, so here goes.

01. Full Tilt Boogie. Space Opera fun with beautiful art, a complete story and a funny cat.

02. The Out. Space Opera fun with beautiful art and a funny bag.

03. Diaboliks. Wasn't at the same level as Absalom or Caballistics but time to get there and it was really great to see Dom Reardon back.

[The Returners: Heartwood]

My mildly controversial picks

01. The Returners: Heartwood. I really like this strip. It does its own thing with its own slightly seedy, off-kilter vibe in a way that nothing else on the list does and the colouring really sets it apart from anything else.

02. Lawless: Boom Town. A transitional storyline this with some big changes which will have more effect on future series then this one. Still, below average Lawless is better than most other strips.

03. Blunt III. Boo Cook's exploding imagination wins out as I can't make myself vote for Waugh.

Additional Beasts make Beasts of Balance an even better game.

I was desperately trying to remember the name of this before Christmas but I couldn't find your old posts so o thought maybe if imagined it. Is it more of a kids game or will work for adults too?

Just gotten round to reading the Christmas Prog. Wasn't feeling too enthusiastic about it but the highs outweighed the lows. Strontium Dog, Survival Geeks and by far TC Eglinton's best script to date were the unexpected highlights.

Maybe time for a longer review tomorrow but I've just read this whole thread and can't believe nobody's mentioned Kek-W's tortuous Grateful Dead joke.

Bah. That's the morning I spent making lists for the 2020 reader survey wasted.

Other categories: favourite writer/artist; best new strip; best new droid

Best short story especially with all those specials

Yeah this is one I know I should defo do. Its just whether I'd get around to fishing them all out. I will try...

Can send you a list for 2000AD stuff but not the other specials.

[1984]

Two absolute beauties but I said in the first round that I couldn't imagine anything beating that Kev O'Neill cover and I was right. 1984.