is it about time that Johnny Alpha reborn?

[Goaty]

I knows he was killed, in way everyone hated, would it about time Johnny Alpha appears alive...?

[IndigoPrime]

Personally, I always wondered why Wagner so rapidly dropped the whole "reboot" idea. The idea of presenting previous stories as "myth" and telling the "true" story of Strontium Dog was a neat get-out clause, enabling him to deftly side-step The Final Solution. However, subsequent storiesâ??although mostly highly readableâ??seem to merely be "lost stories", rather like the recent Rogue Trooper stuff.

[DavidXBrunt]

He's a semi-regular part of the prog anyway with the stories we're getting now so I don't think they need to get into that whole messy 'Gasp! I thought you were dead!' situation.

There's strong circumstantial evidence that the stories currently being told about Johnny aren't the same one that died and that we now have not 'flashbacks' but an alternate history of Stronty.

I'd rather they didn't waste time resurrecting him and kept telling quality stories. Certainly the last 3 have all been as good as anything else in the prog.

[DavidXBrunt]

Tordel - it's subtle but I think it's still there. In 'Traitor to his kind' Billy Glum clearly says that it's the first time he's seen Johnny since they first met at the casino. It ends with Johnny an outcast from Milton Keynes never to return.

That doesn't sit neatly along all the other appearances of Billy Glum in which he tended to hail Johnny as an old friend.

To me it looks like John is taking Johnny on his own journey that runs parallel to Alans stories but without the need for the framing device of the historical context. Anything could happen to these characters...and probably will.

[Byron Virgo]

"To me it looks like John is taking Johnny on his own journey that runs parallel to Alans stories but without the need for the framing device of the historical context. Anything could happen to these characters...and probably will."

Have to say, I think all this 'alternative history' shit is just that - shit. Who cares about the sodding continuity? I just want to read enjoyable Strontium Dog strips, which seems to be what we're getting of late since all this alternate bollocks has been pushed to the wayside.

Also, I think it's somewhat unfair that Alan Grant is always getting lambasted for his work on Strontium Dog - I thought his scripts were top-notch (both with and without Wagner), and it was Wagner's decision that Johnny Alpha ought to be killed off in the first place. And what's so bad about Alpha dying anyway? It's always been one of 2000AD's strongpoints that (with the exception of Dredd) no character within its pages is untouchable.

[stront692]

i always got the idea that they killed him off more bcos they didnt want anybody else that might take over messing about with the character or taking him in directions that they didnt want

personally i think 'strontium dogs' had good scope, especially after the feral monster storyline but subsequent story arcs went for humour rather than continuing where this left off

[DavidXBrunt]

I'm not dissing it, just thinking that Wagner is in a position to write his own stories unbound by the continuity. It leaves the original storys in place but allows for room and growth. Best of both worlds.

I liked Final Solution.

[Radbacker]

I loved the first new Stront story, with him taking on his dad and the Kreelers, the more jokey followups didn't impress me as much but Traitor to his Kind was back on form again.  I do like the idea that this is true history and other stories were Mythical/legendary versions of what happened and have no idea why it was dropped after the first re-boot.

CU Radbacker

[BMB]

"personally i think 'strontium dogs' had good scope, especially after the feral monster storyline but subsequent story arcs went for humour rather than continuing where this left off"

That reminds me, whatever happened to Feral? I remember he was mutating again into a new beastie, and then he never appeared again. Does anyone know any info about him? Or if there are any plans to bring him back at all?

[DavidXBrunt]

Zenith. Luke Kirby. Feral.

We'll not see their like again.

[Bolt-01]

hmmm, is see a 'Whatever happened to...' in the future for Dogbreath.

[Proudhuff]

No, let sleeping Dogs lie,

that includes Feral Dogs

New thrills Gruddamn it, no more Cassandra, no more Rogue, no more Elvis, Beatles or the Rolling Stones

New Thrills not Adrian Thrills


GobHuff

[Dog Deever]

Alpha dead? You're talkin' oot o' yer arse!
That never happened...
You must've made it up or something...

(still in denial)

[BMB]

OK so Ferals gone, but how about the artist that drew/painted his main story...was it Steve Pugh? He did such a great job of depicting the slum where Feral was, I was pretty young when that story came out, but I remember being impressed as it was quite different to most of the other stuff at the time.

Although IIRC Kev Walkers fully painted ABC Warriors was in the prog too around that time....Hmmm, a good time to be a tooth fan!