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Prog 1950 - YOU FEEL LUCKY, PUNKS?

Started by Buttonman, 26 September, 2015, 01:04:36 PM

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Hawkmumbler

Sinnister Dexter aye? Well at least it'll only probably be around for 4 weeks. :P

Link Prime

Quote from: Tordelback on 28 September, 2015, 09:05:08 AM
Quote from: Colin_YNWA on 28 September, 2015, 08:56:14 AM
Don't you lot make me warm up my Sinister Dexter dance...

Is it just a jump to the left, and then a step to the right? 

Ahh, the 'CYNWA Shuffle'? I think my uncle Brendan tried that at a wedding once.

Mikey

Really like that the cover puts you in with the perps!

Yes, Dredd has quality slapped all over it plus PJ has returned. I anticipate this will be top stuff as it builds, and of course its been perfectly set up. I was a bit disappointed in the page of text  - feel cheated out of more MacNeil panels!  ;)


Quote from: Dark Jimbo on 26 September, 2015, 04:18:30 PM
Defoe has a map! Mapmapmapmap! Love 'em, more of this please.

Heh! Just what I thought too! I found myself trying to tie it in with the London inside my head from The Baroque Trilogy. In fairness, I've been doing that with Defoe from the get go. Anyway, I cannot get enough of Gallagher's art on this strip - it's just gorgeously, gleefully grisly when needed, but with clear as ice panels and storytelling. Really loved how it opened, then scrunched my brows a bit at Defoe reading the paper by the fire in a idyllic family scene. Half expected him to compliment Tomazine on a 'cracking fry up, love'. Thankfully it was shortlived and onward with the Reek Renderings! Saying that, it was a great example of how to open a returning series - bit of background, bit of character, bit of action.

Brass Sun was another cracker! Immediately drawn into the strip with the beautiful opening page. This episode felt like some classic sci-fi, being intriguing and a bit weird and I loved the searching drones. Really loved how the rods plunging into the city were revealed - great stuff!

And Bad Company returned. I was eagerly anticipating this and was not disappointed one bit. Just fantastic art from Ruf & Jim that gave me a nice nostalgic tingle and a script that again is a perfect example to me of how to reintroduce a strip. There's no way everything is as it seems...it's good to be back in Bad Company.

Top flight proggage Tharg.

M.
To tell the truth, you can all get screwed.

Proudhuff

Huzzah! A truly top hole prog, its like the sad bad Daze of Dullworld never happened.

All tickidy-boo, only cloud the threat of Sin/Dex and the noise of a loud Burp! from the Nerve Centre.
DDT did a job on me

Spaceghost

Brilliant jumping on prog with gold on every page.

The cover is exactly the sort of image you need on these milestone issues. Dredd takin' out the trash. This is the best interpretation of Dredd I've seen by an American artist for a very long time.

The Dredd strip itself gets back into the police procedural groove with a John Wagner penned tale which finds Dredd investigating a possible serial killer. And what's this? The Menacing Master of Murder, PJ Maybe is HELPING Dredd with his investigations? Holy switcheroo!

It's always a joy to see Colin MacNeil on art duties, and he has become the unofficial artist for the continuing misadventures of PJ Maybe. Looking forward to seeing this one run.

I'm a huge fan of Defoe. I've read and re-read the two collections and I'm thrilled that it's back. It's simultaneously one of Pat Mills more coherent AND conceptually wildest strips. The fact that little Defoe wasn't immediately chomped by the zombie intruder leads me to believe that there's a plot to target Defoe and his family. But WHO is behind it?

Leigh Gallagher's art is, as ever stunning. As Mikey says above, it's grim and grimy but also tells the story flawlessly. Great to see him back in the prog.

I'll admit that Brass Sun has lost me somewhere along the way and I can't quite remember where we are or what's going on. I think I'm going to have to invest in the collected edition to refresh my memory. Loved the city of Wren's mind coming under attack and I'm a big fan of INJ Culbard's art.

Now we come to the story I've been nervously looking forward to since it was announced, Bad Company. When this ran in the prog it was the best thing I'd ever read in 2000 AD and became one of my top rated comics of all time.

I used to pore over the Brett Ewins/James McCarthy art and spent hours trying to emulate the style. The memorable characters, the mystery of the black box, the Vietnam war parallels and the BUDDA BUDDA action combined to blow my mind. I even enjoyed the less well received sequels.

It's too early to tell if this new series will live up to my expectations, but it's definitely a good start. I agree with other boarders who've said that things are not as they seem. There's no way Flytrap and Mad Tommy should be alive. I'm looking forward to seeing the mystery unfold.

Rufus Dayglo and Jim McCarthy are doing a great job on the art. Evocative of the classic strip and of the much missed Brett Ewins' style, but with enough of Rufus' own excellent personality shining through to give it a fresh feel.

All in all, a superb jumping on progg that would definitely get me back on board if I hadn't already sold (and re-sold) my soul to Tharg.

Yes, I'm far from a fan of Sinister Dexter, but four great strips every week is enough to tip my Thrill Circuits over the limit.
Raised in the wild by sarcastic wolves.

Previously known as L*e B*tes. Sshhh, going undercover...

Alien Goodness

This prog was better than expected. I could feel the thrill power crackling through my circuits, dangerously close to overload!

For a while I've been wondering what has happened to P J Maybe since Chaos Day, so now I will find out. I like the police procedural approach of this Dredd story.

The highlight for me was seeing the return of Bad Company, one of my all-time favourite 2000AD stories. I confess to being a bit confused by seeing Danny Franks as the last time I saw him, he was the new Krool Heart. Will need to hunt around for some back issues to fill in the gaps. Though it appears from the comments in this thread from other Squaxx that this story doesn't logically follow the last story anyway. I heart the tribute to Brett Ewins.

Dark Jimbo

Quote from: Alien Goodness on 30 September, 2015, 02:17:32 PMThe highlight for me was seeing the return of Bad Company, one of my all-time favourite 2000AD stories. I confess to being a bit confused by seeing Danny Franks as the last time I saw him, he was the new Krool Heart. Will need to hunt around for some back issues to fill in the gaps. Though it appears from the comments in this thread from other Squaxx that this story doesn't logically follow the last story anyway.

After Book II ended with Danny becoming the Krool Heart, [spoiler]Kano tried to put the war behind him and live a life of peace, but the guilt weighed too heavily on his soul. Eventually he led a small team back to the Krool homeworld and freed Danny, inadvertantly sending the planet's Krool utterly insane. He bought time for Danny and the survivors to escape, volunteering to stay behind and fight a reargaurd action. The last time they saw him, as the ship took off, Kano was being swamped by thousands of Krool - and Danny realising that, for Kano, it's probably his preferred way to bow out.[/spoiler]

So in many ways what we've seen so far is a logical enough sequel - where it not for the fact that Tommy, Thrax and Flytrap are long dead and there's no longer a planet Earth!
@jamesfeistdraws

Dandontdare


TordelBack

Great Prog, that. Great.

Brilliant stock Dredd cover that manages to be anything but ordinary. The two planes of colour work really well.

The Dredd is a tantalising opener. What is Philip up to now, the scamp. I love that I vaguely doubt that it even is him - could the Serial Serial be a copycat, now immitating the master? And if so, grud help him. And did PJ ever spell 'serial' correctly before? Also good to see Corrigan again, recovered from his heroic last stand in Gramercy Heights and apparently in loco Logan. Dredd's loyalty to 'his' people - or his commitment to developing a cadre of good Judges from unlikely material, if you prefer - is one of my favourite things about him.

Defoe is by far my favourite of Mills' later creations, and this is a cracker of a start - the gaffer showing why he is undisputed king of the opening episode.  I love that London is rebuilt as a Qabalah tree, although as with Mikey I find myself comparing it to Half-cocked Jack's London, but also to Sergeant Shardlake's of a century earlier. No bad thing, either influence/allusion.

Brass Sun rescues me from the mild disappointment of the previous book, with an exciting in media res effort, and an intriguing tale of a girl and her collapsible Vonnegut.

Finally Bad Company is everything it should be, with Rufus and McCarthy's art being deeply respectful of the genius of Brett Ewins, but still very much its own delicious thing. So good to see Pete, Jim and especially Rufus in the Prog again.

A good 'un, 4/4.





Magnetica

Dredd: instant classic.

Defoe:
Quote from: Colin_YNWA on 26 September, 2015, 08:21:40 PM
I struggle with Defoe, never been a fan at all, never been entirely sure why, just hasn't worked for me. This opener though I thought was great and not just cos of the map. Its a fine turn and a great set up. The only trouble I've had is Defoe has done this to me in the past, tricked me with nice opening, so I remain cynical about where this will go, but couldn't have had a better start.

I am totally with you on that.

Brass Sun.
Going to have to dig out the back Progs as this seems to have started at a point I don't recognise. Having come round to quite liking INJ Culbard's art, I think I now prefer D'Israeli's (based on Helium) - which is quite a turn around in my opinions.

Bad Company.
One of my all time favourites. Just loved Brett's art on this back in the day. Not sure how I feel about this, albeit well executed, homage.

Quote from: Dark Jimbo on 26 September, 2015, 04:18:30 PM
Very hard to know what to say about Bad Company just yet. Given that [spoiler]Thrax, Flytrap and Tommy are all dead[/spoiler], and [spoiler]Earth died and was abandoned one year after Ararat exploded and ended the Krool War[/spoiler], something's obviously not quite right here - bad dreams? False reality? Psychological breakdown? The key obviously lies with Danny, and it's certainly going to be interesting finding out what's going on. For now it's more than enough to just to bask in the triumphant return of Milligan and Dayglo to the prog.

I had forgotten all that, so thanks for the recap. I did think it was odd Thrax being nice to Danny - I seem to remember he was always horrible to him.

Muon

What a prog. Great stuff guys!

It was great that they took the time to ease new readers in to the back stories of the strips, too - although at some points I was reminded a bit of the expositionary inner monologues in Brief Encounter.  :)

Colin Zeal

A very good prog, with top marks going to Dredd and Bad Company. I've always enjoyed Brass Sun but appear to have forgotten how we ended up at this point so a re read is required. Feel slightly the  same with Defoe. Where there any books that haven't been collected yet?

sheridan

Quote from: Colin Zeal on 01 October, 2015, 06:59:27 AM
A very good prog, with top marks going to Dredd and Bad Company. I've always enjoyed Brass Sun but appear to have forgotten how we ended up at this point so a re read is required. Feel slightly the  same with Defoe. Where there any books that haven't been collected yet?
From yesterday's Thrill-Cast it appears the first episode has jumped forward a bit, and in about two episodes time we'll get a bit of filling-in on how we got to this point.

TordelBack

Both Brass Sun and Defoe open with new and unfamiliar situations, so you'renot missing anything. Bad Company too. When last we saw them Wren (and the Kurt Vonnegut in her head) and Septimus were free, and Defoe had just rescued Tomazine, killed Faust and quit his gig as zombie hunter.

Colin YNWA

Quote from: Tordelback on 01 October, 2015, 07:43:29 AM
Both Brass Sun and Defoe open with new and unfamiliar situations, so you'renot missing anything. Bad Company too. When last we saw them Wren (and the Kurt Vonnegut in her head) and Septimus were free, and Defoe had just rescued Tomazine, killed Faust and quit his gig as zombie hunter.

Yeah the shifts in story for all three of the none Dredd stories are what make this a really strong jump on. We're being thrown in a little at the deep end and so new readers will be able to learn what the heck is going on as we do. We're all learning together.