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Mach One Magazine and Judge Dredd Fortnightly - the 2000AD spinoffs that never were

Actually, I'd love to do something similar with Commando - what are the PoDs that could potentially make things like Air Ace and Battle (often far, far gritter and more well-written than Commando) survive to the present day
 
Quick thing @AndyC , is it possible to put artist credits under the pics? (Enio for the MACH 1 pages, Carlos Ezquerra for BAD Company, John Burn for the MACH 1 cover and Glenn Fabry for Megazine #1)
 
Actually, I'd love to do something similar with Commando - what are the PoDs that could potentially make things like Air Ace and Battle (often far, far gritter and more well-written than Commando) survive to the present day

That is a thing that comes up in Blazing Battle Action, with Pat Mills arguing more strips like Charley's War and Johnny Red could've stretched it. (Garth Ennis would still be on it now if it had lived!)
 
That is a thing that comes up in Blazing Battle Action, with Pat Mills arguing more strips like Charley's War and Johnny Red could've stretched it. (Garth Ennis would still be on it now if it had lived!)

Thing is, while I still love collecting Commandos at times, a) they're ridiculously expensive right now and b) their stories are so bland most of the time.

Battle and Air Ace and things were always mixtures of grey - they didn't flinch from showing the bodies or that the Allies were often just as bad as the Germans if they had to achieve things and not plucky, stiff upper lip chaps
 
I'll admit I basically know nothing about the British comic scene, but even so there's fascinating hints there- for example I wonder successful monthlies leading to the UK having a more 'European' comic scene might lead to more stuff from the continent ending up getting successful translations over here?
 
I'll admit I basically know nothing about the British comic scene, but even so there's fascinating hints there- for example I wonder successful monthlies leading to the UK having a more 'European' comic scene might lead to more stuff from the continent ending up getting successful translations over here?

Good question - once the format was established, probably a lot easier if someone's willing to give it a go. Diabolik Monthly!
 
Good article, Charles. Brings back some fond memories from the early days of 2000AD.
I don't believe that there's any likely POD that would either push the UK comics towards a European model or allow more spin-offs to survive. Moving to monthly publication is more likely to lead to a greater popularity of the US Marvel/DC publications (and killing off Simon Furman's work on Transformers is not a positive, btw), more spin-offs is likely to result in lower readership numbers overall - comics readership (especially boys) was very much a Primary School phenomenon in the 70's & 80's; if you were still reading them after entering Secondary School, then you were regarded as (& jeered at for) being somewhat more juvenile than your peers that had moved on to reading Smash Hits! or the NME.
 
Oh no, in fact the impact of no Furman Transformers is going to be huge - that's an entire influence removed from creators as diverse as Kieron Gillen and webcomic's David Willis.
I meant more along the lines that his work on it at Marvel UK at least had consistent plots, decent story arcs & character building. Which was almost entirely missing from the US generated strips.
But yeah, lots of creators with a major influence removed.
 
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