We stared into the untempered schism and all we saw was this dodgy CSO effect

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Elizabeth Sandifer

Elizabeth Sandifer created Eruditorum Press. She’s not really sure why she did that, and she apologizes for the inconvenience. She currently writes Last War in Albion, a history of the magical war between Alan Moore and Grant Morrison. She used to write TARDIS Eruditorum, a history of Britain told through the lens of a ropey sci-fi series. She also wrote Neoreaction a Basilisk, writes comics these days, and has ADHD so will probably just randomly write some other shit sooner or later. Support Elizabeth on Patreon.

13 Comments

  1. Daibhid C
    November 21, 2013 @ 6:07 am

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    Reply

  2. Elizabeth Sandifer
    November 21, 2013 @ 9:25 am

    My one comment on this entry, and you deleted it. 😛

    Reply

  3. Eric Gimlin
    November 21, 2013 @ 9:27 am

    And, in part 19, we finally reach Warrior; arguably the first actually well-known battlefield in the war.

    And, of course, the first matters to be dealt with therein are not Marvelman and V, but Laser Eraser and Warren Ellis's fan letter. I find this even funnier than your use of "Doctor Who" in the previous part. I'm just wondering how far you'll keep the gag going; are we going to see Zirk dealt with in more detail to introduce Brian Bolland and Garry Leach before we actually get to the big two?

    And here's a 2nd comment, since you responded to the previous one as I was posting this one…

    Reply

  4. Elizabeth Sandifer
    November 21, 2013 @ 9:38 am

    The trouble with V and Marvelman is when to deal with them. Properly V should be up fairly soon – it started in 1982, we're on stuff that started in 1980 now. Likewise Marvelman. But they extend so far forward that to treat them entirely early is as inaccurate as holding them.

    In the case of Marvelman, I'm holding it for fairly late. Its concerns are so close to Watchmen that I'm going to fold it into the book length spectacular that will be the War's coverage of that. I think it goes better there, in the end. But, of course, that opens its own problems, since the Marvelman stuff is what got Moore the Swamp Thing gig.

    V for Vendetta is going to be split, on the other hand – the Warrior stuff considered on one side of Watchmen, the DC stuff on the other. But still slightly out of order – it's coming immediately after the Swamp Thing chapter, mainly because I think the transitions work better that way. (Basically, I'm going to use V to get back to the UK for it, Bojeffries Saga, and Halo Jones prior to Watchmen.)

    I have no idea how hellish it's going to be when I get to the point where multiple people's careers are running simultaneously and I have to successfully braid not only the rough sequence of works within a single career but the sequence across multiple careers. But I imagine the answer is "oh God why did I sign up for this project." 🙂

    Reply

  5. Eric Gimlin
    November 21, 2013 @ 9:52 am

    Splitting V makes sense, since there was a gap in publication; Miracleman got very, very slow at points but arguably didn't quite stop until the Eclipse collapse.

    Slightly odd question that actually has a slight bearing on the war: Do we know for sure if the Dave Gibbons drawn story in Giant-Size Chillers 1 is actually by the same person who did Watchmen? As a 1975 story it would be arguably the first scouting party of the British Comics Invasion, but the timeline just seems very odd; one stray story half a decade too early.

    Reply

  6. ferret
    November 21, 2013 @ 1:20 pm

    "obscure lizard people from a 1973 Doctor Who episode" – such a slap! but oh so accurate – it's amazing how they seem to have played a bigger part in Doctor Who than they actually did. They feel like Pertwee regulars, appearing in both Peladon serials, wandering around the background of Inter Minor, running a rival mining operation on Uxarieus (the mining robots reptile disguise a clear attempt to frame them for the murder of the human colonists).

    Reply

  7. HarlequiNQB
    November 22, 2013 @ 4:43 am

    'Do we know for sure if the Dave Gibbons drawn story in Giant-Size Chillers 1 is actually by the same person who did Watchmen?'

    Based on the art style I would say that it is indeed an early work by the same Gibbons.

    Reply

  8. David Gerard
    November 23, 2013 @ 12:17 pm

    Of course, I started reading 2000AD and Warrior in early 1983 at age 16, so this is getting tremendously relevant to my interests …

    Reply

  9. matt bracher
    November 28, 2013 @ 9:51 am

    "After Daak was abandoned after a dispute about length – Marvel was phasing out ten issue series, and wanted Moore to contract it to four issues focusing on, as editor John Freeman suggested, “what Daak does best,” which, as Moore put it meant “he wanted a thug with a chainsaw” – a far cry from Moore’s far more somber story of death and redemption."

    I remember loving these stories when Marvel US reprinted them. The idea that something as grand as this was planned and then mooted is just so meaningless….

    But thank you for a reading into the circumstances around its writing: that it wasn't just an odd fiction (Daak carrying the dead Taiyin around with them) but was born of something far deeper.

    Strangely, my strongest impression when I first read them was the disappointment of Steve Dillon being replaced by David Lloyd. Not to question Lloyd's brilliance, it just felt so different.

    Reply

  10. matt bracher
    November 28, 2013 @ 10:01 am

    Fascinating.

    I haven't been following "The Last War in Albion" all that closely of late, largely due to things getting far too hectic, but this chapter provides the background for the stories I enjoyed in childhood.

    Steve Moore's instatement as lead writer dismayed me — I never liked "Time Witch", especially its senseless aging of Sharon, and it wasn't until "The Dreamers of Death" that I allowed that feeling to shift. I'll have to go back and reread the stuff in-between.

    But this comment is inspired by something deeper:

    "An ebook omnibus of all seven parts, sans images, is available in ebook form…."

    My apologies for what someone may have asked earlier. What are the reasons behind the lack of images? The sequence of Absolom Daak's guest appearance in Warrior is hilarious, and I'd hate to have missed it in ebook form.

    Reply

  11. matt bracher
    November 28, 2013 @ 10:03 am

    (And it looks like someone else hits Daak in the final panel, based most significantly on the character's sleeves. Is there something I've missed?)

    Reply

  12. Elizabeth Sandifer
    November 28, 2013 @ 8:55 pm

    Because the level of image use I do on the blog is very high, and would at times be difficult to justify under fair use, and I'm not comfortable using that sort of image level in a for-profit work like the ebook. Also, images are a pain in the neck to format and would add a full day's work to every ebook. I expect I'll do a book collection at some point that will split the difference image-wise.

    Reply

  13. Daru
    February 16, 2015 @ 12:25 am

    David Gerard: "Of course, I started reading 2000AD and Warrior in early 1983 at age 16, so this is getting tremendously relevant to my interests …"

    Exactly the same for me, this whole era coming up all the way through 2000AD to Swamp Thing has many memories for me. I know all of the comment threads are long-dead here Phil, but as I am marathoning through to catch up with the Last War in the present – I read all the V posts recently – I just want to acknowledge how brilliant a read this is.

    Reply

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