Saturday Waffling (February 21, 2015)
First off, because both of these posted at odd times, here’s a link to the commentary on Episode 1 of The Rescue. Thanks again to Jack Graham for co-commenting. We’ll be back Wednesday with Episode 2. And here’s this week’s Last War in Albion, which has the start of a couple entries’ worth of coverage of Marvelman/Miracleman before we put that back on the shelf for a bit and wait to catch up to the Eclipse era.
Since we did it last week for Eruditorum, let’s do it for Last War in Albion, because I’m genuinely curious. What are your favorite/least favorite bits of that so far?
February 21, 2015 @ 7:14 am
I'm still waiting for the proper book to read it. Give me book!
February 21, 2015 @ 7:27 am
I think my favorite part of Last War so far would probably be the Starblazer section. Largely because it's the one section of Last War so far that introduced me to something I was pretty much completely unfamiliar with that I could nevertheless actually track down copies of without too much difficulty. (It took a bit for all the issues to turn up on eBay, but they weren't terribly expensive when they did.) I'm also very fond of your brief coverage of Walt Kelly, who is my all-time favorite comic creator. But I've been immensely enjoying all of it.
If I did have to pick a least favorite bit, I would go with the Swamp Thing chapter as a whole. That's really not down to how you did it, but I think the scale of the material made it a rather indigestible chunk for the coverage of the War as a whole. I'm pretty sure it's Moore's longest run on anything; and except for The Invisibles and Sandman it may be the longest run of anything in the War. Unlike Invisibles or Sandman, though, it's not the centerpiece of the respective creator's work in comics. You managed to cover it as well as anybody could, I think; but it's still both too long and too short for the material.
February 21, 2015 @ 8:00 am
I liked the Captian Britain portion. It really lays out a template of sorts for how Moore's later works would unfold. And I really loved the Swamp Thing section, as well. Mostly because therein I was able to see the aforementioned template play out over a long run of issues.
February 21, 2015 @ 2:40 pm
Being what most here would describe as a non-comic reader (the sum total of my comic experience would cover a couple of years of 'Battle' and 'Commando' in my early teens, anything Doctor Who in DWM, usually the last piece I read, and a full set of Milo Manara's works, collected in my late teens… ahem.), I have found the entire journey fascinating so far.
To date I've enjoyed the early formative chapters slightly more than the more current entries covering the major works. How talent gets going I typically find more interesting than talent at its peak. But I'm along for the ride so far.
February 21, 2015 @ 3:01 pm
Swamp Thing and Captain Britain were highlight chapters for me, I think. I'm enjoying the depth in general, even if some of the more esoteric chapters go over my head a bit.
I'm definitely looking forward to the full book and hopefully many many more years of War coverage, though.
February 21, 2015 @ 8:13 pm
I don't read the words, I just like when the writers punch each other! How do you make the words stick so close to the pictures?
February 21, 2015 @ 8:33 pm
BTW, Phil, in Watchmen Babies in V for Vacation, which of the Watchmen Babies is your favorite?
February 21, 2015 @ 9:19 pm
Well the whole period of the War from the beginning and beyond current posts is one of heady nostalgia for me, so it's been amazing to see images of comics from 2000AD, Starblazer (I so forgot that existed!), Swamp Thing, Near Myths, Warrior and more – some of which I hadn't seen since my initial read. So Swamp Thing would be one of my favourite individual sections, since that stretch of comics was so formative for me; but overall I had loved having the experience of having moments when I load up the blog and there before me is a long-forgotten comic book image from my teens – that's special along with the Blake sections.
Least favourite? Not much to be honest. I did on first read gloss over the publication history parts of Marvel/DC, but then on understanding the importance of the context they give, I got fascinated. I was really glad that the Infinite Crisis was summarised in such a succinct manner – I would have loved one commenter's suggestion to read it as one long individual sentence.
February 21, 2015 @ 9:20 pm
I meant to say that with the Crisis, you made the kind of comic book I find pretty boring an interesting topic.
February 22, 2015 @ 6:41 am
Captain Britain for me, too, though I'd probably put V second. I've been reading this with a kind of phase shift thing going on, because I started reading the Alan Moore bits of Last War before starting Lance Parkin's biography but now that's overtaken your own writing, and the similarities and differences of your approaches mean I keep thinking I've seen things before but distorted. On top of that it's all coloured by my teen memories of Warrior and his DC comics. Rather fun.
Anyway, I don't comment much but I'm enjoying it, thanks!
February 22, 2015 @ 9:19 am
I've enjoyed all of it, but if I had to pick a highlight, once I realised what was going on, I loved The Parenthetical Comment That Wouldn't Die.
March 1, 2015 @ 2:16 pm
And don't forget this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDDHHrt6l4w
March 1, 2015 @ 7:12 pm
No force in heaven or earth could convince me that's not exactly what Ozy's planned saturday morning venture was going to be.
March 2, 2015 @ 9:36 pm
Om my BerserkRL that video is amazing! Good to see the original source material, very nostalgic.