Blood for the Baron!

Wiggy wrote: I watched the documentary on the history of 2000AD the other night and was thinking the whole time "yeah it was cool, but Battle Action Force was far better"

I watched that too... what a great doc.... it made me very nostalgic for for that period of British comics.

Although it makes me want to weep when I see the sh*t state of the British comics industry now... just look at the garbage on offer for kids at your local newsagents today!... They barely resemble comics. They're more like activity books with straight-to-skip toys taped to the front!

Some of the commentators on that doc seemed to suggest that, although 2000ad survived, the way the management dealt with it's artists and writers, forcing most of them to the states, that this might have been one of the catalysts in the decline of the homegrown British comic scene.

Imagine if that talent pool was still here in the UK knocking out incredible weekly titles on newspaper quality paper!

This documentary sounds interesting, what channel was it on please?

The Kraken Wakes wrote:This documentary sounds interesting, what channel was it on please?

It's called "Future shocks: The story of 2000ad"... It was on Film 4 and they usually show stuff more than once throughout the month... it was really good, they'd interviewed loads of the big names from 2000ad's history... Pat Mills, Dave Gibbons, Kevin O'Neill, Grant Morrison, John Wagner....

Lavenderlad wrote:

The Kraken Wakes wrote:This documentary sounds interesting, what channel was it on please?

It's called "Future shocks: The story of 2000ad"... It was on Film 4 and they usually show stuff more than once throughout the month... it was really good, they'd interviewed loads of the big names from 2000ad's history... Pat Mills, Dave Gibbons, Kevin O'Neill, Grant Morrison, John Wagner....

Brilliant! Thank you.

Herzlich Wilkommen!

Wiggy wrote:Space Force was the holy grail of toys back then, never got the Triad or the Cosmic Cruiser

Don't panic. Yeah, so I got the Triad at Xmas 1984, presumably through some manner of unspeakable arcanery as it was never in the most frequented toyshops either before or after...

... But only got an MIB Cosmic Cruiser in Spring 2006.

Wiggy wrote:I watched the documentary on the history of 2000AD the other night and was thinking the whole time "yeah it was cool, but Battle Action Force was far better"

Got to find this documentary! Seems channel already gladly ID'd.

I shall seek out and watch asap - as a loyal Squaxx, my weekly subscription to thrill power is still going strong.
Though I must admit I only regularly read BAF... everything else (Victor, Warlord, 2000ad) was an occasional treat.

It's a brilliant documentary, it goes into some depth about the comic industry in the late 70's and early 80's and how society influenced the 2000AD writing. Then the collapse in the 90's (when we all grew up) and then into more recent times.

Someone needs to do the same for BAF

Welcome Wiggy!
Future Shock was indeed zarjazz, well worth a watch. Pat Mills is a very angry man and very entertaining and talks a bit about Action comic. Glad they didn't gloss over how badly most of those guys got screwed by IPC / Fleetway.
Seems to me that BAF is often a footnote at best in the history of British comics, probably due to the licensed nature of it. BAF was certainly my doorway in to 2000AD. If memory serves 2000AD was the only comic I read after Battle Storm Force stopped until I got in to US comics.

Going back through the comic I have a new appreciation for the Battle stories now, as a kid I skipped most of them but reading Charlie's War again I realise now that it was brilliant story telling, someone should adapt it for t.v (if I win the lottery I'd buy the rights).

After BAF I went onto Action Force then Transformers. I loved the Marvel UK runs and Death's Head and Dragon's Claws. From there it was onto Games Workshop and I've been collecting 'toy soldiers' ever since

Ah yes, I forgot about the Marvel comics!
I listened to the third part of the 2000AD podcast interview with John Wagner today and he said he never read comics once he started writing them apart from Charley's War.

Games Workshop - thankfully I've kicked that habit now!