The second season of Battlestar Galactica ended in Americaland on Friday and my torrent finally came through last night. Quite, quite wonderful. This program has gone way beyond the “it should be shit but it’s not” line and into genius territory. Yet whenever I preach this to non-geeks they look at me all funny. But I was the same. Battlestar Galactica? Must be shit. It’s not. Trust me on this.
I really should start cataloguing all the things I rescued from my mother’s house last week as there’s some curious stuff suddenly in my possession. Part of it is the suitcase full of British comics that had been in her attic since I moved out of home in 1991. These are mainly copies of 2000AD and early issues of Deadline along with a selection of zines and other A4 sized comics from the 88-91 era.
The 2000ADs are the real diamonds here. I’d started buying the comic in 1987 and got severely hooked, so when I discovered such things as comic marts and mail order services where back issues were available I started completing my collection backwards in time to around 1984 (issue 363). These are now sitting by my bed in a large stack which I’m slowly working through each night, and what’s struck me is how well they hold up. Yes, they’re a little corny at times and the quality is not consistent across the board, but there’s some really top-flight stuff in there (Halo Jones has just started). I was toying with selling them for a nice lump of cash (although I doubt I’d get much) but instead these are going to be saved for Isobel and Spike when they’re old enough to appreciate them.
The other comics are somewhat embarrassing, coming as they do from that era when comics “grew up”. In hindsight they just reached puberty and got a bit shouty but there are a few gems amongst the shit. Philip Bond‘s Wired World, for example, shines like a beacon and really should be collected for future generations. Tank Girl, on the other hand, is bollocks.
[Update: Just having a cursory glance on eBay and it seems the bottom has plummeted on the 2000AD back issue market. I was paying £1-3 an issue back in the day and now it's just pennies and postage... Maybe it's time to complete the run? Or is that crazy talk?]
If you do want 2000ADs, Pete, then I have a load that I was contemplating offering up on Freecycle (similar story to you: rescued from my parents’ attic when they moved house a year or so ago). Many of them are in pretty shabby condition (having been read and reread and then reread some more during my childhood) but I think I’d be able to provide every issue from about 125 to 362 and various other ones prior to that. Drop me a line if you’re interested.
Ahhh, 2000AD in the early to mid-Eighties. Those were the days.
Get them. They’ll be worth something someday. everything is.
Hey Pete! I LOVED Battlestar Galactica! I don’t suppose you still have season two? I haven’t seen it at all. :(
Remind me next time you come over…
2000ad came up in conversation regarding what stays and what goes with whom “those boxes, they will be going with you won’t they…..”
Just discovered a rather large gap in the run. It pauses at 380 and then starts again at 460.
Dave?
When I was last working in a comic shop (about 4 years ago) the bottom had definitely fallen out of the 2000AD back issues market.
We sold thousands off for pennies. Bloody annoying sized/shaped things 2000Ads. If you want to keep them, keep them, but keeping them for profit would be a losing bet.
In the reocrd shop we had a guy come in last week to day he’d been keeping his complete collection of Garry Glitter records as an investment and was wondering if now was the right time to sell them for big money…
Not that I’m saying 2000AD is on a world childfucking tour of course. That would be ridiculous. It’s a magazine sized comic with no organs or muscles, let alone a passport.
I was a big fan of the original Battlestar Galactica. BTW Pete I was born in Salford and now live in Canada.
Hi Pete – yup, pretty sure issues 380 to 460 must be in there somewhere.
Hang on, I’ll dig out the boxes and give you a better idea…
Patchy up to 98 (but more than half of them are there) then, as far as I can tell, a solid run from 98 to 607. You’re welcome to any or all of them. The only issue would be how best to get them to you.
Wired World *was* great – as was Hot Triggers and Cheeky Wee Budgie Boy. I loved Phil Bond’s eye for detail, not to mention his shoehorning of obscure early REM references into his work.
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Tank Girl was okay for a while until it fell into a directionless story arc which seemed to just concentrate on the fact that Tank Girl was finally going to get her tits out for the lads.
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Deadline died for me when Tank Girl & Wired World both finished.
Re: Deadline…
Maybe my rubbish memory is playing tricks with me but I pretty much carried on liking Tank Girl right up to the end. It was only ever the dodgy painted second summer of love type episodes in the middle(?) that left me cold.
Apparently there are a couple of books of new Tank Girl material coming out sometime soonish, written by Alan Martin but not drawn by Mr Hewlett (or at least so my man at Gosh tells me).
Phil Bond was and remains a great talent and I only wish he’d take some time out from working to other people’s scripts and write something for himself again. Best thing he ever did was in an issue of A1 and called (I think) Endless Summer. Lovely.
2000 AD? – depends who’s selling and who’s buying.
http://www.trademe.co.nz/Books/Comic-books/Other/auction-50726680.htm
With Battlestar Galactica, the real fantasy is that of the ‘home culture’ as a complete and utter victim. I’ll take ‘Life on Mars’ any day of the week.