The second issue of The 77 arrived through my letter box yesterday and an excellent read it turned out to be. British comics were always anthologies unlike most american fare which featured a single character or genre. The 77 isn't yer traditional IPC/DC Thomson material either. It's new and refreshing, the product of a lot of effort by those involved.
Of course as I always warn anthologies are designed to appeal to a broad range of readers so there are always strips and features that appeal and some that don't it's the nature of the beast. My tastes may differ to yours it's as simple as that and no offence to any of the creators after all I spent my entire childhood skipping over any football or sport related stories. Not my thing.
The issue opens with the second instalment of V by Steve Bull & Ade Hughes, one of those kill tournament stories that seem quite popular. There's more to the killing than might be seen is the message I got from this chapter. Still on the fence on this one.
Next up is the second chapter of of Mal Earl's post human genocide story Prodigal as the creatures of legend reclaim the Earth following our continuing destruction of the world we live in. It seems a bit harsh that people were simply exterminated. The human race is seemingly gone forever and the story of mankind's downfall is explained. More to come from this excellent story that has plenty of potential.
There's a stray velociraptor in The Ship That Screamed featuring Jericho-5 and mad pensioners brains in bottles in the full colour but ultimately disappointing Martian Law. However The Collector by Steve McManus and Charlie Gillespie makes up for that with this excellent story.
The Screaming Hand makes it's enigmatic way through five pages of The House That Never Was with a promise that it will return soon. Good.
The excellent centre pages and colour feature Division 77 by Dave Heeley & Sinclair Elliot opens up a mystery as one soldier finds himself seeing the conflict from a different point of view. This is followed by a short story of family and loss Trompe La Mort by David Bedford & Andrew Redmond.
One of my favourite strips in this issue (especially as I am watching the re-runs of Buffy) is Penny Pentagram: Occult Detective. promising story with appropriate matching art from D. Thomas and J. Roydon. This is followed up with a traditional science fiction tale about space whaling in Gut Crawlers. Not a job I'd fancy even if the Galaxy depended on it.
Then there's a dark tale The Cell. Pain and freedom with the threat of death. The future? Then there's a flooded world in Undertow by Joe Dunn & Jeremy Dunn an almost silent tale to be continued.....
To end there's a sports story of sorts but I did read Ghastly United by Barrie Tomlinson and Neil Sims. An amusing short strip.
There's some good stuff in this comic and comes highly recommended. My only complaint? It's not weekly! But I'm just being greedy. Next issue is due out in the Autumn and there'll be a Kickstarter to support this project.
In fact support British Comics where you can. There's some good stuff out there and this is one of the best!
Rating: 4 Stars.
Obtain your copy from: getmycomics.com/The77
The first issue is also still available:
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