The Comic Strip Presents is a TV series that has been running, irregularly, since 1982. Arguably its finest episode to date is Detectives on the Edge of a Nervous Breakdown from 1993 (with close competition from 1990's GLC).
SPOILER warning
The plot sees several TV detectives from the 1970s brought back out of retirement to solve a case in the 1990s - somebody has been killing off the '90s TV detectives, but in a '70s style.
The main characters are all (affectionate) parodies of real '70s TV detectives, plus one (not so affectionate) '90s detective:
Jason Bentley, played by Peter Richardson, a take on Jason King
Shouting George, played by Jim Broadbent, a parody of Jack Regan from The Sweeney
The Bullshitters Bonehead and Foyle (Keith Allen and Peter Richardson (again)) are versions of The Professionals Bodie and Doyle returning from an earlier Comic Strip story, The Bullshitters
Dave Spanker, played by Phil Cornwell, is a send-up of Jimmy Nail's Spender
Unwillingly forced to work together to prevent the demise of TV detectives as a genre, since all the actors are too scared to play them any more for fear of the killer, they each have a go at solving the murder in their different idioms before the killer is finally unmasked and the Bullshitters finally get to have the car chase they were so desperate for.
A lot of the comedy comes from the blurring between the actors and their characters, as TV detectives hunt the killer of actors who play TV detectives. It gets pretty meta and the fourth wall takes a beating, even before we get to the song-and-dance numbers.
There's also plenty of laughs from the wordplay, and the interactions of the different detectives and their clashing styles: Spanker doesn't like George's shouting or the Bullshitters' obsession with guns; the Bullshitters think Jason's approach of going around country houses looking for a mad old colonel to arrest is "f'ing mad"; and nobody likes Spanker's '90s-style methods of detecting.
If there is one major criticism to be levelled at Detectives on the Edge of a Nervous Breakdown, it is that it isn't long enough. This causes structural problems with the plotting, namely that Spanker is revealed to be the killer with time to neither properly foreshadow this twist nor establish any alternative suspects. With five main characters, this could have easily supported a longer run time.
Also, the jokes about the central locking of cars (still a novelty in the early '90s) have dated badly.
But these don't really detract from a very funny half-hour, made by a team on the top of their game.
Gamma Longcat rates this TV programme at 5 out of 5.
The Project Strigas Affair is supposed to be an episode from the first season of The Man From UNCLE TV series from 1964. But in it Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin do a Mission: Impossible plot and the guest stars they meet are played by Leonard Nimoy and William Shatner! So I can't tell what programme I have just been watching and am a confused cat.
Throughout the whole story THE SHAT seems determined to steal the entire episode. At the end, just before the credits roll, he even manages to out-sleaze Napoleon Solo - a seemingly impossible task even for Captain Kirk considering that Napoleon Solo is a sleazier manny than James Bond - and a star is born!
Tidyup woke up one fine Saturday morning. He had no idea what fate had in store for him, as several of his friends had decided to pay a visit.
"Muuuuuh!" he said
"Let's go and visit Tidyup today. You can drive," said Eat Your Greens to Comb Your Hair
"Alright then, but only if you phone The Big Bad I Said No! and have an argument with him," said Comb Your Hair to Eat Your Greens
"Right then, Eat Your Greens, we're coming down there too!" shouted The Big Bad I Said No!
"Let's see if Sleepy Old Go To Bed wants to come with us, seeing as we have no idea where Tidyup lives," said Stoppit, but it sounded like "Ee ee ee ee ee eeee."
"I have no idea where Tidyup lives either, but that's no reason not to go," said Sleepy Old Go To Bed, adding "Stoppit can use his mobile to get directions, if we get lost."
Which, of course, they did
But they got there in the end
Everyone got drunk and lived happily ever after
Except Stoppit who suffered greatly from bogvom, and later sinkvom
Sleepy Old Go To Bed and Eat Your Greens talked bollocks in the kitchen for hours, and Sleepy Old Go To Bed and Stoppit felt not-at-all-well the next day
The Last Jedi! is one of the very best Star Wars comics, with memorable characters and an exciting, intricate plot. The plot succeeds where The Third Law failed by fitting seamlessly into the Star Wars setting, even enhancing it in a way that very few other comic stories could.
It begins simply enough, with Luke, Princess Leia, C3PO and R2D2 on a mission to rescue "Prince Denid of Velmor" who has crashed his spaceship on a planet, and they hope they can make friends with him.
They meet him and Princess Leia is immediately smitten with him, as shown quickly in two small panels and a line of dialogue. Princess Leia has a happy face as she says:
...We've come a long way to find you -- and it was worth the trip!
To which Luke adds:
Humph!
However, the really interesting character they meet is Prince Denid's friend Jedidiah.
Jedidiah is dressed like a Jedi and has a stick instead of a laser blade, so Luke at first thinks he is "a JEDI KNIGHT?!" but then Denid explains Jedidiah's - or "Jedi" for short - tragic backstory where he turned down the chance to become a Jedi so he could save Denid, but "his injuries robbed him of his reason" and he began acting like he thought a Jedi should act.
Jedidiah has a unique look, and his madness is effectively conveyed by the wobbly speech bubbles and uneven text. It is easy to feel sorry for Jedidiah, but Luke takes against him and a caption reveals his thoughts and feelings on the matter.
The thing is a walking parody of Luke Skywalker's highest, most revered goal... and it makes his blood boil!
Later on, he says to C3PO:
Keep this crazy old guy away from me, will you, Threepio? I'm gonna have enough trouble without baby-sitting him!
Considering that Luke is one of the main characters and the hero of Star Wars, it is a strange and bold move that we the readers are not supposed to side with him when he thinks and says these things. He is being presented as definitely being in the wrong here.
They fly to the planet Velmor, and are just in time to interrupt the coronation of Denid's usurping brother Prince Anod.
Luke and Princess Leia are in disguise, which for her means a "gold" wig and for him a wig, a hat, an eyepatch and a moustache - Luke taking no chances that somebody from the Empire might recognise him.
Luke takes the fake name "The Bounty Hunter Korl Marcus" while Princess Leia pretends to be Denid's betrothed Loren. The real Loren is dead and does not appear in the story, but this is an excuse for Denid to spend time with Princess Leia.
The baddys of the story are introduced as Regent Zelor and his friend from the Empire, Captain Traal. So that Jedidiah does not have a monopoly on unusual speech balloons, Captain Traal's bubble drips with icicles when she says "Delighted" upon being introduced to Denid.
After Denid is confirmed to be the prince he says he is, Captain Traal wastes no time in trying to seduce Luke to her side.
I want you...
Huh?
... to kill Prince Denid and his little queen at the ceremonial games tomorrow!
They kiff and Luke pretends to go along with it. Of course as soon as he leaves it is revealed that the baddys plot to kill him too, and then Zelor goes off to plot against Traal and Anod as well. Luke goes to tell Princess Leia about the baddy's sceheme - the part he knows about at least - but he finds she is with Denid and they are also having kiffs!
I love you Leia! Marry me, and rule with me, as my queen!
Denid, I...
Hush, my love... ...Don't say another word!
Luke only gets to speak to Leia the next day, and he is sarcastic and abrupt to her even when warning about a plot to kill her.
But Luke, if you knew about this last night, why didn't you--
Because you were too busy playing spin-the-bottle with Denid, that's why! May I be the first to congratulate you?
Meanwhile, in a sub-plot that seems to have diverged completely from the main plotline, C3PO is still looking after poor Jedidiah, but cannot find a droid to repair his brain.
The storylines begin to converge as it heads for the conclusion, when Luke double-crosses Captain Traal and then they are both double-crossed by Zelor and Anod. Luke gives himself away when he calls Princess Leia "Leia" (she's still in disguise, after all) and uses his "light-saber" (as Jedidiah called the Jedi laser blade earlier on, and Captain Traal calls it now when she recognises it).
Anod shoots Princess Leia and Denid, and Luke runs away as Traal, Anod and Zelor betray and shoot at each other, and Anod is the first to go
Luke is hunted by the other two, and thinks to himself that he is in trouble.
Both Traal and Zelor know the terrain-- "I don't. "They both have blasters-- "I don't." But I have something going for me they don't... ... The best ally in the universe... "... The Force!"
A great picture representing Luke reaching out with the Force. The moment he does so Jedidiah, miles away with C3PO and R2D2, looks up and reacts, and his speech becomes lucid and normal and he leaps into action:
What? The young one -- he is in danger! I must help him!
Luke uses a clever trick to defeat Zelor, but then he is about to be shot by Captain Traal. Jedidiah races up and saves him...
... but Jedidiah is shot instead.
There is a burst from Traal's blaster, then, in a twinkling, it is over... ... and silence reigns...
Zelor and Traal have one more go each at Luke, but he defeats them both. Princess Leia and Denid wake up and meet Luke, who is grieving over the body of Jedidiah, his opinion completely turned around. Luke makes a speech:
... Somehow, this valiant old man found the strength and the wits to save my life... but lost his...
... He did that for me... though I scorned him and derided him in my heart! He lost his life, and I lost him!
After that it is all over bar the wrapping up of the Princess Leia/Prince Denid romance sub-plot, which ends as it inevitably must with Princess Leia turning Denid down to go on being a main character while Denid will not be in it again. Ever the diplomat, Princess Leia says
I'm honored, Denid... more than I can say... but my place is with the rebellion!
In the final panels Luke sends Jedidiah's body into space in a "rocket-powered coffin" as he salutes him as "the last Jedi".
What truly sets The Last Jedi! head and shoulders above other Star Wars stories is the emotional impact of Jedidiah's sacrifice. Although he has only a pawful of lines of dialogue, his distinctive appearance and unique form of speech make him stand out immediately, and his tragic backstory is conveyed quickly and simply for an instant effect.
And not just on the reader - by having the opposite effect on Luke Skywalker, the hero, than on the reader, he becomes even more sympathetic. Cleverly, Luke returns to being the hero again at the moment he recognises Jedidiah's true worth and seeks to atone for wronging him.
This story also achieves the rare accomplishment of having Jedidiah both being a Jedi and not being a Jedi. Jedi by name and nature, but not by training or title. The Star Wars setting had already set in stone that there could be no 'real' Jedi Knights beyond the characters we had already met, but Jedidiah was a clever way of working around that restriction. It is a trick that could really only ever work once, but it certainly works here.
The Third Law is a clever and tightly-written story full of political intrigue, scheming, plotting and counter-plotting, and really the only thing wrong with it is that it does not feel like a Star Wars story at all.
Princess Leia, C3PO and R2D2 are on a mission for the Rebel Alliance to a planet that is nothing but a giant space bank. They want to get money to meet Paul Darrow buy more space ships, but Darth Vader is there too.
The exposition of the space bank's three laws is delivered by way of a huge sign with them written on it.
While a space bank is not intrinsically something that does not belong in Star Wars, the idea that Darth Vader is as subject to its laws as the rebels and so it acts as neutral territory where they cannot immediately fight definitely is something that does not fit in with anything established elsewhere in Star Wars.
Darth Vader has three aliens with him, each of whom has a superpower with which he plans to cheat the laws and kill Princess Leia's friend Viscount Tardi. The aliens are in disguise, but Princess Leia displays her cleverness by recognising them.
Most of the story is taken up with the three attempts to kill Viscount Tardi, each of which is foiled by Princess Leia with the help of C3PO and R2D2. These are enjoyable scenes, let down only by the foundation of the premise upon which they are built.
When all of his alien friends have been defeated, Darth Vader deals with Viscount Tardi personally using his laser blade.
At this point the story degenerates into an overly-convoluted mess of "I knew you were going to do that" and "I knew that you knew that I was going to do that" between Princess Leia and Darth Vader. Viscount Tardi was a droid all along, and R2D2 made a recording of Darth Vader using an illegal weapon so it looks like the goodys have won.
But then Darth Vader reveals that his plan was actually to steal the crown jewels of Alderaan that Princess Leia had with her and he knew about all along, so in the end he wins... and looks fabulous when he does so.
Because so many of the twists and turns of the story are only revealed to the reader at the moment they are necessary to create a surprise twist, it has the cumulative effect of making it seem that the writer is making it up as he goes along, and as a result it feels contrived and artificial.
Princess Leia is the obvious choice of main character for the story, but it does not ring true that she could come up against Darth Vader so soon after the events of The Empire Strikes Back without reacting to them, mentioning them or being affected in any way. In fact, as I said at the start, none of the events feel like they fit in with the rest of the Star Wars universe, making this a below-average and easily missable comic.
This would have made more sense as a Blakes 7 story, with Avon, Tarrant and Vila in place of Princess Leia, R2D2 and C3PO, and Servalan instead of Darth Vader. It would even work the other way around, with Servalan as Princess Leia and Avon as Darth Vader.
Droid World! is an unusual Star Wars story, because it features C3PO and R2D2 as the main characters in a way that is rarely seen after the original Star Wars film. It also uses the technique of starting the story in media res, not often seen in Star Wars comics, with C3PO and R2D2 being chased and shot at by pewpewpew guns on the very first page.
Three pages in they find themselves in a literal cliffhanger situation, and then the story goes back to explain how they got into the dangerous predicament they began in.
They are on a mission for the Rebel Alliance to Droid World, where only droids are allowed, and they find themselves in the middle of a civil war between Kligson, ruler of Droid World, and the baddy ZX3, who is a droid who works for the Evil Empire.
After killing Kligson, ZX3 sends his friends to chase C3PO and R2D2 and they wind up back in the position they started the story in. This time they are rescued by Kligson, who is not dead. He is not a cat, he is more like a good Borad (from Doctor Who's Timelash).
There is a big fight between Kligson's friends and ZX3's friends, and the good droids win at much cost and Kligson is left feeling sad.
C3PO and R2D2 leave and Droid World flies away, and that is the end of the story.
Droid World! is very imaginative, with great designs for many of the droids and Droid World itself, although ZX3 is not a very impressive or scary baddy because he just looks like a pink Stormtrooper. I certainly didn't need Scary Cat's help to not be scared this time!
There is good use made of both C3PO and R2D2's characters, and overall this is an enjoyable, if slight (it had time to tell the part where the droids were being chased twice, after all) story.
There was another version of the Droid World story, one with less pictures but with voice acting and sound effects to create a different experience. The art style is very different even if some of the scenes depicted are almost identical - Kligson looks different and ZX3 is red rather than pink. It tells the same story even if some of the details and dialogue differ.
The theme for this year's Doctor Who Night was: Daleks!
We started by watching Daleks' Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. which I have already reviewed here. It was unusual to watch a film on Doctor Who Night instead of the TV series, but if we had watched the TV version of the Daleks Invasion of Earth then we may not have had the time to watch two more stories yesterday.
This time I noticed that the character of David Campbell from the TV version seemed to have his characteristics spread across three characters in the film: Tom Campbell got his surname, David got his first name, and Wyler got his Scottishness.
The second story of the Night was Day of the Daleks.
This is a great story even though the Daleks are not actually in it that much, leaving most of their work to Ogrons and the Controller's mannys, but you are never in doubt that they are the real baddys behind it all. The scene where the Controller stands up to them, redeeming himself before he is exterminated, is one of the best in all of Doctor Who.
I have seen Day of the Daleks before but only on a VHS video where the four parts of the story were edited together to make a film-like continuous version. This was the first time watching it on DVD as a four-part serial, and it felt strange because I had come to see the video version as the normal version, even though it would have originally been shown on TV as four parts.
The last story of the night was chosen to be Genesis of the Daleks, which I have already reviewed in six parts here, here, here, here, here and here, so I don't have much to add now. Mew.
