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John Allison's Scary Go Round et al.

Falselogic

Lapsed Threadcromancer
(they/them)
My recommendation, if you're playing catch-up:

1. Buy the first 5 issues of Steeple (AKA volume 1) and then read the rest up to Christmas with Clovis online
2. Buy Wicked Things (which is effectively Solver book zero) and then read Circus Windows online
3. Enjoy the wonderful Author Unknown crossover event
4. Finish catching up with Steeple and Solver at your leisure

Steeple and Solver are both excellent IMO, among my favorite stuff that Allison has ever done. Confusingly, both series start with work that is (for the moment) not available for free on any of John's multitudinous websites.
Is Desmond in any of these things though? That's the real important question that needs to be answered. @JBear knows how important this is.
 

conchobhar

What's Shenmue?
If I'm being completely honest, Giant Days isn't my fave. I enjoy it, but not to the same extent as Bad Machinery, Steeple or Solver. My biggest gripe is that Esther's character seems to have been completely rewritten from her old SGR days - not that most people would remember. McGraw's existence makes up for that in large part, but I think I'll always prefer my Allison stories with a bit more weirdness and supernatural aspects to them.
I admit that Esther is my least favourite of the main characters (except for maybe Ed, but Ed is kind of boring by design).
 

Paul le Fou

24/7 lofi hip hop man to study/relax to
(He)
My recommendation, if you're playing catch-up:

1. Buy the first 5 issues of Steeple (AKA volume 1) and then read the rest up to Christmas with Clovis online
2. Buy Wicked Things (which is effectively Solver book zero) and then read Circus Windows online
3. Enjoy the wonderful Author Unknown crossover event
4. Finish catching up with Steeple and Solver at your leisure

Steeple and Solver are both excellent IMO, among my favorite stuff that Allison has ever done. Confusingly, both series start with work that is (for the moment) not available for free on any of John's multitudinous websites.
Bless your heart sir, this is what I've needed. Well, that and time, and the will to sit at a computer to read comics. Maybe I should get a tablet.

My biggest gripe is that Esther's character seems to have been completely rewritten from her old SGR days - not that most people would remember.
I admit that Esther is my least favourite of the main characters (except for maybe Ed, but Ed is kind of boring by design).
This...this makes me sad...!
 

SpoonyBard

Threat Rhyme
(He/Him)
So I've dabbled on and off reading Allison's works and only recent sat down and read through all of Bad Machinery, then I started reading Solver before realizing 'oh wait there was a published work that took place between these two wasn't there' so I picked up Wicked Things and read that too.

Yeah there really needs to be something sorting the various projects together.

But anyway, Wicked Things. Is there only 6 issues? It looks like it ended in 2020 and there hasn't been anything since but it REALLY feels like there's more story to tell there, right? Like, we get no closure on who the murderer is, no answers on why the detective's translator was so damn sus, we just see Lottie faff about working with an unlikeable police force solving frustratingly non-supernatural crimes and then the victim wakes from his coma just long enough to clear her name before dying, the end.

Was there any discussion about this when it came out that I might have missed? I know I absorbed a large quantity of Allison's work in a short period of time so maybe Wicked Things hit different after a few years since seeing these characters but to me coming right off finishing Bad Machinery it just felt kind of ennnnhh?? If Allison had another set of issues planned and they just haven't materialized yet then it would all make more sense but I don't know if that's been confirmed anywhere?

Solver, at least, has been delightful and feels more of a fit with Bad Machinery. And hey, in the most recent pages Shauna's back! We get a sense that despite Lottie and Shauna mending their friendship in the final pages of Bad Machinery that it never fully recovered to where it was prior to the big Blossom schism, Shauna didn't even realize Lottie was framed for murder.

Is it weird that despite only just reading all of Bad Machinery the past couple pages of Solver feels weirdly nostalgic?
 

conchobhar

What's Shenmue?
If Allison had another set of issues planned and they just haven't materialized yet then it would all make more sense but I don't know if that's been confirmed anywhere?
He's talked about it in passing in the news blurbs, at least: it was cancelled by the publisher and isn't likely to return. Which certainly gives another meaning to some pages!
 

SpoonyBard

Threat Rhyme
(He/Him)
Ah so it felt unfinished because it WAS unfinished. That's unfortunate the publisher cancelled it, but it makes more sense than the story just ending where it did.
 

MCBanjoMike

Sudden chomper
(He/him)
Yeah, Allison hoped that Wicked Things would be a long-running series where Charlotte would help the police as a civilian consultant. He even name-checked The Mentalist in one of his Patreon posts where he talks about it, which made me pretty happy. But the fact is that the premature death of Wicked Things eventually gave us the Solver/Steeple crossover, which is my favourite thing he has done in recent memory, so I can be too sad about it.
 

Falselogic

Lapsed Threadcromancer
(they/them)
Sometimes I feel like the John Allison Comic Universe (JACU) is too big.

I've fallen behind and I dont know how to catch up except try and read it all from the beginning but that seems like an impossibility!
 

SpoonyBard

Threat Rhyme
(He/Him)
Well supposedly that's the end of Solver. Kind of a bummer way to end things, honestly, hopefully it won't be too long before we see Lottie et al again?
 

MCBanjoMike

Sudden chomper
(He/him)
I have to admit, I wanted to love Solver a bit more than I ended up actually loving it. Lottie's post-high-school adventures started out incredibly strong, between Circus Windows and her stint over in Steeple, but Solver proper hasn't hit quite as hard for me. Things took a pretty long time to get going, and then as soon as the team was up and running, we get an arc about Lottie getting distracted by other things. Give us a couple of cases before shaking up the status quo! There hasn't been time for an actual status quo to even develop!

Ah well, at the very least I always enjoy spending time with Allison's characters. His next project is apparently going to be X-Men themed (???) and after that it will be back to Steeple, which I'm pretty chuffed about. I'm not sure how much of that will end up on the website, but as a Patreon subscriber, it's not a problem for me either way. Consider signing up if you like Allison's work, you get pdfs of pretty much all his books from the last few years and every new issue in full on the day their first pages get published online. It's neat!
 

SpoonyBard

Threat Rhyme
(He/Him)
He ended Steeple last week, and I'm still a bit torn on the ending. I knew it was the last issue going in, but he kept piling on twist after twist I didn't know how he was going to resolve it all and it turns out his intent was NOT to. Intentionally stuffing a story with a series of unresolved cliffhangers as an ending is a choice I suppose but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a bit disappointed. Who knows, he may go back to it someday, we'll see.

In the mean time, hell yeah I'll read a Conan story by John Allison.
 

JBear

Internet's foremost Bertolli cosplayer
(He/Him)
Yeah, I can see why folks are disappointed, but I still enjoyed it well enough. The reveal that we missed out on another Solver crossover makes me sad, though.
 

Falselogic

Lapsed Threadcromancer
(they/them)
Missed a real opportunity to have the baddie be a Fishman and use Desmond in this story...
 

JBear

Internet's foremost Bertolli cosplayer
(He/Him)
Have patience, you Desmond-loving reprobate. He's clearly in the cover image-- he'll show up soon enough, probably to do something selfish and stupid.
 

Felicia

Power is fleeting, love is eternal
(She/Her)
I have never read Scary Go Round, but I am a big fan of Conan. I'm enjoying this take so far, but I was really won over when the serpent men were introduced. That's the kind of classic Howardism I love dearly. Ka nama kaa lajerama!
 

Falselogic

Lapsed Threadcromancer
(they/them)
In future years the 'thief toss' would be one of the most beloved events in the Hyperborean Olympics...
 

Falselogic

Lapsed Threadcromancer
(they/them)
Have patience, you Desmond-loving reprobate. He's clearly in the cover image-- he'll show up soon enough, probably to do something selfish and stupid.
Allison did my boy wrong! Of course you're happy about this you Philistine!
 

Falselogic

Lapsed Threadcromancer
(they/them)
I dont see how we're seeing any thing more than we'd see when he is in his speedo....
 
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