Still Moore to find

Even after happily following Alan Moore's career since falling hard for DR and Quinch 40 years ago, and spending the following decades tracking down all the diverse stories he did for Raw or Aargh of whatever, it's still possible to crack open an 2000ad annual, and be a little startled to discover a strip by Moore I've never read before

After the DR and Quinch introduction, I most definitely thought I'd read all his 2000ad comics, especially with the frequent reprinting of all the writer's work- I have the gorgeous and haunting 'Red Planet Blues' in multiple formats.

But there it was - 'Old Red Eyes Is Back', a Ro-Busters story in a 2000ad annual that I had to buy from overseas, with some typically rock solid artwork by Bryan Talbot. It ain't much of a story - Hammerstein gets bonked on the head, goes crazy and has to be shot through the head to reboot -  but there's a couple of good gags with Joe Pineapple's lingo and Talbot is always fantastic, drawing every speck of dirt in the rubble left behind by the rampage.

It's early in the writer's career, but it's still new to me, and just an absolute delight that I can still find unknown comics like that, that somehow managed to pass me by.

After completing an actual life goal of getting every 2000ad prog, I'm close to getting all the specials and annuals and other ephemera, so it's highly unlikely I'll come across a buried gem like this again. But then again, that's what I thought that before red eyes came calling again.