I carry no phone An aspiring Luddite In a wired world. Mastodon Verification Link	Jeff Berry is an early adopter of the Internet and the Web, was a late adopter of Twitter and left when it turned fascist, and always declined to adopt Facebook. He was a fairly early adventurer into the Fediverse. He admins a medievalist Mastodon instance. He hates cell-phones.

I finish off Starslayer, so to speak ...

As Starslayer entered the second half of its run, not that anyone particularly knew that its days were numbered, the story line, which had started as fairly hard sf, drifted more and more into fantasy. Some of that is down to the arrival of The Jolly Roger and her crew in Cynosure, but some of it ... I don't know. I can only assume that Ostrander had an idea of where he wanted to take it and did so.

I think it lost its way, though. Torin's crew is killed, and then resurrected when Torin enters into a bargain with The Morrigan, the Celtic 'goddess of death.' Resurrection needs to be handled very carefully since it moves the goalposts on the stakes of a story; if death isn't the end, then the risks are weighted differently. The stories remain interesting, and build to a fairly satisfying conclusion. Ostrander's supporting cast is also interesting, and the one-off characters are engaging. Something was in the air, though, and the series began to change artists with more frequency. Ostrander even cited the changing lead artists as a sign that the series had run its course.

As previously noted, Grimjack finished its time as the backing feature with issue #18. The new backing feature was 'The Black Flame.' It's an unusual story - experimental, somewhat phantasmorgical, probably allegorical. One issue it was actually the lead story - 'Starslayer Presents The Black Flame.' I think it got its own series at some point or was reprinted.

In any case, the whole series came to a natural(ish) conclusion.

I got rather sidetracked with the reread - May is a busy month for us - so rather than delay any longer, I'll go ahead and publish this, brief as it is, and get started on the next few bits. I'd been thinking about Jim Starlin's 'Dreadstar' but that box is on the very bottom of the pile, so it's going to be some random indie comics next time.

• Comic Read Through Part Seven