Thursday, 5 July 2007

Fanzines Reviewing Fanzines - TSV #51


Another flashback to an old review:
TSV #51

TSV changes its fonts and layouts more times than Matt changes his underwear. I still believe that they haven't found the right balance. I noticed a lack of artwork in this issue. Is TSV going towards a text only basis? The comic strip is something that is usually looked ofrward to, but In Bloom didn't strike the right chord. The Karkus seems to have established itself as the cartoon regular of TSV now and should be so for quite some time.
Once again TSV have an interesting interview with a New Adventures author, being Gary Russell. The fiction count has increased and includes a nice wee Star Wars crossover story by Alistair Hughes. A large proportion of this issues pages is taken up by a tribute to Terry Nation, but I feel the overall make-up of issue 51 suffered as a result.
News is so comprehensive in TSV that we here at Reverse the Polarity! don't feel we need to include it, unless something groundbreaking occurs. An alright issue, but still doesn't come anywhere near issues 47 or 49.

- Wade Campbell
Not quite a brutal as the review of issue 50, but not hugely positive either. I am left wondering if, as newbies to the whole fanzine editing thing, Matt Kamstra and Wade Campbell could have possibly written a 'nice' review of TSV. It certainly seems like an extension of their grudge against Telos.

1 comment:

Paul Scoones said...

We were changing the header fonts quite a lot, but that sort of thing can actually help to keep a fanzine fresh and visually interesting, and Nick Withers (who did the layout for TSV at that time) was looking to inject some added creativity with the use of varied fonts.

The problem with fanzines reviewing other fanzines is that it's all too easy for personal agendas to get in the way of balanced review, and I think that in the early days of RTP there was a tendency to take a poke at TSV whenever an opportunity presented itself. I don't think this attitude helped RTP or hindered TSV so I didn't let it get to me.