Warren Ellis pimps Don McGregor's Sabre

On his Bad Signal list today, Warren Ellis shared his love for Don McGregor's Sabre, which was drawn by Paul Gulacy:

It was an early graphic novel -- graphic novella, really, published independently around 1979 (I'm at the pub, so can't check that). It's been reprinted a few times, once as part of an ongoing series from I think Eclipse, so you can probably also hunt around in the cheap bins at your local comics store for it. Eclipse had a real renaissance period in the 80s of putting older works back into print director's-cut style -- I still cherish their reprint of Craig Russell's beautiful NIGHT MUSIC.

Anyway, go and look at it. It speaks to yesterday's ramble about panelling. Dunno if it was done full script or Marvel-style, but with Paul Gulacy it doesn't matter -- he'll always cut panels into two or three and create this mad tumble of images across the page, the visual equivalent of Keith Moon drumming. It's Don McGregor, so it's over-written all to hell -- he's practically the patron saint of florid comics writing now, and by halfway through you'd pay real money to just grab him by the collar and drag him back three steps. There's a guy who was born twenty years too late. The smaller lettering of today would do him some favours.

Which is not to say he was/is a bad writer: when he pulls back and allows one line to do the work, he can crack out some fine moments. You can't help but smile when he pauses at the top of a swordfight to salute his enemy's monumental evil. Complete with actual salute.


In a later message, Ellis mentioned that Sabre is still available for purchase at Don McGregor's website. Ellis talked about a few other "forgotten gems" from the 80s recently on his email list; the decade was a hotbed for indy comic activity. What indy comics from that time period do you remember fondly and want to see in print again? I'll go with Tim Truman's Scout ...