Entertainment For Lively Minds
What a shame
Posted by bamthwok on 9 May 2011 - 11:45am.
The all-new-brand-spanking-new-never-to-be-repeated 100th issue of Th'Word has just announced itself and the cover is...v poor.
Sorry, the content is probably as splendid as usual. But. 100th issue. Cover. No. No. No.
Right, that's over. I'll settle down and absorb.
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Agreed
Haven't opened up the wrapper yet, so assuming more effort has been spent on the contents.
The cover looks like one of those emergency jobs they used on weeklies during 1970's power cuts - did the staff retire to the Rat & Ratchet on completing No.100 and suddenly remember no one had fixed the cover?
Or maybe I'm just a miserable bugger.....thanks for the previous 99 anyway :-)
Sorry guys ...
... but what were you thinking? Really really wanted to have something positive to say about cover but -- just can't. Such a missed opportunity.
Whatever your views on The Words
ideas around graphic design I always admire them for standing up for free speech always amazed that they allow such open negative opinions about their magazine to be published on their own site.
Must be disheartening though to labour a way for several months on an anniversary edition only to have the first comment on your own site saying it looks rotten.
If this was my magazine
I would welcome any comment as long as it was constructive. You don't get anywhere by just being told how great you are, surely The Word, like any business wants to always improve.
Businesses that use the internet as a live interactive tool with its consumers are in the very fortunate position of getting free comment from its buyers rather than expensive surveys and what have you.
They're grown men, they can take it, I'm sure.
But this is a discussion blog/forum Chris...
not really the Word's official "site", it's just a monster that they have created! I'm sure you'd be first to complain if someone from The Word started censoring comments that they might deem critical.
There can't be many magazines that get such in-depth free and easy "market research" and communication from it's readers.
Oh bugger.
I really didn't mean it to come across like that.
I absolutely love the whole construct of The Word. I just thought that after estblishing a run of really impressive and distinctive covers that a milestone edition should have an unforgettable visage.
I don't really mind the cover,
but then I'm not a shelf-browser for mags; I either subscribe or ignore.
Lovely to see the 100th come up though; a well deserved success. I'll even tolerate the article about the seriously over-rated 'comedian' in the otherwise sumptuous 100th edition. You know the smug berk I mean. And his gormless oppo.
Oh,
is there a feature on Stewart Lee?
Can't be worse than....
"Rock WAGs". There's a purchase killer if ever there was one. Heat Magazine here we come.
Woah there!
That article was amazing, though! And I loved the illustration!
Now, the 2008 end-of-year cover collage with random "Get In" slogan; questionable.
Agreed.
There was nothing "Heat"-ish about the Rock WAGs article: it was fascinating.
I'm so glad someone else said something...
I just assumed it was a mistake, some rough mock-up before the photo art boffins got stuck into it.
Mind you, titfers at jaunty angle for the content, chaps. Happy 100th!
Just got back in from a sprint down the drive to the post box
only to find that it hasn't arrived yet. It's pi**ing down here as well... :-(
EDIT: I've just seen the little red van pulling away from the end of the drive so have braved the rain a second time.
I see what you mean about the cover. Compared to some of the wonderful, distinctive Word covers over the years, this one is a bit 'generic music magazine' and the tw*t in the top right hand corner would have put me right off buying it were I not a subscriber.
A touching editor's letter though.
Glad you share my
low opinion of the "tw*t in the top right hand corner"; I couldn't agree more.
can't wait to get home
To see what all the fuss is about. What with Word 100, family Guy series 10 and it being spag bol night, I am gonna have a very Happy Monday!
As long
as BO*O Isn't on the cover I'm as happy as a pig in s**t.
Surely we have all missed the point
The 100th issue has a picture of a 100 year old man on the front. Now do we all get it?
Hadn't noticed
My eyes were drawn slightly to the left of Hugh Laurie...
Subscribers v Standard Edition
I have been disparaging of the current(ish) stream of Word covers but I am also a subscriber and have noticed that the mag looks rather better in the shop than it does via the letterbox.
It's all that lovely typography that they strip out for us chosen ones that - ironically - provides balance to the illustrations that many of us don't care for.
Happy 100th!
I'm not saying it's a bad cover...
But Princess Beatrice wants to wear it as a hat.
Ten
There are ten people on the cover and I only know four of them. I cannot be reading my Word properly.
As we're all having our tuppence worth...
...while Mark E, Heppo, Mossmistress and the boys are punched and kicked into metaphorical design-critique submission, blubbering, wimpering and begging for mercy in the corner (among piles of unloved promotional copies of rubbishy Glasgowvegas product),I'll chip in and say this: you've all got a point. The cover's no good.
But - hurrah! - the content inside, from a brief skim so far, looks to be absolutely top drawer (with agreed caveat about the smug, unfunny tub of lard in the top right corner on the front).
Worryingly, though, I seem to have yet another slab of unthinkingly churned out blog text in the letters pages. This has happened several times now - and it's never intentional. So for all those bloggers who are actively hoping to get into the mag - please accept my apologies for hogging all the space. In fact:
Well I'm in the review section again
so my tip for the top - wear a nice shirt when the editior comes a calling
He'll be along shortly
and I'm guessing he'll take a dim view of that spelling of "editor"
I don't like the cover, I
I don't like the cover, I don't hate the cover - it protects the bits that I do like, so job done. Probably more so than any other mag I buy or have bought, the cover bears no correlation to the enjoyableness quitient. Yes, possibly a made up word.
There clearly must be snipers in Pentonville Road somewhere though.
Seventies Johnson, Kate Mossman & Mark Ellen are the only ones who look happy in the Office photo, and they are the only 3 who are behind cover.
Ricky Gervais
FWIIW, I really enjoyed the article / interview with RG & SM.
Absolutely, to this.
He's been overexposed recently perhaps
but I'm not ashamed to say that I think Ricky Gervais is a genius of the first order.
Nearly absolutely, to this.
I think The Office is the greatest sitcom ever broadcast, on any level you care to mention. I don't particularly rate his stand-up, his films have been bobbins and Extras was only OK, with some outstanding moments.
But The Office genuinely was comic genius - real genius - at work.
What? WHAT?
You cannot be serious!?
/McEnroe mode
Words fail me.
Sorry, apart from Love Thy Neighbour, obviously.
Agree Bob on the office
But to me extras comes a fairly close second, if only for Steven merchant and 'Barry from Eastenders' parts.
I'd also rate
Extras up there very close to The Office.
I find his stand-up DVDs very watchable first time around, but I simply can't come back to them.
Agree on the films, they are almost without exception lightweight money making vehicles trading on his name.
The same applies to the US version of the Office, where they appear have never seen the UK version, or missed the point entirely and missed out all the subtlety and nuance of the original.
US Office
Have you watched past series one? I hated that, but think from series two onwards on it's very nearly as good as the original, even if it's a little more slapstick.
You're not the first person
to say that to me, so I really must set aside my prejudices and give the US Office another go.
I think part of the problem is I've not enjoyed any of Steve Carell's other work. So there is also that small hurdle to overcome.
Agreed
I'm a big fan. It's become a show in it's own right now - totally different to the original. FWIW I also agree with Bob that the original was excellent.
I'd heard that too...
...but what worries me is the old "film of the book" problem, if you know what I mean. Just as I won't go and see a lot of films of books I love for fear of spoiling them (regardless of the quality of the film), I'm wary of the US Office for the same reason, even if it's really good.
I know it's silly, but I don't trust myself to sort of disengage from the original while watching the remake. It'll always be at the back of my mind.
I don't doubt it's as brilliant as people say, though.
And to be fair
the Americans do have form in this area: adapting a brilliant UK TV show for local consumption and in the process stripping it of the very thing that made it good in the first place.
The US version of Life On Mars anyone?
RG
Hits the mark every time with me, I can't remember any other comedian being so in tune with what makes me laugh (the GLW on the other hand is not so keen, although that is largely based on his laugh during interviews).
Blimey, who cares?
It's the cover of a magazine! I never understand why people get aerated about the cover, I really don't. And this certainly doesn't strike me as the worst cover ever ever of all time ever - it just looks like the front of a rock mag. Chill.
"Colossally Collectable"
The C - word is like catnip to me. I'm keeping my copy vacuum-sealed in a lightless, lead-lined box.
Wanna buy any back issues?
I have all the Editor's letters too. Reasonable rates. Other titles are available. Sold by the Kilogram. All very COLLECTABLE. Buyer collects.
Sold!
That's my son's inheritance, that is.
The cover is redeemed....
...by the image of the Pierce sisters, although I'm not sure why Catherine is holding a gun.
The gun-toting image is itself absolved by the much-better picture of the sisters on page 13.
The power of advetising
after all the rending of garments and gnashing of teeth and general brou ha ha on this post and elsewhere I was more than usually curious to see this months cover.
all looks fine to me...