Thirty years on, I was reviewing the thirty-six pre-ban issues of Action looking for a favourite, or even the best issue. I was struck by one thing; I couldn't find one. The first issue is very important, but somewhat flawed in terms of both style and content. I remember a favourite of mine was issue 11, I read that one so many times it's unbelievable, but still flawed. The issue widely regarded as the one where Action fully hit its stride is issue 13, which saw the first episode of Death Game 1999, replacing the less than popular Sport's Not For Losers! Again, there is a flaw, as this issue was the second not to feature Hook Jaw. So, perhaps the closest we come to perfection is issue 14, with the stunning return of the great white to the centre pages. Alas, this issue is ruined by the poor art on Dredger, and despite John Stokes' clear and detailed style, he was never the definitive Death Game 1999 artist. This leaves an ever decreasing window of opportunity, because the original series artists were starting to be moved off of their regular strips, and a major format change was on the way. The change from Web Offset to Letterpress printing was the single most detrimental move made by IPC outside of the ban itself. Letterpress was cheaper, as it was done 'in-house' by Fleetway, whilst Web Offset was farmed out to the aptly named Carlisle Web Offset in Carlisle. The Letterpress paper was of a poorer quality, and didn't allow for full colour printing of a large palette with bleeds. Letterpress was strictly four-colour printing, giving the bitty feel of a group of dots over solid areas of colour. Battle Picture Weekly had run in web offset for over a year before making the change. Conversely, 2000AD launched in Letterpress and only dabbled with Web Offset a couple of years down the line. For whatever reason, and we must assume that it is financial, Action only managed twenty of the superior Web Offset issues, and any perfect issue would have to come from these. Never mind content, it's a matter of quality.

So, why was there no 'perfect issue'? Well, I'd rule out issues 1 to 8 simply because of The Coffin Sub, which was rubbish. Similarly, issues 9 to 11 for Play Till You Drop!, and issue 12 for Sport's Not For Losers!, and although Look Out For Lefty! showed promise on its debut, there was no Hook Jaw. Issues 13 and 14 were good, but as discussed above, were marred by poor art, particularly in the case of issue 14. I can nit-pick issue 15 for art once more. Issue 16 had a free gift and a Hook Jaw poster, but that succeeded in removing the shark from the colour pages. By the time the poster had finished in issue 20, and Hook Jaw was back in-situ, Ramon Sola was gone, and Felix Carrion was the regular, and markedly inferior, artist. In addition, Blackjack had entered its idiotic second phase, Horacio Altuna was long gone from Dredger, and Mike Dorey had been replaced on Hellman. Whilst several of the replacement artists on strips were either good or excellent, others were poor. This is also true of several of the writers. Personally, I identify Hellman with Mike Dorey and Dredger with Horacio Altuna. Both artists produced the definitive versions of their respective characters.