Welcome, citizens, to this week’s installment of Multiver-City One! Each and every Wednesday we will be examining the latest Prog from Tharg and the droids over at 2000 AD, and giving you all the pertinent information you’ll need headed into this week’s Thrill-Zine! This week we’ve got a double-feature for you, as both 2000 AD AND Judge Dredd Megazine are hitting stands today. Let’s kick the week off with a little Megazine!
I. THIS WEEK IN JUDGE DREDD MEGAZINE 344
Judge Dredd: The Man Comes Around
Elephant-In-The-Room Time: RM Guera’s art in this strip is flat-out ridiculous in the sense that you wonder how it took this long to pair him with Dredd when he’s so suited to the character. His Dredd is 300 pounds (136 kilos) of hamburger meat packed into a plastic bag, and it is perfect. The approach RM took to rendering out these pages is even more of a treat, as he changes his line panel to panel. Sometimes he’s using a crisp and minimal approach, others he’s switching to an inkier, brushier look when the mood needs it. I wish this wasn’t just a one-off strip, and I’d bet Rob Williams feels the same way.
Speaking of Rob, we’re doing the age thing again. The best I can figure is that Mr. Williams is up to something. Something big. He’s bringing up Joe Dredd’s age WAY too often in his stories for it to all be some weird coincidence. I don’t want to sound like a crazy person, going on about this week after week, but the more these stories play out, the more fixated I become on what it all could mean.
The story itself focuses on a rather twisted take on a suicide bomber hostage situation. Bits of human are raining down on the streets, and it’s up to Dredd and a team of Judges to put the kibosh on the situation. All they have to contend with are a strange cancer-gas, the power of suggestion, and an equine guest star. Piece of cake, right?
Credits: Rob Williams (script), RM Guera (art), Giulia Brusco (colors), Annie Parkhouse (letters)
Demarco, P.I.: The Whisper, part 2
Demarco continues her missing citizen investigation in the newly settled Sovsec of Mega-City Two. With the help of former cadet Edwin Kessler, Demarco digs deep into restricted files and uncovers some documents she’s not exactly privy to. These discoveries will lead her to a new, not exactly human partner and an adventure into a part of town many don’t just wander into!
Credits: Michael Carroll (script), Steve Yeowell (art), Ellie De Ville (letters)
Ordinary, part 5
The Megazine’s creator-owned spot is tearing to a close in the penultimate installment of Ordinary, by Rob ‘I’m On A Roll This Week’ Williams and D’Israeli. This has been a strip that I’ve really enjoyed over the past few months. It’s chock full of humor, can be incredibly touching, and is wildly unpredictable all at the same time. I have some suspicions about our hero(?) Michael that I can’t really get into without spoiling where this strip ends, but we can go way into it all next month when it’s wrapped up.
Credits: Rob Williams (script), D’Israeli (art), HV Derci (letters)
Anderson, PSI Division: Dead End, part 2
It’s never been a secret that the PSI Division has to endure an enormous amount of on-the-job punishment. There’s the day-to-day physical grind of being a Judge and patrolling the Mega City streets. with all the requisite share of human horrors that job entails. Things that will haunt every badge-wearing one of them for the rest of their days. Now, on top of all that, imagine what that must feel like to a Judge with PSI capabilities. Not only do they bear witness to the crimes of the city, but they have to feel the literal pain of the victims as part of their job, in a way that even stone-hearted granite-jawed Joe Dredd would have trouble dealing with. The anguish and psychoses of the criminals is their beat, and they have to walk it alone. Tough stuff. And that’s exactly what this strip focuses in on.
Continued belowAnderson and Dredd have discovered a facility using forced child labor, making them handle toxic materials without any type of protection. These are kids who were vulnerable after being orphaned by the Chaos Bug, and it’s up to the Judges to save them. This discovery is the latest in a line of traumatic events that are pushing Judge Anderson to the brink.
This story has heft to it and deals with some pretty serious topics like depression, isolation, and suicide. Anderson is probably my favorite character in The Meg; she’s the best Judge for writers to use when they want to go in and push emotional boundaries with, and Grant really takes that idea to heart with this story, adding add a new dimension to her.
Credits: Alan Grant (script), Michael Dowling (art), Simon Bowland (letters)
II. IN ADDITION TO THAT…
The thing that really separates Judge Dredd Megazine from the weekly 2000 AD Prog is its articles and bonus content. This week, Matthew Badham writes about Marvel UK and the upcoming Revolutionary War mini-series and interviews David Ballie. There’s also a second interview with artist Garry Brown, who’s done some pretty stellar work on The Massive and Dark Matter over at Dark Horse. He did this nifty Anderson pin-up for the occasion…
There’s also a collection of Demarco P.I. comics, picking up where last month’s issue left off.
The Megazine is great for all this extra stuff. The bonus Demarco reprints are bound up in their own separate volume and are a good chunk of extra story. This extra book helps push this whole enchilada up to 130 pages of content. I’d call that a steal (if I weren’t afraid of getting hauled into an Iso-Cube for doing it)!
III. OF INTEREST
Before we head into the Prog proper, we just wanted to show you guys and gals something that came across our Twitter feed this week.
This came courtesy of Mr. Chris Weston and is a flipping treat to look at. Judge Dredd/Batman is now available in softcover, you know.
IV. THIS WEEK IN PROG 1864
We’re coming off last week with a full head of steam and a pack of strips that are all in the midst of some hearty storytelling! Let’s get to it!
Judge Dredd: Titan, part 3
When last we left our title character, he was hurtling towards Titan on a mission with some of Mega-City One’s finest space marines to found out what happened to a penal colony for disgraced Judges that has gone mysteriously silent. But this Prog starts with Dredd doing that the benefit of a spaceship. Remember all that talk above about how Dredd’s getting older and everything is more difficult than it needs to be? That comes into play when you’re trying to, oh, save yourself from becoming a greasy spot on the rocks of a moon hundreds of thousands of miles from where you usually try to save yourself from becoming a chalk outline on the street (spoiler alert: he lives).
But do you think Williams would let that be the worst thing that happens to Dredd? Absolutely not. The plan proceeds to go pear-shaped at every opportunity, leaving Dredd to have to rely more and more on not only the marines, but McIntosh, the ex-con helping them get back into the colony. Or is that ‘helping’?
Credits: Rob Williams (script), Henry Flint (art), Annie Parkhouse (letters)
Ulysses Sweet, Maniac For Hire: Centred, part 4
Still got the dolphin hat. Still got the attitude. Still living up to his job title. Now he’s started calling those he’s ‘helped’ as being ‘sweetened’. Which would be almost charming, if his help didn’t cause inordinate amounts of destruction, terror, and mayhem, as well as the explosion of a celestial body or two. But really, isn’t that why he was hired? And why you need to keep reading?
Credits: Guy Adams (script), Paul Marshall (art), Chris Blythe (greytones), Ellie De Ville (letters)
Continued below
Grey Area: Did You Pack Your Luggage, part 2
There’s a story about Marlon Brando preparing for the role of Jor-El in the first Superman movie where he was talking about playing the character as a green suitcase (or a bagel, depending on who tells it) because, in his estimation, how would we know what an alien race would look like? They could look like green suitcases (or baked bread)? Richard Donner managed to finesse Brando into imagining himself as whatever inanimate object he needed to get the performance out of him, but that kind of out-of-the-box thinking would have done Bulliet and his team well in this strip. It turns out, the specific aliens they were waiting to meet and have first contact with DID look like luggage (or the future equivalent). So while the humans are wondering why the vaguely humanoid-shaped rock figures stopped talking and moving when their luggage was sent into an 80-km-long containment facility, the aliens are loose in a luggage-filled facility that’s 80 km long! Hijinks ensue, right? When the aliens name translates to “silent killers who move with grace and slay the deserving” and were most likely sent as a revenge tactic against Bulliet for a past grievance, hijinks could mean a WHOLE lot of things…
Credits: Dan Abnett (script), Patrick Goddard (art), Abigail Ryder (colors), Ellie De Ville (letters)
ABC Warriors: Return to Mars, part 4
The blast from Happy Shrapnel’s past continues, as we see what the other ABC Warriors were doing when they got to call to come back to Mars: Kaos concert security! Complete with an almost-accidental (as in it almost happened or it was almost an accident – or both) mowing down of the crowd by one of the robots. But what passes for rock & roll will have to wait when they get the message that Mars is in need to help; activating their old programming and firing up the space ship, with a course set for the Red Planet! (or as close to red as you can get in a black & white flashback)
Credits: Pat Mills (script), Clint Langley (art), Annie Parkhouse (letters)
Strontium Dog: Dogs of War, part 4
For a term that’s supposed to be about harmony and togetherness, I can’t think of the last time a group had ‘Brotherhood’ in their title that turned out to actually be a good thing. Brotherhood of Evil Mutants? Nope. Aryan Brotherhood? Uh-uh. The strip keeps that streak alive with the Norm Brotherhood, taking this opportunity to pick off mutants already fighting for their own survival. Only Johnny Alpha and Kid Knee’s arrival helps turn that tide for the moment. But they need intel on the Brotherhood’s real numbers and motives. Someone’s gotta get tatted up and infiltrate the human group. Is it the guy with the face for a left knee (the aforementioned Kid Knee)? Ummmm… no. As the only person there with all their features in basically the right proportions and locations, it looks like Johnny Alpha’s going undercover!
Credits: Pat Mills (script), Clint Langley (art), Annie Parkhouse (letters)
That’s gonna do it for us this week! Prog 1864 and Judge Dredd Megazine 344 are on sale today and is available from finer comic shops everywhere, from 2000ADonline.com, and via the 2000 AD Newsstand app for iPad and iPhone. So as Tharg the Mighty himself would say, “Splundig vur thrigg!”
