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’s cover is by Alex Ronald.
I. THIS WEEK IN PROG 1876
Judge Dredd: Mega-City Confidential, Part 3
Sharp-minded readers will remember the predictions I made about this strip last week. While I was close, Wagner definitely had things more complicated than I made them out to be. Which is why he’s the writer and I’m the pundit, right? The motivations I assigned to Max were far too black and white, and Wagner showed us all what nuance in storytelling is.
This week’s installment was a real turning point for the story. It seems as if one character’s arc ended as another’s began, as a figurative baton has been passed between the two. It’s exciting to imagine how this story is going to take shape from here. Now that we may have seen Erika for the last time, and Max front and center with all of Erika’s secrets in hand, will he pull a third player into this? Will he make good with whatever is in that data slug? Or will Dredd snuff out this Justice Department problem before it ever sees the light of day? Instead of making predictions here, let’s just say: read on!
Credits: John Wagner (script), Colin MacNeil (art), Chris Blythe (colors), Annie Parkhouse (letters)
Outlier, Part 3
This week we start finding out what happened on the Outlier that lead one of the crew to start hunting down and killing the rest. From what we saw last week, the reason for vengeance is something that the rest of the crew (a.k.a. the walking corpses) knew about. Now Carcer, the private investigator tracking down the killer, is up to speed and trying to get one step ahead of his quarry.
Which is kinda hard to do when your target can adapt to any environment. If it’s looking for a pair of hunters on safari in a jungle, it can grow a few more arms and go swinging through the trees. Good luck outrunning THAT thing. But Richardson and Eglington show us that the hunters might not be the easy prey that the first two victims were. Just remember, boys: if it bleeds, you can kill it. IF it bleeds…
Credits: T.C. Eglington (script), Karl Richardson (art), Annie Parkhouse (letters)
Slaine: A Simple Killing, Part 3
Slaine’s been invited to preside over a bacchanalian festival in the south, complete with mead-drinking and spiritual cleansing through artifact burning. Who wouldn’t want to get naked, paint yourself green, slap on some horns, and dance around in a drunken reverie? Certainly not Slaine. But he runs into a woman with a story that changes his mind.
Mills keeps things interesting as he gives Slaine a reversal in each of the last few episodes of this strip. While the strip subtitle may be ‘A Simple Killing’, Mills is making it anything but. Now he’s giving us more and more evidence that the Formorians, one of Slaine’s most consistent foes, are going to be at the center of all this. My guess is that the simple killing will, in fact, wing up being many complex killings. Which is fine by me, as I can look at Simon Davis drawing Slaine giving people the ax all day long.
Credits: Pat Mills (script), Simon Davis (art), Ellie De Ville (letters)
Sinister Dexter: Gun Shy, Part 3
Man, these guys never had a chance, huh? Sinister and Dexter thought they’d just roll up on The Pastor and be the ones to handle a situation that no one before them has been able to do anything about. Hubris is a powerful storytelling tool, huh?
This chapter gets us into one of the things I think Abnett does superbly: religion. He’s got a number of interesting approaches under his belt: The All God’s Children arc of Grey Area, his Warhammer work, and even back in his Guardians of the Galaxy run. Each time he handles the subject, it’s in a fresh and interesting way. I’m sure that what he has planned here will be no different.
Continued belowCredits: Dan Abnett (script), Smudge (art), Ellie De Ville (letters)
Jaegir: Strigoi, Part 3
Jaegir is all about business in this week’s strip. Well, that is to say, she’s even more all about business than usual. There were a few loose ends that she needed to take care of before tackling her Strigoi mission, and it seems that they needed to be tidied up quickly. So her and her new team see to getting it done.
I think that, more than anything, this week’s strip is intended to show us all exactly how badass this team is. And let me tell you, it succeeds. These people are as ruthless as it comes. Not only that, but Jaegir makes a hell of an entrance (see above), and the scary guy in the mask apparently tells jokes. Really bad jokes. I’m highly enjoying this one; Rennie and Coleby are doing a hell of a job here.
Credits: Gordon Rennie (script), Simon Coleby (art), Len O’Grady (colors), Simon Bowland (letters)
II. 2000 AD ON AMERICAN NEWSTANDS
We have good news for everyone jonesing for their weekly dose of thrill-power in analog form. If you happen to live in NYC (and by British standards the surrounding area), you can pick up the latest copy of 2000 AD directly from your newsstand! As the PR droid Michael Molcher himself put it in our weekly email:
I’m pleased to let you know that, for the first time ever, we’re going to be supplying issues of 2000 AD directly to selected newsstand retailers in and around New York! These issues will be weekly, rather than the monthly Diamond packs, and will also be available just ONE WEEK after the UK.
2000 AD has always been, and continues to be, predominantly a newsstand comic book in the UK, but as other publishers pull out of newsstand they want to see if there’s a market for them in the US. These are the retailers in question:
Massachussetts
- -MUCKEY CORP. CAMBRIDGE MA
- -NEWSBREAK, INC. 53 POPES ISLAND, NEW BEDFORD MA
- -NEWSBREAK, INC. 579 GAR HIGHWAY SWANSEA MA
New York
- -BJ MAGAZINES 200 VARICK STREET, NEW YORK NY
- -VILLAGE GLOBAL NEWS INC. 22 EIGHT AVENUE, NEW YORK NY
- -S INTERNATIONAL NEWS 405 SIXTH AVENUE, NEW YORK NY
- -GEM SPA INC. 131 SECOND AVENUE, NEW YORK NY
- -BORDERLESS INK CO. 66 AVENUE A, NEW YORK NY
- -BROADWAY NEWS & MAGAZINE 2175 BROADWAY NEW YORK NY
- -UNION SQUARE MAGAZINE SHOP 44 UNION SQUARE EA, NEW YORK NY
- -LAFAYETTE SMOKE SHOP 63 SPRING STREET NEW YORK NY
- -LEXINGTON NEWS 987 LEXINGTON AVENUE, NEW YORK NY
- -SHAMI SMOKE & MAGAZINE 1886 BROADWAY NEW YORK NY
- -PARSLEY SAGE INC. 73 SEVENTH AVENUE NEW YORK NY
- -SOHO NEWS 186 PRINCE STREET NEW YORK NY
- -MAGAZINE CAFE 15 WEST 37 STREET NEW YORK NY
- -THE MAGAZINE BAZAAR 80 VARICK STREET NEW YORK NY
- -BJ NEWSSTAND INC 670 LEXINGTON AVE NEW YORK NY
- -INTERNATIONAL NEWS & TOBACCO 108 UNIVERSITY PLA, NEW YORK NY
Washington DC
- -ONE STOP 2000 PENNSYLVANIA WASHINGTON DC
How awesome is that? If you happen to see one of these Progs out in the wild, take a picture and we’ll put it up in this space!
III. OF INTEREST
Once a week we scour the internet in search of new and exciting visuals that relate back to 2000 AD and all its thrill-packed goodness! First up is an old favorite treading familiar ground.
That piece is by none other than long-time 2000 AD artist Arthur Ranson. He’s done a good amount of work on Judge Anderson strips, so when this came across the screen including it was a no-brainer. If you’ve never seen his work before, let us officially recommend Button Man. The story’s got Ranson on art with John Wagner writing, you’ll thank us.
Continued belowThe weather’s changing and spring is in the air, which can only mean one thing: FREE COMIC BOOK DAY!
That there is a little teaser Chris Burnham posted to his twitter last week. It’s a panel for a rookie Judge story he’s working on for 2000 AD’s 2014 FCBD offering.
This final image is from the blog of Daniel Bayliss. You’re gonna want to check out what he’s doing, because this guy’s good. He’s the artist on soon-to-be-released Translucid from Boom Studios, with writer Claudio Sanchez.
IV. FUTURE PERP FILES
ATTN: ALL CITIZENS OF THE MEG! Be aware that there is always a Judge watching you. Each sector is equipped with millions of HD-CCTV and bioID units. They are there for your protection. If your intent is upright citizenry, then you have no qualm with our surveillance. And remember: if you see something, you are now an accessory to a crime. That’s six months in an Iso-Cube, creep! Random CPU algorithms has selected this citizen for immediate surveillance and assessment…
That’s gonna do it for us this week! Prog 1876 is 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!”
