Welcome, Earthlets, to Multiver-City One, our “2000 AD” weekly review column! Every Wednesday we examine the latest offerings from Tharg and the droids over at Rebellion/2000 AD, the galaxy’s leading producers of Thrill-Power entertainment. Let’s get right to it!
THIS WEEK IN 2000AD
Judge Dredd: Flaws, Part 2
Credits T.C. Eglington (script), Staz Johnson (art), Abigail Bulmer (colors), Annie Parkhouse (letters)
Greg Lincoln: ‘Flaws’ feels like the most well rounded of the “Judge Dredd” arcs recently. There are clear stakes for everyone involved and, despite the tight page count, they all get their time on the stage. Mo Malik gets to show his reporting chops with his purposeful, informative and, most importantly, ratings grabbing spots. We’re given a peek behind the scenes of Linus’ Sons of Booth planing and their preparedness for their ‘all or nothing’ risky scheme. Dredd leads an effective and methodical investigation into the stolen trucks. Dredd’s approach is surprisingly something that would likely work today, given the precision and ubiquity of GPS devices. It’s a path that makes solid logical sense, told in a gripping and well paced way. This arc reads very smoothly, transitioning between the subplots with very cinematic cuts.
Staz Johnson’s layouts featuring Mo play with visual juxtaposition as it swaps between the two sides of the John Higgs/John Gray blocks conflict. Johnson gives them equal page space, as Mo gives them equal time. Both sides look equally equally vicious, ugly, and self-righteous in their expressions and posture. The investigation montage staged by Johnson visually hooks and draws you in and along with the story. Bulmer gives that sequence a real sense of time passing; her color rendering gives depth to the night and her handling cold to warm tones as night become day gives a palpable urgency to the Judges’ discoveries. Bulmer and Johnson put time and thought into the fashions on display beyond the iconic Judge Uniforms. Mo is the most obvious example but everyone’s clothes are individual, and say something about them, even the incidental characters. It creates a fuller world when there is that kind of attention to detail; for example, the crowd scene gives a sense of scale to the protest come riot. The biggest question we are left with after the grinning Dredd bust makes it’s dramatic appearance, is where the second stolen vehicle is heading, and what Linus’ true goal may be.
Jaegir: In The Realm of Pyrrhus, Part 5
Credits: Gordon Rennie (script), Simon Coleby (art), Len O’Grady (colours), Ellie de Ville (letters)
Kent Falkenberg: Kapiten Jaegir’s transport makes a frantic escape from Souther forces as ‘In The Realm of Pyrrhus, Part 5’ opens this week. Incendiary blasts scorch and scar the side of her vessel as we learn a little more about a certain new prisoner of war being tossed about within.
“It seems milli-com want you back alive, rather than dead,” Jaegir tells Madam Choi, noting that the ships in pursuit are aiming for damage not destruction. “I wonder – does that mean you’re less important than you thought, if they’re willing to take the risk that we still might escape with you.”
It’s a comment that seems to perfectly capture the thread of cynicism that Gordon Rennie’s been weaving into the story. No matter how powerful the individuals in this war may seem, they are still pawns subject to the whims and calculations of the powers-that-be. And while Choi may not be entirely all that important to the Souther war effort, Rennie tips his hand that the information she might have about Jaegir’s father makes her all the more important to the Kapiten herself.
Compositionally, Coleby’s framing sticks to tightly cropped squares that reflect the claustrophobic tension within a cramped transport vehicle under fire. But when Rennie’s script calls for him to show the chase, the paneling stretches out wide across the page to give an sprawling impression of the scope and pace of the pursuit.
The chase is on, indeed. And ‘In the Realm of Pyrrhus, Part 5’ finds Rennie and Coleby fully hitting their stride.
Sinister Dexter – The Devil Don’t Care Part Three
Continued belowCredits Dan Abnett(script) Steve Yeowell(art) John Charles(colors) Ellie De Ville(letters)
Michael Mazzacane: Sometimes you can’t get rid of a bomb. Other times, you just can’t get rid of the Devil. The “Sinister Dexter” creative team turn things up a notch by turning this strip into a slasher themed chase, as our Gun Sharks and friends try to out run a Devil who just can’t seem to die.
The slasher dynamic to this strip works in its favor. Functionally the strip is a chase out of The Terminator as Finn and Ramone slam and shoot the Devil with whatever they can get their hands on. The various homages Steve Yeowell pays in his art, work as parody. After smashing the Devil into a building, Yeowell cuts to a panel of Finn, passenger door open and proclaiming his comrades “Get. The. Funt. In.” If they want to live is implied. Playing with those kinds of echoes and the general slasher dynamic gives the wild chase through Downloade a sense of geographic cohesion that can be lost as things go sideways. It makes sense because it’s being shown in moments readers are already familiar with.
While the Devil is treated here as some unkillable monster, Yeowell treats him more like a Bullet Tooth Tony as his body gets smashed, shot, and thrown about instead of a Jason. There’s a bit of humor to how driven the Devil is at righting his perceived slights and the phantasmic ways he keeps just showing up with barely a scratch. With the Devil constantly firing his guns, his figure is the one that gets colorist John Charles washed out pallet the most. It gives him a mysterious vibe, the difference in application makes him appear devilish and incorporeal.
The body humor in this strip gets a chuckle, but the real comedy comes from Finn and Ramone being passive aggressive with one another and the continued shock of their company. When your best friend saves you from the Devil, maybe the first question shouldn’t be “Where did you get that car?” and more “How did you survive being shot?” Their bickering is not so amusing to their company who seem to finally realize what a terrible mistake they’ve made. That creeping realization came through in the overall chase structure of the strip.
Anderson, Psi Division: Undertow, Part Five
Credits: Emma Beeby (script), Mike Collins and Cliff Roberson (art), Jose Villarrubia (colors), Simon Bowland (letters)
Rowan Grover: Emma Beeby finally presents a grounding and solid chapter in this prog of “Judge Anderson”. The threat is present, and concrete, as vampire that are invading the city, and it’s actually a lot of fun! We get to see the other side of Anderson’s calm, understanding nature, with Beeby giving us a cool-headed, action ready protagonist slinging one-liners left, right and centre. There’s also a fun and somewhat interesting character introduced in the sword-wielding, vampire slayin’ Kazuo, who’s motives are mysterious enough to be interesting but who’s actions don’t leave a huge imprint of the story. I do love how the usage of vampires is giving a sense of unknown and unrevealed lore to Mega City One, however, especially how they congregate like an already established secret society.
Mike Collins and Cliff Roberson handle art for this prog, and boy is it a visual treat. The pair find a careful balance between the cinematic realism of previous artist David Roach and more stylised, cartoon-aesthetic artists like Greg Capullo and series great Mike McMahon. The opening shot of Anderson shooting a vampire in the chest is visually commanding and a great way to bring reader’s attention to the prog, and the art only continues to be more fluid and smooth from there on in. Collins and Roberson’s cityscapes are dizzying and tall, sprouting all around like a tumultuous forest, representing Mega City One in a way that feels dizzyingly original yet blindingly obvious. Plus there are some great close-ups that keep the underlying horror tone in check, like the partially hidden close up of Karyn struggling with vampirism in the dark.
“Undertow” is back on track, telling a much cleaner and fun story than the last few prior progs. Beeby is delivering great conflict between the protagonists and the vampires, and the new art team is doing a killer job at bringing it all to life. Jump on this while it’s still hot.
Continued below
Strontium Dog: The Son, Part 5
Credits: John Wagner (script), Carlos Ezquerra (art), Ellie De Ville (letters)
Tom Shapira
So this a talking episode, in which Johnny Speaks with the ghost of his dead buddy Wulf. Mostly about how Johnny should react to Wulf’s son decision to join the bounty hunter’s trade. This is a bit of lazy writing – it allows Johnny to quickly go through the bulk of the story’s mental process alone, when he should be going through it with Kenton. Everything that Kenton did throughout the story, and everything that he is going to do, is rendered null because Johnny already made the decision basically by himself. It feels like a cheap way to move the story quickly along, and while it does wonders for the pacing, no one would ever accuse John Wagner of wasting the reader’s time, it does badly by the characters. Wulf’s ghost / heelucination does bring up the idea that he has other children out there, which is certainly an interesting notion for a future story (or possibly a set up for a spin-off, I would gladly pay for John Wagner’s space vikings).
Carlos Ezquerra, as usual, does the best with what he is given – recalling the poses from the classic “Max Bubba” story and thus giving the story some added emotional weight. He really does seem to enjoy drawing Wulf’s face and it shows, giving care to facial expressions that tell a story all by themselves. But none it can really liven up a story that feels more like a stepping stone than a thing by itself.
