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: Who Killed Captain Cookies?, Part One
Credits: Ken Niemand (script), PJ Holden (art), Quinton Winter (colors), Annie Parkhouse (letters)
Rowan Grover: The latest ongoing “Dredd” joint looks to be a light comedy with some socio-economic themes going by this first issue. And yes, reader, you might be inclined to say, “Why Rowan, sounds like you’re just calling the grass green!”, to which I might agree! But all the components here are strong, with the final coup-de-grace being the re-introduction of recent show-stopping character Noam Chimpsky. There’s not much else to say at this point since a lot of this is table setting, but I do like the weird cookie-themed group of vigilantes that is established in the latter half of this chapter and their neo-viking funeral procedures. They’re played perfectly, not being made explicitly the butt of the joke but working well at lightening up a potentially dark story, but being totally believable as a cult of do-gooders in the bizarre Mega City One.
Since there’s not a whole bunch to pick apart narratively in this chapter, Holden’s art is the real standout to analyze. Being a veteran Dredd artist, Holden knows exactly what to accentuate: when to populate scenes with dense character/environment interaction, and when to strip them right back for dramatic effect. Holden does a great job of the former with showing the masses of smiling people who’ve crowded around Captain Cookies to mourn him, and similarly by building intrigue in the Vigilante base with a production line of humans that echoes a cookie baking production line. The latter is done really well when we see Captain Cookie’s body dropped off the production line and picked apart, with Holden using silhouettes to highlight the vigilante’s heroic form amidst negative space before having him stripped of his uniform by machines showing a mere human underneath it all. It works as a strong visual metaphor for how we treat real-life heroes post-mortem.
“Who Killed Captain Cookies” is packed with strong creators doing solid jobs at setting up a story, and is worth checking out to see them all flex their abilities, if not then to follow on with the tragic case of Captain Cookies in the next few progs.
Sláine: Dragontamer Part 8
Credits: Pat Mills (script), Leonardo Manco (art), Annie Parkhouse (letters)
Jeremy Hachat: Prince Alban, son of Brutus, has been released from his cage by Sláine and revealed himself to the scholars of The University of The Lord Weird. He finds them pathetic and unworthy, unleashing the fury of Rathrach upon them. Sláine reveals himself to the Dragon Prince and and after a little back and forth is in a battle for his life with Rathrach who he quickly discovers has been bred to be invulnerable. Sláine is one bad dude, so even that is not enough to slow him down for very long, which we find out in an incredibly graphic way.
While Leonardo Manco’s art has been nothing short of breathtaking every week, this chapter was a bit a letdown except for the final splash page. The art this week was very straightforward and told the story well, but was not as special as it had been up to this point. Manco has set such a high standard that even an off week still contains a lot of dynamic figure work. The final page is mind blowing and does a great job paying off Sláine’s battle with Rathrach.
Pat Mills is telling a pretty basic story of good vs evil here pitting Sláine, the common man, against the evil, all-consuming ruler in Brutus. Mills is so good at telling this type of story that he makes it very enjoyable and exciting to read even though you have a pretty good idea Sláine is going to come out on top.
Continued below
Thistlebone: Poison Roots, Part 1
Credits: T.C. Eglington (script), Simon Davis (art), Simon Bowland (letters)
Brian Salvatore: After a 18 month layoff, “Thistlebone” is back. In story, it seems that just about as much time has passed, as Seema has had enough time to begin to recover from the events of ‘the Wild Hunt.’ She is writing a book about the experience, and is behind on deadlines and, judging by the bottle of liquor that she drops when startled, is not coping with either her past or her assignment all that well. Eglington lays on the trauma pretty thick, between her startling and the visions she’s seeing in her daily life. But, this shorthand allows us to get to the bottom of what’s going on with Seema in just a few panels.
Most of the strip takes place away from Seema, and is in a Scottish forest, where a giant oak tree has fallen, revealing in its trunk skeletons seemingly woven into its roots. This event has given Seema’s publishers more urgency for her story, and has also infected one of the onlookers to slice into his chest and be corrupted by its evil.
None of this would appear all that engaging if not for Davis’s art, which manages to add tension and a creepy filter atop every scene. His work is traditionally beautiful, and so when horrific elements pop up, it is especially jarring. His use of color is subtle but striking, as the demonic image’s red eyes and blue skin jump out, without going for a cheap, over the top scare. His art instantly transports the reader into this world, and is especially successful at both lulling us into a false sense of security, and then reminding us that this is no place we’d want to be.
Proteus Vex: The Shadow Chancellor Part 9
Credits: Mike Carroll (script), Jake Lynch (art), Jim Boswell (colors), Simon Bowland (letters)
Greg Lincoln: Proteus Vex has been working through the memories he acquired from Chancellor Baryon (in the first “Proteus Vex” arc) in ‘The Shadow Chancellor.’ Mike Carroll has been dropping tidbits of the old Chancellor’s memories throughout this second arc and it’s all come together with the addition of Vex’s journey into the mind of his new Silent ally. By the end of this chapter, we learn not only there secrets behind the Silent and their past but the fate of the Armada that ended the last war. Andrum is the character that is most felt for in this story; she’s had one hell of a day and Proteus Vex relies on her again to make his plan work. Hopefully she becomes a regular in the story for how much she’s been through.
Looking at everything that Jake Lynch and Jim Boswell had to fit into these pages, I have to commend their storytelling prowess. They managed to hit plot points for all the players in this story. They make feel the loneliness of Midnight as she’s whisked away on the first page, Andrum’s frustration at having to help Vex again, while having to include a couple new characters and the revelations that Vex has come to. They handled all those separate stories in a way that felt coherent, building up to the confrontation in the last panel. This chapter is filled with talking heads scenes and yet they manage to maintain the visual tension without action to carry the story along.
Durham Red: Served Cold 09
Credits: Alec Worley (script), Ben Willsher (art), Jim Cambell(letters)
Michael Mazzacane: As Alec Worley and Ben Willsher push “Durham Red” into the final phase, their latest strip is more about what isn’t shown and the ambiguity it creates. We finally get the name of Red’s rich nemesis, Warren Hardladder. He isn’t wanted in 12 systems, but he has businesses in them. Red rightly posits the only thing that makes someone go after them this hard is love, so which is it? Durham killed his daughter, Sarah.
The thing is we don’t actually see Durham “butchering” her as Warren states. The brief two panel flashback is idyllic, nostalgic, with Durham looming over Sarah in the background like an angry shadow. Maybe it did go down like that, as we saw at the start of this strip sometimes Durham gets hungry, and it doesn’t matter who she sees. This one-sided flashback with her own lapsed memory creates a very interesting hole in the narrative that could easily fit one more twist in it.
At the same time that gap is emblematic of Durham’s own bifurcated self between her thirst and the more human side. They are in tension between what to remember or dwell on. This monologue about herself, however, isn’t really shown. Worley and Willsher use it to show minor plot movement with the Sheriff coming to the rescue and the mercenaries celebrating. It creates a gap between what Durham is saying and how they are saying it. Prior to our return to Durham on the final page, Willsher obfuscates her figure either hiding it in shadow or only showing a brief glimpse of it. That gap makes the final image of her with a single tear not all that effective. Most of the time it’s the build up to that moment of melodrama that makes it feel earned, instead we just see it suddenly. Which reemphasizes the narrative gaps that are prevalent in the strip. Her speech is fine, a rare moment of introspection from a character that has mostly been commented on by others.
“Served Cold” Part 9 is an odd way to set up the final act, but that difference is intriguing and at least a novel way to set the table.
