Reviewer : William Cooling
Editor : Matt Smith
Publisher : Rebellion
Hello all, my name is William Cooling and I am writing this from some godforsaken village in England. Now growing up in a small village means that until your old enough to take the bus into the nearest city the only comics available to you are those carried on the (checks English to American dictionary) newsstand. Luckily the British newsstand contains the best comic on the market-2000AD.
2000AD is nominally a sci-fi anthology but in reality this has long since gave way to it simply being an anthology of good comic strips. Herein lays the key strength of 2000AD, which is its variety. The anthology format allows it to carry a diverse range of stories in a single issue insuring that there’s something for everyone.
Unfortunately that is not true of this issue…
2000AD has quarterly jumping on points with an all-new line up. This is the launch issue of the Autumn Offensive with a complete Judge Dredd story, the return of Durham Red and the debut of two all new stories.
However something has gone wrong. You see this issue has a theme and obviously if you have an issue that has a central theme then it can’t be as wonderfully varied as the Summer Offensive was. The cover reveals to us the theme of the issue with its montage of the three leading ladies of the non-Dredd strips-that’s right 2000AD’s going all Charlie’s Angels on us.
Nothing wrong with that you might say and as perhaps the only guy still reading (and enjoying) Trouble I’d agree with you, but the trouble is these women are all quite similar in that they are all-take no nonsense, sex vixens from the future, fighting it out in space.
Oh and their stories aren’t brilliant either.
On with the show:
Cover: by Andy Clarke and Chris Blythe.
Andy Clarke is a great artist and whilst this montage isn’t up to his usual standards it does contain some nice drawing and a wonderful pointer to what is contained in the Prog inside.
Judge Dredd in “The In Club”
(Six Pages)
Written by : John Wagner
Art by : Dean Ormston
Lettered By : Tom Frame
Judge Dredd (most respected officer of Mega-City One’s ruling elite that is called the Judges. Each Judge is empowered to dispense instant justice) is undoubtedly the star of 2000AD having appeared in almost every single prog since his debut in Prog 2. Over the years one of his continuing strengths have been these complete six page short stories. In these stories you get to experience compressed storytelling at its most extreme with the character of Dredd usually in the background playing the straight man to the weird and wacky world that is Mega-City One (the eastern seaboard of the North America as a single city).
One of the favourite concepts for these stories is satirising youth culture especially its fads and crazes. After the highly successful Club Sov by Gordon Rennie that did exactly this in 1358 Dredd’s co-creator John Wagner returns with a similarly themed story.
Of course the story itself couldn’t be more different.
This story details the attempts by a group of four young people to make their way to and into the hottest club in Mega City One-The In Club. Of course in their haste to get to the club they break a few laws (and believe me we’re talking more than speeding) and so come across a certain Judge.
This is a surprisingly violent strip with some quite graphic scenes of violence for example the running over of a little boy. Such violence seems uncalled for until you get to the twist at the end, which reveals the moral of the story. It’s quite a departure from what we’re usually get from Wagner in these stories although it does have his usual black humour.
The art is to me perfectly suited to this strip and brings out the violence and supernatural elements in the strip wonderfully. It’s also fully painted which I always enjoy. Over all a good Dredd story that makes a nice change from Gordon Rennie’s more traditional (although still good) fare.
Dead Men Walking
(Five Pages)
Written by : James Stevens
Art by : Boo Cook
Lettered by : Annie Parkhouse
Have you ever read Harry 20 on the Rock? It’s a strip about a con being sent to an inescapable prison and setting himself the goal to escape. No? Well James Stevens certainly has as this new story has almost the exact same idea with the only major changes being that the prisoner is a female and the story being a lot more sci-fi (lots of aliens). What’s worse is that Harry 20 is being reprinted right now in 2000AD’s sister title Judge Dredd Megazine so even younger readers like myself can compare it with this.
What’s worse is that the strip not only shares the same basic concept but it’s frankly derivative of Harry 20 right down to the ominous caption box warnings that “NO ONE GETS OUT ALIVE”. The writing doesn’t improve with the dialogue, which is quite frankly as stiff as Linda McMahon’s. This is especially true of the lead character’s (named Jude) narration, which is a collection of earnest convict clichés.
The pacing is also slightly suspect, feeling rushed. Without Jude even being fleshed out as a character we are already seeing her change her mission for her stay at Lazarus (the prison camp she’s staying in). Of course what the writer fails to address is why should we care about this change if we didn’t care about her original mission to escape?
Where the writing does shine is the introduction of some nifty sci-fi ideas into the basic concept for example the prisoners are given contact lenses which they are promised will allow them to see in different environments but they are also cameras which show the guards whatever the prisoners see. The other characters in the story are also all suitably weird and wonderful.
This aspect of the strip gels well with the artist Boo Cook, whose bright, vibrant, cartoony style brings a lot of these characters to life on the page, especially his colouring which is extremely vivid. In particular his portrayal of the Governor is a truly hideous creature. Of course it should be noted that his style is in no way realistic so you going to have to be a fan of this type of surreal cartoon to get anything out of it.
Being a fan of Boo Cook’s work this saves the strip for me however if its going to match recent newcomers like Lobster Random, Leviathan and From Grace then it’s got to improve in spades. The character of Jude needs to become something more than a generic sci-fi bitch (especially in the context of the other strips) and the story needs to offer us more than being a Harry 20 clone as it just doesn’t compare to the original. To be fair the end of the first part offers hope that it will be going in a different direction.
Synnamon in Facing Mecha: Part 1
(Six Pages)
Written by : Colin Clayton and Chris Dows
Drawn by : Lauerence Campbell and Lee Townsend
Coloured by : Gary Caldwell
Lettered by : Ellie De Ville
Oh man does my spell checker love that title.
In the second our leading ladies we are introduced to Synnamon. The strip takes place in the midst of a civil war between the United States of Earth and the Colony States and various rebel forces. Because of the nature of the twist at the end I can’t really reveal much more than that without spoiling the entire strip.
The writing is proficient, quickly establishing the premise of the series and introducing us to the lead character. In a move to be applauded they do all this whilst paying homage to the Fat Bastard/Felicity Shagwell sex scene in Austin Powers 2. The dialogue whilst no Ennis is better than Dead Men Walking with some nice banter between Synnamon and her off screen assistant. The cliffhanger ending is highly effective as well.
The art has a clean look that is at times lacking in detail, for example in one scene he uses dots for eyes. It also fails to impress in the fight scenes with some quite daft poses that expose the somewhat static nature of the artwork. Also Campbell doesn’t really make Synnamon the sex symbol that the writer seems to envisage her as being, a problem that also plagued his run on Demarco P.I. That said the art does fit the script and the space setting of the piece.
To me this is a good opener and an improvement on this creative team’s last work (Bison) which is almost universally ridiculed over at 2000AD’s message board.
However I fear this could be let down by the scheduling with it being packaged with two very similar stories. This could be especially true of the lead character which could be found wanting in comparison with the sci-fi sex goddess…
Durham Red in The Empty Suns: Book 1: Part 1
(10 Pages)
Written By : Dan Abnett
Art By : Mark Harrison
Lettered by : Elle De Ville
Okay you know how Captain America got frozen in ice for 20/30 years but was found and went on to live in the modern world?
Well imagine that instead of soldier you have a mutant vampire bounty hunter and instead of being frozen for 20 years she is frozen (in a malfunctioning sleep machine in this case) for a 1,200 years. During this time the tensions between humans and mutants had escalated to a galactic war which when ended resulted in a new Dark Age and her former home Earth being seemingly lost.
Oh and she’s now worshipped as a God by some mutants.
With this concept Abnett and Harrison revamped Durham Red in the mid-nineties with the excellent Scarlet Cantos series which saw her try to escape the label of goddess. In its sequel the Vermin Stars we see her try to use the label to broker peace with humans with the help of the Offspring. This betrays her and releases a virus that will eventually kill humanity. At the end of the Vermin Stars we see Durham Red devastated and believed to be dead by those who know her.
Many years have now passed and Durham Red is still missing but now a search party, which includes her former lover Godolkin, has returned to where she confronted Offspring to look for her.
This is the third book of a trilogy that began way back in 1078. This of course means that there is a mass of back-story to wade through. Luckily, Abnett is a tidy, efficient writer and quickly reminds you of the back story that you need to know to make sense of this story whilst introducing us to the new status quo. That said, his script suffers from a lack of the title character as she only appears at the end). Although this is probably necessitated by the circumstances of the story, it does rob the story of what (writing wise) was always its strongest asset; the character of Durham Red herself.
That said the thing that really made the past two series stand out was the art of Mark Harrison. This was a thing of beauty; his excellent pencils brought to life by an awe-inspiring mixture of CGI and paint. It was a style that perfectly suited the sci-fi fantasy nature of the story. Unfortunately he has adopted a far more painted style for this book which whilst is still good just doesn’t compare to what he has previously done with this character.
I’m really undecided on this story. Whilst it’s a good read it just feels anti-climatic which was perhaps to be expected with the expectation that has been built for this story. Also, while I don’t want to sound like a whinging fan boy bemoaning any change, the new style art is just not as good as what Harrison did in the first two books. It’s a good read but if this book is going to match the first two it will have to improve.
Overall this Prog is extremely disappointing and this line up is easily the weakest we’ve had for quite some time. What really hurts it, is not the quality of the stories (although that doesn’t help) but the fact that three of them are so similar. Hopefully the two new ones will find their feet and develop into something more but I have my doubts.
Oh well at least we get Caballistics Inc. back next week.
In closing may I thank you for reading my first review, hope you enjoyed it (and that you will read the second) and may I thank Daron for giving me the chance to review for this excellent site.
All feedback is appreciated.
