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2000AD Prog 2071 (emag review).

‘Judge Dredd: Live Evil’ (part 3) is beginning to add up after another exciting episode in the latest edition of ‘2000AD’. The Judge who can talk to the dead meets a ghostly alien presence who explains what’s been happening to her. The concept is similar to the Old Ones in Heinlein’s ‘Stranger In A Strange Land’ of beings who survive physical death. Ian Edginton writes it and the art by Dave Taylor is starting to grow on me. I think in this issue he had more opportunities to strut his stuff. He still uses few colours and the whole thing looks a bit blue but that must be deliberate. He can draw. So far, Dredd plays a small part in this drama but presumably, that will change.

In ‘ABC Warriors: Fallout’ (part 11), the team discover that Blackblood has tricked them again and there’s a spoof of a famous scene from ‘Spartacus’. This was interesting for a conversation between two chaps in which they complain that the populace is getting restless. Social media and trivia are meant to distract them from thinking about important issues but they seem to be doing it. Some of them are even talking to each other. All very disturbing for the rulers. The art by Clint Langley is glorious. The script by Pat Mills has bite.

‘Brass Sun: Engine Summer’ (part 11) has a script by Ian Edginton and art by Inj Culbard. There’s a fight between Enginemen and plant-like creatures. In keeping with the romantic tradition, I imagine we are meant to sympathise with those beings closest to nature but I bet the story was written and drawn on a computer and the comic distributed to the urban readership of large cities in trucks. I’m just saying.

‘Savage: The Thousand Year Stare’ (part 11) is the conclusion of a story I missed nearly all of and so didn’t mean much to me. However, I enjoyed the art of Patrick Goddard.

Last and most colourful is ‘Bad Company: Terrorists’ (part 11). Bad Company are a gang of misfits who fought in the unpopular Ararat War and are now on some mission I can’t quite make out at this late stage. State news says they are terrorists. The art of Rufus Dayglo is growing on me. On closer digital examination, you can see he puts in a lot of detail and in one panel here he does Kirby Krackle better than anyone since Kirby. The script by Peter Milligan includes an attack by the Dead White Men that uses the works of Rilke and T.S. Eliot. It incapacitates modern brains which can’t deal with poetry of this intensity. ‘2000AD’ continues to mock and satirise modern society.

If you’re accustomed to reading comics with 20 pages devoted to one character this piecemeal delivery with bits of five stories instead of a single whole one seems strange. As a childhood victim of the American cultural imperialism of Marvel Comics, I have become unused to the British anthology comic format but will patriotically retrain my brain over the next few months to enjoy it. God save the Queen!

As with the last issue, I read this in a digital edition which can be yours for just £1.99 – less than the price of a pint – and can be had even cheaper if you get a subscription. The glossy paper print edition is £2.75 with free UK postage. Now that I think about it, that’s still less than the price of a pint in most pubs. ‘2000AD’ is put out weekly but not weakly.

Eamonn Murphy

March 2018

(pub: Rebellion, 07th March, 2018. 32 page digital magazine: £ 1.99 (UK))

check out website: http://2000ad.com

Eamonn Murphy

Eamonn Murphy reviews books for sfcrowsnest and writes short stories for small press magazines. His eBooks are available at all good retailers or see his website: https://eamonnmurphywriter298729969.wordpress.com/

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