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Review: 2000 AD – Prog 1882

Review: 2000 AD – Prog 1882

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It’s always a good start to an issue of something if the cover contains a warrior ducking under an axe-swing from a giant. Always. Coming from the continually stunning artistry from veteran Simon Davis, this weeks fold-out cover is just what we’ve come to expect on his current Sláine run, and a welcoming-ly simplistic description of the things to come to boot. Something of a pet peeve of mine within comic books is the lack of a succinct cover for the book; good analogy and stirring poignancy aside, if the cover doesn’t link with the story, it shouldn’t be on the issue. Thankfully, 2000 AD are good at adhering to this rule (mostly), and this weeks front is a shining example.

As always, judge, jury and executioner, Judge Dredd head’s up the Prog with the conclusion to Shooters Night. A simple, brash tale of broken youth taking matters into their own hands and rebelling against a reality they’ve become equal parts obsessed with and disillusioned with, I really enjoyed how this has panned out. John Wagner knows well how to handle the judge, being his creator, but more importantly he has a great grasp on Mega City-One. This, and the last story Mega-City Confidential, have been love letters to the dreadful undertow that exists in a city so over-populated and so deep in it’s own waste. Mega-City is a setting that allows for sprawling stories and big moral dilemmas, but it’s important to remember it has masses of people and a LOT of occupied space that needs to be visited in order to keep us remembering how much of a living environment it is. Shooters Night does that, it brings us down to Earth, and reminds Judge Dredd he is but one man in the process. Violence with a wonderful tinge of resentment is a beautiful thing.

Going from a bad day to a Perfect Day with Indigo Prime, the wackyness continues. Trans-dimensional sci-fi adventure with singing plants – only in 2000 AD. The script here is well done in setting and dialogue, if a touch uninventive, but the realistic art-style from Lee Carter is the obvious highlight. The color spectrum gets a full representation in just these half dozen pages alone, and his sense of scale works wonders for minor jokes and little accents that really give the story life. Set against a reality involving modern-day nazis and immortality, Perfect Day is very Terry Gilliam-esque in execution and much like Gilliam’s works, it’s the surroundings that turn a good story into a great one.

Cover star and all around nice guy Sláine is back mid-book as A Simple Killing trudges forward with a fight with a giant. I don’t care who you are, pitting a celtic warrior against a giant in a mythical land is a recipe for entertainment. Full stop. Unconventional layouts with panels being planted on top of bigger splashes and telling the story with sprawling spreads that abandon boundaries altogether just impresses over and over. Simon Davis, Ellie De Ville and 2000 AD veteran Pat Mills are on fire with the humble beginnings of this epic. Each week I’m running out of ways to gush over how good this looks and feels.

Short and sweet is underrated, and much like a good punk rock record, Tharg’s Thriller’s Colony ends as quickly as it began. Merging aliens, zombies and taking firm inspiration from John Carpenter’s Thing, Kek-W’s script and Vince Locke and Adam Brown’s art provided a very nice story, but is obviously just a space-saver for longer thrills. The short-lived tale had a very intriguing set-up with interesting characters and the pay-off fits all the criteria for providing a nice release and tying everything together just enough to leave a gap for a sequel. However, it’s hard to shake the feeling that this could have been more, but still like a good punk rock record, you will want to experience the next installment if it happens.

Outlier, Outlier, Outlier. This story has really surprised me. Going toe-to-toe with a Sláine epic for length right now as the rest of the jump on thrills have finished and gone home, Outlier refuses to let up and keeps kicking ass, issue in issue out. Preaching firmly to the choir of vengeance and reaping was has been sown, our protagonist finally provides the final piece of flashback to give us a complete image of what REALLY happened and how it happened and exactly why certain other characters deserve to die. Torture has been shown before, but this goes that one step further on the gore-o-meter to really make us care about that gauntlet being thrown down. It looks like next week this will end, and I can’t wait to see what happens, even if I’ll miss it.

 

2000 AD Prog 1882 is available now.

 

[easyreview cat1title=”The Arcade Verdict” cat1detail=”Great art is let down by slightly off scripting and obvious space saving.” cat1rating=”8″]

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