Some questions about the Judge Dredd universe

[Smith]

Lets not forget Mean Machine.

[Frank]

Lets not forget Mean Machine.

Great example of why it's best to let Dredd shoot people.

The strip's historians cite Mean as an example of the problem of Dredd's shoot to kill policy, but it's not as if TB Grover did anything remarkable with him once the baldy kid brought him back.

Mean is a great character*, but his post-post mortem stories are great examples of the increasingly desperate measures writers take to keep members of a rogues gallery returning.

The best Mean Angel story of the last 37 years is the one where Wagner retired him for good.



* He looks great and his 'nobody tells me to ____ lessen I sez they can' schtick is just always funny

[AlexF]

The best Mean Angel story of the last 37 years is the one where Wagner retired him for good.

I've a lot of time for 'Travels with muh Shrink', admittedly that was still 25 years ago!
Whatever happend to Richard Dolan?

I enjoyed Grennie's noir pastiches, too, although, I agree they never quite recaptured former glories.

[Frank]

The best Mean Angel story of the last 37 years is the one where Wagner retired him for good.

I've a lot of time for 'Travels with muh Shrink'

It was a romp!

Destiny's Angel, Son Of Mean, Merry Tale Of The Christmas Angel - they're all enjoyable stuff, but if you'd sat in Tharg's office in 1982 and said 'I want to bring a character back from the grave in quite an unlikely way, but it will be worth it because these are the stories I'm going to tell', the Mighty One would probably have asked if you had any other ideas.

Regarding Richard Dolan, if you know the story of any one of the talented painters who worked for Tharg in the nineties but don't anymore, you can write them all: http://richypickle.blogspot.co.uk/

[I, Cosh]

The best Mean Angel story of the last 37 years is the one where Wagner retired him for good./quote]

I've a lot of time for 'Travels with muh Shrink', admittedly that was still 25 years ago!

It was a romp!

Destiny's Angels, Son Of Mean, Merry Tale Of The Christmas Angel - they're all enjoyable stuff, but if you'd sat in Tharg's office in 1982 and said 'I want to bring a character back from the grave in quite an unlikely way, but it will be worth it because these are the stories I'm going to tell', the Mighty One would probably have asked if you had any other ideas.

Regarding Richard Dolan, if you know the story of any one of the talented painters who worked for Tharg in the nineties but don't anymore, you can write them all: http://richypickle.blogspot.co.uk/

Not having this. Destiny's Angels was my first Dredd story so it is objectively the second best one ever. Also, by virtue of missing the first episodes I had no idea about the resurrection until it was finally reprinted in the Case Files.

[Smith]

Lets not forget Mean Machine.

Great example of why it's best to let Dredd shoot people.

The strip's historians cite Mean as an example of the problem of Dredd's shoot to kill policy, but it's not as if TB Grover did anything remarkable with him once the baldy kid brought him back.

Mean is a great character*, but his post-post mortem stories are great examples of the increasingly desperate measures writers take to keep members of a rogues gallery returning.

The best Mean Angel story of the last 37 years is the one where Wagner retired him for good.



* He looks great and his 'nobody tells me to ____ lessen I sez they can' schtick is just always funny

That was a pretty heartbreaking story,I admit.You just keep think hes faking it,and that hes gonna pull a Joker on us,but no,hes just...an old man.Very much like Dredd himself.All that in just a page or two. 

And no love for Three Amigos?

[Frank]

Destiny's Angels was my first Dredd story so it is objectively the second best one ever.

Can't you see that prog 511's The Beating Heart was the innovative and inspirational story that took the strip in an entirely new direction, which has continued for nigh-on thirty years?

Some readers insist it's a lazy Edgar Allan Poe rip-off, and that you can see Steve Dillon starting to dial down the detail (which would lead Tharg to pair him with Kev Walker as inker on Cinnabar and Harlem Heroes), but they're crazy as loons.

The crash opening meant certain readers were never sure if they'd missed a previous episode (even though it says PART 1 right there at the top of the page) and still have to check before typing this post.

[Sandman1]

Your 'enemies' questions gets to the heart of Dredd: people like PJ or even Judge Death might like to think of themselves as Dredd's mortal enemies, but as far as Joe is concerned they're just one more lawbreaker out of millions. Just one more perp to bring to Justice: most don't last very long.

So Dredd can't really have an archenemy, but which is the most interesting ones? Who do you "need" to include in a large, comprehensive story?

[Smith]

The Sovs,I guess?

[Frank]

.
Robot Wars - Call Me Kenneth (defunct)

Luna-1 - Mr Moonie (cube)

Cursed Earth - various (mostly dead)

The Day The Law Died - Judge Cal (pavement pizza)

Judge Death - (fool, you cannot kill what does not live)

The Judge Child - Owen Krysler (dead)

Judge Death Lives - Dark Judges (undead)

Blockmania - Orlok (dead)

The Apocalypse War - Kazan/East Meg 1 (all dead)

City Of The Damned - Owen Krysler/The Mutant (dead)

Oz - Morton Judd/Judda/Chopper (dead/all dead/respected)

Necropolis - Dark Judges/Sisters Of Death/Kraken (dead and loving it)

Judgement Day - Sabbat (inactive)

Wilderlands - Mechanismo robot (discontinued), Justice Department conspirators (dead)

Inferno - Grice (roadkill)

The Pit - Bongo dude (cube)

Doomsday - Nero Narcos/Remnants of East Meg 1 (dead/wet)

The Hunting Party - spiders and sharks (dead)

Sin City - Orlok (dead)

Total War - (dead/exile)

Origins - Bad Bob Booth (dead)

Tour Of Duty - Sinfield/PJ Maybe (in a bad way/dead)

Day Of Chaos - Borisenko/East Meg 2 (dead/at bay)

Trifecta - Bachmann (dead)

Every Empire Falls - Oswin/Texas City (dead/subjugated)

[James Stacey]

Spoilers

[JayzusB.Christ]

Destiny's Angels was my first Dredd story so it is objectively the second best one ever.

Can't you see that prog 511's The Beating Heart was the innovative and inspirational story that took the strip in an entirely new direction, which has continued for nigh-on thirty years?

It was awesome.  I really liked these small-scale studies of disturbed people living in a madhouse of 400 million.  (That one about the weird medical zombies springs to mind, as does the Phantom of the Shoppera.)  I still remember my dad laughing at the recap box description of 'insane wimp Earl Lacewing'.

[Jim_Campbell]

(which would lead Tharg to pair him with Kev Walker as inker on Cinnabar and Harlem Heroes)

And, of course, nothing to do with Steve MacM wanting to help Kev improve his basic figure drawing and story-telling skills by pairing him with an artist who excelled in those areas, as corroborated by my own conversations with Kev, and Kev's comments on Dillon's untimely death.

[Frank]

Trying an experiment: "black".

[Jim_Campbell]

Trying an experiment: "black".

I'm assuming you're attempting to imply that I will simply take a contrary position to anything you post, rather than what is actually happening, which is that I (and others) may sometimes take exception to you posting opinions and suppositions as if they are fact, and may occasionally feel compelled to point out that you're talking shite.