Meg 375: Crazy Train

[TordelBack]

I'll confess to being mildly amused by the hand-wringing and teeth-gnashing over the whole 'Dredd ages in real-time' thing, whilst there is a considerable murmur of discontent over the fact that an artist has chosen to depict Anderson as if she might actually be a woman in her 50s.

No complaints from this corner - I think Dyer and Doherty's version of Anderson is outstanding - even better than Dowling's. Along with Beeby's script it suggests a whole new exciting phase for a character that I had grown completely bored with.

And just to be clear about the rejuve thing, I have never been against the idea of Dredd being kept on the street through medical advances, and I admire the willingness to tackle the issue directly and succinctly. I just think that this was a poor way to do it, jettisoning a whole aspect of the character (his basic humanity and mortality) in an offhand SF-gimmicky Lazarus-Pitty way and with an uneven tone that just left me feeling cheated of a potentially momentous development. 

And again, I respect and enjoy all the creators involved.  This just wasn't for me. At all.

[Jim_Campbell]

No complaints from this corner - I think Dyer and Doherty's version of Anderson is outstanding

To be clear, I wasn't having a specific pop at anyone on this thread, or the prog one. Everybody is obviously entitled to like or dislike anything they damn well please, I'm just curious that some fans seem able to simultaneously gush over Dredd's real-time ageing whilst simultaneously expecting Cass to permanently exist in some sort of late-twenties/early thirties psychic hottie limbo.

[TordelBack]

... psychic hottie limbo.

Now if that was an Olympic event the past few weeks would have passed more pleasantly.

[Jim_Campbell]

Now if that was an Olympic event the past few weeks would have passed more pleasantly.

Is Ian Gibson still doing commissions? :-)

[Frank]

jettisoning a whole aspect of the character (his basic humanity and mortality) in an offhand SF-gimmicky Lazarus-Pitty way and with an uneven tone that just left me feeling cheated of a potentially momentous development.

I'd have liked it to be less momentous.

Since Chaos Day broke Dredd emotionally, Al Ewing's left him bleeding at the bottom of a set of stairs, Rob Williams cracked his head open like a coconut after a 24 hour beating, a huge monkey broke every bone in his body, and Mike Carroll actually killed him.

If anyone had been planning this dip in the fountain of youth, there were a dozen opportunities to surreptitiously get the readers used to the idea that a different part of Dredd had been repaired good as new, one limb or organ at a time.

It would have been a fun game to keep track of all the different bits of Dredd that had been replaced with cybernetics and lab grown tissue over the years, and it would have felt more organic - a little less like being told he'd found a magic whistle.

[TordelBack]

Yeah, all that. What I meant was that if 'the ageing fix' was going to be tackled directly and succinctly, I'd have preferred something involving important character or story development.

As it was, this story felt like it should have been presented as a MegaCity legend (did you hear that Dredd gets all his skin and muscle taken off and replaced once during totality at each full solar eclipse, and like a moulting crab for that one moment only he can be killed), but was delivered as a simple fact. Which just seems a dull waste, even as soft reboots go. Either leave well alone and gradual, or make the change in status quo momentous.  This does neither.

[maryanddavid]

Great Meg,  I thought the rejuve tale was good too, The Wilsher Droid is a cracking artist.

Its not as if he hasn't had a complete make over before, in  'Nightmare' prog 702 over a few pages he went from The Dead Man to good old Joe again.
The tech exists to clone and birth (right term?) children ready to enter the Acadamy of Law, new organs or a new cling film of skin shouldn't be a such a leap?

[TordelBack]

The Dead Man/Necropolis/Nightmares is exactly what I mean when I say 'momentous'. And I've no problem with the technology existing.

But consider that every scar, every wrinkle that Dredd has acquired since then has just been erased. And any future ones presumably will go the same way. No more craggy, aching Dredd, this is the static, renewable version from now on. And I think that magnitude of change merited something better than '..and the hideous skinless creature preying on the raiders was... Judge Dredd!!!!'. 

I feel shitty moaning about a Carroll story, when he writes a damn good Dredd, and it's clear this development comes with the Betelgeusian seal of artisan thrillmaking approval. But I genuinely think it was a bad way to tackle "the 122 exit". 

"Someone needs to put up a sign".  Well, someone did, I just don't like what it says

[TordelBack]

Quick addendum: I suspect I would have enjoyed this more had it it been part of the Every Empire Falls saga - a solution to Dredd's injuries from Thorn, for example.

[JOE SOAP]

Quick addendum: I suspect I would have enjoyed this more had it it been part of the Every Empire Falls saga - a solution to Dredd's injuries from Thorn, for example.

I assumed that's more or less what it was addressing, in a round-about way along with Dredd's physical history, but I can see the point - especially with the last moments of Reclamation being Hershey's sombre words, "Mega-City One is dying. We can't go on like this". It seemed a ripe moment for that kind of cross-cutting soliloquy between scenes just as Dredd is getting out of the drier.

It''s notable that Mike C. all ready had a trial-run of the In the Bath style set-up with Sleeping Duty - prog# 1956.

[Frank]

I've no problem with the technology existing.

But consider that every scar, every wrinkle that Dredd has acquired since then has just been erased. And any future ones presumably will go the same way. No more craggy, aching Dredd, this is the static, renewable version from now on.

That's pretty much where I am too.

Used right, Dredd's newfound indestructibility could actually provide new storytelling opportunities. Used wrongly, he's just Captain Scarlet.

The rushed and perfunctory nature of Carousel felt like the latter, but let's see whether this signals a change in tone or if it's just something that had to be got out the way and is never mentioned again.

As interesting as the story itself is the fact it wasn't written by John Wagner, which is probably a more significant sign than the one alluded to in the story.

[Dandontdare]

I think people are making way too big a deal about this - we all know Dredd can still jump out of H-wagons in his 70s because of y'know "future medical science stuff". I'm sure Messrs Wagner, Carroll et al get a bit tired of our continual nit-picking obsession with the nuts and bolts of exactly how it's done, so we get an explanatory story with the subtext "OK, that's how it's done - can we just move on now?"

It doesn't change anything - there's no "newfound indestructibility" it's not "momentous", it's just a peek behind the scenes at what Dredd probably does every few months to keep in shape.

While some have found it "rushed" or "perfunctory" I think the opposite - did it really deserve a full story on it's own? A couple of panels in another story would have done. Still, it's a good excuse for a "Grud he's a tough bastard" story

[Frank]

Yeah, there's a whole spectrum of opinion, and people are just expressing theirs.

I'm aware I'm at the extreme end of the spectrum, given how many folk thought scooping out Dredd's brain and sticking it in Rico's body was the ideal storytelling solution to the question of Dredd's age.

The solution itself is obviously acceptable.

[Proudhuff]

I'm 100% behind TB on this and glad he has taken the time and effort to articulate his (my) POV. Well done sir!

I'm also behind Jim on this one as I've long argued to see an aging Anderson and the effect of the menopause on her Psi talent...

[dweezil2]

I really enjoyed that Dredd tale as it proved that, even looking like Frank out of Hellraiser, Dredd could still kick serious perp arse!