Prog 1972 - the defiant ones

[Richard]

There are still only 7, the cover is just the ABC Warriors and Ro-Jaws too.

[Jacqusie]

There are still only 7, the cover is just the ABC Warriors and Ro-Jaws too.

That's dangerously close to an 80's film, that to my knowledge didn't involve the use of mechanics, apart from Bobs Rover that is...

[Magnetica]

Best thing this week - ABC Warriors by a country mile. This series has really re-kindled my interest in it.

The Order and Kingdom...re-reads required I am afraid.

Dredd - sorry but has to be my least favourite Dredd story in a very long time. Let's just get back to the hard boiled thrillers with art by Flint, Willsher or MacNeil and the occasional other like Mark Sexton. Sorry I have been spoiled by re-reading DoC and Trifecta lately, plus throw in the recent PJ and Total War stuff...can't expect everything to be that standard.

Future Shock - not bad, not great.

Overall the Prog wasn't up up to recent high standards for me.

[Grey M@a]

Still waiting for the sub copy to arrive, since moving here I am lucky if I see it within a week of the usual Saturday xD

[Citi-Def_Joe]

Cover: I really liked it yes it was red but very nice IMO.

Dredd:  I appreciate that Dredd occasionally needs some levity but this stretched it out, jokes were repeated, and I still cant get down with the art.

The Order:  Skipped, like a few other folk I will give it a re-read now its finished and try and get my head around it

Ro-Blusters/ABC Warriors: a good pay off left me wanting more, but there was as bit too much "banter" for my liking. Beautiful artwork

Future shock: Bit dull

Kingdom:  My highlight of the prog , just like Ro-Blusters this left we excited for the next run.

[McNulty]

Dredd: I'm not crazy about the artwork in this story. The misshapen heads are really jarring. Hershey looks like Patrick Troughton. The story by and large was entertaining enough apart from Dredd's internal monologue. It was just too out of character. In all the years I've read Dredd he has never contemplated suicide, even in jest. Just too unbelievable. Also, it is well known that Dredd has a problem with non family members liking him. Otto Sump and Walter the Wobot never had their regard for Dredd returned. In the early years Dredd did have friends but they all ended up getting killed; it's probably that that's given him his attitude.

The Order: The story ends well, but its been two books now and I still have trouble knowing what's going on. I'm all for a mysterious story that has it premise explained over time, but it's just confusing now.

ABC Warriors: Great art, great story, great ending. Looking forward to seeing more. A lot of the time when a magazine revisits and retcons a beloved story I have a problem with it, but the use of a time delay patch which prevented Hammerstein from remembering this until now was a good to explain this new information. I still don't get the Hell Something angle though.

Future shock: The weakest link in this issue in my opinion but not terrible. Simplistic art and an overcomplicated story crammed into four pages.

Kingdom: Great cliff hanger, but I hate to think what has happened to Leezee if the humans were happy to weaponized the tick things.

I enjoyed this issue overall, as I have most of the recent run of stories in 2000AD. It certainly scores over the Meg at the moment, which is in dire straits. I'm not enjoying it much. I know things are supposed to be edgier over there, but outside of Dredd and Demarco the rest is drek. I don't need to see people's dangly bits to further my enjoyment of a story. I'm not a fan of Norwegian Death Metal of 1960s counter culture, so that's a good part of the magazine that's just not for me. I thought it was supposed to be the Judge Dredd Megazine after all...

[Dark Jimbo]

Hershey looks like Patrick Troughton.

[Bad City Blue]

In short...

HELL YEAH! - Kingdom, Ro Warriors
HELL MEH! - FUTURE SHOCK, DREDD

[robert_ellis]

Loved Dredd - best fun I've read in ages. The art eccentricities add to the general bizarreness. I'm sure next week we'll be back to the grim procedurals so it was great to have a breather. I think Trifecta was the apex of recent Dredd - humour has always been a strong element. The future shock was strong. This was a good prog - looking forward to more Deadworld!

[Tiplodocus]

This current run seems to be dividing opinions.

I thought the Future Shock was great both art and script. The "simplistic" art does a great job of conveying character and emotion and it's a clever script that gets such complicated ideas across in such a short space of time. The technobabble aspects of it did not read like technobabble. Great stuff, more please.

Dredd finishes amusingly if somewhat unbelievably. A bit like the whole story itself. But the storytelling in the art is superb (even thouse that don't like D'Israeli s character design can see that, surely?) and some of the jokes were inspired. So more from this team in a similar vein please - it is a good counterpoint to current grimness and harks back to when Dredd had more time for fun. Just not every week.

Kingdom is a masterpiece in how to slowly evolve an ongoing serial and build plot elements so that the story you read today is one that was only hinted at when you started reading it. The art is killer stuff too. If Ì have a criticism, it's only minor - and a hard one to get round in limited space - the deaths of the team members were lessened somewhat by not quite knowing them well enough as characters.

The Order, while a rollicking read with beautiful art could learn a thing or two from Kingdom. It throws too many elements at us too quickly. This, I think, is evidenced by the number of boarders saying that they will need to read it in a oner to fully appreciate it. Surely that isn't a good thing to be saying of an episodic weekly serial? But having said that, it's something that can easily be fixed and again, I look forward to more from the same team.

And finally,  after all of the well thought out and considered criticism above, I will borrow a phrase often used in the Last Movie Watched thread:  ABC Warriors? More like Shit Warriors.

[Timothy]

Molch-R in the most recent podcast described this Dredd story as dividing opinion. He certainly wasn't wrong. To my mind it's been a great little tale crammed to the gills with quality laffs and with some cracking art too. I can't understand the dislike from some quarters. Still, each to their own.

[TordelBack]

So that was a cool Prog, cover to Burdis advert.

Kingdom and the excellent Future Shock share the top spot, both completely flawless tales in every respect.  How often do you read a twist that really delivers? This week, the answer is twice!

Dredd was a good ending to a fun, colourful tale.  I'd have enjoyed an extra part that did something (anything) with Sino-City 2, but wanting more is never a bad complaint.  It's been a long strange journey for Big Barry Penge's lowliest henchman, that's for sure.

The Order was great, but yes, overstuffed with cool things. And that too isn't a bad complaint really, even if I'd have like to have seen two pages expended on a big Burns centrespread of the Wyrmqueen and the burning airships over London.  Any chance we could get a longer run next time, Tharg? 

ABC Warriors looked great, and I've enjoyed the past two or three runs now, but this week read like a prologue to something else.  If we could have swapped that double-splash for one of the aforementioned London sky battle I'd have been a happier camper.

Next week looks like a good 'un and all!

[Steve Green]

I certainly understand while people haven't liked Dredd, but as others have said it was a great change from the bleak post DoC Dredd, and a bit of a return to the oddball episodes of Dredd in the 80s - Musical numbers and all.

The Order is the only thing that hasn't grabbed me - and I can't put my finger on why that is.

[Proudhuff]

Cover:  My telly used to go like that occasionally

Klegg: Loving Moe from the three stooges as Hershey....so sad it's over. Would love to see what Matt would make of an aging Anderson.

The Order: Nice to look at but I CBA working out WTF going on, this establishes that next time Huff will start totally confused again!

Ro-Bluster:  You know,  it's all just horseshoe'd in there.  The sentence is: 'Show don't tell' And it doesn't even read well. I rather hope someone else writes the next book. heresy I know.

Future shock:  Huzzah!  Both tale and art...Huzzah!

Kingdom:  I  knew them muddy basters was up to summit!

[Richard]

In fairness to D'Israeli, Hershey is in her fifties now. She's past her prime. I'd rather artists drew Hershey (and Anderson for that matter) looking their age, instead of in their early twenties as they're usually depicted.