Oliver Davis reviews 2000AD Prog 1909…
Borag Thung, Earthlets!
We begin with an ending. The ending of Kingdom, to be precise – and the story of how Gene the Hackman found it. Beyond mindless action and a consistent (if irritating) dialect, there is little to enjoy in Dan Abnett’s tale of mutant dogs fighting a race of giant alien bugs. Beethoven meets Starship Troopers, this is not.
If you’re looking for mindless action, you’ll struggle to find a more literal example than in Pat Mills’ Greysuit – which opens on John Blake’s latest target, The Family Man (so-called because he murders a victim’s entire family when on assassination hits), bashing his own brains in against a wall. The disconnected eyeball flailing in each hit’s recoil is inspired. As is the army officer who suffers from singing Tourette’s (every other frame has him breaking into song), whom through Blake goes to reach the big boss of the strip: Prince.
A far more touching death occurs in this week’s Stickleback, which sees its titular character experience a rare tender moment as the masked Lady dies in his arms. I think I’ve figured out why I can’t empathise with the hunchbacked cockney – it’s the way he’s drawn. The ragged hair and creased face; the pointy chin running parallel to his nose. Although freaks usually work well as protagonists, Stickleback’s whited-out eyes keep you from both imagining yourself as him and identifying with his situation. A shame, as everything else in this strip sizzles…
…just like the four blast holes in new recruit Corrigan’s torso in Judge Dredd. Old Stoney Face displays his famous sensitivity by merely uttering: “YOU’LL GET A BREAK NOW. YOU’VE EARNED IT”. (“JEEZ,” utters the paramedic to Corrigan. “FOUR BLAST HOLES EARNS YOU A BREAK – WHAT WOULD YOU HAVE TO DO FOR A FULL VACATION?”)
John Wagner’s story of Dredd becoming the Block Judge of Gramercy Heights finally reaches its conclusion this week. Over ten instalments, he’s shown Dredd systematically take down the gangs and their organised crime reign of terror. Unfortunately, you can never account for the John Lennon-lookalike wacko on the sixth floor. A bomb sends half of Gramercy tumbling down in the penultimate page. Just as a modicum of progress appears to be made, all of Dredd’s work is undone. And in his reaction is the whole point of Wagner’s story. He simply moves onto the next case. The next block. Systematic, unchanging, unstoppable. What started as a repetitive story has turned into a wonderful mediation on Dredd’s character. In any other issue, it would be the highlight. Unluckily for Dredd, though, he’s been sharing 2000AD with Ichabod Azrael.
2000AD’s Scrotnig Story of the Week
God is a manically obsessed writer, plot devices become physical, tangible constructs. Characters get trapped within the confines of panels on the page, pushing against the black borders as though threatening to break into reality. Rob Williams’ majestically metaphysical and lengthily titled The Grevious Journey of Ichabod Azrael (and the Dead Left in his Wake) is yet again the best story in 2000AD.
The aforementioned God no longer has control over His story as the typewriter begins to punch keys all by itself. Now is the chance for Azrael to forge his own ending. The art is bleakly fantastic, the writing absolutely absorbing. Williams manages to cram huge concepts and plot twists into the short space that Mighty Tharg gifts his yarns. You feel like you’ve just read a whole graphic novel in five pages. Few can touch this.
Oliver Davis is one of Flickering Myth’s co-editors. You can follow him on Twitter (@OliDavis)
Originally published November 26, 2014. Updated November 28, 2022.
