Part 1
Number 88 - Judge Dredd (and Dreddverse) by Kenneth Niemand
Keywords: 2000ad, Chimpsky, Citizens, Mystery man
Creators:
Writer - Kenneth Niemand
Art - Various
Colours - Various
Publisher: Rebellion
No. issues: By a very quick estimate I have it as equivalent to 49 US comic issues
Date of Publication: 2019 to date
Last read: Ongoing
This is another one I've been subconsciously, and occasionally consciously, drafting in my head since I started writing these things. There are quite a few things to unpick here, most importantly why I like the Judge Dredd work of Kenneth Niemand so much.
Copyright - Rebellion
After all he's a new writer on a character that's been around for almost 50 years now. Dredd has had numerous very good writers working on him, so It felt a bit weird that Niemand's work in Dredd would spring quickly to mind when making my rundown. Was I just thinking about him more than other Dredd writers as he was new? Was his work really better than other writers of Dredd that haven't made the list? For those reasons I really questioned his work on the character and its place on the list. The more I questioned it however the happier I became about the fact it was there.
Before we get into why let's set the scene a little with some background about what I'm actually talking about on this one. Kenneth Niemand is shrouded in mystery, he turned up writing a Starlord story in late 2017, not returning until just over a year later on Dredd. No Future Shocks, no 3riller, no 'lesser' thrills, straight to Dredd. He quickly established himself as a regular Dredd writer and also created a major supporting character Noam Chimpsky. Each year (2000ad in Stages A-Z as my guide and some very quick and possibly wrong maths on my part.) he's written more and more by page count on the character across the Prog and the Meg. I would hazard a guess he's one of the, if not the, biggest contributors to the character over the time he's been writing him. Though I've not attempted to qualify that.
That's a pretty rapid rise to the top. That, added to the fact that we know Kenneth Niemand is an acknowledged pseudonym and Niemand can loosely be translated to 'who?' from German (or Dutch I forget which) meaning he is literally Kenny Who? Has led to all sorts of speculation about who he really is. I'm going to ignore all that and treat him at face value 'cos we don't know any different and their work does have some very unique qualities. This leaves me to think they could well be 'just' a writer of radio plays who uses a pseudonym to separate that career from his comics career. And Tharg just really liked the stuff they submitted and so he got a really quick raise up the ladder. I don't know, I could be wrong, but that's what I'm going with.
Number 88 - Judge Dredd (and Dreddverse) by Kenneth Niemand
Keywords: 2000ad, Chimpsky, Citizens, Mystery man
Creators:
Writer - Kenneth Niemand
Art - Various
Colours - Various
Publisher: Rebellion
No. issues: By a very quick estimate I have it as equivalent to 49 US comic issues
Date of Publication: 2019 to date
Last read: Ongoing
This is another one I've been subconsciously, and occasionally consciously, drafting in my head since I started writing these things. There are quite a few things to unpick here, most importantly why I like the Judge Dredd work of Kenneth Niemand so much.
Copyright - Rebellion
After all he's a new writer on a character that's been around for almost 50 years now. Dredd has had numerous very good writers working on him, so It felt a bit weird that Niemand's work in Dredd would spring quickly to mind when making my rundown. Was I just thinking about him more than other Dredd writers as he was new? Was his work really better than other writers of Dredd that haven't made the list? For those reasons I really questioned his work on the character and its place on the list. The more I questioned it however the happier I became about the fact it was there.
Before we get into why let's set the scene a little with some background about what I'm actually talking about on this one. Kenneth Niemand is shrouded in mystery, he turned up writing a Starlord story in late 2017, not returning until just over a year later on Dredd. No Future Shocks, no 3riller, no 'lesser' thrills, straight to Dredd. He quickly established himself as a regular Dredd writer and also created a major supporting character Noam Chimpsky. Each year (2000ad in Stages A-Z as my guide and some very quick and possibly wrong maths on my part.) he's written more and more by page count on the character across the Prog and the Meg. I would hazard a guess he's one of the, if not the, biggest contributors to the character over the time he's been writing him. Though I've not attempted to qualify that.
That's a pretty rapid rise to the top. That, added to the fact that we know Kenneth Niemand is an acknowledged pseudonym and Niemand can loosely be translated to 'who?' from German (or Dutch I forget which) meaning he is literally Kenny Who? Has led to all sorts of speculation about who he really is. I'm going to ignore all that and treat him at face value 'cos we don't know any different and their work does have some very unique qualities. This leaves me to think they could well be 'just' a writer of radio plays who uses a pseudonym to separate that career from his comics career. And Tharg just really liked the stuff they submitted and so he got a really quick raise up the ladder. I don't know, I could be wrong, but that's what I'm going with.