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Prog 2287: Grinders Keepers!

Started by IndigoPrime, 19 June, 2022, 11:23:54 PM

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IndigoPrime

The Prog kicks off with a fun Dredd one-and-done by Niemand/Dyer. Hope feels like an expansion episode and is a bit clunky. Things go wrong in Skip Tracer and I realise in the final frame there's a big reveal, but I've no idea who these people are.

Terror Tales is good and grim. Notably, it's Kek-W, so that shouldn't be a surprise. Part 24 of Brimful is next, which I only mention because it's the episode where a certain J Kingsley and M Smith enter the fold. Then we finish with Brink, which feels like it really wants to be a movie. Solid, at least.

Next week, we're back to Regened, so it's two weeks until the ongoing thrills continue. In all honestly, I'm fine with the break this time.

Dredd > Terror Tales > Brink > Skip Tracer > Hope

broodblik

When I die, I want to die like my grandfather who died peacefully in his sleep. Not screaming like all the passengers in his car.

Old age is the Lord's way of telling us to step aside for something new. Death's in case we didn't take the hint.

broodblik

When I die, I want to die like my grandfather who died peacefully in his sleep. Not screaming like all the passengers in his car.

Old age is the Lord's way of telling us to step aside for something new. Death's in case we didn't take the hint.

Barrington Boots

Got mine on Saturday! Big fan of this cover.

Dredd very enjoyable silly story and the highlight of the Prog. Really liked the design on the Grinder itself which was smack between menacing and totally derpy.

Everything else much as it was last week for me:

Hope I still think this is fairly dreadful, but glad others are enjoying it!

Skip Tracer this is inoffensive without being engaging. I think I know who that is at the end?

Terror Tales - this one also didn't work for me really.

Brink keeps on Brinking

I thought Brink and Hope would wrap up this week, not sure why but everything resumes in two weeks.
You're a dark horse, Boots.

broodblik

Quote from: Barrington Boots on 20 June, 2022, 09:14:11 AM
I thought Brink and Hope would wrap up this week, not sure why but everything resumes in two weeks.

From an interview with Matt Smith he said that Brink will be something like 24 episodes whereas Hope will most likely be 12 like the previous arcs but it might be more
When I die, I want to die like my grandfather who died peacefully in his sleep. Not screaming like all the passengers in his car.

Old age is the Lord's way of telling us to step aside for something new. Death's in case we didn't take the hint.

Goosegash

Quote from: IndigoPrime on 19 June, 2022, 11:23:54 PM
Things go wrong in Skip Tracer and I realise in the final frame there's a big reveal, but I've no idea who these people are.

I recognise Anime Girl from an earlier story but goodness knows who Pointy Ears is. It says a lot that despite running to so many episodes, Skip Tracer hasn't ever really managed to build a memorable supporting cast, further cementing it's position as a bit of a non-classic.

Colin YNWA

Andy Clarke is certainly giving good cover at the moment. This one kinda reminds me of the stuff Cliff Robinson has been doing of late. Its a Dredd cover and the story itself is good fun and feels like Kenneth Niemand stretching some different muscles - which I think he referenced in a recent interview. Its a fun solid one off and nice to see a different tone. Niemand is so good with Dredd (and the other stuff). Also Nick Dyer art which is always a massive boon.

Hope creeps along, on all levels. good stuff.

Skip Tracer well its a decent episode again and I recognise the popstar from the previous story when Skip T was her bodyguard and I kinda get tingles about the other reveal, but nothing springs to mind. This is fine so far.

After however many John Tomlinson miss fires Kek-W shows have you can have an involved, twisting tale, make it frightening, shroud it in mystery and still have it make sense, have you care and make it hit home IN 4 PAGES! What an excellent Terror Tale and more from Kek-W like this - with great Warren Pleece art - this is the way these should be done.

Brink well its Brink isn't it. Another masterclass and I strongly suspect when read as one this will be even better - when read back to back with Book 1 even better again.

Looking forward to the Regened next week. They have been improving the hit rate of late and so I'm optimistic about what we'll get.

Leigh S

Yeah, this is the sort of Dredd I would agree is closer to being a lost classic. Good stuff

I'm mainly here to ppint out that we have Hope stopping its porno for a week to allow the kids to read - hope they dont pick up next weeks!

Honestly, I just dont want this in my prog, and certainly not being the bread of a Regened sandwich.  Down with this sort of thing.

Huey2

"Honestly, I just don't want this in my prog, and certainly not being the bread of a Regened sandwich.  Down with this sort of thing."

Whilst I can admire the craft on display from the creative team, I've got to agree with you Leigh.

The arrival of a Regened prog always makes me wonder what made all of the other issues "non-regeney". Last year, there was very little that would have stopped me sharing the prog with a youngster and that which was child-unfriendly always seemed unnecessary. Feral and Foe, for example, seemed like it had the potential to be the perfect all-ages strip - all it needed to do was drop the some "proper" swear words and a couple of wanking gags - neither of which felt essential to the tale it was telling.

At the moment it feels as if the regular prog and the regened prog are pulling in two different directions - both have their pluses and their minuses - and the prog that I want to read is one which falls somewhere in the middle. More than anything, I'd like a prog I can share with my son in the way that I shared the old prog with my Dad.

And before somebody says it - I know that tastes and trends have changed since the '70s and '80s but it still possible to do a prog that appeals to all ages.

Anyway, the other bits from today's prog...
Dredd - good stuff lifted by some great art by Nick Dyer - such an underrated artist.
Terror Tale - really nice - although, if I'm going to be consistent - were the severed fingers really necessary? The story was fine without that.
Skip Tracer - I quite like Skip Tracer. It remembers to have something cool happen each episode, it doesn't expect me to remember whole story arcs from years previous and the lead character isn't evil.
Brink - fine.

Richard

Is Indigo Prime for all ages? Cradlegrave? Anything by John Smith, for that matter? Dark Justice? Deadworld? Defoe? I think 2000AD would be poorer without them. And without Hope too.

Huey2

John Smith arrived at a time when the prog would still have bridged the chasm of all-ages and intelligent. I think you can tell mature tales without including language or imagery that would get parents snatching the prog out of a kid of say ten upwards. Slaine the King, Halo Jones and Zenith all feature narratives that rely on the protagonists having sex but are able to do so without nudity and I'd suggest tell the tale in a better way because of this.

Taking Smith as an example. IIRC he was a little miffed that nobody was shocked or offended by his inclusion of incest in the tale. It was there for those who were old enough to notice but not for those who weren't.

Deadworld? Dark Justice? Both of these are based on the Judge Death who appeared way back in the bog paper days.

Thinking back over the past 45 years, I can only think of one story which couldn't be told in an all ages without a bit of editing and that's a Sinister Dexter story where they go to whack a porn star. That's it.

Thing is, I'm guessing that the majority of us reading the prog are aging middle-aged farts and if 2000ad is going to continue it will need new blood for the readership.

Richard

I don't think you remember those stories as well as you think you do! Either that or you've just focused on sex to the exclusion of everything else. I was thinking more about violence and horror. There is a world of difference between the original Wagner and Bolland Judge Death of 1980 and the Deadworld of today. Indigo Prime: Soft Bodies is gruesome, and Killing Time has people being blinded and mutilated.

(My own mother confiscated a reprint of some old 80s Judge Dredd stories because she thought the Otto Sump story about people eating rats and cockroaches, and the story Blobs about plastic surgery, were too disgusting for children!)

Richard


Huey2

"My own mother confiscated a reprint of some old 80s Judge Dredd stories because she thought the Otto Sump story about people eating rats and cockroaches, and the story Blobs about plastic surgery, were too disgusting for children!"
Sounds like a great idea for a thread: Comics our parents have confiscated. Whilst the 70s/ 80s progs managed to get under the radar for me - partly I'm sure to my dad wanting to read them too - it was an early copy of Deadline that nearly got confiscated. The cover was shots of a model cos-playing as Tank Girl, making the thing look like some porn mag.

"Either that or you've just focused on sex to the exclusion of everything else" Whilst it didn't come across in my post, I was also thinking of non-child-friendly gore or violence (Even if I did forget Killing Time). I guess the distinction between the the two areas is that some level of threat needs to be implied in every episode. It's how O.T.T. you are with it. I recall the spray of blood being covered up in a Talbot Nemesis episode and I don't think anything was lost for that.

" Killing Time has people being blinded and mutilated." - No, you're right. Killing Time is brutal. How could I forget killing Time? Killing Time is fantastic and - again, you're right - this is a tale where something would be lost if the violence had been toned down. However - IMO - the violence being shown in that much detail and being that integral to the story is kind of rare. And, by that time there were other sister titles (which boasted of being 2000ads more mature stable mates) around which could have housed the story. Revolver was originally slated to feature a Tyranny Rex story and the Megazine was by then running non-Dredd world stories.

 

Southstreeter

Brink - for years I thought the Mercury Event was actually the disappearance of the planet, which seemed an unbelievable thing to happen, and therefore maybe the space gods actually did exist. We learn this week that it's actually (just) the habs and other infrastructure in the vicinity of the planet. This makes much more sense, even if it remains unexplained. I can't believe I was that dumb!