Prog 2154 - Combat Shock!

[TordelBack]

Happy to say every strip is good for me - and so much to read and ponder in every one!

Thought the cover was a bit dull, but i think that's mainly because the distinctive elements (heads on poles, magical symbols) were quite obscured by the wordy bits, so at first glance it's just a near-silhouetted head on a red background.  That's about the closest thing to  negative I can muster for the whole prog! 

Neat segue to Hope itself, the strip I'm probably least excited about, and even so it's a very good read.  I get the feeling that if this had run in the prog around 1989-1991 (the years, not the prog) I'd have been obsessed with it - it's like a Revere or a Brigand Doom that actually makes some kind of sense, the alt.history is right up my street, and the art is so very stylish.  Coming to it as a jaded fart that mainly likes a good story, I still have no real sense of why I should care about Hope and his demon nun. It doesn't stop me enjoying it week to week, but maybe I should do a re-read.

Deadworld remains one of the most brilliantly sustained premises of recent years, playing its own twisted version of Dredd history against a cast of distinctive characters and a roster of backstabbing villains, all rendered in such a bleak and magnificently disgusting way.  Sov invasion force versus the unholy footsloggers of the Dark Judges, I could drink this stuff down every week.

Brink this week is a terrific slice of procedural with such neatly defined characters and believable interactions. Oh Kurtis, may you never tire of chasing homicidal loonies into the grubby bowels of orbitals!

In Defoe Moore and Mills seem to feed off each other in an escalating spiral of madness.  So different to the gritty detail of Gallagher's work and the almost period feel of MacNeil's beautifully washed pages, this is as arcane and grotesque as this storyline demands.

I am a little dubious about the Nerve Centre's claim that this is set in 1668 - surely so much has happened since the strip started that we can't still be only 2 years on from the Comet and the Great Fire?

Dredd I've touched on, but suffice to say it continues to be intriguing, gorgeous stuff.

[JayzusB.Christ]

d have been obsessed with it - it's like a Revere or a Brigand Doom that actually makes some kind of sense,

Oy! I'm not having that. Revere was an epic, haunting tale of a post-apocalyptic Messiah, and one of the stories that kept me reading through the prog's difficult teens. Brigand Doom was just a poor man's V for Vendetta.

[TordelBack]

I'll rephrase that - Revere and Brigand Doom made no sense to me.

[DrJomster]

Hope Book One is on sale at the moment... I think I might have to pick up a copy. Largely driven off how well Book 2 is coming along.

Halfway through yesterday's bargain £5 purchase of Book One and it's  holding up very nicely indeed! Reads well collected.

[JayzusB.Christ]

I'll rephrase that - Revere and Brigand Doom made no sense to me.

Fair enough, can't really argue with that. That said, your opinion is wrong and mine is right, so you'd probably best change yours to mine.