Judge Dredd: The Mega Collection discussion thread

[Silent_Bomber]

I seemed to enjoy America more reading the follow ups because it gave the story a nice grounding.

I feel the opposite to be honest, I feel like America was focused, grounded, and concise, it knew what it was trying to say and did it well. Fading of the Light was confused and all over the place.

Making Beeny a Judge was a very good call though.

[Mattofthespurs]

Disappointed that issue 2 is in the shops now and my sub copies of 2 & 3 have yet to materialise 

Got a cold and a chest infection and was hoping to curl up under a warm duvet and read these today.

Ah well, I'm a big boy. I can wait they bloody well better turn up tomorrow or I'll throw a proper hissy fit

Just to clarify, in order to keep P&P free orders are sent out in big batches from Hachette's warehouse - it's not like the Prog where it has a specific date that all orders go out on so there may be the occasion where books are in shops before you receive yours. However, you'll be getting them two at a time and, as the subscriptions level evens out, they should become more regular.

Yeah, no worries. The Marvel ones were always 2 weeks behind the shops.

Just eager to get my grubby mitts on them 

[Skullmo]

It was this play on the limits of tolerance that impressed me when I first read Wagner's supple, terse story. But now what strikes me most is the story's attack on the way men treat women. America is the most attractive, assertive character in the story and yet she is used by almost every man she comes in contact with. She is beaten up by Judges on a democracy march while pregnant only for the judges to then end the pregnancy because of the foetus's "genetic abnormality". And she is ultimately betrayed by her best friend Benny who then takes the betrayal to another lurid sci-fi level, effectively stealing America's identity.

Wagner continues exploring questions of female agency in a number of subsequent stories gathered in this Hachette edition. And so what we have here is - you might argue - a feminist text. It just comes with big guns.

http://www.heraldscotland.com/arts-ents/books-poetry/graphic-content-a-sense-of-dredd-on-rereading-wagner-and-macneil-s-america.1422871513

Strangely, reading it this time I really disliked America and felt that she was exploiting Bennett to get what she wanted/further the aims of her terrorist organisation. The back-story of her pregnancy I took with caution as she was an unreliable source of information, I felt like it could have been just to get Bennett on side.

We also have to remember it is told from the point of view as Bennett, and he puts his own spin on the events. Bennett is clearly obsessed with America and is looking for justification for both his and her actions.

The story originally ran in an age where the UK was generally free from the threat of acts of terrorism, and I think the current state of things has probably changed my view of her.

It's a wonderful story!

[I, Cosh]

The story originally ran in an age where the UK was generally free from the threat of acts of terrorism, and I think the current state of things has probably changed my view of her.

Wow!  Bearing in mind that the first issue of the Meg is cover dated 01/10/90, do you really think so?

I would agree that it's the mark of a decent story that it rewards rereading and supports different interpretations but hasn't the satirical point of the Democracy/Total War movement always been the reframing of something which we take for granted as an underground, terrorist movement?

[Skullmo]

The story originally ran in an age where the UK was generally free from the threat of acts of terrorism, and I think the current state of things has probably changed my view of her.

Wow!  Bearing in mind that the first issue of the Meg is cover dated 01/10/90, do you really think so?

I would agree that it's the mark of a decent story that it rewards rereading and supports different interpretations but hasn't the satirical point of the Democracy/Total War movement always been the reframing of something which we take for granted as an underground, terrorist movement?

Oops - maybe I meant when originally read it - which would have been about 94.

I can't believe it was in 1990!

[Silent_Bomber]

felt that she was exploiting Bennett to get what she wanted/further the aims of her terrorist organisation.

I didn't dislike Ami, but I also felt she was manipulating Bennett, and after her friends had shot him too!

[TordelBack]

I'm not sure there's much doubt that Ami is manipulating and using Benny, but at the same time I don't doubt that she's telling the truth.  I've always felt lthat Judge Beeny having a compulsorily-aborted mutant half-sibling is an important point, given what happened when Dredd discovered his mutant relatives.

[ZenArcade]

It always troubled me as to whether the unborn child was in fact a mutant at all. Z

[The Legendary Shark]

Maybe taken away to be speed-incubated into a cadet. Beeny might not be the first judge of the Jara line...

[TordelBack]

Ooh, what if the mutation was psychic ability, and the abducted Psi Judge Jara is already on the streets!

[The Legendary Shark]

I can see it now; Judge Jara discovers her/his true heritage... civil war in the Justice Department... Judge Dredd v Judge America...
.
I'll get me 'elmet.

[TordelBack]

It'd be more your line to start pitching Zarjaz a script, Sharky.

[The Legendary Shark]

They don't take Mega-Epics :-(

[TordelBack]

Take a leaf from the half-page Apocalypse War in the Daily Dredds!

[The Legendary Shark]

Hmmm...