Main Menu

Space Spinner 2000AD

Started by Steve Green, 19 April, 2017, 09:18:18 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

milstar

Mentioning Dredd showing understanding to Kraken is one of the reasons why I dislike Wagner's early 90s Dredd. He unnecessarily made Dredd complex character, when it worked for years as two-dimensional lawman. Earlier Dredd would never do that. And the primary reason why I am not enamoured with America is that it bends your perception of Mega City from earlier stories, where it was all cops n robbers and judges were heroes, much like what superheroes meant in American comics. For example, Dredd harassing that kid who suffered bullying is so out of his character. Dredd would never do it.
Reyt, you lot. Shut up, belt up, 'n if ye can't see t' bloody exit, ye must be bloody blind.

I, Cosh

Quote from: The Corinthian on 16 April, 2021, 11:12:29 PM
The Morrison who wrote Dredd is the same Morrison who publicly disparaged Kafka for not imagining that Gregor Samsa could use his new-found insect powers to fight crime.
This seems like a pretty reasonable criticism. You can't have The Trial if you don't catch the villain first.
We never really die.

JayzusB.Christ

Quote from: milstar on 17 April, 2021, 06:41:26 AM
Mentioning Dredd showing understanding to Kraken is one of the reasons why I dislike Wagner's early 90s Dredd. He unnecessarily made Dredd complex character, when it worked for years as two-dimensional lawman. Earlier Dredd would never do that. And the primary reason why I am not enamoured with America is that it bends your perception of Mega City from earlier stories, where it was all cops n robbers and judges were heroes, much like what superheroes meant in American comics. For example, Dredd harassing that kid who suffered bullying is so out of his character. Dredd would never do it.

Couldn't agree less, I'm afraid!  Some of my favourite Dredd stories were the ones that led from Oz to Necropolis, showing a tiny bit of character development.  Also, I could be wrong but I think that's a different judge harassing the young Beeny.

Quote from: I, Cosh on 17 April, 2021, 09:37:49 AM
This seems like a pretty reasonable criticism. You can't have The Trial if you don't catch the villain first.

Trial?  This ain't America any more, kid.
"Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest"

Leigh S

Yeah, I've never taken that Judge harassing young Beeny as Dredd - Dredd would go and kick some bully butt!  As Wagner always said, you wouldnt want to live in a word of Judges, except those brief moments where someone cuts you up and you'd love to see that Lawmaster in your rear view...

Good point about Return of the King and "The Law is never wrong", but again, that's Garth's cloth eared support for the "tough guy" that you see in stuff like Preacher - John Wayne style machoness is great, anything "effeminate" must be ridiculed.

Dredd is a very subtley complex character - hence why when Morrison said about Dredd "at least Batman has two dimensions" it showed he really wasnt paying any attention at all.


milstar

Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 17 April, 2021, 09:51:52 AM
Quote from: milstar on 17 April, 2021, 06:41:26 AM
Mentioning Dredd showing understanding to Kraken is one of the reasons why I dislike Wagner's early 90s Dredd. He unnecessarily made Dredd complex character, when it worked for years as two-dimensional lawman. Earlier Dredd would never do that. And the primary reason why I am not enamoured with America is that it bends your perception of Mega City from earlier stories, where it was all cops n robbers and judges were heroes, much like what superheroes meant in American comics. For example, Dredd harassing that kid who suffered bullying is so out of his character. Dredd would never do it.

Also, I could be wrong but I think that's a different judge harassing the young Beeny.


I dunno, they (the Judges) all look alike (like Dredd) to me. I mean, they are drawn that way. I maybe connected that with the monologue that Dred gives afterwards (I think) about giving hard glance at wannabe perp.

Quote from: Leigh S on 17 April, 2021, 10:45:25 AM
Yeah, I've never taken that Judge harassing young Beeny as Dredd - Dredd would go and kick some bully butt!  As Wagner always said, you wouldnt want to live in a word of Judges, except those brief moments where someone cuts you up and you'd love to see that Lawmaster in your rear view...

Good point about Return of the King and "The Law is never wrong", but again, that's Garth's cloth eared support for the "tough guy" that you see in stuff like Preacher - John Wayne style machoness is great, anything "effeminate" must be ridiculed.

Dredd is a very subtley complex character - hence why when Morrison said about Dredd "at least Batman has two dimensions" it showed he really wasnt paying any attention at all.



Morrison has stated many ludicrous things, aside him, remember that the Judges are the only solution for ever increasing crime rate in MC-1. It's a world that, imperfect they may seem, judges are in demand. I find Dredd very simple character, in rather complex situations.
Reyt, you lot. Shut up, belt up, 'n if ye can't see t' bloody exit, ye must be bloody blind.

Leigh S

#1850
The Judges tell us they are the only solution, and that's the complexity right there - in some ways, that's true, in others, not so much.  When you have invading Sovs, yay the Judges. When you have mind controlled Judges happily executing the population (not once but twice!), not so much yay!

It's interesting that , withbout getting too inappropriately  political, that you can see the Judges are trained to be "better" than modern day US cops - a George Floyd situation would see a trip to Titan.  There is an "ideal" there that Ennis loves, and kind of all of us love a bit, and Dredd is that ideal manifest - but the strip is at it's finest when it explores how that "ideal" is all but impossible to actually enact,a nd even when you can, the unintended consequences of it on how people's lives are damaged

JayzusB.Christ

With you all the way there, Lee.  In fact I'm a bit disappointed that Fargo's last words to Dredd have never really been addressed.  I have a feeling that if it's the two-dimensional, emotionless, unchanging avatar of the law you're looking for, Alan Grant's take on Dredd is the man for you.  Me, I'm far more a fan of Wagner's version, the one that once in a blue moon releases Democrats from the cubes and stops the Resyk belt for bereaved old men, but each to their own.
"Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest"

Leigh S

Indeed, the Fargo ending of Origins is 90% of my love for that series, but so far barely mentioned again.

It's why the current Dredd with corrupt SJS rankles - the Justice Dept doesnt need to be corrupt to be "wrong" , and you lose a lot of the subtlety of the political comment in Dredd when you can;;t make the Judges "bad" when they are beng ostensibly "good"

milstar

Quote from: Leigh S on 17 April, 2021, 11:25:40 AM
The Judges tell us they are the only solution, and that's the complexity right there - in some ways, that's true, in others, not so much.  When you have invading Sovs, yay the Judges. When you have mind controlled Judges happily executing the population (not once but twice!), not so much yay!

It's interesting that , withbout getting too inappropriately  political, that you can see the Judges are trained to be "better" than modern day US cops - a George Floyd situation would see a trip to Titan.  There is an "ideal" there that Ennis loves, and kind of all of us love a bit, and Dredd is that ideal manifest - but the strip is at it's finest when it explores how that "ideal" is all but impossible to actually enact,a nd even when you can, the unintended consequences of it on how people's lives are damaged

Well, I don't see doable as Judges going happily and deliberately wasting population (because they feel like it) and that somehow it'll paint Judges as bad, because it's rather exception to the rule. Corrupt Judges, yes, and this ideas were explored in the earlier strips. From Dredd's PoV, there's nothing more ashaming than a corrupt Judge. And let's be  honest, Mega City has seen a lot of them corrupt. I definitely see Dredd as someone who'd deeply scorn Derek Chauvin.
As for the treatment of MC citizens, what I like about the Dredd is the he's brutally honest with his views. In Democracy, his famous "I'll do anything to protect this city from dangerous fools like you". Or stunning opening and closing monologues from America. This is seen in a rather unnerving effect in Apocalypse War, where judges execute people for defection. But I suppose it's rather echo of the times, where penalty for treason was death.

Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 17 April, 2021, 12:40:29 PM
With you all the way there, Lee.  In fact I'm a bit disappointed that Fargo's last words to Dredd have never really been addressed.  I have a feeling that if it's the two-dimensional, emotionless, unchanging avatar of the law you're looking for, Alan Grant's take on Dredd is the man for you. Me, I'm far more a fan of Wagner's version, the one that once in a blue moon releases Democrats from the cubes and stops the Resyk belt for bereaved old men, but each to their own.

I don't know how good is Grant's example, when Grant openly professed that he, as an anarchist, purposely made Dredd more and more fascist, to the point it became self-parody (this is one of the reasons why he broke up with Wagner).
Reyt, you lot. Shut up, belt up, 'n if ye can't see t' bloody exit, ye must be bloody blind.

Leigh S

Nt sure what you're getting at - are we supposed to agree that the democrats are dangerous fools?  Are we supposed to agree that the Judges are the ONLY solution and that, as dredd famoously states, the price of Justie is Freedom?  Are we to say  that it's the Militarised police Gvt that get to decide if that is a cost willing to be paid? 

If so, then that's a worrying reading of the strip in my book.  Sure, Dredd is interesting in that he actually beleives in the ideal, he gains no profit from what he does, he would risk himself for the life of a criminal.  All of that is part of the complexity of the strip, and the conflict in the character - a "good" man upholding an oppressive system.  It's an incredibly thin wire to walk as a writer, which I imagine is the reason so many fall off one side or the other

milstar

#1855
I'll say first that I would never read a strip about a fascist. Dredd himself may be a simple character, because he is, in the society that is complicated, and I see him as a necessary tool. Not perfect, but ideal it could get. And these strips to me serve as reflection of your own moral standards. And I gotta say, the price for justice IS freedom. Either you get one or you don't. Because the justice in its core doesn't suffer compromises.
And I'll add this. Democrats, or fighters for democracy in America indeed were dangerous fools, whose acts border on sheer terrorism.
Reyt, you lot. Shut up, belt up, 'n if ye can't see t' bloody exit, ye must be bloody blind.

JayzusB.Christ

"Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest"

sheridan

Quote from: milstar on 17 April, 2021, 11:08:37 AM
Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 17 April, 2021, 09:51:52 AM
Quote from: milstar on 17 April, 2021, 06:41:26 AM
Mentioning Dredd showing understanding to Kraken is one of the reasons why I dislike Wagner's early 90s Dredd. He unnecessarily made Dredd complex character, when it worked for years as two-dimensional lawman. Earlier Dredd would never do that. And the primary reason why I am not enamoured with America is that it bends your perception of Mega City from earlier stories, where it was all cops n robbers and judges were heroes, much like what superheroes meant in American comics. For example, Dredd harassing that kid who suffered bullying is so out of his character. Dredd would never do it.

Also, I could be wrong but I think that's a different judge harassing the young Beeny.


I dunno, they (the Judges) all look alike (like Dredd) to me. I mean, they are drawn that way. I maybe connected that with the monologue that Dred gives afterwards (I think) about giving hard glance at wannabe perp.

Quote from: Leigh S on 17 April, 2021, 10:45:25 AM
Yeah, I've never taken that Judge harassing young Beeny as Dredd - Dredd would go and kick some bully butt!  As Wagner always said, you wouldnt want to live in a word of Judges, except those brief moments where someone cuts you up and you'd love to see that Lawmaster in your rear view...

The script book has an intro by Wagner saying that Dredd did not appear in the first few episodes of America - a bold move considering this was a fledling title named after Dredd, and that the narration was added to draw him back in.  Which is the long way of saying - the bully judge wasn't Dredd (the script just refers to 'a judge').

Leigh S

So what do you make of Fargo's hot take on the Judge System as Overlords in Origins?

http://www.theliberati.net/quaequamblog/2012/08/01/f-is-for-fargo-and-fargo-clones/

Democracy "could" coexist with the Justice Dept - it would mean the law would be from (and for) the Citizens rather than "what's good for them/what keeps them in line", but even the founder didn't intend the Judges to assume ultimate power iindefinitely.

You can have Freedom without Justice, but can you have Justice without Freedom? If the citizens have no say in what laws are imposed on them, then that's not Justice, that's oppression, plain and simple. And if it's a great system, why are the citizens routinely prone to criminality and psychosis? 

Now, that's not to say I am not a fan of the old style futuristic "post need" elements of Mega-City One, where citizens are ostensibly free to grow their noses and head eggs into buckets (if they arent being gassed into a stupor to keep the crime rate down) - again that's some of the charm and complexity of the story - the citizens ARE in many ways stupid children, who "need" keeping in line - but what's keeping them stupid children?


Colin YNWA

Has the Justice Department's and indeed Dredd's use of the term Justice been explored explicity? Its certainly a continual subtext throughtout many, many stories. Use of the word within the 'Justice System' of the Mega Citys seems like clever propoganda. There is very little real justice in Mega City One, just the enforcement of a brutal legal system of an extreme right wing state, called justice on the basis you get what you deserve. Label things justice and folks are more willing to accept things. Its justified its not oppression. Its what we need and deserve.

So the law says you get 6 months imprisionment for dropping litter. If you drop litter you get nicked and serve 6 months. While that is geting what the law tells you you deserve, its not really justice in modern terms...

... oh I really shouldn't enter this debate as there's a lot to unpack and I've got silly tournments to prepare.

Always wise to remember Wagner's wise words - which I'm about to mangle - Dredd is a warning not a blue print.