Into Prog - 1850 Part 1 - Dredd There's a lot going on with the line -up running up to Prog 1850. We get the third and final stories of both Age of the Wolf and Ten-seconders, we get The books of Scars, we get Defoe. I'm going to talk about a few of these as I take one of my traditional breaks - this time to read more Grendel and some old(ish) Shadow comics. The first thing i want to talk about though is something I almost over looked...
... see sometimes I'm guilty of taking Dredd for granted. Its there, its normally good, its often great and at times its exceptional. When you get great Dredd I'm guilty of not commenting on it much, cos you know its Dredd, its often great. For some reason the run of thrills up between 1837 and 1849 - which is all great (not exceptional) has struck a cord though. There are three very different stories
Wasteland - By Wagner and Dave Taylor in which a billionaire believes he can out fox the judges using a web of contacts to mask his murderous attempts to better a property deal - the property being block isolated in the post Day of Chaos wasteland (of the title).
Savengers - By Rob Williams and Carl Critchlow in which a squad of judges dive in to the submerged ruins of Luna City 2. The crashed God City from Trifecta, as confliciting sides try to take control of its aresenl and a sensitive klegg comes to Dredd's aid.
Bender by Wagner and Willsher - a cross over with Futrama in which crew from Planet Express nose dive into Mega City One and... alas no - that's a crossover I would pay to see. In this case Bender is a hard judge pushed over the edge and his straight and true new partner back from injury. The of course come into messy conflicit with each other.
Okay so there's a lot of Wagner, but that's not the only reason these stories stood out to me. I think one of the key things is that these tales all deal with sold Dredd tropes, but do it very well. Wasteland returning to the ways the Justice Department and particularly Dredd, use their wily ways to crack organised crime. Often helped by the simple arrogrance of the crimelords
Second in Savengers we get a crack squad influtraing and combat situation, meeting and interesting charater lost in the middle and Dredd comes out.
Finally Bender - the classic bent cop going to far and becoming an over violent law unto themselves.
All these tropes are given fresh life by their respective creators. Particularly the ending of Bender which plays with the more vulernable Dredd we've seen from DoC forward. The ability of the series to support exciting stories, even when immersed in old ideas, is testament to its brilliant thrilling concept and world that's been created over the years. The fact that each of these well trodden roads is testament to the creators that work with him. The fact that William's story is as successful as Wagners' testament to the folly of the idea that no one but Wagner should write the character - not that Wagner's take is brilliant and consummate. The fact that three great Dredd stories is something I'm in danger of taking for granted is testament to how much wonderful stuff we've had over the years and how many wonderful thrill Tharg has in his locker these days.
I should also make reference to the wonderfully diverse art. Taylor, Critchlow and Willsher are all on top of their form. What's more impressive is how each strip seems hand picked for the strip they do. Taylor all cityscapes and lurid charatcers. Critchlow a crocked broken, world hidden beneath other world depth full of monsters. Willsher anger, agression and violent energy. Its almost as if the editor's been doing this for years and knows his stuff perfectly!
The other sign of the embarrassment of richs we have playing in Tharg's kingdom is this is just great Dredd not exceptional Dredd!
