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[23 - Hi-Octane]

23 - Hi-Octane

Dredd plus Lawmaster equals DAKKA DAKKA VROOM VROOM...


Judge Dredd Mega-Special #5 (1992; Sean Phillips) - rather than use the onboard armament, Dredd's just using the bike to get him close enough to day-stick the punks. To be honest, this looks a bit like he's mown down some fashion victims from Miami. Loud shirt - three months, creep! This cover was special because the grey bits are actually metallic silver.


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Hit the Sked (prog 1815; 2013; Darren Douglas) - again, has the slight appearance of Dredd just going on an extra-judicial rampage during a frustrating commute. His pose on the bike is a little uncanny valley, but points for having someone's teeth being ground out on the skedway.


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Crash Course I (prog 1957; 2015; Jake Lynch) - a proper homage, this one. We've got pat wagons from Block Mania, a Manta Prowl Tank providing air support, Johnny Vegas block as a backdrop and Dredd once again opting for day-stick carnage. Oh, what a lovely day!


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Summary Justice (prog 2239; 2021; Stewart Kenneth Moore) - a little busy, this one. Is it that the descendants of The Human Torch have turned to a life of crime? Positives: wheel goes squish.



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Crash Course II (prog 2373; 2024; Stewart Kenneth Moore) - what Dredd thinks of seminal manga. Also: why is the tree hologram not there in the published version? Was it there on the printed one?



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Next: Ricardo Montage-ban...

Prog 2382 has a wrap-around cover!

Shit! I mean, "And so, the list grows!"

this forum needs a "Love" button

 

So, standard smoke and mirrors, or unexpected development?!

It might be someone that doesn't know. I was watching someone give a presentation on UX the other day, that didn't know what UX stood for. Fun presentation.

Sometimes news is interesting: Obsolete, but not gone: The people who won't give up floppy disks

In a brutal calculus, Dredd was correct in his choice of cadet. He survived, after all.

I'm calling this one of the strongest Dredd stories ever. Tragic, yes, but I'm not following the notion that it somehow shouldn't be allowed, or has broken any rules of character or setting.

Yeah. Of course, Dredd's character would push back against the idea, I suppose. It'd be a horrible irony if his mind was forced into a Mechanismo unit.

What if the strip was still called Judge Dredd, but it was just about Mega-City One? You'd still have Fargo clones knocking about, but he'd be retired, or CJ, or teaching at the AoL, or dead.

(We already know he's got invulnerable Rebellion-IP Plot Armour +5, +10 vs. Aging, so you can take that as read.)

Brain transplant?

And Cal, and how!

Ah, and so we agree!

It is a recurring theme, yes. Ever since tight boots, right? And, I know, fridging be bad. (I sometimes wonder about catching myself on, though, when another black side character dies and I face palm. Like, are black side characters *not* allowed to die? Anyway - different debate.)

Some right-wing politicians being horrible ass-hats seems to me an argument for democracy, not against it.

As for "those who believe in government" - that (for me) is nonsensical. Government exists right now. It's not a belief, it's a fact. (I realize it's only a label for a particular structure, but the label and the structure both exist - really whether one believes in them or not.)

I'm not sure that's how the creators see things though.

I'd be fascinated to hear what the writer was aiming for.

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I have wondered if Moon has to die in order for Logan and Dredd's relationship now to become even more frayed.

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Regarding plot armor - it's difficult to have any enjoyment in any story, I suspect, if one is focused too strongly on that aspect of things. And it applies to most tales.  Folk used to complain about Alpha flashbacks on the basis that there was no threat to the character - but most SD stories one would assume that Johnny had plot armor. Well, right up until they killed him, anyway.

I suppose my point is that I have to believe that Dredd is killable in order to have buy-in for the dramatic tension of any given story. (But the same is true of Tyranny Rex, even though a bunch of her just died, or Feral & Foe, or Gene the Hackman, or Sin-Dex, even though one of them appears to be sort of dead etc.)

It was dreadful to see Moon's promise fade to (probably) naught.

Playing devil's advocate, though, I think this could be part of an interesting meta. By the end of A Better World, it's clear that Dredd is losing control. I mean, literally, he's swamped by perps and crying out for Control, and not receiving any help. It's not just that he's lost faith in a leader (that's happened before), although he does seem now partially estranged from Logan. He has support in Beeny, but that only speaks to a wider split within Justice Department. Hernandez represents the Street Judges - and really that's where you might expect Dredd to command respect, but now they don't see their future in him. The SJS tidy away Maitland's evidence, so Maitland is both actually and metaphorically buried by the Department.

So, who can he turn to for support? Perhaps the Cadets? But Rend & Tear With Tooth & Claw shows us both that he needs support (he wouldn't have survived without Moon, or the perp - he's getting old, clumsy, his missions fail before, or just after, they get off the ground) but also can't reciprocate. At the end, he has to be alone (having, really, failed) - and realizing that death is coming - and not just for Arctos. Look at how small he is in the final frame.

It's bleak - yes - but I think it might be poetry.

Does he mean his own?