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Understood. Entering stealth mode.

OK, I'm gonna have to call in back-up to help with the Elinora Garcia page.

1. Is there some backstory I should know about? (apart from Hershey's enigmatic death-bed comment)

2. 'Another mother' - confusing phrase. Is the implication Elinora's a clone?

3. Am I missing a wider plot point - why did Uno take Beeny to see her? Simply as an example of how the robot regime treats humans? And of so, why a clone of Hershey? If she is cloned from Hershey, do the robots know this?

4. Uno's comment about the entrance being too narrow for his robots seems a bit pat. Was it a clumsy invention by John Wagner in order to allow Beeny and Elinora to have a conversation on their own? Or did Uno leave them alone for a reason?

Bit lost, sorry.

Cover: Magnificent - but yes, surely intended for last week's prog? (Come to think of it, when was the last time we got a MacNeil cover?)

I said of prog 2152 that with the exception of Dredd its strips' story-lines seemed to be treading water. Well this week it's Dredd that relaxes the pace while things get moving elsewhere. It's so great that Wagner can say to his artist "Look, just take a page to do something special", and that MacNeil can reward his confidence. Also, there's no way that the Humanista leader's conjugal invitation (and there's definitely nothing ambiguous about it!) would have had the impact it did in a busier installment. In the past Dredd has brushed off amorous advances but that final panel almost makes one think he regrets this decision...

Brink is starting to warm up nicely, after a slow couple of episodes even by its own unhurried standards. Hope continues to be an intriguing read but it does feel like this second chapter is still in search of a plot. Deadworld has perhaps exceeded its scope with the involvement of the Sovs - I kind of preferred when it was mired in unpleasant American backwater towns - but I guess that increased scale presages the sort of global catastrophe that resulted in its complete transformation. Defoe ain't a bad read and I guess Moore's busy artwork reflects the hectic narrative.

A majestic Dredd from Wagner and MacNeil, it should almost go without saying now.

Strange situation with the remainder of the prog. Four of my absolute favourite current 2000 AD strips but none of them seem to be quite scaling the heights of previous chapters. Brink and Hope are superbly written but plot-wise they're both missing some kind of fundamental premise, even if it's a MacGuffin, to draw us in and get the characters motivated. Deadworld risks descending into the sort of erratic runaround that made Kek-W's recent Indigo Prime run so annoying. And I think the move to outer-spacery is a step too far for Defoe - it's reminiscent of the time Slaine suddenly stopped being an authentic Celtic epic and started being about multi-dimensional time monsters.

Plenty of time for all these strips to turn it around, and I'm confident they all will. But this week only Dredd truly hits the spot.

That Kano poster - the way he's holding the gun, it has to be based on a photo of a guitarist, no?

Dredd's the standout this week. John Wagner owns the strip, literally of course but also metaphorically - he continues to set the standard to which others aspire. Love the way the Ambassador refuses (or feels unable) to address the Mechanismo droid personally. MacNeil provides the superb artwork the script deserves. Brink is also beautifully written and rendered, though this chapter is perhaps lacking a gruesome opening hook that previous installments gave us. Hope is living up to its own high standards too but again, a couple of episodes in and plenty of scene setting but no concrete plot. Deadworld ploughs its own macabre furrow and while I am getting a bit of multi-chapter amnesia I can enjoy each episode on its own merits. Finally Defoe thankfully reinforces its credentials as by far the most enjoyable of Pat Mills' strips though. While the SKM droid clearly possesses bags of talent, I wish he'd rein in the Photoshop effects a bit.

Oh, the cover. Very reminiscent of a Leigh Gallagher cover, I thought. It took me a few moments to realise it was a wrap-around as the art on each half doesn't blend especially well.

Where to start with this thrill-packed extravaganza? Putting the strips to one side for a moment, it has to be the phenomenal cover. How utterly inspired of Tharg to go full-on late 70's retro-style, gloriously redolent of the nascent heyday of 2000 AD when no-one really had an idea of how to draw Judge Dredd. His face and helmet are a terrific pastiche of those early European artists drafted in to provide illustrations for cheap rates at short notice. Honestly, this could be straight from the front of an unpublished 1979 Sci-fi Special - one almost expects Dan Dare, Shako and Frank 'Visible Man' Hart to complete the ensemble. With its breathtaking unwillingness to conform to any conventional notions of anatomy - Dredd depicted in a tangle of mis-shapen body parts projecting at apparently random angles - this piece has an almost Cubist air. And then we get to Anderson, flaunting everything that defined the very notion of 70's cheesecake. A shame the whole thing is spoilt by the artist drawing modern-day Lawgivers! Or trying to draw them, at least.

Florix grabundae, Tharg. This cover will live in the memory for years to come.

Anyway, on to the contents, and across the eight strips there isn't a genuine weak link present. Dredd... what is there to say? That third page in particular, just spine-tingling, especially the final row. That Dredd has been such an enormous part of Hershey's life, he's the last thing she sees. Wow. I wonder if any ideas for unwritten episodes of Spector will find their way into a plot about a sentient robot?

So happy to see Hope back, got a feeling it's going to be every bit as good as before. I'd forgotten that the break in the first book was over six months - no hiatus this time please! Nice curveball in the welcome return of Brink. Curious to see the term 'vic' used in the non-Dredd universe. Coincidence, or are we in for the mother of all crossovers? A decent Future Shock but perhaps one that will be more remembered for the return of the Simpson droid. A proper Annual-tier Anderson story, but no less enjoyable for it, and greatly enlivened by the excellent work of Jake Lynch. I wouldn't exactly call it a 'favourite' but Defoe is the Millsverse strip I have the most time for, and this is no less intriguing than previous chapters, if a typically unfocussed. A very un-Abnett SinDex in that it does literally nothing at all, being 100% recap of the previous story. Not even sure it makes sense in the context of this being a jumping-on prog. Finally, Dave Kendall pulls out all the stops once more in a fantastic opening to the latest Deadworld chapter.

But at the end of the day, there's only going to be one reason this prog is remembered.

But as they said do not judge a book by its cover

No, but we may have to cover this book, by its Judge

Jovis. I've just Googled 'Joseph Linsner' - I wouldn't recommend doing so at work.

I can see the guy has... talent, of a very specific kind, but based on his abilities he seems a poor choice and has produced a poor cover, especially for a jumping-on prog.

At last, I get to review the prog in the thread I started a week ago 

Dredd cranks up the tension big time, taking the Judges' disregard for the rights and well-being of the common Cit to new levels. Though I can't help feeling they might have been better using someone from the Wally Squad, someone a lot less likely to crack under pressure. Or perhaps that's the point..?

SinDex is a beautiful read, as ever. Long may it continue to fill four-week slots before jumping-on progs.

Rather impertinent of IP to take up so many pages, I thought.

Red Road, hmm... I think it's perhaps asking rather a lot for us to buy into a continuation when we've been given so little information about the protagonists or the world the inhabit. I get that as a 3riller it's run like an action-packed pre-credits sequence but it needed, I think, to at least hint at a little more depth beyond the vague exchange in the final page.

Jaegir - killing it. Literally.

Robinson crease-oh

Thanks!

Here's the big picture for ya, scuzzpucks...




Finny and Ray looking awesome of course, but how good is that background? Epic stuff.

Never started a prog thread before. Hope no-one minds.

Anyway - What. A. Cover.

Cover: Lynchtastic

Dredd: Shaping up so well, a totally compelling tale. Although... after last week's page one narrative confusion controversy I wonder if I should mention this, but - 'EL'? Was that/they mentioned last week?

SinDex: Looking forward to seeing where the Abnett droid goes with this 'ultimate AI' concept. Will it be a one-off thing that he's just transplanted into the Downlode universe because he's got no other story to include it in? Or will it play a big part in the series' future direction..?

IP: This is becoming interminable. Please put it to bed and let Kek-W concentrate his efforts on worthier projects!

3riller: It's been weird reading two weeks of a Mad Max-style road pursuit without knowing anything about the participants. I guess next week's payoff will determine if it's been worthwhile. No pressure!

Jaegir: So good.

Also not sure what those robotic snakes were supposed to do

They're basically cleaning droids. I thought that was fairly clear, myself...

Yeah, I got that when they were shown with Barbarbara (fantastic name, by the way), but what threw me was the way they moved not just from cell to cell but through communal areas too - it just seemed too obvious that they'd be used to traffic small goods (or as dangerous weapons as Proudhuff mentions).

I also found the first page a little confusing - I thought it was the woman with the child who was narrating, not the innocuous figure in the background

Phew. Not just me, then.

Whenever it comes to Dredd I just think of John Wagner's beautifully simple yet coherent prose, with which there's never any ambiguity.