Prog 2183: Regened - Five knockout thrills!

[broodblik]

You have to produce what the market wants and not want you as an individual wants. If it was up to me then no children but then again I loved Stranger Things.

[Jim_Campbell]

not least given that comics "for boys" back then were basically "be a strong white man"

A memo Mick McMahon hilariously missed. I occasionally wonder what the UK SF landscape would look like if IPC had run with Mick's mistaken notion that Dredd was black...

[73north]

Cadet Dredd - has some lovely call backs to the John Higgins story where Kraken takes his Route Combat Assessment (check please) and I want to pull out the issue thats in to see cos I think some of the panels are straight lifts. Which is a nice touch for old timers. BUT not the bloomin' point here. Read as it is its sub average filler Dredd with nothing to grip you and a nod to the Robot Wars. Just utterly lacks thrillpower I'm afraid.
Read the Regened Prog on Tuesday
I have to say , was not that impressed - only 2 stories were okay - the rest pretty poor
the worst was Strontium Dog - my lord , Alpha runs through solid walls supposedly in the strip
and then with closed doors , that he suddenly enters with ease  - poor .

Finder and Keeper _ was the best story for me , good art as well .

Anderson was just so-so .

Future Shock - was okay - not that bad .

Strontium Dog - I really felt this was a missed opportunity - very weak story and it felt like a re-hash of old episodes - I mean I bang on about wanting it back , well sadly this was not the way to do it .
I think it proves John Wagner should be the writer if it comes back ,and if not , it stays unwritten
from now on .
I also feel that Dogbreath has far better writing compared to this - that's how bad this was .

I felt let down this week .
am I being too harsh - I don't think so .

[73north]

" Cadet Dredd - has some lovely call backs to the John Higgins story where Kraken takes his Route Combat Assessment (check please) and I want to pull out the issue thats in to see cos I think some of the panels are straight lifts. Which is a nice touch for old timers. BUT not the bloomin' point here. Read as it is its sub average filler Dredd with nothing to grip you and a nod to the Robot Wars. Just utterly lacks thrillpower I'm afraid. "

should have been quoted - I can't do any better than what this guy wrote
- just to add I also feel this is spot on for the Dredd Episode - it was a weak episode .

[TordelBack]

Great discussion about what kids want.

I like to think that the stuff I devoured as a pre-teen starred adult protagonists -Biggles, Gimlet, Kiell Randor, Dan Dare, Deathwish, Ivanhoe, Luke Skywalker, Slippery Jim, Scott Saunders (he was an adult, right?), the Connecticut Yankee, Ishmail, Lt. Steve Martin of the Suicide Squad.  But the fact of it is, there's a huge amount that was child-centric - the Famous Five/Secret Seven/Oxbridge Eight, the Machine Gunners, the Narnia gang, Billy's Boots, Chocky, Will Stanton, Taran, the Bash Street Kids.

So I'm happy to go along with the idea that kids want to read about kids (although I'll suggest that those kids are always going to be a few years older than they are) - certainly the best thing so far (IMO) in the Regened brand is Finder & Keeper. My problem isn't (for example) using Young Dredd, it's doing nothing interesting with him beyond saying 'look, he' a cadet!'- surely there are issues specific to being a parentless clone bred to be fed through a 15 year long indoctrination programme alongside another superior version of you that would make a good framework for stories: even ones that foreground blasting things. You can bet Jaqueline Wilson would write a corker with this setup.

[IndigoPrime]

I'll suggest that those kids are always going to be a few years older than they are

I suspect it's more a range around the current age, perhaps tending towards 'same and older' as the child grows up. Here, mini-IP loves Sweeny Toddler in the new Cor!! specials, because he's really naughty and funny. She's a big fan of Betty in the Beano (who seems around the same age), but then also various charters across Phoenix/Beano who appear to be in the target range for the readership of those comics (something like 6–14).

[Richard]

looking at everything through a prism of 1977 isn't terribly helpful

I wasn't trying to make the point that "everything was better in 1977" so much as trying to remind adults what it was they liked when they were kids themselves, using as an example a popular comic which has stood the test of time. There are of course some aspects of the 70s which I would not endorse, but we weren't talking about that.

[IndigoPrime]

I wasn't suggesting you were saying everything was better back then, but what makes for longevity now can't be applied to what worked then. 2000 AD survived for all kinds of reasons. Perhaps it having adult characters (in terms of age) was beneficial in it subsequently becoming a comic essentially only bought by adults. I suspect in the current marketplace, it would be a hell of a thing to try on today's child/YA audience.

That said, I do think there's a gap in the market for a different type of content. The Beano is very formulaic in its writing. The Phoenix is more anarchic, but very safe in terms of action. Something a little more raucous and rough — channeling the feel, if not the character demographic, of Action/Misty/early 2000 AD — might have some cut-through.

[Leigh S]

It's interesting to look at marketing and focus groups - I think Harry Potter may have moved the window on what kids like towards liking what kids do to some degree?  That said, what cemented my love of Strontium Dog was starting reading when he was being an abused kid, so that's a bit telling.  Tordel's take on Dredd's own traumas sounds like very rich and kid enticing material - All these orphans/no parent types are big business!

I seem to  recall reading that when Doctor Who was prepping for return, the focus groups were damning about the idea of its return and the BBC really started to sweat it - turns out, sometimes people don;t know what they want until they get it.  And of course, unless you are a Super Forecaster Big Brain like our mate Dom, how can you know what will break the mould?  Until then, you only really have what can be gleaned from such groups to go on and the problem lies much deeper than simple analysis and number crunching might tell you. 

To quote myself in the Space Spinner episode wot I was on, sometimes there is a big hit and it's hard to learn the right lessons - Most people didnt like those 80s Alan Moore strips primarily because they were adult, they liked them because they were good.

So for me, the main thing to be is to be good - In that regard this Special is about standard for current 2K - some good, some OK, some not my thing with an occasional but thankfully rare  "what were they thinking?"

[Leigh S]

11 in Stranger Things is a good modern parallel to Dredd, no?

[TordelBack]

Yeah, good point!  I think the ideal trick to pull off here (and here I am very much hurling on the ditch) would be to give us a story that both prognards and kids would find interesting - and that I think that means digging into what makes Dredd Dredd. A lonely, driven Joe, both 'naturally' talented and hard-working but with that sort of 11/Data/ River thing going on - the legacy of growing up in a lab: a teacher's pet that has a lot to learn from weaker but more worldly classmates, while dealing with his potentially bullying big brother. It could be fascinating to see why this is the Fargo clone that made it - and yet somehow keep short stories action-filled and self-contained.  Maybe this means longer individual episodes?   

[Leigh S]

prognards

Tordelback wins the Internet - your prize is writing Young Dredd.

[Richard]

I love Tordelback's idea. That has legs.

[Leigh S]

It's interesting to note that both of Wagner's top creations for 2000AD have daddy issues - Johnny always trying to undo the legacy of his father, while Dredd is trying to live up to it...that was hat was so amazing about the end of Origins and sadly not really picked up.. Fargo giving Dredd a new slant on what he was born for.

[Funt Solo]

2000 AD Regened

This is the fourth Regened issue after the 2018 FCBD, then progs 2130 and 2170: but this is the first one I've read. I'm 100% behind the concept because it seems to be trying to appeal to a new generation (of readers and creatives) - and despite my bone-deep detestation of both Scrappy Doo and Jar Jar Binks, I'm wise enough to realize that my lack of enjoyment doesn't amount to a hill of beans if someone else is enjoying it.

I've noticed a lot of online poo-pooing of this prog (in the wider Net) even before it was published and I can only wonder about what a gang of grumpy old codgers blathering on about the golden age must look like to anyone coming in fresh. Dem yout, man.

The cover from Robinson is a corker, with some of the alien's eyes worried about the bump whilst others glare accusatively at mini-Dredd.


The thrills, in order of most to least ghafflebette...


Anderson Psi Division: First-Class Citizen
S: Cavan Scott, A: Paul Davidson, C: Len O'Grady, L: Simon Bowland

Having read Cadet Dredd first I was assuming we'd get Young Anderson, but then she's often portrayed as eternally youthful, so I don't suppose it matters when this is set, but rather what she's doing. The look is interesting, as well, because this could easily be 2012 movie Anderson with the haircut.

I loved the art on this one: it's got the most visual pop, getting to have its splash page and eat its panel layout all at the same time. The escalation of insanity keeps this moving along at a pace. I wonder about Joni Reeves becoming a strong recurring character - which could work because this is a fluffier, bouncier Mega-City One than I'm used to (which has Dredd leg-shotting perps who feck around on hover boards).




Cadet Dredd: Combat Ready
S: Matt Smith, A: Nicolo Assirelli, C: Chris Blythe, L: Annie Parkhouse

For the old hands, this has the Disney/Lucasfilm callbacks to our nerd landscape by visually referencing the Routine Combat Assessment from prog 650's The Shooting Match, and riffing on Robot Wars. But we should always remember this famous maxim of art that hath been repeated oft down through the long ages: "Shoe-horning our favorite droids into the prequels trilogy was cheaply pandering to the gallery whilst ignoring the needs of logical continuity."

It's quite difficult to tell Dredd and Falkirk apart at times, and I suppose Falkirk is there as a mirror held up against Dredd's excellence. There are great action sequences - and I love the return of the Cyclops laser (that seems to have been written out of modern Dredd).




Finder & Keeper: Nuisance Neighbours
S: John Reppion, A: Davide Tinto, C: Jim Boswell, L: Simon Bowland

Some lovely art on this: with the opening panels deftly introducing the characters and their backstory. I suppose I found the story a little twee, but then I'm a cynical old git so can safely be ignored when it comes to Cockney orphans in baggy trousers eliciting sympathy.

I really enjoyed the cereal-box faced poltergiest-bot with fried eggs for eyes.




Strontium Dog: Acceptable Losses
S: Michael Carroll, A: Nick Brokenshire, C: John Charles, L: Jim Campbell

I enjoyed the story here but was confused about Johnny's Jedi mind trick, which I don't recall being part of the character's manifest prior to this. That scene was a bit hard to tell: I had to go over it a couple of times to get that she was hypnotized but he wasn't.

Disappointing that the Thwup guns didn't make THWUP sound effects, like they did when they were first introduced during Portrait Of A Mutant. It's what makes them cool: they're onomatopoeic.




Future Shocks: The Queen of Mean
S: Laura Bailey, A: Andrea Mutti, C: Barbara Nosenzo, L: Annie Parkhouse

This one's got an interesting premise: hints of Black Mirror crossed with Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. My favorite line is "Get used to it, donkeys! Queen Tanya ain't going nowhere!"

It suffers a bit from the odd notion that the Queen could be just anyone, as really the monarchy survives only because there's enough will to allow it to continue. So, her lording it over the PM is an odd scene, and (beyond the strong opening premise) this has a bit of meandering middle. A muddle in the middle.