Best Dredd for Newbie

[MikeTheRed]

I'm interested in jumping into the world of 2000AD. What are the essential readings I should be looking for? I'm looking for specific runs; bonus if it's available in tpb.

[Emperor]

I'm interested in jumping into the world of 2000AD. What are the essential readings I should be looking for? I'm looking for specific runs; bonus if it's available in tpb.

Welcome

See here:

http://forums.2000adonline.com/index.php/topic,31063.0.html
http://dreddreviews.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/where-to-start-reading-judge-dredd.html

[MikeTheRed]

You da man. Thanks for the links. I was too lazy to use my search-fu as I was working on other things. I hope to be sticking around!

[The Adventurer]

Judge Dredd: Mandroid

Full Stop.

EDIT: I was gonna do a search for a 'Best Place To Start Reading Dredd' thread I started a year ago. But apparently there is no Search function.

EDIT2: Oh hey, it was linked in Emperor's Link. Noice. Pick Three(3) Judge Dredd Trades that will make anyone a Fan.

[Spikes]

If your keen to sample some older stories, as well as some of the newer stuff, then you cant go wrong with The Cursed Earth. First released in 1978, in Progs 61 to 85.

The collections are cheap enough, on E-Bay here, and here.

[Dandontdare]

If you're buying the Compete Case Files, I reckon vol.5 is a good one to start with - some of the older ones are a bit dated and may be a bit off-putting to a new reader. Of the more recent Dredd TPBs, The Pit is a dense, self-contained story that will give you an excellent introduction to the city and Justice Dept.

[Fisticuffs]

I'm alternating with the Complete Case Files, buying one early and one later at a time. I found that reading the later stuff, whilst sometimes lower in quality, raises the enjoyment of the much earlier stuff by an order of magnitude.

[Spaceghost]

As great as Dredd is, he's not the be all and end all of 2000 AD strips. I'd also recommend -

Older stuff -

The Complete Nemesis the Warlock volumes 1-3
Strontium Dog Search/Destroy Agency Files volumes 1-4
Slaine
The Ballad of Halo Jones
ABC Warriors

Newer stuff -

Zombo
Stickleback
Cradlegrave
Leatherjack
Kingdom
Defoe
Shakara

[JPMaybe]

Easily America I reckon.  That's the one my ex-social-worker, non-comic-reading mum read and enjoyed.  After that, I'd say The Pit, very self-contained and a brilliant story.

[DoctorIntrepid]

     So first post here. I want to start by saying: Judge Dredd is awesome and I love him. I also hate him. He is everything I love about action movie heroes and cop movies etc. He is everything I'm terrified of happening with unlimited government power, expansion of police privileges, and restriction of private citizens rights. It's amazing how in one character they can take everything I love the most, and everything I hate the most. It is pure brilliance.

I saw the Dredd trailer when it released, it looked awesome and I thought to myself "that looks highly entertaining, and more than a little fun!"
I voiced the opinion to my wife and surprise surprise, one day I came home to find Complete Case files 05 on my bedside table. (She's a keeper.)

So I read the whole book and LOVED it.

The parts I was really fond of were the first half of the book; the Mega Rackets short stories, one to two issues each, featuring Dredd just being a Judge. Driving around, dispensing justice, maintaining the Status quo, serial adventure stories, operating within the regular world of Mega-City 1. They were refreshingly creative while playing off familiar riffs. A great examination of police cliches, turned on their collective ear.

The second half of the book was Block Mania and Apocalypse war, and I'm sorry to say that I really didn't care for it. At all. (This surprised me because everything I've read talked it up immensely)
A large portion of my dislike was due to the art. Ezquerra is a talented artist I'm sure, but I just don't like his style.
Bolland did a couple of issues in the first half of the book and his stuff I loved, I've already gone back to reread it. McMahond as well, great clean line work, nicely detailed.
I'm afraid the art is a big factor for me in comics, and as much as I tried, I just couldn't get behind Ezquerra. Because of this, I find it off-putting and the stories are hard for me to enjoy.
After doing some reading, I realize this may be a problem since he is a co-creator of the character and a prolific artist.

My second beef was the format. I can only draw comparisons from what I know, so I will point towards American comics. I loved DC and Marvel both, a long time ago, but all they ever do is mega-events, these enormous stories guaranteed to "change the status quo, forever!" Well how am I supposed to know what's normal and baseline if EVERY issue is a mega-event changing that? I guess the giant arching story-lines are just not as attractive to me.

In the plus columns: From what I've seen so far , Wagner is great. The art in the first half was very fun, very clean, very technically adept, I very much enjoyed it. The book is massive and incredibly cheap for so much material. It is plain simple unadulterated fun, and I loved it. So many of today's books use a heavy hand to push a political or social agenda, it was refreshing to read some stuff that uses a more deft approach. (Although the stuff I liked the most had almost most no agenda, just good old fashioned fun)
The world of Dredd is interesting and new, after so many years of the same old spandex, capes, and Batmobiles, Shoulderpads and LawMasters make for a nice change of pace.

Could you guys point me towards some more collections available here in the USA that feature the procedural, short, Dredd being Dredd, stories more so than the giant 25 part storylines? With clean, detailed lines in a more traditional art style, rather than Ezquerra's?

Not that I'm demanding   


Also, I hear wonderful things about Strontium Dog, and if any of y'all are fans, if you could direct me towards a TPB of his so I can get started on him as well, I'd be much obliged.

I thank you for your help and I am thrilled to discover this whole new universe of comics to enjoy. I really thought I was done with comics, I was convinced I had read everything decent out there. 2000AD has brought me back in to the fold.

[Emperor]

Welcome.

I saw the Dredd trailer when it released, it looked awesome and I thought to myself "that looks highly entertaining, and more than a little fun!"
I voiced the opinion to my wife and surprise surprise, one day I came home to find Complete Case files 05 on my bedside table. (She's a keeper.)

Does she have any sisters??

OK we'll side-step your dislike for Ezquerra's art (although your name is now down in The Book) and move forward to the question of police procedurals. You will find most collections contain shorter stories and longer ones (although huge stories like the Apocalypse War don't come around that often, it is why the aftershocks of it are still being felt today), but you'll find that not all of those are the "everything changes forever (OK until the next big story)." On the art front you'll presumably prefer the Ron Smith runs on the series although there is a lot of Bolland in the early collections along with McMahon and Gibson. Have a look through Barney and you can see the mix of story length and artists, so you can work out what suits you (but really you couldn't go far wrong picking up the next ones, and then perhaps dipping back into the earlier ones):

http://2000ad.org/?zone=reprint&page=gnprofiles&choice=casefiles1

An example of how a longer storyline can also be a police procedural is possible best demonstrated by The Pit:
http://shop.2000adonline.com/products/judge_dredd_the_pit

It might also be worth flicking through Douglas Wolk's reviews of the Dredd trades and see what appeals:
http://dreddreviews.blogspot.co.uk/

Also, I hear wonderful things about Strontium Dog, and if any of y'all are fans, if you could direct me towards a TPB of his so I can get started on him as well, I'd be much obliged.

Hmmm if you were put off by Carlos's Dredd art, then you might not like Strontium Dog as he is the artist on it, although you might feel his style fits the story better. Not liking Carlos is so far off the map that it is difficult to predict which way you might jump.

[DoctorIntrepid]

Thanks buddy!
I knew I was making a foreign request when I typed it, but there's no helping taste, even if it's bad. I'll be looking into those then and probably picking one up later this week.

I am glad I can admit my "faults" and be accepted for who I am, rather than pelted with rotten produce and driven out of town with torches and pitchforks 

[IndigoPrime]

In addition to Emperor's suggestions, if you can grab a copy of Restricted Files 2, you might enjoy that—it compiles a ton of stories from annuals/specials, which are generally short and pretty good. (RF 3, however, is a bit duff, and RF 1 has a lot of very early stories that in hindsight are pretty awful, although the second half of the book is great.) If you're a fan of Cam Kennedy's Dredd, also consider The Art of Kenny Who?, which is chock full of great and mostly short Dredd strips. Note that these are UK releases, but you can easily enough import from the likes of Amazon UK or The Book Depository if your local comic stores won't play ball.

[thehod]

      A large portion of my dislike was due to the art. Ezquerra is a talented artist I'm sure, but I just don't like his style.
Bolland did a couple of issues in the first half of the book and his stuff I loved, I've already gone back to reread it. McMahond as well, great clean line work, nicely detailed.
I'm afraid the art is a big factor for me in comics, and as much as I tried, I just couldn't get behind Ezquerra. Because of this, I find it off-putting and the stories are hard for me to enjoy.
After doing some reading, I realize this may be a problem since he is a co-creator of the character and a prolific artist.

Burn him. BUUUUURRRRRN HIM!


ahem.


Actually, whilst I love Ezquerra's earlier art, certainly more than stuff he was turning out in the mid 90s, I can fully understand why some people would find it a little jarring. Its not "clean" art at all, not in the style of Bolland or Smith, and it has more of an organic feel to it.

You may find that his later work, when coloured, is far more to your tastes. Others have suggested The Pit as its the perfect story with the more proceedural aspects you're looking for. This does have a lot of Ezquerra's art, but its coloured and his style has developed a lot since the days of the Apocalypse War, so maybe you could give that a try.