Prog 1900 - The Perfect Storm

[PsychoGoatee]

Plus trades from Amazon etc seem to sell better than individual comics for indie titles. And well, Kingdom is available on Amazon in US, I have it anyway.

[robert_ellis]

Strong Prog with one of the best ever covers. I wish there was a collectible 4 part poster but Dredd with Wagner & Carlos is celebration enough.

[JamesC]

Plus trades from Amazon etc seem to sell better than individual comics for indie titles. And well, Kingdom is available on Amazon in US, I have it anyway.

That's as long as they've had enough exposure for people to look for them in the first place. 8 months of exposure on the new releases stand at the comic shop isn't to be sniffed at.

[Jim_Campbell]

Fantastic prog. Stunning cover — proclaimed to be the single best image of Dredd's face ever committed to paper by none other than King Carlos himself — with three cracking openers inside, crucially all radically different in tone, content and concept, with the same also true for the newcomers joining the line-up next issue.

This is why I don't understand the resistance of the US to anthology titles... I know the last few progs haven't been to everyone's taste (I've really enjoyed them, however) but you're never far away from something like this.

And, yes, Kingdom. Barring the odd bit of swearing*, I don't think there's any era of 'classic' 2000AD you couldn't drop Kingdom into and have it hold its own. Adding it to the line-up of US-style mini-series is a great idea, given just how good it is, and the name-recognition Abnett and Elson have.

Cheers

Jim

*I won't go on about it again. Promise.

[Frank]

At first glance Joe Bugner, Grouty from Porridge, The Adventures of PC 49, Mother London, Father Thames and the lost rivers of London (again)

... and, thematically at least, the nostalgia for a disappearing London (and curiosity regarding how it reasserts/reinvents itself) of St Etienne's London Trilogy. There's a rich vein of that in fiction, which runs through Alan Moore's Unearthing, Amis's London Fields, and all the way back to The Old Curiosity Shop. What's going on with Stickleback's reconstruction of his shattered mental and physical form seems to map directly onto what's happening with London itself.

[I, Cosh]

Leaving aside my dislike for the jumping on Progs having only three stories, this was a jolly good outing. Initial promo images made it seem like another standard headshot cover but up close it's a thing of beauty. Even more so in Pete Wells' stripped down view.

An excellent opener for Dredd. My initial (hardly insightful) impression is that it's a deliberate refocusing on the day to day after the massive events of Chaos Day and will probably introduce some new supporting characters and villains.

I think it's missing the point to say it's riffing on the welfare state as such. We've been getting iterations of that joke for thirty years, but the real target is the social inequality which it's a symptom of. The "separate El serving the upper levels" is straight out of the contemporary property developer's handbook.

I could walk around in the style D'Israeli uses for Stickleback. Seeing past the initially confusing view to the detail within is a joy. In the past, it has occasionally become too hard to distinguish the elemens and I've never been sure whether that is just the vagaries of the printing process or a deliberate experiment by the artist. Either way, this installment - like the first story - has the contrast dialed in perfectly.

Finally, Edginton's take on Jack the Ripper? I look forward to as much piss and vinegar as you can shake a stick at.

I've never been as mad for Kingdom as most seem to be and I'll admit to having forgotten most of the details of later stories. Nonetheless, it's an enjoyable Thrill and Abnett is always careful to structure each one as a standalone, mythic tale with enough information given to fill you in on what you need.

The sparseness of the text always gives more focus to the art (it's nice to see Elson back) and justifies the longer pagecount in a way not every story does. Highlight of this opener is definitely anticipating the deluge of ridiculous names for the new pack, but surely Abnett will be sore about being beaten to the Prog's best pun by "Sisters of Gramercy."

[James Stacey]

I wonder if Gramercy Heights (other than the obvious play on words) is named for the 'super high rise' http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gramercy_Residences or the area of Manhattan.

[Frank]

I wonder if Gramercy Heights (other than the obvious play on words) is named for the 'super high rise' http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gramercy_Residences or the area of Manhattan.

Yep. It's doing the same thing as Peach Trees * and Elysium Heights in the two films based on Dredd; the ironic contrast between the name and the social conditions of the blocks suggesting a fall from better times, or a gap between the intent of the architect and how the buildings actually function redolent of the grand ideas posited by the social engineers responsible for sixties high rise developments, which quickly fell into disrepair and misuse.

I'm interested by the idea that Gramercy Heights might be a play on the name of John Tomlinson and Kev Walker's E.R-in-space melodrama from the nineties. Wagner is famously not really too interested in much else that goes on in the comic, so the odds of him coming up with a pun referencing a story many here will only have a vague recollection of seem remote.



* Yeah, I know it's named after a restaurant, but the contrast between the name and the shitty situation in which the residents find themselves has the same sadness of the planets in Bad Company 2 - like All Our Yesterdays - named after a human race that had reached the end of the line.

[Goaty]

What an awesome Prog! Great starts!

So for Dredd - it will be 10 parts, EPIC? But what would be real story, or it just all in the single block like the Pit?

Stickleback - right, who the hell is he?

Kingdom - beautiful. Just beautiful.



Not sure looking forward to Greysuits next week, as didn't enjoy the last series.

[Hawkmumbler]

Cover- Oh so very striking. Gotta wonder who was the model for it though....

Dredd- Now then, this is shaping up to bensomething special. The King's turn out a fantastic tale that i'm very much looking forward tomspending my wednsdays with until christmas.

Stickleback- I love the Pope of Crime, so this is my pick of the prog. Which is saying a lot let me tell you! Gotta love how British it feels, almost Talbotian (is that a phrase?) in feel.

Kingdom- First story i've ever read but this is basicly Mad Max and Meet The Feebles isn't it? Oh we'll get on just fine!

[Timothy]

Now I'm confused. I had a lengthy 2000ad hiatus and missed the whole of Kingdom. Why is it that, if Gene is a dog-soldier as he is described in the Nerve Centre blurb, he looks nothing like a dog? I thought the prog as a whole was the best this year, and the final page was a stunning piece, but I'm scratching my head lots about the dog thing.

[Muon]

Great prog. I knew it would be. The Dredd story is already looking like a classic in the making. It always amazes me how Dredd's world continues to yield interesting new aspects of Mega-City One that haven't been explored before.

I agree with the people heaping praise on D'israeli's work on Stickleback. Those surreal cityscapes are so evocative and fascinating to look at, with all those distorted buildings that seem to defy the laws of physics. Looking forward to seeing where this one leads.

Kingdom's looking like it's going to be great fun. Fantastic start that tells you a lot of the world and has quite a bit of humour. I was a little confused about who the main character was, though. Because the dog in the plane had such a heroic entrance I thought he was Gene the Hackman for a moment, but then I worked out it was the blue bloke at the start. I loved the flying dog's entrance - that cracked me up. Great art, too - all the characters' faces were really expressive and fascinating to look at.

The Damage Report this week gave me a little chill of embarrassment, as I think I might have been one of the people guilty of acting like an overenthusiastic "human shield" in other areas of the web on some occasions...  Might just be my imagination, though.

[Muon]

Btw, I lived the line, "Your mouth is full of strange" in Kingdom. What a great comeback! I'll be using that regularly from now on.

[radiator]

Any indication of how long Block Judge will be? Been a while since we had a long Wagner run on Dredd.

[Muon]

Any indication of how long Block Judge will be? Been a while since we had a long Wagner run on Dredd.

Someone said it will be a ten-parter.