Cover: Karl Richardson
Published by Rebellion
Judge Dredd
Writer: Ken Niemand
Art: Cam Smith
Colours: Emilio Lecce
A hunter-streamer stalks the wild man through the zone of Brian Eno. He runs “Big Game Time with Phil & Caz”, and the footage could provide a boost to his viewer count. The hunter finds that Dredd is hunting him, and a lucky thing too, as he soon falls into a garbage crevasse.
Disaster! The edge of the pit crumbles, and Dredd begins to fall, but luckily, they’re not alone out there.
This week’s Dredd is a lovely self-contained tale which sets up some characters, a setting, and a situation, which has a twist and a post-twist twist, all lovingly drawn by Cam Smith. Smith’s Kirby-esque depiction of the wild man sells his savagery, but the true savagery to be found is in the hunter’s motive: greed. He is willing to hunt a man for views. While I haven’t seen the thumbnail for such a video, it is only a matter of time.
The Ravilious Pact
Writer: T.C. Eglington
Artist: Steven Austin
Colours: John Charles
Letters: Simon Bowland
Tharg’s droids serve up an action-packed episode of The Ravilious Pact this week. I have to admit that I’ve been a wet lettuce about this series the whole way through, but when a cancer-ridden Scotsman drives into certain death while telling a story about his pal on his wedding day, who wore a kilt, sat on his bride’s wedding dress, and left a skidmark, what’s not to love?
Jason closes in on Todd, but Todd calls the demon Ba’Laal into his henchman, set up nicely for next week’s final showdown.
This part is a high point of the series.
Nu Earth War Tales
Writer: Karl Stock
Artist: Karl Richardson
Letters: Jim Campbell
Kapitan Kanal tells the Souther prisoners of his unit’s plight, of how they had to fight their way through the North Loyalty Assessors to escape the front line.
I wonder why Kanal tells the Southern forces of his split from the main force. Does he seek their forgiveness? Permission? We’ll never know for sure, as Rogue soon arrives and chases him from his hideaway. In the end, Kanal was a coward who abandoned his post and whose sadism earned him Rogue’s vengeance.
The prog keeps serving up these isolated stories from Nu Earth, which are wonderful tastes of what the wider universe has to offer. The Quartz Zone massacre still fuels Rogue’s vendetta across the land, and any Nort who crosses him doesn’t see another vile Nu Earth sunrise.
Scarlet Traces
Writer: Ian Edginton
Artist: D’Israeli
Letters: Annie Parkhouse
An extra-long chapter in which Bey, Stranks and the Austrian band together to survive. Four stories have to fill out the prog’s page count this week, so Scarlet Traces has all the room it needs to build a thrilling action sequence. D’Israeli’s compositions sell the chaos of the scene while still being crystal clear and easy to read.
Bey hotwires a Martian weapon to save the Austrian before they speak with the dying alien, who we have been tracking all along, who just wants to go home, but when the humans decide to interrogate it, we find out that it finally has the last component it needs to complete its escape vessel.
It’s a brilliant chapter where nationalities fall away to reveal their common humanity. Even if the Martian do manage to escape, that still leaves Earth with an arsenal of Martian weapons with which to kill each other. The fallout promises to be an exciting read.
Overall: 8/10
Tony Holdsworth is a comics writer based in Dundee, Scotland, who reviews 2000AD each week.
His comics can be found here: https://tonyholdsworth2.wordpress.com/category/portfolio/
