Cover: Cliff Robinson & Dylan Teague
Publisher: Rebellion
Judge Dredd
Writer: Rob Williams
Artist: Henry Flint
Letters: Annie Parkhouse
Carver, a swirly-eyed fisherman armed with a harpoon, wakes Anderson up with a story. As he tells the story of America, his eyes unravel into worms.
Dredd rows Tan and Hurst towards the barge. Hurst reveals that she can only resist the mist by shooting up. In front of Dredd! It must boil his blood, but he’s not a fool. He sees what the situation calls for and actually orders Tan to take whatever Hurst has taken, too.
Ashore, Enoch projects his mind into Anderson, and we get to see what the prisoners aboard the barge for the first time.
And to the Sea Return continues to thrill week after week, with new things revealed each time. I can’t wait to finally see Skolex. Will Enoch have a relationship with Skolex in some form? Flint draws him with snake-like facial features, so I wouldn’t be surprised if it were revealed that the black worms were actually some Black Atlantic breed of microscopic snake. Regardless, Dredd has been a strong strip for a long time, and this chapter exemplifies that fact.
Red Dragon
Writer: Rob Williams
Artist: Patrick Goddard & Steve Yeowell
Colours: Dylan Teague
Letters: Simon Bowland
A superhero and his dad feed pigeons in the park. Peyne is the only one who Red Dragon can tolerate, and knowing how badly things go wrong in Zenith, it’s heartbreaking to see. Siadwell is isolated and lonely, and when the phrase “Our little secret” comes out, it’s a recipe for abuse.
In the present, Martin goes with the police to see Morgan, but he’s not there. As PC Dai talks to Angharad, her sons come out to the car to intimidate the documentary crew, or “the filmers,” as Dilwyn puts it. Love that phrase. Seeing Angharad’s other son has made me curious about who Dilwyn and Morgan’s father is. Could it be Siadwell?
Everything shown is interesting, but I’m eagerly awaiting the point where the past and the present clash.
Void Runners
Writer: David Hine
Art: Boo Cook
Letters: Annie Parkhouse
The Oracle’s addiction woes are eased when a Void Runner returns with dust-carrying pleroma, but to create a renewable supply, he finds he must wait 50 years. If I were the Oracle, I’d harvest one of them for now and then keep the other five, but maybe there are restrictions of which I am not aware.
After last week’s events, the liberators have found the vaccine, apparently unguarded by subjugators, but the manjukaks won’t take it. To find out how to break them from their mental prisons, Shikari smokes dust to gain greater wisdom. She finds herself talking to the spirit of her mother. Shikari Senior tells Junior to get Moondog to show him “the squish.”
Why Moondog forgot about the squish, I don’t know. It seems overly convenient for Moondog’s memory to fail him until this chapter. Void Runners isn’t really doing it for me. The cliffhangers promise thrills, but it fails to deliver drama.
Brass Sun
Writer: Ian Edginton
Art: INJ Culbard
Letters: Simon Bowland
On the hellish world of Variety, Ariel prepares Wren to see some horrible shit. They are about to infiltrate an ex-city which is now an engine dedicated to reaping minds.
Ariel knows how to break in because she knows how to break out. She once escaped with her partner Ramkin, but he did not survive the last escape.
In a vast hall, thousands of people have equipment bolted to their heads. Wren and Ariel quickly find the parts they need and they could escape, but Wren sees a family being brought in to get reaped.
Brass Sun always delivers. After hopping around perspectives for a few chapters, fleshing out the universe, we’re sticking with Wren for a time, and everything is running at a quick clip. The art really delivers a dystopian atmosphere to sell the story. Small moments enrich the events, for example, near the end, when the family is brought into the reaping centre, Wren turns to reveal the scars on her face. We know that she can’t allow what happened to her to happen to anyone else.
Rogue Trooper
Writer: Alex De Campi
Art: Neil Edwards
Colours: Matt Soffe
Letters: Jim Campbell
Lee lands at Checkpoint Zulu, the closest outpost to Rogue’s last sighting point.
As they descend, rookies introduce Lee to new targeting systems which use AI.
Nygaard’s ex is posted here, Lee finds out, but the revelation is cut short when the Norts attack the base. They exploit the AI targeting system to make the Southers shoot each other.
The first time we see the AI targeting is at the beginning of this strip, so it was fairly obvious that it was going to go wrong, but it’s nice that it’s a proper plot point, where Norts are trying to spread the AI virus to other outposts. That being said, Lee’s experience with non-AI-powered weapons has somewhat solved the issue. What’s to stop Milli-com from issuing a message, saying Hey, use manual targeting?
I do hope the problem is further complicated, but Rogue Trooper is a highlight of the prog yet again.
Overall: 7/10
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/
