Cover: Alex Ronald
Publisher: Rebellion
Judge Dredd
Script: Ken Niemand
Art: Nick Percival
Letters: Annie Parkhouse
In the forest, the pilgrim finds that he is expected and will be used for the city’s foundation.
In Mega City One, Dredd blasts a gang of perps and Sarah Kopp prompts him to talk to one of them as they lay dying, about the fathers, the oubliette and the black tower.
Giant and Rico blast Merlin Kovaks and receive a message from beyond the shift.
And in the last thread, no one gets blasted, but a messenger leads a judge and Iron Teeth to the forest of the fathers.
Part two of Messengers draws out the scene-setting, and I’m sure it’s necessary for what comes later on, but I found it a bit dull. From part one, we know that there’s supernatural hijinks in store, so what’s new in this episode?
Rogue Trooper
Script: Alex De Campi
Art: Neil Edwards
Colours: Matt Soffe
Letters: Jim Campbell
A gigantic angler fish bears down on Rogue’s ship. In a daring move, Rogue propels himself through a damaged window, into the deep sea, and kills the angler fish with grenades. His actions, though, have not gone unnoticed.
I do enjoy the action chapters in Rogue, but I feel like we’ve lost the plot regarding Jock and Nygaard. We’re in quite a different place to where we started, where we’d only hear of Rogue in anecdotes from soldiers as Jock and Nygaard pursued leads relating to their own personal goals. I hope to see more of them in the next chapter.
Deadtown
Script: David Barnett
Art: Luke Horsman
Letters: Simon Bowland
Zombies have rights. Five years after a Russian satellite falls into a graveyard, reanimating the dead, parliament rules that they have protections and entitlements. They resume their old lives.
Forty years after his death, Detective Bill Rook rejoins his old precinct.
Detective Gayle Ewing takes Rook to the Hulme Crescents, where Jimmy Pills, another revenant, has been decapitated, on a page which could have been the final one of a part 1, but wait! There’s more!
It’s a shame that two parts were knocked together for Deadtown’s first outing in the prog, as the pace dramatically slows down with a recap beginning the second half. Anyway, we find that Pills was murdered – the first time – by a rival drug dealer, Crawley.
Crawley professes no connection to Pills’ second murder and reveals that Pills was dealing something else, which is revealed on the last page. Afterwards, Ewing takes Rook home: where they are staying in temporary housing at a hotel, outside of which are protesters.
It’s interesting that the zombies occupy hotels, as asylum seekers in the UK currently do. Hopefully, the metaphor is fleshed out, instead of just casually tossed in there. Hatred towards oppressed communities are often stoked by populists, so maybe we can look forward to Deadtown’s scope widening dramatically.
What’s interesting, too, is that revenants don’t feel anything, but still desire things. If Pills’ stash is anything to go by, revenants have peculiar tastes which less scrupulous merchants can source and supply. What drives them? Let’s see where it goes.
Brass Sun
Script: Ian Edginton
Art: INJ Culbard
Letters: Simon Bowland
Pontifex Septimus witnesses the attack on the rebels, at first angry that Sybilla let them spy on the order, until he hears that she orchestrated it.
Septimus meets Wren, who reveals that Laurel, their daughter, is alive. Their meeting is cut short.
And that’s the end! Twelve parts has flown by, and it’s a shame to leave the story here right when all the characters are assembled, but I’ll be ready and raring to read it when it comes back.
Overall: 6/10
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/
