Epics 19-17: hidden gems

Epic 19: Dead Zone Megs 350-355
Written by John Wagner; Art by Henry Flint
(6 episides, 60 pages; epic number 43 in sequence)

The Basics: A poor couple out in the Cursed Earth are kidnapped and forced to work as slaves in a death mine. One of them finds a bracelet that gives him magic powers, and ends up fleeing into the city, pursued by Dredd.

The other key point of the story - our protagonists are genuinely good people.
Art by Henry Flint

Analysis: It’s the art that makes this story stand out. Henry Flint was really going for it with the colours especially, which keeps the story going even when the focus shifts from one character to another quite suddenly. The story is fine, but rather odd, a weird mix of very new, with the post-Chaos setting, but very old, in the sense of Wagner playing around with the sort of Sci-Fi concepts that cropped up in the really early days of 2000AD.

The tale opens out in the Cursed Earth, just. Specifically, on top of one of many vast pits where Chaos Plague victims were buried in haste. Flint’s depiction of the people who work here, from the civil servants to the bosses to the slaves is superlative, right back in the territory of McMahon and Smith from the glory days of the Judge Child.

 

Such glorious grisly detail
Art by Henry Flint

Wagner meanwhile gives us Yodie and Ellen, who are on the lovable and decent end of the characters he ever writes about. The trick then is to see what happens to good people who stumble on bad times, then chance into a weapon of great and terrible power – in this case, a bracelet that confers magic science powers on the wearer. 

Invisibility confers the power to steal donuts.
Art by Henry Flint

You could say it’s another poke at the themes of Mandroid. As in that tale, Dredd is more of a witness than a major player. Unlike that tale, Wagner sort of loses confidence half way through and feels he needs to explain the magic bracelet – they’re from the future, you see. And then the focus shifts into the city, and onto two time travellers who brought bracelets with them. These characters are perfectly well-drawn, but also not quite drawn enough to win over our affections from Yodie.

It mildly irritates that we don’t know anything about the future they came from, and how or why that informs their choices in the present day (as it were). Wagner keeps the focus on Yodie just enough to see the emotion of the first half through, but if it wasn’t for Flint keeping the art at top levels of fancy, this would take a fair dive.

 

Dredd is a constant background presence, stubbornly forcing his way through the investigation.
Art by Henry Flint

Story: 7/10
Art: 10/10
Legacy: The story got a sequel – Breaking Bud - fairly soon afterwards but for some reason in the Prog not the Meg, making this a cross-over of sorts. We don’t follow Yodie this time, but a disgruntled Mega citizen. And, as before, the focus shifts part way through back onto the future people who own the magic bracelet and the timecops who come to get it back. Ultimately Judge Dredd wins, and now there are multiple magic bracelets, and potentially also some new time-jump devices in Justice Dept storage. One imagines any writer who was inclined could summon them back.

Overall score: 17 out of 20
Want to read it? There's a collection, which includes the semi-sequel, too.

 

Some neo-noir for you now, in a hard-boiled tale of fake identities, gangsters and Dredd in the middle...

Epic 18: Served Cold/The Cop Progs 1718-1725; Megs 356-361
Written by Al Ewing; Art by John Higgins and Ben Willsher
(If you add them up, it's 14 episodes, 108 pages. I'm listing this 'split' epic as number 45 in sequence)

This one’s half way between being a spit epic and a technicality. Writer Al Ewing wanted to tell a modern noir tale in Mega City One, and did so with a neat little 8-parter in the Progs called Served Cold. Whether planned or not, he picked up on a couple of story threads later, and then one day delivered a full-blown sequel in the Meg. By virtue of the Megazine’s increased page count, this sequel is big enough to qualify as an epic in its own right. I think the whole thing counts as one, not least because a time delay is a built-in part of the plot.

The Basics: Deller, a gangland heavy, escapes from prison and enacts a careful but violent revenge against the various people who set him up to get in prison in the first place. Dredd heads the team investigating. Deller's plot succeeds... right up until the point that it doesn't.

 

Art by Karl Richardson

Analysis: In essence, this is a long form version of a story about a criminal who is able to outsmart Dredd. Of course, by the story's end, Dredd wins. But the point is that the criminal made just a single error, partly as a result of over-confidence in his own abilities, and partly because his emotional need for revenge got in the way of his calculating brain. This is all, I think, very deliberately designed as a counterpoint to the character of Dredd, who is not especially calculating, but rather methodical and relentless in pursuit of a foe, and whose emotions generally work to make him more effective – by ramping up the doggedness – rather than bringing him down.

 

Dredd does not like it when a perp seems to get the better of him!
Art by John Higgins

As such, it's great. But, alongside all this, the story is also, I gather, a sort of pastiche/homage to the Richard Parker novels, which I haven't read, and based on this, I don't really want to. Tough ne'erdowells getting into scrapes and setting each other up for a fall isn't my thing, and nor is the writing style that goes along with it. I will say that I admire the plotting, which is very clever across both 'Served Cold' and 'The Cop'. It's very satisfying to read a well-executed prison-break / infiltration / revenge story. Even more satisfying to see Dredd being outwitted, until the exact point when he isn't.

 

Dredd doesn't mind waiting decades to get the justice he's after...
Art by Ben Willsher

Less satisfying when the whole thing hinges on one of Mega City's many criminal enterprises. In this case that's 'The Organization'. I get that these things do exist in the real world, and probably would in Mega City 1, but I've never been taken with them as story points, not matter how artfully constructed.

 Story: 8/10
Art: 9/10 You've got John Higgins on The Cop and Ben Willsher on Served Cold, both doing very good work with criminals, noir tropes, poker faces and grim Dredd visages. But this is a rather more down-to-Earth type tale than much of Dredd, so neither has the chance to show off that spectacular Sci-Fi weirdness that remains at Dredd’s core.
Legacy: quite a large time gap between Served Cold and The Cop meant space for a few stories in between to bring up 'the Organisation'. And in theory, it could make a comeback but hasn't so far. One of those stories introduced Accounts Judge Maitland, who has become a recurring character of some importance since, though!

Plenty of trademark 2000AD violence on show - rather less of the trademark Ewing funnytimes.
Art by Ben Willsher

Overall Score: 17.4 out of 20
Want to read it? So far, it's only available in the Hachette Mega Collection, which you'll have to find second-hand at this point.

Time now for another exploration of how gangsters can get away with it in Mega City One - at least, until Judge Dredd gets on the case...

Epic 17: Block Judge Progs 1900-1909
Written by John Wagner; Art by Carlos Ezquerra
(10 episodes, 61 pages; epic number 42 in sequence)

The Basics: Dredd is appointed to clean up a problem Block with a minimal staff to help him. He succeeds, sort of.

Analysis: So the first thing I noticed on this re-read was the art. Carlos Ezquerra is on frantic form, packing in the panels and doing all he can to show you quite how overwhelming the task for Dredd is. The first episode, in particular, is so densely packed it sort of smacks you over the head. By episode 3 or so the epic has settled into an A) narrative about Dredd breaking up a gang-based drugs ring, and lots of B) narratives about everything else that goes on in Block life. It gets a bit easier to read, and the whole thing becomes quite reminiscent of TV cop dramas such as The Wire, but really all police procedurals.

Lots of panels, lots of Judge-work!
Art by Carlos Ezquerra

You could also say this is The Pit again, but focussed on a single Block, and not nearly as long. You could again also say that this is an extended version of the much-loved story ‘Graveyard Shift’, which feels like it ought to be an epic but wasn’t quite long enough. Or again, it has elements of ‘Sector House’, the Pit kinda-sequel. There are even elements of the first half of ‘Tour of Duty’, in which Dredd and Beeny have to work with slightly sub-standard Judges to get a job done.

You get the idea - Wagner is playing around with themes and story ideas that he knows he is good at, and knows work well for Dredd. And on this level Block Judge satisfies. There are places when it does more than satisfy. We’ve seen Dredd and co use proper bullying tactics to take down gangsters before, notably all the way back in the Mega Rackets. But here Ezquerra really nails quite how vicious this looks, and Wagner takes the time to show that even Chief Judge Hershey disapproves. More interestingly, we the readers know that Dredd is definitely punishing bad people – so we’re forced to ask ourselves if we think we would like to live in a system where the police could use similar methods. I think I’d rather allow a few druglords and gangs to operate than live in a police state. But perhaps if I lived in that Block, I don’t know…

 

When is it acceptable for the police to lie and hurt people? Always/never?
Art by Carlos Ezquerra

This brings up one of the disappointments. Comparing this epic to The Wire is entirely my own suggestion, but unlike that show, Wagner gives literally not a single thought to the people who are buying the drugs – and clearly, the drug business in booming in this Block. In fact, where the gang and criminal mastermind stuff is almost played seriously, pretty much all the other block shenanigans are played for laughs. They’re funny and needed laughs, but I think there’s a missed opportunity for Dredd to muse on why citizens tolerate gangs and indeed are so keen on buying the drugs they sell. Even a throwaway line of dialogue from Beeny would have made the point.

Still, you can’t deny the fun of seeing Dredd methodically and just-about legally plodding his way to the end of the case. And you absolutely can’t deny the fun of seeing a small team of Judges win out against hordes of baddies. And I do love the joke on the final panel, which Wagner has built up just carefully enough that you know it’s coming but can’t quite believe it’ll happen.

 

This isn't the ending - just another day on the grind
Art by Carlos Ezquerra

Story: 8/10
Art: 9/10 – it’s great, obviously, but perhaps not quite as great as some of the King’s best.
Legacy: None to speak of, except more bonding between Dredd and Beeny.

Overall Score: 17.5 out of 20
Want to read it? It was collected as a mini-trade bagged with Megazine 396.

 

Next time: now it gets serious! We're getting our first two big names, when it comes to Mega Epics, and a recent tie-off to a years-long background storyline.