Sinister Dexter - should the gunsharks be permanently retired? No - they've many more stories to tell! Yes - to the electric chair with them!

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Home ¦ Reviews ¦ 2004AD Review - Part 1

31st December 04

Gavin Hanly - 2000AD Review editor

2004 Overview

An excellent year, by any standards. In April, we produced the first and only of the abortive “quarterly reviews” which raised significant concerns with the way things started out in the first 3 months. But soon after, 2000AD hit possibly the longest stretch of consistently high quality that we’ve seen for some time. Even Bec and Kawl was good (to an extent…). Pat Mills had something of a renaissance with Savage and The ABC Warriors (even if Slaine continues to reek mildly). Red Seas went from strength to strength, Low Life had a great start and the Megazine continued to evolve into a must purchase for any 2000AD reader.

There was a slight redesign of the main comic's cover, finally listing all the stories within and highlighting the anthology format better than ever before. And after many complaints from our reviewers, we’ve finally witnessed a redesign of the Nerve Centre in Prog 2005.

So it’s been a great year for 2000AD and on this form it looks like the 2000AD Review site will be around for a good while too…

A wonderful new addition to the 2000AD canon, arguably more successful than The Simping Detective (the other undercover judge story). Both tales highlight that there’s plenty of scope for more strips to be based in Mega City 1 and that the surface of possibility is barely scratched. But it was Low Life which helped to create a character with long-term appeal. Rob Williams matured as a writer on the first series, setting up the world of Nixon brilliantly, while immediately following up with a second shorter series which indicated the scope that this character could reach, with the kind of Mega City tales you could never achieve with Judge Dredd.

Williams was ably matched by Man of the Year, Henry Flint, who created a unique look for the series, mixing squalour with astounding cityscapes. Plus some excellent shades. A highly promising debut for a hopefully enduring character.

And let's make sure Dirty Frank comes back in the next series too...

Best writer: John Wagner

John Wagner has silenced most of his critics this year. He’s once again become energised on Judge Dredd with a series of excellent tales that didn’t lose steam before their end - a major improvement on last year. Strontium Dog continues to be a high quality comeback, and the knowledge of his eventual demise no longer seems to matter (Rogue Trooper writers need to learn from this). We’ll try to get an interview with the man this year (if he agrees) who, in my mind, is possibly the best comic writer we have in this country next to Alan Moore.

Best artist: Henry Flint

While Arthur Ranson made a valiant attempt to wrest this title with his work on Anderson, it seems that only Henry Flint could have come out on top.

With a highly impressive ration of his art appearing, in 32 out of 50 issues this year, he’s currently the artist to beat on both quantity and quality. With each week bringing work of extremely high calibre that brings back memories of the time when artists like O’ Neill and McMahon were working on the comic, he’s the best asset 2000AD has short of John Wagner. His work has the anarchic quality of his forefathers while still retaining his own unique style. If you compare his art this year to his early work as seen in the first Sinister Dexter collection, the level of improvement is astounding. Truly a god amongst 2000AD artists, and with more Shakara in 2005, the best may yet be to come.

Best Cover: Dredd badge broken

While the comic itself has shown a massive improvement in 2004, the covers have been a little lack-lustre. 2000AD could do with more creativity in this area if they want to stick out on ever more crowded news-stands. It has the talent to do this, but needs more of an impetus and perhaps overall creative direction behind what is one of its biggest selling tools.

Dredd’s badge has been used as the cover a number of times, memorably as with a bullet wound for the Apocalypse War or as “Brit” themed one. This image, using the “judge” emblem instead of “Dredd”, again shows how sometimes it’s the simplest ideas that work best. The shattering of the badge immediately conveys that something particularly awful is happening inside the covers and ups the excitement that had already been created by Total War. Easily the most impressive use of the cover this year.

Best Judge Dredd story: Total War

A closely fought one with Brothers in the Blood, Terror and Total War, but the latter takes the prize for being the most consistently exciting Dredd tale to appear in 2000AD for at least 5 years, and maybe even a decade.

But all three stories illustrate how far 2000AD’s core character has come this year. Finally, we’re seeing character and plot development, as well as the first significantly long series since Dredd vs Aliens. During 2003, Dredd floundered somewhat after the aforementioned Dredd/Aliens epic. But this year, things have got back on track with a good balance of one-off stories interspersed with series that actually developed an element of continuity – while still making it easier for new readers to jump on board.

Total War was the punchline for a year of backstory, with the characters of Rico, Dolmen and Vienna having been set up as significant foils for Dredd. Notably, Vienna finally brings a character to the series that can effectively stand up to Dredd and who isn’t afraid to tell him how he needs to change. Indeed, she works too as a way of telling the reader that the character of Dredd needs to develop if he’s going to last another 25 years. Comics have become too sophisticated to allow Dredd’s character to remain so unmovable, and his reaction to Vienna’s danger at the end of Total War brings with it a potentially significant shift for the future.

Whatever happens, let’s hope Wagner continues to develop his creation and that he starts to work closer with Gordon Rennie whose Dredd strips have also taken great steps forward this year, to keep this level of quality going in 2005.

Because of the general greatness in 200AD this year, this has been a particularly hard category to call. Low Life and Savage have both had highly impressive debuts, the latter showing that Pat Mills can throw of the shackles of Slaine and produce a damned good tale, free of interminable preaching, when he wants to.

But it was the return of Anderson to the Megazine which has particularly impressed. Alan Grant has had mixed success with his Dredd tales in the weekly comic, but his work for the Megazine has been excellent.

With Anderson stuck in (another) coma courtesy of John Wagner in the last Death series, Grant seemed to rise to the challenge with the double whammy of Half Life and WMD. Joining together with Arthur Ranson, who this year produced his best 2000AD work to date, he created a story that always had me reading it first whenever the Megazine arrived. I had previously been ambivalent about the Anderson series, but the fantasy world he created in Half Life, as well as the background characters in WMD made it a joy to read again.

Best Single episode: Six – Episode 1

This wins for the extremely successful way that Wagner brought PJ Maybe back to the fold. With absolutely no fanfare from the Editorial staff this provided one of the biggest shocks this year. We had already received a refresher course on the character from the well timed PJ Maybe special earlier in the year, but still none of us expected him to return to current continuity so quickly.

The method by which he was unveiled was genius – a smattering of very slight spelling mistakes could be spotted on a second reading and the reader pretty much discovered the identity at the same time as Dredd. This is a masterstroke and very difficult to achieve, so top marks to Wagner.

Most Under-rated: John Lucas on Valkyries

Valkyries made most of the 2000AD Review writers sharpen their claws. The strip had many problems, not least the George and Lynne style nudity which made you think the whole thing might actually be set in a naturist colony.

But despite the many criticisms, it seemed clear to me that John Lucas was a very talented artist who deserves far more work in the comic. I feel that assertions that his art “isn’t suited to 2000AD” are woefully misguided. The beauty about 2000AD has been that it doesn’t actually have a house style, and that some of the most unique artists in the industry have graced its pages. For the online fans to start acting as style guardians is the wrong step. If the art needs work, or if it’s unsuited to that particular storyline – then the accusation is valid. However to dismiss a clearly talented artist off-hand seems lunacy. Hopefully Lucas has licked the wounds received from Valkyries and has been hired by Tharg for something else in 2005.

Most Over-rated: Chopper

While John Wagner has had a very strong year, occasionally the praise can be a little too blind. This category was a toss up between Strontium Dog and Chopper. Strontium Dog because "Traitor to his Kind" simply wasn’t anywhere near as good as some of its critics would have you believe. Sure, it was highly enjoyable and a good step back towards the more serious side of Alpha but it wasn’t as earth-changing as we might have hoped.

But the most over-rated has to go to Chopper. Never having understood the attraction of Chopper, especially after he came back from the dead, this is one character who needs a major revision if he is going to get another chance. This series achieved absolutely nothing in furthering the character – at the end of it he’s exactly where he began and we’re left wondering “what was the point?” Just because he’s a “fan favourite” shouldn’t make the fans turn off their critical faculties. If he has to come back again, let’s make it worth it next time.

Metro Dredd

Metro Dredd was possibly one of the best deals Rebellion have done since buying 2000AD. Instantly attracting a readership that might have forgotten all about Dredd and not even known that the comic was still going, this is a masterstroke in marketing. Getting Eva and Inaki on art duties was also a great move, giving the strip a continuity in look and feel from the outset and the artists were ideally placed to work in the tricky nature of newspaper strip art. Andy Clarke’s later art has shown him to be even a better choice, with the strip continuing to be of an extremely high quality art-wise.

However, the 5 day strips are beginning to show their limitations. At the moment, they simply isn’t getting the scope needed to properly show the masses the true appeal of the character. And there really need to be better jokes too – there have been a number of cringeworthy scenes.

Finally - no more reprints of earlier strips, please. Having reprints in the first year was a cardinal sin and made me, for one, stop reading it regularly. Considering that the paper is free, and I pass by a stand full of them every morning, this is clearly a bad sign. So longer strips and no reprints for 2005, please!

There are a number of things to consider here. The improvement in the quality of the Dredd stories, the generally high quality throughout the year, and a tendency to have slightly longer series of 10 episodes at a time were all highly welcome.

But perhaps the best was the announcement and launch of the DC/Rebellion line of trade collections. For too long, the Rebellion or Titan collections have been short and expensive but that time is gone, hopefully for good. The first collections have been of varying quality, but anything that finally brings a complete reprint of Devlin Waugh and, more importantly, Nikolai Dante is to be praised highly. The collections in 2005 all look like being good buys and its gratifying to see such an intelligent cross company publishing solution.

The worst thing: 2000AD PR and news

The worst thing has without doubt been the PR surrounding 2000AD. From the lack of a significant announcement of Dredd Metro (Nemi got a full page article yet Dredd gets a solitary mention on the front page?) to the extraordinary lack of press surrounding Dreddcon (more of that later), Rebellion clearly need to improve their game in 2005. This also extends to making better use of the Nerve Center and non strip sections of the comic. The Megazine has gone the right direction with some intelligent articles and now the Nerve Centre needs to do the same thing. Prog 2005 has at least indicated that we’ll be able to read the Nerve Center in 2005, now let’s make it worth reading…

Let’s also see a return of the regular press releases that we saw in 2003.

What would you recommend for Dreddcon next year?

Once again, I missed Dreddcon. However, this is another year where the trek to Oxford made attendance impossible for me. Now, many fans travelled over far more ground, but I can’t help feel that moving Dreddcon to Oxford has meant a backward step for Dreddcon. Only the hardcore fans or locals make the trip, whereas setting it in London (not necessarily central London either – there are many areas outside of the centre that are just as easy to get to, and a hell of a lot cheaper) would immediately deliver a larger audience.

But one thing’s for sure – we need a hell of a lot more warning about the date of 2005's Dreddcon. Let’s agree on a date for Dreddcon much earlier in the year. Hell – make it on the launch of the Rogue Trooper game (although game delays may make this impossible). But announce it (and a location – even a rough idea of a location) within the first 3 months and start to build things up from there. Agree a final line up about a month beforehand (latecomers can always be added if necessary) and publish the day’s talks and activities online at least one to two weeks before the con.

In other words, make the damned thing easier to report. One thing that was clear from this year’s con was that there was little or no reporting of the event beyond this site (not counting messageboards). This is a huge missed opportunity – things should be announced at the con that get picked up by Newsarama, Pulse and the like. By all means act as a meeting ground for the online community, but this year, please try to reach a little further too.

What would you like to see from 2000AD in 2005?

The one thing I would particularly like to see would be a decent game in the shape of Rogue Trooper as well as decent PR on the same. The gaming community is very much on Rebellion’s side and most of the reviews for Dredd showed their love of the character, but an air of despair at the game. Early shots of Rogue Trooper in 2005 look promising, but let’s get a decent amount of coverage out there – not just restricted to PC Zone and C&VG. Online sites such as Eurogamer and IGN are becoming more ever influential and we need to see previews starting to appear everywhere from early 2005.

Oh, and properly enhancing the game for the Xbox would be nice too. With Xbox live too, perhaps?

Otherwise, it’s be good to see some more promotion of the DC line of graphic novels in the comics aside from editorials and more in depth features in both publications.

What would you like to see from 2000AD Review in 2005?

For the whole thing to manage itself and require absolutely no work from me? Hmm - I can't see that happening...

This question was more targeted at my fellow reviewers, but I’m always looking for more reviewers and of course if anyone writes into 2000AD and the Megazine mentioning this site, all efforts would be much appreciated.

In the meantime, I'd like to thank all those who have helped out with the site this year:

• John Amans
• Ed Berridge
• Martin Charlton
• Richmond Clements
• Liam Greene
• David Knight
• WR Logan
• James Mackay
• Eric Moore
• Iain Nixon
• Hugh Platt
• Leigh Shepherd
• Sprout
• Paul White

And a big thanks to all those who agreed to be interviewed in 2004 - hopefully we'll have loads more interviews in 2005.

Go to part 2