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Home ¦ Features ¦ 2005AD Review part 2

31st December 05

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Onto part 3

David Knight - reviewer and synopsis writer

2005 Overview

2005 had a lot to live up to, given that 2004 was such a golden year for 2000AD, with Judge Dredd in Total War, Strontium Dog in Traitor to his Kind, and the return of ABC Warriors.

There were more than a few mediocre patches in 2005, but it wasn’t a bad year on the whole. There were peaks of excitement around the Safe House story arc for Caballistics Inc., Judge Dredd in Blood Trails and Mandroid, the return of The Red Seas, and Savage in Book II: Out of Order; and Dan Abnett and Simon Davies gave us the most fun Sinister Dexter story for ages in Slow Train to Kal Cutter.

Best Strip: Shakara

When not pitting the central character against an entire army at once – or two opposing armies – Shakara is at its best, with Shakara either picking off small groups of his opponents one by one; or when Shakara isn’t there at all, and the story is building up characters like Valentine D’eath and his gang. It’s great too when Shakara comes along later to kill them all off.

Best writer: Pat Mills

Pat Mills had a great year, not only producing a Slaine series that moved along at a fair old rip, but also scripting the triumphant second book of Savage, giving prominence to madcap weapons technology and syphilitic rape.

Best artist: Henry Flint

It was Shakara that did it. Flint wasn’t as much in evidence in 2005 as in the year before, but his Shakara artwork has been among the most eye-catching in 2000AD this year. Part of the responsibility of course lies with Robbie Morrison for giving him such amazing things to draw, but the visual realisation of Shakara’s mind-boggling adventures is all Flint’s.

Prog 1455

Best Cover: 2000AD Prog 1455

Charlie Adlard drew this eye-catching Volgan propaganda flyer featuring Captain Svetlana Jaksic; a companion piece to Prog 1451’s pro-resistance leaflet cover.

Quite apart from the attractiveness of the uniformed enemy dominatrix sitting atop the turret of a military vehicle, what impressed me about this cover was the economy of Chris Blythe’s colouring, and the fact that 2000ad can show this much imagination in its cover designs once in a while, recalling the newspaper front page of Prog 78 for Ant Wars and the movie poster of Prog 88 for Hammerstein’s War Memoirs.

Best Judge Dredd story: Caught in the Act

Despite the pathos, artwork and unhurried pacing of Mandroid, I’ll nominate Caught in the Act, which showed how a pithy short Judge Dredd story can be the equal of many a mini-epic, and also just how menacing a police state is in practice, and how our own government might behave if allowed to do whatever it likes in the name of ‘the public good’.

Best Non-Dredd story: Slaine: Odacon

I’ve amazed myself with this choice, but judged against my other highlights of the year, Shakara and Savage Book II, it seems clear to me that Odacon was the most entertaining. Maybe it’s just relief at seeing Slaine doing something different after hating the Tara storyline so much. Odacon started off with Slaine executing his countrymen and burning innocent villages merely for being infested with symbiotic sea-demon larvae, in effect becoming a cipher for Nemesis The Warlock’s old adversary, Torquemada. Whatever illogic followed, the story kept up a lively pace, was packed with incident, and built up to a spectacular finish, regardless of the stupidity of Slaine’s enemy. Artist Clint Langley played a major role in making this story something to look forward to reading each week.

Best Single episode: Shakara: The Assassin, Part 2 (Prog 1442).

Introducing a new, ultra-cool character, Valentine D’eath!

In most readers’ minds, Sinister Dexter is the filler strip, to plug a gap between ‘real’ stories when Tharg hasn’t got enough Future Shocks to bridge a gap of three issues or more. Well, they’re wrong! Sinister Dexter has been a mainstay of 2000AD because the characters are memorable and interesting enough to have been invited back time and again …and they’re useful because their adventures are both short and numerous.

Slow Train to Kal Cutter was good not because of the annoying device whereby Dan Abnett disrupted the chronology of the narrative, but for the escalating destruction and the proliferation of clones toward the end of the journey. Lovely use of mauve By Simon Davies there, too.

Most Over-rated: Breathing Space

There were a few series I found disappointing this year, including Blood Trails, The VCs, and Tiger Sun Dragon Moon. American Gothic disappointed because it seemed like a great missed opportunity, focusing on the main character’s feud with his brother more than the hurdles the folklore creatures face in making a new life for themselves. Leatherjack was overrated, I think, because it was a bit of a dogs’ breakfast of enough ideas for several shorter stories, and the most interesting ones got used up early on.

The most overrated series of 2005 was Breathing Space, which seemed to get a good reception on its first appearance but went out of favour quite quickly.

The best thing about 2000AD this year

2000AD’s artists may be an even more important resource than its long-running characters. The likes of Charlie Adlard, Clint Langley, Henry Flint, Boo Cook, Simon Davies, John Burns, Carl Critchlow, Dom Reardon, and Steve Yeowell, plus regular Megazine artists Fraser Irving, Colin MacNeil and Carlos Ezquerra, are themselves reason enough to buy the comics, although fine artwork is all the more enjoyable when used to tell a well-written story.

The worst thing about 2000AD this year

The only downside to 2000AD for me in 2005 was a lack of really big stories featuring premier league characters; but last year we got simultaneous Judge Dredd and Strontium Dog epics, so it has hardly been a surprise.

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

I’d like to see 2000AD playing to its strengths, so more Strontium Dog, some extended military-style Judge Dredds, the next book of ABC Warriors, the next book of Savage, and as much of the new favourites like Caballistics Inc., Lobster Random and The Red Seas as can be published without resulting in over exposure.

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Onto part 3