Synopsis by David Knight
Review by Gavin Hanly
2nd Opinion by Martin Charlton

Summaries and reviews contain spoilers for this issue.

The Monsterus Mashinashuns of PJ Maybe - part 2

Maybe claims another victim...

Synopsis: While the Mega-City One delegation to Cuidad Barranquilla sleeps, P.J. Maybe’s remote controlled robot assassin bug creeps into their quarters. It injects Mrs Synthia Eucre with a deadly poison. Her death throes draw the attention of Judges Dredd and Gordon, but the robot escapes into an air vent and moves in to attack Judge Rymes, who has taken sleeping pills. Councillor Sutch is found murdered in his room, but Judge Rymes hasn’t appeared, prompting Dredd and Gordon to try her room, where they are in time to stop the killer robot bug. P.J. Maybe could have controlled the machine from anywhere within 5 kilometres.

Dredd is awaiting the outcome of a DNA analysis on a sample of Pedro Montez’s blood, which may prove the suspect is really P.J. Maybe in disguise. When the results come in, the samples do not prove to be a match because Maybe deliberately provided the judges with a false blood sample.

Meanwhile, P.J. Maybe’s robot girlfriend and accomplice, Inga, is on a mission in Calhab, abducting the philanthropist Dr. Byron Ambrose for her master’s nefarious purposes. Ambrose is the leader of a desperately poor rural community. Inga tells Ambrose that she represents his grandfather who wishes to leave him a vast fortune. Using her feminine wiles to get the doctor on board her ship, the robot kidnaps him and subjects him to automated surgery for the removal of his heart.

GH: John Wagner and Carlos Ezquerra on potentially the last ever PJ Maybe adventure was never going to completely disappoint, but there's always room to be wary of such a hyped up story. Thankfully, this is showing both creators at the top of their game as Maybe goes straight back to his murderous ways, revelling in his own cleverness at the outwitting of the judges.

And just when we thought this could be a standard Maybe vs Dredd battle of wits, Wagner pulls in the deftly handled sub-plot of Doctor Ambrose and his rather unfortunate fate. In some ways, another complete body transplant should have been an obvious turn for Maybe, but I simply didn't see this coming until the final page, which is what makes this and much of Wagner's recent output such a joy. The knowledge that this is going to lead to more "mashinashuns" next issue as maybe goes after even more money makes this a fascinating read.

Whether Dredd, who has an instinct that Maybe perhaps underestimates, will catch him this time is already proving in doubt. One way or another, this is an excellent series and no matter how good Rennie is proving to be in the weekly, he's got some way to go to top this...

MC: It’s great, this is. That could quite easily do for this review. I mean, look at the composite parts – Wagner, Ezquerra, Maybe – it was never gonna be a stinker, was it? Some great action again this month, with a real sense that the subtitle could be ‘the plot thickens…’ or some such. I did feel this chapter lost steam somewhat towards the end, with the occasional piece of clunky dialogue, but nothing major. I do have just one request though. Could Dredd possibly catch Maybe sometime soon? I know the fun is in the chase, but I’d love to see it happen this time. It won’t though, and this predictability does ruin the narrative somewhat…

Art wise, Carlos turns in the quality of performance we expect, with a glorious blend of ‘proper’ colour and ‘Carlos-colour’ adding depth and texture where needed. Superb, but then, you knew that…

Part 2

Backed into a corner...

Synopsis: Cuidad Barranquilla Judges Xavi and Sofia’s local guide leads them to Zancudo Picchu, a city built by sentient giant mosquitoes. It is easy to enter the city, but getting out is another matter. The mosquitoes tax their slaves, taking payment in blood, and lay eggs under their skin. Slaves and mosquitoes alike are afflicted by the blight, a debilitating sickness.

A high-ranking mosquito demands payment in blood from the uncommonly healthy intruders, but is killed by an armour-piercing round from Judge Xavi’s gun. As the judges flee, mosquitoes capture the girl and disarm Xavi. They are cornered in an alley, but are shown a way out of the city by a stranger.

The slave girl is examined by the Divine Empress mosquito Culextl, whose vizier pronounces the girl has been cured of the blight. One of the mosquitoes’ prisoners, a telepathic criminal named Fendito who escaped from Xavi and Sofia’s custody, gets himself released by offering to help capture the judges, whose medicine may be the key to curing the blight.

The judges follow the stranger into the jungle, where they see diseased mosquito larvae in the river, and their benefactor tells them to wait for him to bring the Old Ones in the morning. They spend the night in an old military hut, and in the morning Xavi is captured by giant mosquitoes led by the outlaw telepath Fendito. Before he can capture Sofia as well, his mosquitoes are frightened off by the Old Ones – giant ants that have existed in this part of the Amazon since perhaps as long ago as 1978.

GH: So Simon Spurrier reveals his hand as this is beginning to look more and more like a sequel to that pulp favourite, Ant Wars (Perhaps we should be keeping a closer eye on the Extreme Editions for ideas on what to expect from future issues? Maybe M.A.C.H.1 is the new Dredd nemesis, Mandroid?).

Realising that you simply can't write a story like that in this day and age and make it "serious", Spurrier goes straight for the absurd approach. Unlike his writing on Bec and Kawl, which suffocates under the use of far too many obvious film references, this is a far more satisfying read given that Spurrier has to try harder to get to the punchline. Most of these are limited to the wonderful captions and overuse of bold ("in the rancorous rainforest you must snatch what comforts you may!) but the whole story is pleasantly ridiculous.

Spurrier's way of making his characters act more or less straight-laced helps to reinforce the humour, as does Kennedy's artwork, which never makes the mistake of laying it on too thick. Indeed, this has all the comforting allure of a cheesy B movie, and I can't believe no one's ever attempted something like this before...

MC: Ah, so that’s what Spurrier is doing, revisiting a classic, and giving it a new twist, while walking the fine line between repetition and tradition.

Whenever I read something like this, I’m always reminded of that Durham Red story that looked again at Fiends of the Eastern Front. Some gentle parody/homage to Ant Wars original, much maligned, writer adds a sort of ‘carry on Anting’ vibe, although this isn’t all together unpleasant. I must admit, Fendito seems to be as much a plot device as an actual character, but I’ll let that slip, when the story is this much fun. I love the work of the Spurrier droid, and its always pleasure to see him try his hand at something new/old, with the obvious comparison being that every time he does so, he moves closer to the title of ‘the new Alan Moore’. And I mean that.

Cam Kennedy, whilst never going to be remembered as ‘the man who drew Zancudo’, turns in another stellar job, fitting the ‘retro’ category nicely, while still being contemporary enough to stop this looking at first glance like a reprint story.

All Hell - Part 2

Little riled Waugh more than ruining a good coat...

Synopsis: Devlin Waugh, Ralph Beerbohm and Harry Kiri fly in over Sino-City Two. The I Ching warns of trouble, and Harry detects something evil taking form in the realm of the afterlife. Their intelligence has discovered that Grand Master Tsung leads a group of enemy magicians intent upon using the stolen Eye of Sekhmet to retrieve someone or something from Hell. It is also known that Tsung has allied himself with Devlin Waugh’s old adversary Jakob Sprenger, known as the Catechist; and a demon, Kolkiss.

Having set down in Kowloon, Devlin and his comrades are attacked by the Yen Mei, five ninja demon animal spirits. Ralph uses his body magic to accelerate the rat spirit’s demise through bacterial decay, while Devlin and Harry fight off two more. Devlin Waugh draws the remaining fox and badger spirits away from his fellows and hits the badger in the face with a wok of boiling oil. Devlin issues a challenge to the Catechist through the senses of the badger before killing it with its own sword.

Wu Master Tsung opens a doorway to Hell, and asks his companions who will be the first to go through it.

GH: Unlike the last Waugh series from Smith and MacNeill, this is less of an action romp and harks back to the more convoluted tales like the Herod affair. Indeed, the publication of the recent trade collections make the return of the larger supporting character community much easier to bear.

But despite the emphasis on plot this time around, they do manage to throw in a fine fight sequence that superbly illustrates how Smith and MacNeil are producing a wonderful team effort. While I have to admit there are moments where I don't have a clue what's going on (although David's synopsis above certainly helps), I can't help but think, to quote Devlin, "isn't it ripping?"

MC: Making it three great strips in a row, with John Smith and Colin MacNeil both reminding us why they are so pivotal to the roster of droids currently at Tharg’s disposal. Look at the top row of page five, the way the panel disintegrates with its occupant. It seems so obvious, but it would be so easy to miss. The perfect synthesis of art & script, in my view.

The story itself continues to hurry along, and while I must admit to occasionally not knowing what exactly is happening in the wider picture, panel to panel it continues to thrill. So mission accomplished.

A Bullet in the Head - Part 2

Woo tried to hold it in...

Synopsis: Inspector Liu Chan Yeun, also known as Johnny Woo, has been assigned to provide police protection to a criminal boss named Tommy Heung. The inspector meets Heung’s bodyguards, whose cousins and brother he himself shot dead. Woo, Heung and Heung’s bodyguards set off in a hover limo as Heung conducts his illicit business, flanked by two more cars for protection. Heung asks Woo about his private life. The inspector’s wife was a justice officer like himself, but disappeared while undercover and is presumed dead.

Woo sees an attack formation of assassins on flying bikes in the rear view mirror, and climbs up through the sun roof to return fire. Heung’s own car is shielded against rocket attacks, but his other cars are not. They take refuge in a safe house with a concealed hover-car port, but all is not as it should be. Heung’s men are not there to protect him, and a sniper lies in wait. Heung’s bodyguards die protecting him, then Woo is hit in the shoulder. He fires at the sniper, but the sniper’s armour deflects his shots. The sniper turns and runs, having lost the element of surprise and having failed to shoot to kill the inspector.

GH: I remain slightly unconvinced by the Johnny Woo character. There's not a great deal in him that's making him particularly sympathetic and that the story appears to exist mainly so that Rennie gets to write an old-school John Woo epic. It has a feel of a story written to order, rather than the writer actually trying to achieve something with it.

That said, such tales can still be entertaining and looking past the almost paper thin main character, there's still a lot to like. Rennie can keep a tale moving fast enough so that you don't have time to be too concerned about originality, and Holden improves every time I see his work, with some outstanding action pieces on show here.

MC: Third Dredd spin off, and the first one I wasn’t looking forward to. I never liked Woo’s character in his previous meetings with Dredd, so much so that I didn’t read the first part until the second arrived. However, while Rennie doesn’t hit the heights of his other work (you know what I mean), there’s nothing wrong with this. It sits nicely in the Meg, as an all action counterpart to some of the more ‘considered’ strips, and has some lovely internal monologues, that give the impression that if Dredd allowed it, Rennie would get us inside his head more often, with fascinating results.

PJ Holden’s art fails to offend, and fits the story well, once you get into it. The dialogue is often sparse, which means Holden has to tell much of the story visually, and does so without risking that moment where the readers thinks ‘which panel do I go to next’. So far, so good.

Return to Casablanca - Part 6

The "motorcycle maestros" show their dedication to duty...

Synopsis: The Bogie Man, believing himself to be Humphrey Bogart in the role of Rick Blane from the film Casablanca, has tracked McCurdie’s gang to their hideout by a stroke of luck. McCurdie believes an Albanian fugitive to be his old flame Ilsa Lund, currently in the clutches of the gang whom he believes to be the Gestapo, whom he calls the ‘Scuzi’. The Bogie Man shoots the Albanian woman’s chains to set her free, and hatches a plan to put her husband Viktor Laszlo (Sir Rab McNab) on a plane out of Casablanca (Edinburgh) and for ‘Ilsa’ to remain with him.

The Bogie Man kneecaps the McCurdies’ henchman and returns fire on the other gang members whose attention is attracted by the shots. Outside the hideout, the rescued Albanians climb aboard the dray the Bogie Man (Francis Forbes Clunie) hijacked outside the Rix Bar. Clunie causes a pile-up with the truck, giving McCurdie’s men their chance to get on board, while the Albanians attempt to fight them off.

Clunie heads for Edinburgh Castle, believing it to be the way to the airport. He crashes through a barrier straight into the Edinburgh Tattoo. The barrel with Sir Rab McNab nailed inside falls off the dray, and as he emerges drunk, he sees the audience and thinks he is performing in his one man show at the festival. Inspector Douglas spots Clunie and attempts to arrest him, but is flung into the motorcycle display team for his trouble.

GH: In previous reviews, I've mentioned how I never really got the point nor joke of the Bogie Man before. But the more I think about it, I believe it's because I've never particularly paid any great attention to it. But with it being in the Megazine on a regular basis there's been plenty of time to get to grips with the utter nonsense of a storyline and warm up to the general insanity that permeates the strip.

It's always infectious when you can sense that a writer or artist is really enjoying what he's producing, and it's certainly the case here. This brings back memories of early Grant/Wagner collaborations where they would bring out one daft situation after another. Once you get to the kilt-wearing police motorcycle display team, paying scant attention to the fights going on around them, you know you're onto a winner.

Far, far better than I thought it might be, and it's given me new appreciation for Robin Smith's art too - and I couldn't imagine anyone else taking on Clunie from now on.

MC: When this started, I wasn’t bowled over, then I warmed to it. However, over the past two issues, I’ve kinda lost it again. Maybe it’s the month gap that’s doing it, a similar effect that blighted Red Tide in 2003.

This month sees more lunacy, but I personally am going to wait till the conclusion of the tale before re-reading it. Robin Smith turns in another great performance, but I’d put this tale down as a failed experiment for all concerned. I know most people are enjoying this, and I hate to sound like a purist, but this story isn’t pushing the thrill buttons I ask for in a 2000AD tale. Sorry. Don’t hold it against me.

City of Dead - Part 2

Redefining the term "bad dog"

Synopsis: Under the control of a nanotech virus, Psi-judge Janzen has gone berserk, killing fellow judges and taking a hostage. Anderson orders Psi-judge Moog to put on a psychic amplifier helmet and separate Janzen from his hostage by telekinesis. Moog’s control of his boosted powers is inadequate, and Janzen is flung through a window onto a spike. Shenker, head of Psi Division, orders a ban on telepathy to prevent the spread of the Half-Life virus among his judges, but also orders a mind probe of Janzen’s corpse.

The effects of the virus are felt elsewhere, as it influences a self-proclaimed prophet to set fire to himself. A minor criminal named Dazzy Beatle commits a spontaneous murder as a first step on a new path. The pets at a robot dog show turn on their owners and every human within the arena.

Judge Anderson visits Judge Shakta, who has been attempting to contact the witch-judge Gistane and is being blocked by his superior, Fauster. Anderson and Shakta head down to the Extispicists’ laboratories in the basement. Fauster tries to fob them off, but reluctantly calls Gistane. Gistane speak to them formally and shows no signs of personality. Returning upstairs, Anderson resolves to read Fauster’s mind to discover what he’s hiding.

GH: Things are building up nicely here, although I must admit that I'm not quite getting to the same levels of excitement as witnessed during the first two parts of the Half Life saga. Indeed, the revelation of the Half Life virus being out in the city has come as something of a disappointment - partly because I don't really understand what this means and what Half LIfe actually does. But Grant throws things in like the "blanket ban on telepathy", which is an interesting turn, throwing more limitations on an already stretched department.

Ideally we'll see things pick up speed now that Anderson is more aware of the real villain at the heart of the piece, and I'm looking forward to next month's episode where the plot laying of this issue should have some pay-off.

Ranson is still utterly excellent, and his work seems to be getting more gory every time he appears. He's a truly outstanding artist, and certainly one of the best working for 2000AD at the moment. However, when this epic is done, I'd be happy to see him try his hand at something else for a while as it'd be good to see him stretch beyond Anderson.

MC: It’s great to see Anderson back in the big Meg, rather than in her mind. Of course, we all know that Mega City 1 is capable of producing things more terrifying than the worst nightmare, and this has really been the case with this tale thus far. Another story which feels like its just getting going, Grant really is taking the Caballistics approach, spinning this story out slowly, focusing on the day to day events, while drip-feeding us the over arching narrative.

The dog show is my personal favourite moment this month, itself not being part of the main story, but worthy of inclusion because it gives Arthur Ranson something wonderful to draw. And he really does a grand job here. Maintaining the monthly output can’t be easy, but he really seems to be having a ball depicting this version of Dredd’s world – grim, gritty, and seemingly populated by Judges who are WAY out of their depth. Good stuff.

Miscellaneous Material inc.

• Bryan Talbot interview
• Sexton Blake feature
• Dreddlines
• Judge Dredd - Curse of the Spider Woman
• Metro Dredd
• Heatseekers
  

GH: The back up material this month is certainly decent enough, but I must admit to skipping the article on Sexton Blake, time getting away from me.

I do feel that the Heatseekers contributors should be doing something a little more like columnist work as opposed to reviews of whatever comes their way. Only Simon Spurrier's column does seem to be heading in the right direction, with a much more coherent piece, less prone to the rambling that inflicted his earlier articles. I feel there could be some interesting analyses into comics themselves in these short articles, and the Yojimbo piece just doesn't cut it for me.

I've said it before, but they should really get David Bishop in, who did such a wonderful job in Comics International. This section needs someone to replace Rennie, and so far none of the other columnists are quite up to the job.

Good choice of Dredd reprints, however, even if I find myself less impressed with Will Simpson's colour art than I remember being at the time.

MC: I love Bryan Talbot’s stuff. It’s that simple. He produces some deeply subversive work, and deserves to be much bigger than he is. Tale of One Bad Rat was a masterpiece, his Nemesis work is equal to any other done on the series, and this interview just reminded me what a minor classic Memento was. The interview itself could have had more of Talbot’s dialogue, rather than this timeline we are presented with, but no real complaints. (incidentally, I bumped into Bryan in Sunderland a few months ago, and came over all fanboy. Happens to the best of us.)

The Sexton Blake piece was well researched, interesting and quite funny, but I failed to connect with it due perhaps to the writing style, which seemed less interested in giving a fair appraisal of Blake, and instead was just a snatch too celebratory for my tastes. Like an extended Heatseekers gone wrong.

Dredd: Curse & Return of the Spider Woman added a nice insect feel to the issue, like the Ant Wars EE, but Will Simpson’s art is a bit too ‘washy’ for me, especially in the later tale. Wagner’s integration of ‘The Raven’ into ‘Return’ is nice, and adds a feel of class, but hides a somewhat wafer thin plot, but then again, isn’t that a nice feature of reprints? That they should read quickly? All in all, I’d say ‘an inoffensive reprint, but one which also fails to inspire.’

No Dredd Files? Shame…

Some more interesting Heatseekers, with some interesting comments on Nostalgia from Jonathan Morris (and he’s right, you know…), although Simon Spurrier’s piece seems to be one of his University Essays turned into a lay audience article. Nothing wrong with that, but I don’t half miss Gordon Rennie. Come back, big man...

Metro Dredd? Not a classic, but again, better than most of Bishop’s strip work, and some nice art to boot.