Synopsis by Gavin Hanly
Review by Adam Crabtree

Summaries and reviews contain spoilers for this issue.

Splashdown

Dredd gets a nasty surprise...

Synopsis: An unidentified alien object has landed in the Black Atlantic and has been taken by the Pirate Captain Borek Stragg. Anchored halfway between Brit Cit and Mega City One, Stragg calls for envoys from both cities to discuss terms. The first envoys were taken as hostages and the price doubled. Now, as the MC1 and Brit Cit teams argue, the Mega City Black Ops operative (last seen in Dominoes) dives under the pirate ship and, after taking out Brit Cit's black Ops operative, climbs on board. She kills the two earlier envoys and throws the MC1 envoy overboard.

The judges spot the body and Dredd begins his operation as the Brit Cit mob also invade the ship. However, the Black Ops unit, has come across the artifact and now reveals herself to Dredd as Domino Blank One and tells him to get off the ship. But it's too late as Dredd finds the monster that landed and it attacks the judges. Domino comes to the rescue and throws and EM grenade into it, destroying it.

24 hours later, the Brit Cit team are shocked at the use of covert ops and Dredd is also appalled that the Brits got to keep the corpse so they could save face. Hershey introduces Dredd to Domino Blank 1 who tells Dredd that the probe was trying to absorb data from both cities and it had to be killed, despite the data loss. Also, the EM grenade also carried a virus that allows MC1 to spy on Brit Cit...

AC: Cross publication shenanigans from Spurrier; the domino fixated operative from Dredd’s recent Cuban misadventure in Dominoes returns in another highly accomplished self contained tale of espionage and questionable morals. The twisted worldview of Domino Blank One, who lives a life of extremes (kitten snuggling isolation by day, fanatical bloodshed by night) is a highly compelling one, though perhaps El Spuriso should relax with the narration a little; on the one hand it makes for a longer and (typically) more enriching read, on the other it makes everything look a little crammed in.

Dominoes was a fantastic and fiendishly intriguing tale, engrossing us with the ethical quandaries of surviving in a hostile world environment… you think the nuclear deterrents, deceptions and sneaking around of today are bad, what will we be like in the future, when we’ll doubtless have built on the exceptional groundwork of killing folk that we have today? Of course, with a larger page count, this tale ups the ante, thematically as well as action wise. We have a more comfortably genre story, with fabulously grotesque alien art, and some degree of resolution to the black ops arc.

Here’s to Spurrier and Domino making a go of it again… perhaps in their own series?

Stalingrad - Part 1

A Fiendish Nazi...

Synopsis: In Stalingrad, November 2nd, a German Soldier takes down a Russian with a bayonet. But before he can react, a german officer vampire attacks him.

3 months later the russians have captures a Panzergrenadier, and Lieutenant Mariya Charnasova is ordered to interview him. The germans want Richter back and are agreeing to exchange him for a Politburo member's son - they need to know why. She enters a tent where Richter is kept, with his eyes bandaged up. She asks him why he was found beneath the Red October factory. He says he lost his eyes in an explosion on 2nd November and crawled into the sewers, eating rats to stay alive. She asks him why Berlin wants him back and suddenly Richter becomes more co-operative, refusing to go back. "Keep me safe and I'll tell you everything!"

AC: Having never seen the original Fiends series, I went into this with no expectations… and was pleasantly surprised. Not, you understand, by the pacing. I feel they might have moved things along a little further by this point, set up the supernatural hook a little more, made the panels a little smaller and closer together (though Colin MacNeill’s art is excellent, and captures a feeling some of the higher end Warhammer GN’s I’ve seen have) to make room for a tighter story. But this will serve as an entrée (that metaphor holds some spooky connotations; I’m literally freaking out over here) and I guess it’s different for the emphasis to be so much on plot and character rather than concept payoff.

Return of the Jester - Part 1

Kanak's backstory unfolds...

Synopsis: "Uncle David" gets a call from Jester Kanak, offering him some work...

Elsewhere, at Raven Towers, Ahswinin, a Bollywood writer is about to be killed by Kalidas Bodhi as his latest movie has just tanked at the box office. The producer's son, Zev is ordered to kill him as he need to be "blooded" and Jester is busy. After the writer makes one last attack on them all, telling them that it bombed because of "Sashi's acting" who only gets work because she's about to marry Bodhi's eldest son. They all shoot him and Zev faints at the sight of the blood.

Elsewhere, Matt Webster is called by Jester Kanak, representing the Bodhi Organisation. He is ordered to pay the protection from the Zomosas to them instead.

Elsewhere again, Rohan is watching TV about Kanak's escape from a hospital. Kanak was a street magician/ caricaturist who acted as a lookout for the Bodhi's and then rose to become an enforcer for them. The police are looking for him, and now Black Siddha is too...

AC: My first exposure to this strip begins with a variety of very entertaining scenarios; say what you like about Pat Mills, he can apparently slip into any number of storytelling styles with ease. Slaine only seems to be crap because he’s having us all on. This is an unknown quantity to me like I say; supernatural themes, doll based horror (always a winner when you incorporate themes of childlike innocence, isn’t it?) and revisionist Indian gangster spoofing all comfortably sit together in an attractive and often hilarious package.

Simon Davis, an artist whose work most are familiar with from Sinister Dexter (which this strip reminds me of somewhat (and where the funt are those guys when they’re needed?)) is integral to the success of this title. The musty, gunsmoke thick atmosphere of the Black Siddha’s world, with its library shootings and Bollywood reworkings of Lord of the Rings emerges fully formed from the page.

Headshots

The headshot killer strikes...

Synopsis: The curator of the museum introduces us to the headshot killer, which appears to be simply an ammunition box.

The case started when a variety of citizens were shot by sniper fire - all taken down by a headshot. After dozens of cases are reported, the judges are getting no closer until headshot number 13 - on a commercial hauler driver gives them the evidence they need to pin it down as a heatseeker bullet fired from a lawgiver.

SJS gets involved and they realise that a heatseeker round fired while judges were taking down a block war was never recovered. As the death toll grew to 26, they triangulated the whereabouts of the rogue round and finally Judge Stross lures the bullet into a bulletproof ammunition box containing a radioactive isotope. the bullet was trapped inside, and Stross later died of radiation poisoning. No one has dared open the box since, and you can still hear the bullet tapping and trying to get out...

AC: More dark hearted fun from the Dredd verse, and this week that heart has gone a deeper shade of Satan’s-Asshole-Pitch. Mega City One stories often toe the satirical line and there are obvious parallels this week with the Washington sniper this week as citizens are picked off by a “Headshot Killer” running amok in the city. But of course, the only running being done is by the Justice Dept. as the culprit is more of a flier. All thoughts about serious political and human folly allegory go out the window with a big stupid grin! A rogue heatseeker? Absolutely.

Last week’s more out-and-out horror fixated offering pales in comparison to this tale that has a strikingly authentic ring of “Unsolved Mysteries” to it. Dan Abnett has been on the rise since late last year in my estimation (especially enjoyed is the very Dredd like, saurian law enforcement logic that sees the very technically guilty Judge landed in it), and the art duties are exceptional.

Miscellaneous Material inc.

• Dredd reprint
• Grant Morrison article
• Springheeled Jack
• Top 20 convention tips
  

AC: Springheeled Jack: Quite clearly this is the opening installment to a much larger story. Not even that actually, it’s more of a teaser, a general overview. Of course if you’re not a purveyor of small press you’ll be a bit “meh”; you’ll never know quite how this turns out and what dimensions it explores. The artwork is quite extraordinary, dusty and smoggy and with a great deal of character, that which is depicted looks to have real depth and volume.

The script, for all its expositive nature, is also very accomplished, and has a convincing authorial “voice”; last Meg’s small press offering stumbled every once in a while as it tried to do Victorian era semantics (no offence to the Berridge droidette, “By the Pricking of My Thumbs” too was a very well told horror) … Victoriana seems to be quite an “in” thing doesn’t it? High quality, but ultimately a bit inconsequential.

And the rest: A very sweet natured Dredd reprint this month; while I kind of miss Charley’s War, I wasn’t all that wedded to it. This right here puts me in an irrepressibly good mood every time I read it and, unusually for me, I went back and read it a couple more times after finishing it, as much for the cute depictions of the Japanese couple as for John Wagner’s funny script (and that Japanese broad? Day-um.)

Metro Dredd is on the rise in terms of quality, telling nicely rounded little one-shots that have a Future Shock style sting in the tale. Like that series however, you can always see there’s a twist coming and it’ll always be the somewhat more sympathetic characters that will get it in the neck (often quite literally).

Excellent Grant Morrison article; I went to my local library and pretty much ordered in all the Morrison books on the County library service after this. Sprout, our very own blue-eyed (sproutly-green-eyed, and don’t you just know it) boy, gives a very funny convention guide, but are those “comics facts” all real? They seem a curious mix of the plausible and silly.