Cover by Clint Langley

Gavin Hanly: Some of the best things about The Volgan War have been the excellent covers and double page spreads from Langley. The last Steelhorn cover was admittedly a little messy, but he comes up trumps for a moody shot of Zippo, the mysterious (possible) 7th Warrior.

Robert Frazer: Langley's art has enjoyed many superlatives before now, and I can only add to them.

While I would have enjoyed a portrait of Zippo to match the series of covers that ran during the previous book of the Volgan War, that doesn't diminish this composition. The urban wastes are dark and the character is in shadow, but the scale of the background with the addition of mist as it withdraws into the distance successfully prevents it from being disaffectingly turgid and grim. Zippo himself has an classically rugged pose which his bandana only emphasises, and of course his truly tremendous chin would put Dredd himself to shame and set Tharg's heart a-flutter.

The "Make Waste Not War" tag is an ingeniously play on the traditional slogan which conveys an anti-authority intent without having "love" ridiculously jarring with the punk-industrial atmosphere. Finally, the "writing on the wall" tagline reflects how Zippo's graffiti is playing with fire admirably!

A thorough success, and definitely a contender for cover of the year.

Us cialis Script: Robbie Morrison Art: Sam Hart Colours: Len O'Grady Letters: Annie Parkhouse

Dredd gets close and personal...

Synopsis: Bloodstone starts ejecting passengers from the ship so Dredd decides to hand himself in, holding his guns out in front of him. However, Nova starts using escape pods to destroy the pirate ship and Dredd takes the opportunity to kill Bloodstone and all his crew.

GH: It can't be an easy thing, writing Dredd while rabid Dredd fans watch from the sidelines, waiting for you to slip up. But unfortunately, Morrison appears to have walked straight into a banana peel with this strip, one which seems to have stretched a single part story into three.

2000AD fans, like myself, will say that Morrison doesn't get Dredd. Defenders will say that Dredd is multi faceted and it's more about what the different writers bring to the story. The reality is really somewhere in between. Morrison is certainly capable of bringing something to Dredd and has proved this on other occasions, mainly when writing around the man himself and focusing on the citizens. But the problems occur when trying to establish Dredd as an action hero. While Wagner speeds into the distance, effortlessly balancing continuity with full-on action scenes, others who take on this facet of Dredd seem slightly mired in the 70's version of the character - all action hero, full of grit and pithy one-liners - but with no real soul.

And that, unfortunately, is the case here. Dredd merely goes from a-b in this three parter, and also doesn't feel as if he's really achieved anything. In some ways, bringing the whole crew back alive would have been far more impressive.

I've mentioned it before, but it bears repeating - Dredd tales could really benefit from a stronger continuity that all the writers on the strip could tap into. There's no reason why Morrison couldn't write an offshoot of the mutant crisis, or perhaps pick up on the character of Rico over Dredd. The strip badly needs something to fill in those gaps for when the "real story" goes on hiatus. If 2000AD can somehow make the guest writers part of the overall picture - then they's have something really strong to start off every week. It's something that has be achieved in American comic characters with multiple books, where different runs have completely different stories - but they all feed in the whole. Certainly something needs to be done to cover for Wagner down-time and tackle head-on the readership belief that non-Wagner stories "don't matter".

As for the art - Hart is certainly competent and does his best with a slight story, but it does all feel a bit old-school to me. Still, not at all bad for a first showing.

RF: "Firestorm" has sustained substantial criticism in past weeks, but I feel that it's unjustified. The action-focused content of this adventure has not essentially been any different from that which occupied the majority of the preceding "Mutie Block", except in that "Mutie Block" had ties to an overarching plot arc to lift it up in people's estimation (and, in all fairness, some character moments which are absent here).

A lot about the Thrill's mood can be elucidated from O'Grady's colouring - the recurrent cricle-patterns that overlay the artwork grant it a vibrant, quirky, forthright and bold pop-art pizzazz that really suit the punchy action-adventure thrills'n'spills. Parkhouse is also an asset in encouraging this atmosphere - I've criticised her sound effects in previous Thrills, but here they're greatly improved and have suitable solid body to them (notably the "BDAM" of Dredd's Lawgiver reports.

In any case, it's not as if the action seen in "Firestorm" is particularly implausible. While you do have to wonder why we bother having warships when mere escape pods can rain utter devastation like God's wrath upon Gomorrah, in all other respects Dredd has certainly faced down mass arrays of criminality much more fearsome than Bloodstone's motley mob.

Altogether, there's nothing wrong with kicking back, slouching easily and casually bopping a few baddies on the bonce... 'CAUSE HE'S JUDGE DREDD!

Us cialis Script: Ian Edginton Art: Steve Yeowell Letters: Ellie De Ville

Once again, charming...

Synopsis: After some arguing with the Norse Gods, Dancer and his crew finally get some guidance from Odin's wife. She tells them to get help from the halflings of Asgard - who hide in the great hall...

GH: Along with Lobster Random, the Red Seas is doing the job of holding up the comic at the moment. Not a great deal has happened over the past few weeks, but the grumpy Norse Gods have been a fun diversion and have given Yeowell the chance to show off some nifty deity designs in the process. It's not the kind of strip that will change your life, but it's entertaining and raises a smile - especially with Odin's failure in smiting Jack Dancer at the end.

A pleasant diversion that will hopefully build up into something more.

RF: I was quite critical of Red Seas in my previous review, but this visit to Asgard has certainly elevated the quality of the adventure and restored my enthusiasm for the Thrill.

The dialogue is a delight, with the opportunity for some apt and intelligent punnery ("bitter oak and sour ash") and, of course, the inspired crotchety petulant vitriol of the gods themselves to match it. While I wonder why the gods should be completely impotent seeing as they still have a tribe of Indian believers on Earth, perhaps they just prevent Asgard from fading out of existence entirely. 

Yeowell's art has also improved in my estimation. His chess-piece deities are wonderfully characterful, as well as matching the internal explanation of them resembling what Dancer and his crew himself know. While we haven't quite banished the unfortunate problem of half the cast blundering about playing blind man's bluff, our heroes themselves demonstrate a great and skilful range of expression, from Bill's lidded disdain to Jack's own cheeky flirtation with Frigg.

The last few weeks have led me to something of an epiphany of how to read "Red Seas". It's not action, nor even really fantasy, at least in the way we understand it post-Tolkien - it is classic adventure for boys, with all of the bluff amiability, rugged intrepidness, stern moral fibre, dry wit and valuable instruction that entails, and a happy thing to have in our more pouting cynical era. 

Us cialis Script: Pat Mills Art: Clint Langley Letters: Simon Bowland

Zippo searches for a petrol station that sells lighter fluid at this hour...

Synopsis: Inspektor Sturn is preparing to destroy Zippo. Zippo flashes back to his days of fighting the G Men and street cops and covering the city with his tag - as inspired by the mysterious figure - Kroll...

GH: Oh dear, oh dear. What the hell is going on here, then?

As far as I can tell, Mills seems to be finally getting round to telling the backstory of Zippo, who appears to be part Chopper, part cigarette lighter. As mentioned with regards to the cover, there's some excellent work by Langley here - with an amazing cityscape - but all of the graphical delights can't hide the fact the the story is indeed a complete load of rubbish (or perhaps "Biol-ix") and simply isn't going anywhere.

Is Mills really seen as that important to 2000AD that he's allowed to get away with the sort of naval-gazing that has been prevalent in the Volgan War? It's a shame, as I really enjoyed the Shadow Warriors - but this is all style and no substance.

It's about time Mills was forced to do a few Future Shocks and remind himself how to pace a story...

RF: Anthology comics often demand a faster pace of storytelling in order to communicate events in a restricted page count and sustain interest across frequent interruptions, and this leads to compressed art. Heaven knows that I've struggled with the same in my efforts at scriptwriting. The current ABC Warriors story, then, is something that only Mills himself could write. Only someone of his lengthy career and consequent eminence could possibly have the influence to persuade Tharg to indulge in the grand profusion of splash pages and double-spreads that we've had lavished on us throughout all three books of the "Volgan War" series. I'm glad to have become a Squaxx at a time when things like this are possible. 

It's also something that only Langley could do draw - Flint can match him for sheer marvellous intricacy (although he's the only artist in Tharg's stable who can), and while I'm normally critical of digital colouring, here it eminently suits this tale of robots. When seen on the scale that Mills has let Langley loose on regularly throughout this Thrill, the effect is nothing short of mesmerising. With it, we are truly graced with something all too rare in the Galaxy's Greatest Comic - grandeur. 

This week's double-spread is particularly notable for it having narrative sense as well, not just being a landscape. The suggestion of challenge and defiance between Zippo, with the mists framing him like a halo and his foreground placement, gives him great stature despite his actually being a tiny figure. The scowling skull-faced tower glares at the interloper from across the industrial gulf. The figure of Sturn also shows how Langley has improved since the last book: his humans then were rather too obviously photo manipulations, but now they're entirely integrated with his art proper. The only criticism I can level at Langley is that the final panel of page one seems to have a loss of resolution, as though he's zoomed in on a panel rather than drawing it fresh, but that's only a minor niggle. 

Mills also contributes some strong dialogue, notably the appropriate "hard fish" analogy and the clever pun between "Der Tag" and that the fact that Zippo spends his time tagging graffiti.

ABC Warriors has been a continual delight, and I always look forward to the next instalment with anticipation.