5 out of 5

Last year’s all-ages Regened special was a great idea but hard to settle in to.  Maybe it’s the boon of having had that practice go, or the (praise Matt Smith) smart attack-on-all-fronts this year of doing a FCBD special, a cheap-priced villains special, and another Regened entry as part of the regular progs, but this go-round was pitch-perfect.  All of the artists and writers nailed the tone of a kid-friendly, adult-approved book, and there seemed to be some confidence in testing the waters for some brand new strips as well.  If there was a lesson learned between now and then, I note we have some writers more schooled in the way of all-ages here (Alex De Campi; Cavan Scott), but I think this was also a confluence of a lot of good ideas and good energy.

We kick off with a Chris Weston drawn and written Cadet Dredd strip, and it’s sincerely one of the best Dredd one-offs I’ve read in a while, really channeling old-school calamity sensibilities – you’ve got a talking Grudzilla vs. a ‘mo-capped’ Krong – and including a poop joke for the kids.  Weston is always impressive on art, but I think seeing him geared more toward comedy beats was new to me, and it really felt like it added an extra oomph to his style.  The poop joke made me roll my eyes, sure, but I also thought it was amusing that he just went for it, ’cause why not.

As part of the existing properties, P.J. Holden arts up Anderson, written by Alec Worley.  This is one of the more see-through for-the-kids stories – a girl is trapped in a psychic video game; Anderson goes in to help – but our creator duo keeps the cheapie morals mostly tamped down, and Holden’s art gives it the bump it needs to get over any rough patches.  It’s short, it’s fun.

Cavan Scott and Nick Roche close out the prog with a Rogue Trooper tale.  It’s ‘Rogue is kidnapped; Rogue tricks his kidnappers’ setup is kinda standard, but again, the m.o. here seemed to be to keep things moving, and Scott and Roche do, offering up a great splash page conclusion and tossing in some Bag / Helmet / Gun banter for good merit.

From the new / standalone properties, ‘That Weird Kid’ is a robo-kid one-off by Karl Stock and Brett Parson, similar in tone to the Anderson story in that kids rule and etcetera, though Stock injects some fun cynicism into its lead-up-to-the-twist pages.

De Campi gives us ‘Full Tilt Boogie,’ which is titled that for I-have-no-clue reasons thus far, but I really hope this strip is given another shot.  Debt-collecting bears; a befuddled, ghostly castle protector; a kick-ass ninja warrior born from a cocoon…  There’s a lot of great weirdness here, but it’s presented in a really straight-forward way that appreciably underplays the weirdness, and Eduardo Ocana’s art is gorgeous – just the right touch of detail and motion to really stand out as a fresh voice.

Regular writerly duo Leah Moore and John Reppion also offer us a ghostbusters kids story with Finder & Keeper, illustrated by Davide Tinto.  Unlike Full Tilt, this isn’t written with a cliffhanger, and while the premise is rather played out at this point, the kids’ sassy-ness read well, so while I think this was a satisfying one-shot, I’d also be happy to see more.

I hesitated reading this prog because I was a bit miffed that it was interrupting some weekly stories, but it ended up being a breath (several breaths) of fresh air.  Kudos to the current 2000 AD team for taking a gamble on shaking things up, and finding a way to sneak some new thrill ideas into the mix!