4 out of 5

A good batch of progs.

1871-72 have parts 2 and 3 of Michael Carroll’s JD bit, ‘Squirm!,’ about some shady dealings (are they ever not shady?) that result in having to track down a mutant tapeworm.  The script is by no means surprising – Dredd is glib Dredd, the ‘twists’ are standard fare – but it moves quick and balances out the plotting a action well, and has an amusing (if madly abbreviated) conclusion.  Nick Dyer’s art is a plus, combining Ezquerra’s / McCrea’s breezy characterizations with Darrick Robertson’s heavy-handed inking style (which I dig, but get bored with Robertson’s paneling), and Chris Blythe’s colors bring some pleasing pastels into Dreddland.  1873 has Rob Williams’ ‘Fit,’ which is a wrap-up bit for a previous Dredd story, so it’s hard to get into it if you’re not sure where it’s coming from.  Same to Henry Flint’s art, which is huge and heavy; I sense you love it if you’ve had time to warm to it, but as a one-shot it’s not super welcoming.

1871-1873 conclude a 12 part ABC Warriors bit from Pat Mills.  I jumped on late, so I can’t tell you what it was about… but that’s keeping with any 2000 AD Pat Mills stuff I’ve read: I always get the, ‘you had to be there’ feeling, where I’m not fully on board ’cause I wasn’t there 20 years ago.  Still, the Magnificent Seven Robot Warriors send-up comes through, and Clint Langley’s black and white computer-touched art is to die for.  So while the narrative was take it or leave it, I still had fun reading it.

1871-1873 have David Baillie’s ‘After the Vengeance,’ which was the only story that really fell flat for me.  Jon Davis-Hunt’s humans have a slightly indie look to them, just unpolished enough to look unprofessional (though he reminds me of Mike Wolfer, who does well enough at Aspen, so my opinion – THOUGH WORSHIPED BY MANY – obviously isn’t law.)(…yet.), and though I appreciate the attempt to panel to take advantage of the magazine size, I wasn’t clear if there was ever a reason to go widescreen with it.  Gary Caldwell’s colors stay in the primary range, not helping to make anything too distinct.  The story is billed as “three episodes, one complete, self-contained story,” which doesn’t seem any different from a three part story, which is what it was…  Add that to the over-seriousness of the plot: a post-something financial-collapse world where people have loosely organized into gangs, and a popular folk singer volunteers for some dirty work…  There’s a conspiracy, there’s a twist, but I didn’t care a lick about the characters, so neither had any impact.

1871-73 also each had a Terror Tales or Future Shocks, which are always great, even when they’re just simple Twilight Zone send-ups, which these weren’t.

And 1871-73 also had Dan Abnett’s ‘Grey Area,’ which has the fun premise of being about the ‘Grey Area Immigration Zone’ on Earth in the future, when we’re all alien-integrated, of course.  Names and plots were already established by the time I jumped in, and though Mark Harrison’s art felt a little stiff and undefined to me, the overall vibe did the trick of making characters clear and getting me interested enough to dig in to figure out where we were in what was going on.

1874 was Tharg’s regular ‘fresh start’ issue – a new Dredd bit from Wagner, a new Slaine bit from Mills, ‘Outlier’ by T.C. Eglington, a new Sinister Dexter by Abnett, and Jaegir by Gordon Rennie.  Too early to weigh in on any, but even Slaine, which is outside of my normal tastes, had a fair start.  Hopefully my LCS will actually get in the next pack of issues this time…

Nods to Annie Parkhouse’s lettering throughout, as she did almost every story.  Working with several artists with different pacings, and the beats never felt off and bubbles never seemed in the way.

So really only one miss for the month in ‘After the Vengeance.’