Prog 90

This is almost the blockbuster episode I wished for last week. Every story in this issue is strong (although none outstandingly so) except for Future Shocks, which we can forgive as it is only a couple of pages. We are edging closer to the perfect issue, and it's only a matter of time before I hit the jackpot. Watch this space as my journey continues.  

Prog 90

11th November 1978

"Chief Judge Clarence Goodman had been murdered....Judge Dredd lay fighting for his life, an assassin's bullet in his head...and the icy grip of his murderer, Judge Cal, began to tighten on the frightened citizens of Mega-City 1"

Yes, quite a scenario laid out in the first lines of Judge Dredd, and as grim as it all sounds, it makes for grabbing reading within.  

Judge Cal is a wild blend of Caligula and Hitler, introducing the death penalty, closing down the media, and even going as far as making his Goldfish the Deputy Chief Judge. Somewhere out there Caligua's horse is watching on with sad horse eyes. 

Putting a curfew in force and demanding total obedience from the people, Judge Cal declares himself the Living Law, a god-like status that demands the people hail him. 

Meanwhile, Dredd has survived the assassin's bullet and is well on the way to recovery in the hospital. With the speed-heal machine working on him, Dredd opens his eyes and asks where he is. Unfortunately for Dredd, at this moment Judge Cal's men enter the room and snatch him, despite the nurse telling them that he is too ill to be moved.  

With his face heavily bandaged, Dredd is brought before Cal to receive his judgment. Cal defers to his Goldfish and a flurry of bubbles from the fish condemns Dredd to death. 

At this moment, Judge Giant interrupts proceedings to tell Cal that he can't kill Dredd. Cal is angered by this, but Judge Giant appeases him when he explains that to kill him here would mean getting blood stains on his beautiful clothes. 

With Dredd released to Judge Giant, Dredd is escorted off to the holding pens, ostensibly to be finished off by Giant. However, on the final page, the action escalates, as Judge Giant knocks out the other two guards as they enter the bowels of the Justice Building, before revealing to Dredd that he is still loyal and ready to fight.   

A lot of Judge Cal in this issue, and one can see why. Even in his madness, he is a compelling character, and I couldn't help but be drawn towards every panel he was in. There were plenty of parallels to history and mad leaders and a lesson in the way history repeats itself. One could look at Judge Cal and compare him to contemporary leaders such as Putin, and find that bridge between the two isn't so long. This sliver of realism adds an edge to the story and makes it all the more scary to see the extremes playing out on the streets of Mega-City 1.  As for the artwork, it isn't my favourite artist, but it was just right for this story. The depiction of the crackdown on the street looked superb, and we got a couple of panels of Dredd looking epic and heroic, even swathed in bandages - another nice touch keeping his face hidden in the absence of his helmet. Intense and thrilling, with just a blush of action, this was a compelling instalment that galvanises my love of Judge Dredd and this current storyline.

Rating: 8/10

Best line: "The m-men feel he...he lacks mobility!" 

Hammer-Stein's war memoirs rage on in Ro-Busters and this week we meet a new cast of characters that he will be fighting alongside. 

The Volgan behemoth tank 'Volganaya' is approaching and crushing all in its path. Hammer-Stein is now serving under a new sergeant, 'Country' Joe Farmer, and  Farmer is laying out the plan to stop this behemoth. Commandos are to place charges on the Volgan tank, while the rest of the boys seed the area with shells and raking machine gun fire. 

Hammer-Stein is teamed up with "Bomber' Harrison and 'Baby Face' Brannigan. Harrison is crazy, a gas attack sending him mad to the point where he now thinks he is a plane, while Brannigan is flat-out scared of being scared. Brannigan has been having nightmares about the Volgans and Hammer-Stein does his best to reassure him. However, Brannigan points out that Hammer-Stein is a robot and bullets can't hurt him. 

The battle begins, and from the start, it is a disaster. The commandos are detected by the Volgans and are cut down before they can plant their mines. 

Spying a fuel tanker, Hammer-Stein tells Harrison and Brannigan that there is still a chance to blow up the 'Volganaya' 

Harrison is gung-ho and ready to go, but Brannigan tells them that he's too frightened. He reiterates that it's OK for Hammer-Stein, after all, he is a robot and can't be hurt, and that Harrison is mad and doesn't care. 

This angers Hammer-Stein, and he rips away his armour plating to reveal the bare wires underneath. Telling Brannigan that now he can die too, he demands he go into battle. This conflict is interrupted by a Volgan lunging at Brannigan with his bayonet. Hammer-Stein leaps forward to take the blow, and in doing so is wounded, with some oil lines cut. 

This is enough to motivate Brannigan, and all three rush the tanker with guns blazing. The battler is short, and soon Hammer-Stein is driving the fuel tanker directly at the 'Volganya,' Jumping from the cab at the last moment, he crashes the fuel tanker into the 'Volganya,' saving the day. 

Later he is back being repaired and is approached by Sergeant Farmer who asks how 'Baby Face' Brannigan fared when under fire. Robots cannot tell lies, but Hammer-Stein tells us they can bend the truth, as in the panel we see him telling Farmer that Brannigan did pretty good. 

This was never going to be as good as last week, although it comes close with a strong story from start to finish. The characters were introduced quickly and by the time we got to the battle it was well-established who they were and this gave us a good indication of how the story would play out. The story stayed true to the characters, and this was a good example of the characters driving the story, rather than the story driving the characters. No surprise to see Pat Mill's name on the credits, with its tight plot and interesting characters, one could see his fine hand crafting the story. Now that we are deeply invested in Hammer-Stein's war memoirs,  the story could easily slip into war comic plots. So far it has mined the genre but without slipping into some of the glib tropes we have seen before. The characters remain the beating heart of the story, an odd thing to say about robots, and the display of humanity on the page is why I rate this story as highly as I do.   

Rating: 8/10

Best line: "It's okay for you two - you're a robot, Hammer-Stein...and 'Bomber' is mad anyway! But I don't want to die!"

When we last left Flesh, the trawler 'Horatio' was rapidly sinking after being hit by Big Hungry, leaving Captain Svenson, Captain of the submarine 'Thor's Hammer' with a choice of saving the crew of 'Horatio' or pursuing Big Hungry and Carver's promises of gold. 

It is not a decision he dwells on and we are rewarded with a fantastic two-page spread of Big Hungry bursting to the surface with Svenson's submarine right behind him. With Carver operating the guns it shapes up to be an epic battle, but Big Hungry outwits them as he again plunges deep and hides in a deep sea cave. 

The cave is a long tunnel and Big Hungry emerges into the clear water on the other side free from pursuit. It's risky for Svenson to follow him down the tunnel, however, he elects to give it a try, only to find the ship is soon stuck and the bridge taking on water. 

Svenson and his helmsman, Peters, make for the watertight doors, but Carver is quicker and has already locked them from the other side. Carver is now in control of the situation, and he takes control of the ship and the emergency command deck.

On the other side of the door, waters are quickly rising and Svenson and Peters are rapidly running out of time. A panel later and it's all over for Svenson as he is sucked under. Peters is determined not to suffer the same fate, and diving beneath the water he snatches up a harpoon and smashes his way out of the vessel. He then finds the emergency airlock and returns to the vessel where two crew members tell him that Carver is now in charge and on the emergency bridge. We end with Peters telling them that with Carver in charge, they are all dead men, that is unless he can kill him first. 

The madness of Carver continues, and his conflict with the crew is once again just as important as his conflict with the monstrous fish. Here he is painted as pure evil, and his greed knows no bounds as she shows little regard for human life in his quest for gold. There was a moment early on when we saw him working the guns that he gave me a strong Captain Ahab vibe, but Carver is proving far more extreme and ruthless than Ahab. This story didn't immediately grab me, but a re-reading of it revealed the complex layers at work, and I found it delivered more than just thrills on the page. This is a story that gains esteem the more I read it and from the germ of a good idea, we now have a story that is growing fast and strong. 

Rating: 8/10

Best line: "Carver! I knew I could smell evil on you, well you're not going to murder me, pal!"

Future Shocks this week features an intergalactic flight gone wrong. Rick Travis is caught in a freak meteor shower, and crashes on an unknown planet. 

He survives as his body is thrown from the wreckage, and soon he hears voices approaching. He is taken to a hospital, and after having vague visions of doctors working on him, he awakens to a baby's rattle being waved at him. 

He has crashed on a planet where the children are adults, and the adults are children in a reversal of what we have on Earth. Around him, the children have the adults playing with rattles as they try and pacify them, while our own pilot has a pacifier placed in his mouth. 

A typical Future Shocks, but sadly not a memorable one. Things looked good early on, but the ending was weak and not the big twist I wanted or expected. Future Shocks tend to be a hit or miss, and I can safely say that this one is a miss. 

Rating: 5/10

Best line: "He'll be weak for a while, but these youngsters have a lot of resistance to injury!"  

On the pages of Strontium Dog, the Wolrog attack on the Sandorian planet of Nykos is just about to begin.

We witness the full horror of the Wolrog forces unleashed, as the Wolrog fleet deploys a arrange of kamikaze pilots, each with a powerful nuclear weapon. These have the desired effect and soon behind comes the massive Wolrog ship, laying waste to everything it attacks. 

This is all just a precursor to the arrival of thousands of troops, and at this point in the story, we are reacquainted with Johnny Alpha, Wulf, along with Gronk. Being part of the penal battalion, Johnny Apha and Wulf are ordered to enter the Sandorian bolt holes in pursuit of the enemy.  Two Wolrogs have already found some Sandorians, but Johnny Alpha shoots these Wolrogs dead, much to the surprise of the Sandorians Johnny explains that he wants to escape the Wolrogs as much as they do and soon they are passing through a maze of underground passages. 

They run into two more Wolrogs, and although Wulf kills them both, the Sandorians are fatally hurt. In his dying moments, one tells Johnny that he is a senior member of the Sandorian defence institute and that he has developed a plan to defeat the invaders. His final words are a request for Johnny to get it to the Sandorian high command.

Johnny reflects for a moment and then tells Wulf that there's only one thing they can do - go back to the Wolrogs. 

This felt like a step down from previous issues of Strontium Dog, yet I still score it highly.  The artwork remains of the highest standard, and we had some great images of the Wolrogs going into battle. This was also my problem with the story - there was too much of the big picture and although it was great and added context, we did lose the plot and Johnny Alpha for some time. I can't quibble too much, my eyes loved it. When we did catch up with Johnny Alpha his story moved swiftly forward and by the end of the comic, it felt like real progress had been made. With the scale of the battle sketched out, we have moved to the close-up action of Johnny Alpha, and with a major plot point pushed into place, the next few episodes should see things intensify on the pages of Strontium Dog. 

Rating: 7/10

Best line: "I do not...know you, but-but I...must trust you. Get the plan to ...to the Sandorian high command or all is...is...lost..."

Prog 90 final ratings:

Overall: 7/10

Best Story: Judge Dredd

Best Line: "In order to encourage obedience, a curfew is in force from 1800 hours tonight. Any citizen found on the street after that time will be shot down! I am the law now - the living law!"   

Best Panel: