I'll shut up about Dredd's "Enceladus" arc this week. Just know that it was as fantastic-looking as any previous week, and is leveraging a tragic turn in the story to continue this saga back on earth. I thought that the end of last week's Orlok was awkwardly out of place, and this week revealed why: Orlok and Rasputin, currently headed back to the Meg, are traversing an abandoned movie set with robot extras. The movie set is a send-up of Mad Max, it seems, and is wasting no time cashing in on that absurdity. I expect a big confrontation to go down next week, and for the fight to be peppered with goofiness.
Grey Area tried to get out of its slump this week, and I'm not sure that it succeeded. That the morally upstanding humans would come into conflict with the big alien bullies in the prison was foreshadowed last week, but I was hoping they would forego something this cliché in favor of just getting the hell out of this prison. What at first was reading like a really original story based around an epic, if typical, quandary is now just taking on a bunch of standard traits of heroes-in-prison stories. I have my fingers crossed for a departure from this next week.
I can't really say enough about the quality and variety of the art in the current titles. I could tell you about the chick with three boobs in Strontium Dog, or the fact that an entire army is about to descend on Slaine; but, the reason that I cover these Progs every week--shit, the reason that I'm a fan and come back to read them every week--is because of the quality of comic that this anthology produces. I focus a lot on the stories, mostly because I can only repeat myself so many times about the shockingly consistent quality of many of these artists. But this isn't a short-story anthology: it's a comic anthology, and it's the best damn one around.
Just look at this chapter of Slaine. Look how fearless these layouts are. If you think the word "fearless" is idiosyncratic when applied to panels on a page, you should probably find another medium to appreciate. Davis is taking artistic risks with his layouts that, with his unbelievable style, he straight-up does not have to take. It's possible, of course, that Mills is writing scripts that direct Davis to draw these layouts. That seems unlikely, but even if it's true, it doesn't change the fact that this creative team is coming together with a singular vision for a comic which messes around with the page even when it doesn't have to.
I could probably write an entire Prog review--an entire series of articles, even--on Wagner and Ezquerra. I might dedicate such a review to just this creative team before this run of Strontium Dog is over. Since I don't have room for it here, go ahead and check out the gritty action scenes in this week's chapter and I will let that carefully-crafted chaos speak for itself.
Score: 4/5
2000 AD – Prog 1928 Writers: Various Artists: Various Publisher: 2000 AD Price: £1.99 (Digital) £2.49 (UK) Release Date: 4/29/15 Format: Weekly; Print/Digital