The Weekly 2000 AD Prog #2326: Back On Duty With Garth Ennis And Patrick Goddard’s ‘Rogue Trooper’

Since 1977 2000 AD has been the UK’s greatest sci-fi weekly comic, and every week we give you a glimpse inside the new Prog… it’s The Weekly 2000 AD.

 

Well, the big news this week, if you hadn’t noticed, is the return of the original genetic infantryman, Rogue Trooper.

And before we go inside, let’s look again at that fabulous cover. It’s the usual brilliance from Cliff Robinson and Dylan Teague, so beautifully rendered, such a great line, perfectly weighted. But, it’s also one of those rare covers that has the artist doing stuff to the logo – and it’s something that Robinson seems particularly good at, just as is the case right here.

Okay, then, enough staring lovingly at the cover, shall we dip inside?

In fact it’s something of a jumping-on Prog with three brand new strips and a done-in-one Dredd, with the only continuing strip being The Order: Heart of Darkness. So, alongside that new Rogue Trooper, it’s a new Durham Red tale, Mad Dogs, plus the start of the second book of Enemy Earth. And of course, bringing it all to a close this week, it’s that first part of the 13-part Rogue Trooper tale, ‘Blighty Valley’, by Garth Ennis and Patrick Goddard, a black and white delight to end the Prog.

2000 AD Prog 2326 is out on Wednesday 5th April. Right then, let’s have a darned good little look inside…

 

JUDGE DREDD: SHRINE – Ken Niemand, Nick Dyer, colours by Chris Blythe, letters by Annie Parkhouse

Another week, another solid Ken Niemand done-in-one Dredd for you, this time with Nick Dyer on art.

One of those bad city blues kind of tales, a low-key Dredd to highlight a little bit of day-to-day stuff, with Niemand really evoking the classic spirit of John Wagner, who did these sort of downcast, thoughtful pieces so very well.

It’s Dredd versus a shrine. A memorial to commemorate a fatal shooting by street Judges. But as quickly as Dredd deals with it, callously, heartlessly (and typically), another replaces it. And this isn’t the only one, there’s more springing up across the city, a movement starting to build, the cult of the unknown vic… not something Dredd wants to happen.

There are so many perfectly done little moments in this one, Niemand and Dyer working together nicely, everything emphasising the gulf between those that enforce the law and everyone else, those poor citizens who just do their best to just get through their miserable days.

 

 

DURHAM RED: MAD DOGS – Alec Worley and Ben Willsher, letters by Simon Bowland

The most feared of the Search/Destroy agents, the vampire Durham Red is mistrusted by both the criminals and her fellow Strontium Dogs.

But now, after the events of 2021’s ‘Served Cold’, she’s in custody – and it’s looking grim. Right now, the only question seems to be whether she’s going to die the way the Judge wants her to or whether her fellow inmates do it first. And it’s all set against a backdrop of rival cartel bloodshed that we see on page 1.

 

And that’s it for this opener. Durham Red’s behind bars and it’s not looking too good for her… well, not until the final few panels anyway. Because let’s face it, it’s pretty obvious that Mad Dogs won’t be a low-key prison drama thing of Durham waiting for the executioner. So I don’t think it’s any spoiler to tell you she’s most likely out next episode and off on another mission. But what that mission will be… well, I’d imagine the first couple of pages of this one aren’t just there as a little background to the planet we’re on here.

Anyway, as with the last Durham Red, Worley’s just slowly and neatly setting things up, establishing the mood, treating Red as the dangerous Stront that she is. And having Ben Willsher on art gives it this colourful crispness, a stylised look that deals equally well with the quiet, slow to unfold stuff, and the bursts of intense action.

 

THE ORDER: HEART OF DARKNESS – PART 9 – Kek-W and John Burns, letters by Jim Campbell

Multiple Armoured Gideon-type units on the charge, a war coming to its end perhaps, and then the final attack of Francis Bacon… or one of them.

Yes, the end of The Order brings with it a coming together of all the various plot threads in this always unusual, always strange, multiversal affair. And this episode, more chaos and weirdness going on as Kek-W gets all his ducks in a row for the finale.

 

It’s one that’s never completely gelled for me, never one that’s made me sit up and go wow. But just like before, there’s enough in here to make me, and you, get interested and invested enough… often despite not being completely sure what’s going on.

 

ENEMY EARTH: BOOK II – PART 1 – Cavan Scott and Luke Horsman, letters by Simon Bowland

In Book I we learned about the nightmare world of an Earth where Mother Nature has turned against humanity, with Fauna and Flora the world over turning distinctly nasty.

Society has crumbled, it’s a post-apocalyptic nightmare of a thing, just a lot greener than these things usually are.

Young Zoe survived the nightmare, even though she lost both her little brother and her Grandma. Terrified and alone, she reluctantly rescued Jules, the son of the Prime Minister. Together with Jules’ protection bot, Nanni, they’re now headed to Scotland which is where they think they’ll be able to find both Jules’ dad and some kind of sanctuary.

And that’s exactly where we’re at now – the Scottish border, Scott and Horsman giving you a perfect couple of pages of recap without making it seem like recap, a nice touch.

 

Enemy Earth has family, lost and found, at its heart, with Zoe traumatised after all she’s lost but slowly opening up to the idea of having a makeshift new family, albeit a broken one, literally and metaphorically, seeing as Zoe lost an arm and Nanni is now just a head.

But with that background, it’s also an out-and-out man-against-nature romp, which is where we head for in the rest of this episode. Stingers causing damage to the truck and to Jules – no doubt more of that to come – and then spiders on the attack.

First series was good fun, an upgrade from the Regened one-off strip, lots of peril, great art from Horsman, fast-paced. And just from the opener, I can see this second series being more of the same.

 

ROGUE TROOPER: BLIGHTY VALLEY – PART 1 – Garth Ennis and Patrick Goddard, letters by Rob Steen

And finally, the big one this Prog is all geared around… the return of Rogue.

But not the return of Rogue for a new set of adventures moving forward, oh no, we’re headed right back into the best of Rogue Trooper, roughly sometime after ‘Eye of the Traitor’ (Progs 327-332) with Ennis and Goddard doing this as an insert tale, a super special look at an untold tale of classic Rogue Trooper in the midst of his quest for the traitor General who betrayed his fellow GIs to the Norts, that sort of thing.

It’s an easy way of doing things and making it work. Rogue’s arguably one of those stories where everything’s been said and done and the character should be left as a relic of earlier 2000 AD. But dropping back in for something like this means Ennis gets to play in the Nu-Earth classic sandbox.

So, first episode and it’s a perfect one-page intro to the character and Nu-Earth and then a page explaining where we are and what’s happening – this is Night’s Horizon, the two weeks of the year when Nu-Earth’s orbit takes it closer to the nearby black hole and things get strange.

And what do you know – they do…

 

Rogues back into a war – it just might not be the war he’s expecting.

First episode is just great, setting it all up and then twisting it around into something else. But of course, Ennis writing 2000 AD’s most obvious sci-fi war story makes absolute sense so it’s no surprise he handles it so well.

Similarly, in Goddard you’ve got an artist who combines much of what both Dave Gibbons and Steve Dillon, two of the best classic Rogue artists, brought to the character, that solidity, that classicism. The bonus is having it all in black and white, just like classic Rogue Trooper used to be.

Welcome back Rogue, it’s good to see you once more…