The Monthly Megazine Issue #471: Deptartment K Go Parallel-Hopping And More

Welcome once more to The Monthly Megazine – doing just what it says, taking you through the latest goings-on in the sister monthly to 2000 AD…

Okay then, more and more good stuff packing the Megazine. Just two reprints and seven great originals, plus the usual mix of articles on new books and comics, as well as three interviews with Mark Farmer, Paul McCaffrey, and Gemma Sheldrake.

Next month in the Megazine we have this…

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That’s the latest crossover between the Prog and the Meg, ‘Nordland Rising‘, where the Norts from the Rogue Trooper universe burst out to wage war on the worlds of 2000 AD.

Which means this month is all about concluding series, with Judge Dredd: Hive, Armitage, Harrower Squad, Department K, and Dreadnoughts all coming to their ends. Alongside those, there’s one-off Black Museum, The Haunting of Borley Block by Cavan Scott and Luke Horsman, with Roger Langridge and Gary Welsh’s Pandora Perfect being the only strip to continue into next month.

So it’s another 132 pages to get through – which is absolutely not a chore! Megazine #471 is out on 21 August in the UK and at some point in the future in the Americas – ask your LCS to put an order in now!

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JUDGE DREDD: HIVE – PART 2 – FINAL PART – by Ian Edginton and Kevin West. Colours by Dylan Teague, letters by Annie Parkhouse.

So, there’s been an importation of Mok Mash (Begorrah! It’s Tay-To-Tastic) from Murphyville – way more potato than could ever possibly be eaten, but perfect if certain criminal types are after ammo for a new generation of Spud Guns, lethal weaponry made out of potato cellulose. So far, so typical – and great – Dredd ridiculousness going on in Edginton’s latest Dredd, joined by US artist Kevin West making a damn fine Dredd debut indeed.

But from there it went someplace different, with alien nasties from another dimension appearing, causing chaos and carnage… and, at the final page, we get Izambard IX, D-Tech First Class, turning up to track down what they call Chiggers. It’s another bit of Edginton linking to his own past Dredds, this time from Prog 2330, staking his own claim of a corner of the Dreddverse – something I’ve got no problem with at all as he has a nicely different tone and take on Dredd, something that’s always welcome when it’s done this well.

Anyhow, a nice bit of banter, Izambard coming out with this cracking line…

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Hmm, Dredd’s not going to let little ‘Monkey got skills’ line go unpunished down the line, don’t you think?

Anyhow, a little background on just where the Chiggers come from and why they appear, connecting to that previous Edginton strip, followed by tracking them down to where there’s something of an infestation… time for Izambard to do his thing…

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Except this is Dredd’s world, Dredd’s rules… and one of those rules…

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And he’s most insistent on that.

All of which sets up a bit of Dredd being Dredd, following on from a nice bit of action from West, who’s really got a nice Dredd going on, particularly great from someone debuting on the strip here.

And then we’re bidding farewell to Hive, a done-in-two, and a done-in-two that was done particularly well. It might not be BIG Dredd, but it’s enjoyable stuff indeed.

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ARMITAGE: BULLETS FOR AN OLD MAN – PART 5 – FINAL PART – by Liam Johnson and Warren Pleece, letters by Jim Campbell

The finale for what’s been Liam Johnson and Warren Pleece really stamping their mark on Armitage, delivering us something that’s given us a perfect take on the character – a damn fine character who perhaps hasn’t always had the tales to live up to the potential of the character.

Here we’re at the end of the case, a case that’s got Armitage inside a sealed box with the five remaining targets of the ‘time gun’, and we’re all wondering just how much of an ending Johnson and Pleece are planning for everyone’s favourite grumpy Brit-Cit Detective.

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It’s all come to a head from an old case of Armitage’s, a psychopath pulling the strings from his prison cell, those five time bullets in the wild, set to kill the five targets, impossible to stop… well, that’s where Armitage begs to differ. But by the end of it all, a very wet Armitage finds himself wondering just how much of this was down to him planning and being a damn smart Detective who’s willing to put himself on the chopping block for this case, and how much of it was all pre-planned, with said psycho’s string pulling perhaps extending to matters we’ll hopefully get to discover when Johnson and Pleece return to Armitage. And to show you what I mean, a great final (non-spoilery when it’s taken in isolation) from ‘Bullets For An Old Man’…

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It’s all been a damn fine five-parter, a really well-done Armitage, best for a long time, stuck into a tale that really got deep into what it meant for an ageing cop to be in a new world of Mechanismo Detectives where his only worth is the memories of past cases and techniques to train the new breed of Mech-cops. [Interesting to have this one play out as Wagner and MacNeil are doing rather big things that will, one imagines, really bring an end to all things Mechanismo for Justice Departments – wonder if Johnson and Pleece had sight of that one, or whether it’s just a synergistic coincidence here?]

Anyway, a damn fine Armitage. A tightly constructed mystery, a bit of trickery explained in the end, some typically great artwork from Pleece. So… when’s the next series?

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BLACK MUSEUM: THE HAUNTING OF BORLEY BLOCK – by Cavan Scott and Luke Horsman, letters by Simon Bowland

Black Museum is another one of those semi-regular strips, sort of the Future Shock/Terror Tale equivalent for the Megazine. Set in the Justice Department’s Black Museum, repository of Mega-City One’s Justice Department’s relics of crimes of the past. Undead guide Henry Dubble is your guide here, unveiling tales of MC-1 where things tend to not work out too well for those involved.

This time we have Cavan Scott writing and Luke Horsman on art, the two previously having been collaborators on Enemy Earth, where Horsman’s art really came on in leaps and bounds. And you can see every bit of how good that art is right here – packed with ghoulish details, angular and expressive artwork with just that hint of the comedic (I mean, just look at that chin on the first page).

As for the story itself, it’s Gideon Grimm, paranormal investigator, using his meagre psionic powers to scrape a living. He’s about to walk into a boatload of trouble in Borley Block, the creepiest block in MC-1.

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But there’s a lot more to the supernatural shenanigans, and Grimm and the spirit of a wronged Judge will have to get to the bottom of of things and rid Borley Block of its haunted reputation.

Just as with Enemy Earth, Horsman’s art is the star turn here, with so much visual information filling his pages, starkly beautiful black and white imagery that’s got that super stylised look along with some really well constructed and really rather complex pages. Definitely an artist to watch carefully to see where his work goes next.

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PANDORA PERFECT: PERFECT SOUNDS – PART 3 – by Roger Langridge and Gary Welsh, colours by John Charles, letters by Simon Bowland

Practically perfect in every way, wouldn’t you say?
Miss Pandora’s latest heist is suitably ridiculously funny,
The Beech Band’s lost album her goal in her pursuit of loads of money.

Oh sod it, the rhyming is far too much work. I’ll leave it to Roger Langridge’s opening rhymes to bring you up to speed…

‘The Beech Band were fabulous – their music sublime!
Their lost albums’ fame only grew over time.
Now Pandora wants it. It’s worth quite a lot.
It’s locked in a safe, with a code. That’s the plot.’

Anyway, whilst her robo-buddy GORT is at legendary reclusive Beech Band leader, Byron Beech’s home waiting for Pandora to come up with the vault’s passcode, Pandora’s gotten herself into a little bit of unexpected bother as the sins of her past are coming back – not to haunt her, more to do serious violence for a band breakup and takings that went missing at the same time as Pandora, or Penny Dreadlock as was, ditched the band and went surprisingly solo.

Anyway, she’s had to agree to an interview with vidcaster Spink Bingle to get the code and get the lost ‘Cheer Up’ album. Except her ex-manager Vinnie’s been watching with interest, and a certain homicidal rage…

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So, what’s it to be Pandora? How about getting the band back together? Or perhaps the band, and your ex-manager will be just that little bit pissed with you? And just how are you going to save poor GORT, with a destruction countdown getting way too close to Boom time?

Well, all this and much more unfolds in a typically silly and bloody great Pandora episode, equal parts breakneck thriller and sublime comedy. Yep, practically perfect in every way indeed.

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DEPARTMENT K: MECHA-CITY ONE – PART 3 – FINAL PART – by Ned Hartley and Mike Walters, letters by Jim Campbell

Well, this one’s been rather great. Ned Hartley and Mike Walters take the reins from Rory McConville, PJ Holden, Dan Cornwell, and Nick Dyer with this latest tale of Mega-City One’s weirdest Department of Tek-Division, with Dept K tasked to investigate all the trans-dimensional incursions that hit the city with surprising regularity.

This one has the team in fight and flight mode, having discovered the secret of the alt-dimensional world of Mecha-City One, the place Dept K’s Judge Estabon had decided to call home. They’ve discovered that the accident that wiped out all humanity and let the Mechs take over was less an accident and more planned genocide, with Chief-Judge Atlanta the big bad behind it all.

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So, it’s dimension hopping time for Dept K, chased by Atlanta’s forces, through a spectacularly ridiculous series of dimensions that you just can’t help but want to have their own series – you know you want to see more of Judge Grrrrr and whatever strange place that Bertie Bassett thing exists in.

Yes, Dept K’s latest adventure lives up to all the potential of the series’ origins, an all-ages Dreddworld series that’s just so much fun. It’s obviously in very safe hands with Hartley and Walters. I can’t wait to see what the pair of them come up with next.

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HARROWER SQUAD: URBAN ROTATION – PART 4 – FINAL PART – by David Baillie and Steve Yeowell, colours by Chris Blythe, letters by Annie Parkhouse

And just like that, Steve Yeowell’s back on the art, after last episode’s stint by Conor Boyle. As good a job as Boyle did, this is Yeowell’s story and it’s good to have him back. His art on Harrower Squad really has been quite the shift – all the usual strong stuff, but an added depth and detail to things, great backgrounds to go along with his usual incredibly strong character work.

It all ends here – well, hopefully just an end to Urban Rotation but not an end to Harrower Squad, which has really been a huge surprise. What began as a simple Scots bit of ultra violence doing mutie clearance in the Calhab radlands swiftly shifted into something multi-faceted, politics, corp-culture, social issues, dead psychopaths redirected as demons, and plenty of high-level corruption, all set against a healthy bit of a Judges squad with some damn big weaponry.

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In the finale to this one all of that comes together, tying everything up nicely, adding a couple of questions into the mix for next time – there will be a next time, right? – and wrapping it all up in suitably violent fashion.

Yep, Baillie and Yeowell are on to a winner here. Here’s hoping for a swift return.

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DREADNOUGHTS: NOTHING TO FEAR – PART 4 -FINAL PART – by Mike Carroll and John Higgins. Colours by Sally-Jane Hurst, letters by Simon Bowland

A shorter than normal Dreadnoughts, an interlude of sorts if you will, switching attention to another Judge in a works where the unchallenged rule of law of the Justice Department wasn’t yet fully accepted. That’s something Judge Beckett’s been finding out as he’s ridden into one of those tiny little towns where the ruling family with the money and the power calls the shots, where the sheriff they’ve installed will fight to the las to resist giving up power to the Judge who’s ridden in, daring to imagine his law trumps hers.

That’s what Carroll and Higgins’s Dreadnoughts has done so well since that first episode – putting us boots on the ground with the fall of democracy, taking the huge issues of the rule of law shifting to the fascist state of the Justice Department yet so cleverly showing us the real impact of that amongst the people. Dreadnoughts so brilliantly brings the huge, momentous issues at play to a very human level, and does it so perfectly well.

Now it just comes down to old law versus new law, Judge Beckett against the Sheriff and her troops. No contest really.

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It may have just been a Dreadnoughts interlude in many ways, but Carroll and Higgins have such control over what there doing, that way of showing the bigger picture by reference to the small battlegrounds across America as the old ways fall to the new ways, as the rule of law shifts and moves, inexorably, inevitably, to what we know becomes the new order, that every Dreadnoughts episode, no matter how short, has such power and intensity.

This one may be over, but the saga isn’t done yet. In the time of Dreadnoughts there’s still so many steps to be taken to get from where we are to where we know we’re going to be. And I intend to enjoy ever last brilliant moment of societal change Carroll and Higgins send our way.

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Okay, that’s the originals sorted, now for the reprints…

The Treasury of British Comics preview this month is the just published third volume of one of those classically strange Brit characters, the King of Crooks himself, The Spider. And we have the fourth and final part of the IDW Dredd, ‘Toxic’.

 

THE SPIDER’S SYNDICATE OF CRIME VS THE CRIME GENIE – by Jerry Siegel and Reg Bunn

JUDGE DREDD: TOXIC – PART 4 – FINAL PART -Paul Jenkins and Marco Castiello, colours by Jason Millet, letters by Shaun Lee