The Weekly 2000 AD: Blue Into Battle – More ‘Rogue Trooper’ For Prog #2397

Taking a look inside the UK’s greatest sci-fi comic, the Galaxy’s Greatest… it’s the Weekly 2000 AD.

After last week’s bumper Prog, we’re back to the usual five strips this week. But given that it includes more of the latest brilliant Wagner and MacNeil Dredd fighting back against a Mechanismo insurrection; more of Carroll and Currie’s super-fast action thriller Silver where we’re mixing the supernatural with alien conquest of Earth; more folk horror strangeness of Herne and Shuck; more classically-tinged adventures of Rogue Trooper; and, best of all, the continuing build-up to the climactic moments of the always brilliant Brink… well, that’s five rather good reasons to pick up the Prog this week.

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Prog #2397 is out on 28 August in the UK. You North American readers should get to their local comic shops and demand they get the four-weekly Prog bundles in – you really won’t regret jumping onboard. We’ve spent August in Bruton mansions mainlining the Olympics, then coming down from all that excitement and sporting achievement. Thankfully, by the time this latest Prog is out, we’re watching the Paralympic Games begin – another two weeks of sporting legends being made – all is good with the world for now.

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JUDGE DREDD: MACHINE RULE – PART 6 – by John Wagner and Colin MacNeil, letters by Annie Parkhouse

Well, this one is fair racing past. It’s taken just 36 pages to get here – with the Mechanismos taking over one sector, Dredd getting involved, only for the Mechs to roll out Machine Rule to the city, taking over the Justice Department, imprisoning the Chief Judge, and convincing the populous and most of the Judges that they’re doing it all with Chief Judge’s orders.

Now that’s a hell of a lot in not that much page time. Part of me that’s too greedy wishes this could have rolled out slower, just so the thrill of seeing Wagner give us another deliciously Wagnerian Dredd epic would last longer and giving more pages to let MacNeil do the magical things he does every episode. Yeah, that would have been amazing.

But instead of moaning about what it isn’t, it’s now six parts into an absolutely full-throttle Dredd adventure that’s every bit as good as you could have wished it to be – although I have to admit I’m dreading the time when it comes to an end.

And you get the feeling that end is coming sooner rather than later, with Dredd taking the fight to the Mechs and more and more Judges realising what’s happening in their city.

That’s just what’s happening this episode, hitting that perfect point of thrilling action – there’s nothing in the world quite like MacNeil’s way of packing the action in to the limited page count with so much invention across the panels and pages – and tense drama as the Mech plot is revealed.

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ROGUE TROOPER: RECON – PART 5 – by Geoffrey D. Wessel and Paul Marshall, greytones by Pippa Bowland, letters by Jim Campbell

Well, has this one taken a bit of a left turn? What’s been a simple Rogue versus the alien thing that appeared from the black hole just off Nu-Earth, may have shifted into something a little different with the final page and the story going forward.

Before that, we get Rogue and his new Nort pal dealing with the alien invader – possibly just the first of many given that this one just fired off some form of transmission into the black hole. But that, and the subsequent deadly falling out of the Nort-Rogue temporary ‘the enemy of my enemy’ thing isn’t the big thing here. Nope, that comes on the final page with the Souther top brass putting a new plan in place.

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So, it all could potentially be shifting to something that has a bit more intrigue to it, promises of Rogue having to fight his own and all that. But that’s for next Prog and wherever this one goes.

In the meantime, it’s more simple Rogue action done pretty well, Marshall and Bowland combining to give us a great-looking Rogue in black, white, and grey.

Wessel has a good handle on these Rogue tales, doing it old school, simple stuff, just like Rogue used to be, the sort of simple stories Rogue always has done best. Of course, the problem is that these Rogues come across as mere preludes to the next Garth Ennis/Patrick Goddard Rogue story, the next big thing after ‘Blighty Valley’ with ‘When A GI Dies’ coming in Prog #2401. But even if you consider these mere aperitifs for the main event – which I’m sure Wessel doesn’t – they’re still enjoyable in and of themselves. And sometimes that’s enough.

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HERNE & SHUCK: SUFFER THE CHILDREN – PART 6 – by David Barnett and Lee Milmore, colours by Quinton Winter, letters by Annie Parkhouse

Throughly enjoyable folk horror of a street-wise magician and his demonic black dog, plenty of Vertigo-esque stuff going on – Herne and Shuck has come a long way since the first couple of three-part 3Rillers. But having a longer run’s let Barnett delve deeper into the characters and their history – and it’s all been to the good.

Right now, after the backstory of Herne showed us that he was another Cudd baby, rescued and then given to Shuck to bring up, albeit with several tantalising teases of Herne being a very special Cudd baby, it’s all back to Cudd. That’s Herne, Shuck, Caris, and Jordy, with a plan that’s immediately derailed when Caris’s Crawly Man makes an appearance.

So, on to plan B it is. Which appears to be making it up as they go along.

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But thanks to Caris and an ever-growing selection of nasties, all brought to glorious life by Milmore, who’s art on this is just getting better and better, we’re back in Cudd and… well, that’s the thing, exactly why are we in Cudd? What’s the next stage, and what does the mysterious St Michael organisation have to do with it?

All questions to be answered in the remaining episodes of Herne and Shuck – which really is a great bit of really fun folk horror, a perfect example of 2000 AD taking a story and giving it a go and then letting two creators obviously loving their characters just go for it. And what do you know – it’s worked an absolute treat. Great series, incredible art, and one that hopefully gets another series after this one.

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BRINK: BOOK 6 – CONSUMED – PART 20 – by Dan Abnett and INJ Culbard, letters by Simon Bowland

Well, last time I did Brink I held a few things back as to just how incredible the reveal of the suspect Bonner and Lind had tracked down was. Suddenly, with one reveal, the whole thing came together and what was perhaps seen as another interlude in the long-running series, with Kurtis and her group’s stopover on Belleholme tied into all that had gone before. But it was more than that, as the reveal suddenly brought the events of Book Five into focus – another seeming interlude where investigative journalist Nolan Maslow takes a different look at the events of Book One and everything leading up to the Mercury Event.

Suddenly, everything shifted and changed once more and we’re all left with open mouths as this happens…

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Yes, that’s Lauren Maslow, Nolan’s wife.

And everything suddenly comes into play, all the pieces join up, and were left in awe of how great Brink is once more.

Because now we not only have this current little interlude tying into everything that’s gone before but the whole of Book Five takes on a whole new meaning as well – such is the wonder of Brink. Damn, this is just the absolute best thing.

So, the end of that last episode showed us what Lauren knows – and it’s a hell of a lot…

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So, now it’s episode 20 and frankly Abnett and Culbard can have as many episodes as they damn well want to tell this one.

There’s Eamon Tyce, Gentau Corp, human migration, the specialised propulsion drive engine, the unions, the sects – it’s all In everything Nolan sent to Lauren. Did I mention how incredibly good this all was?

Oh, and then there’s the small matter of Kurtis still being missing and in the hands of the Red River Killer. But that’s one for the next amazing episode.

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SILVER BOOK ONE: UNEARTHED: PART 8 – by Mike Carroll and Joe Currie, letters by Simon Bowland

The action-packed day of the first series of Silver continues with the resistance taking the Sepsis harvester, the Baroness weakened, injured, and the bodies piling up all around.

It’s just such an all-out, never stops, keeps on coming sort of thing, Carroll and Currie doing so much in so few pages, playing out everything in so much style – there’s a real skill to making something so fast as this read so well, and they’ve got it down.

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The beauty of Silver is how it’s constructed, this all-out action thriller where it’s all happening in just one day yet still manages to give us something packed with character development and so much intriguing back story. Balancing the two is done so well, with so much going on to feed into the second series, whilst allowing us to really enjoy the fabulous choreography playing out in the action sequences here.

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Credit to Joel Currie for making Carroll’s plot look so good here, and for delivering all that fabulous action, page after page of those absolutely gorgeous action sequences, all that thin line work showing through, all the detail making it look like nothing else in the Prog, that Euro-styled look really working to elevate this into something really wonderful to look at.

No idea how many episodes this one’s going to run to, but every episode is just a masterclass of how to do it right, all the action and still layering on so much worldbuilding that’s just building the series into something very special indeed.