The Weekly 2000 AD Prog #2411: Nort Hoppers Hit Rogue Hard

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

Back again with all five strips once more, with the penultimate episodes of Dredd: The Comfort Zone and Nightmare New York, along with the conclusion of the second Azimuth story – although that comes back for a one-off tale in the Christmas Prog #2413. There’s also the penultimate Rogue Trooper: When A GI Dies, which ends next week with a 16-page extra-length finale. And finally, we have the fabulous Abnett and Harrison saga, The Out, which takes a break next Prog and returns for more fabulous wonders in Prog #2413.

All that under a Keith Burns cover, full of aerial action…

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2000 AD Prog 2411 is out now in the UK. If you’re in the Americas or anywhere else the Prog’s sold, you’re basically playing the comic lottery – pick a day a couple months in the future and the four-pack of Progs should arrive. But don’t let that put you off – head to your local comic shop and get them to order it in for you. Trust me, it’s worth it.

So, onwards and upwards, let’s show you what’s happening in the latest Prog…

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JUDGE DREDD: THE COMFORT ZONE – PART 5 – by Mike Carroll and Ben Willsher. Letters by Annie Parkhouse.

Like I said last week, this isn’t your standard Dredd action thing. Nor is it your standard Dredd epic. It finished next week and unless Carroll throws us all a huge curve this one’s just been a brilliant bit of very different sort of Dredd.

Essentially it’s been Dredd heads into the Cursed Earth on a case and finds shit loads of other problems to deal with. Like I said last week, in a rather backhanded compliment to what Carroll’s doing here, it’s been really disjointed, but that disjointed nature of this one’s been the thing that makes it stand out. In the five episodes so far, Dredd’s come to investigate one thing, the tech raid on the Justice Dept, and ended up dealing with so many other things. In playing it out this way, Carroll’s really managed to get under the skin of what day-to-day life for every Judge looks like. Sure, they’d all love to doggedly follow one case from start to end, but that’s just not the way it is, despite us mostly seeing it that way in most Dredd storylines.

And in doing it this way, Carroll’s done something different and really good. Essentially, it’s been a story of connected vignettes, each episode pulling Dredd into something else, mostly not even tangentially connected to what got him here into in the first place. I can well imagine that it’s different enough that not everyone reading it will get it or enjoy it as much as I’m doing.

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So, this episode sees Dredd dragged into something else, the town of Boondocks, out here in the Cursed Earth, just your typical Wild West-style town, with typical Wild West-style bad guys coming into town when their regular Judge heads out. But it’s not the bad guys’ day, not when Dredd rides into town instead.

Then again, it’s not the local Judge’s best day either when Dredd appears. Things are not always what they seem. All of which leads us to a really interesting moral dilemma for Dredd, where his own mutie family ties will guide him to doing the right thing, where the Law serves the people and not the other way round.

Again, as with all the episodes so far, it’s a great little tale, just more of the daily crap Dredd has to deal with, just this time it’s got the added moral dimension of Dredd having to question his adherence to the Law and just how much he’ll bend the rules to see the Law serve the people rather than just sticking to the strict reading of the rules. It’s damn good, it really is.

I’ve talked a lot of Carroll’s story here, but it’s nothing without the art, and Ben Willsher is doing great things with the art. Plenty of action, so much mood and atmosphere of this Wild West tale delivered in every panel and page you’ll see here.

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THE OUT – BOOK FOUR – PART 11 – by Dan Abnett and Mark Harrison. Letters by Simon Bowland

Still the best thing in 2000 AD for so many years. Well, maybe equal best with that other Abnett-written strip, Brink. But Brink’s done for now, so let’s concentrate on The Out. Damn, it’s just so good. Epic and then some. One woman’s journey across the stars, dealing with everything thats come her way, be that war, loss, death (hers and others), catastrophes, and much more besides. Cyd’s job as a photo-journalist exploring the universe has meant she’s seen so much, and we’ve been there with her all the way.

But the true joy of the series had come not from the huge things like the war and her personal losses, but from the moments she just sees things. So many things, incredible and alien, full of wonder.

This latest book has dealt with Cyd dealing with so much loss. Her daughter, her friend, Earth itself. And she found herself lost and alone. Well, alone but for Bag, her sentient travelling storage companion. With all that’s happened, she’d lost ‘the Wonder’, lost the thing that made being out here work for here.

But through Book IV, through what seemed like a series of moments as she settles into her interplanetary Uber gif, she’s been dealing with it. Until it all comes to a moment last episode where she rediscovers the Wonder… with this…

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That’s what the Slamboys described as, ‘An edifice. Huge, sticking out through a rupture in the fabric of space.’

A double-page showing you that Harrison’s art is so damn important to everything going on, integral to every idea, working in synergy with Abnett, co-creator, equal in all things, ideas crackling between the pair of them that result in something absolutely incredible.

That’s the thing to give Cyd her sense of Wonder. Just like this…

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So, moving on to this episode, we get Cyd trying to follow up on the what she saw with the ‘Edifice’. What does she do? Well, she hits up the library of the University of Advanced Neuronics and we get the sort of absurdist stuff that runs through the entirety of The Out, Abnett adding in levels of ridiculousness to cut across both the fundamental wonder of it all and the big personal stuff behind it all, the sadness that fills Cyd’s life, that sense of loss that runs through the strip.

She’s looking for answers to what she’s seen. And she’s not entirely convinced with one of the university’s fellows who has a while maybe it’s a tent peg anchoring something else in someplace else.

Apart from that, there’s been a knocking at the hatch of her ship for a while, which turns out to be the next thing for her to do… yep, it’s that thing of throwing a story driver in to push things along. But screw it, it’s just such a damn fine strip that the occasional obvious thing to move it from A to B to C is easily forgiven.

Again, as always, absolutely brilliant. The Out takes a break for one week and then keeps on going into the big Christmas Prog.

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NIGHTMARE NEW YORK – PART 11 – Kek-W and David Roach. Colours by Peter Doherty, Letters by Annie Parkhouse

End of last episode, Lil had a hard lesson in never trusting family, as she discovers that dear old daddy really isn’t a nice man at all…

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This episode, the penultimate episode of this one, sees Lil really getting the lowdown on papa and it’s really not good.

It’s a classic case of selling your soup to the devil. Well, one of them at least. Moloch’s on the way and daddy’s long game is coming to fruition now he’s got Lil back. ‘Your soul is collateral, your blood the dowry’ and now it’s time for the wedding.

But as we know, it’s always darkest before the dawn, but has scuttling little salvation come too late?

Again, Nightmare New York has been a hell of a lot of fun, an excellent self-contained thing, throwing Olde English magicks into sort of new New York, the naive young apprentice thrown into the magical underworld, our perfect ‘in’ to the strip. Kek-W’s storytelling tight and controlled, the art by Roach and Doherty just lush and rich, a perfect nod to the late John Burns, co-creator of it all.

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AZIMUTH: THE FABLED BASILISK – PART 6 – by Dan Abnett and Tazio Bettin. Colours by Matt Soffe, letters by Jim Campbell

More from the rather good pen of Dan Abnett now, this time walking amongst the strange land of Azimuth with his co-creator Tazio Bettin.

What was initially something fresh and new became something fresh yet familiar as Ramone Dexter found himself in the data-driven metropolis ruled by the aristocracy of the Lords of the New Flesh. Immediately, the concept of Dexter being here led to thoughts that Azimuth was something the rogue AI of Downlode had created. Or perhaps Azimuth was instead a sanctuary created to escape from the rogue AI. Or, more likely than not, it was something far better… time and Abnett/Bettin would tell.

And then they did the fascinating thing of bringing Judge Cassandra Anderson into things. Not quite the one from the Mega-City One we know. Maybe. Who knows. But it’s certainly ramped up the mystery in a series where it was all about the mystery.

From the end of last episode… Suzi-Nine, after making use of Legday’s hotel do not disturb token to escape the Overnauts at the end of last episode, finds herself in another strange locale – in Azimuth, aren’t they all? And there’s more familiar names to be found there. But that will have to wait.

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Anyway, whilst she’s elsewhere, Dexter’s convinced the Kray Twins to give him Suzi-Nine (although one doubts they could possibly imagine where she’s gone). He did that by means of the Anderson-created facade of being ‘The Fabled Basilisk’ and fulfilling yet another prophecy, it’s off to Papa Legday’s place for more questions than answers… because Legday’s not only shielded, he also drops references in to Dexter’s past life… ‘Though I thought you were a shark’, and ‘I don’t even know what a shark is. But I guess the Fabled basilisk can be a shark as good as anything else.’

Yep, curiouser and curiouser indeed. And then there’s Anderson’s admission that the Basilisk is what destroyed her world. Hold on. hold on… destroyed her world? Oh, this does add another level.

But it’s going to have to wait… frustratingly, Azimuth takes a one-week break now and returns in the Christmas Prog 2413 with a one-off tale. Seriously, seven episodes really is nowhere near enough for this great strip packed with mystery and strange sci-fi. Hopefully we won’t be too far into 2025 before we see more.

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ROGUE TROOPER: WHEN A G.I. DIES – PART 11 – by Garth Ennis and Patrick Goddard. Letters by Rob Steen

The penultimate episode of this one, but there’s a 16-page finale next Prog… and there’s a lot to get finished as well.

Marcy’s taken a hit down on Nu Earth and Rogue’s going to have to pull her chip to save her – but they’re under a hell of a lot of fire from the Nort Hoppas above…

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Death from above and death below. And a very pissed off Rogue right now, surrounded by the ghosts of GIs long dead and with revenge on his mind. Edvark better watch out.

This one’s all Rogue, leaving events up on Milli-Com to play out in the finale. That means we get all Rogue action, with some absolutely fabulous Patrick Goddard artwork really getting over the absolute carnage that Rogue’s having to fight his way through.

After this, I’m going to head back to the start of this in prep for next week’s finale – I’m convinced it’s one of those tales that’s going to work a hell of a lot better when read as one than taking it week by week. Be back next week for that finale and my final thoughts!