Judge Dredd: The Day the Law Died

What I try to do with reviews at this Bookshelf blog is keep it simple and spoiler-free, and let you know whether I'd recommend you pick up a copy of what I just read. Seems to work okay. This time, a brief review of Judge Dredd: The Day the Law Died (new edition, Rebellion, 2012).


I must admit that I am of two minds about this new collection of this lengthy Judge Dredd story, first published in 1978-79. "The Day the Law Died" is a pretty over-the-top epic in which a powerful senior judge who has completely and absolutely lost his marbles takes control of the city. Thousands of judges, brainwashed and bent to his will, go right along with him. Dredd, who had been out of the city for several weeks on a major mission across the country, had been missing out on the early stages of the brainwashing treatment and needs to be taken out. Soon, the city's top lawman is a wanted criminal, waging a guerilla war against a wild lunatic who gets advice from a goldfish.

Two years previously, the actor John Hurt had portrayed the insane Caligula in the BBC-TV adaptation of I, Claudius, and this, naturally, was the inspiration for this story. Chief Judge Cal - never "Judge Caligula," although that was the name of the original Titan Books repackaging of this story - instantly became one of the all-time great Dredd villains, with his every macabre and ridiculous whim passing into legend. At one point, Cal decides that he wants to make sure one of his lackeys is always there to please him, so he has him pickled. Somebody at the original publishers, IPC, was infuriated by this, fearing that children might attempt to copy it, somewhat missing the point that children have limited access to eight-foot tall jars or quite that much vinegar.

Rebellion's newest packaging of this story is in a new line of "manga-size" reprints, proving that there's no trend that can't be jumped upon six years after the iron is hottest. While I applaud the publisher for branching out and looking for attention outside the traditional comic audience, with our expectations for how reprints should be packaged, and genuinely hope that Barnes & Noble's buyers can be persuaded that this line can easily, and should be, shelved alongside everything else in the "manga" section of their stores, it is not a format that flatters the artwork. Digest reprints have always been tricky things since the artwork is shrunk down so much. With much more detail, and more panels per page, than American comic books of the period, these really lose some luster shrunk down so very small. It's certainly true that art by Brian Bolland, Brett Ewins or Ron Smith looks at least pretty good at any size, but you may need to have a lens ready to read the lettering. Or perhaps I'm just getting old.

This edition is recommended for newcomers or for completists. As the story is available in a larger format in the second volume of The Complete Case Files, however, I'll stick with that when I wish to return to it.

Zatanna: Everyday Magic

What I try to do with reviews at this Bookshelf blog is keep it simple and spoiler-free, and let you know whether I'd recommend you pick up a copy of what I just read. Seems to work okay. This time, a brief review of Zatanna: Everyday Magic (DC, 2003).



So I was talking the other day about Paul Dini's Madame Masque. Coincidentally, I pulled out an old DC project of his from the many boxes of comics that I no longer want, to give them one more airing before moving them along.

They don't seem to publish them very often anymore, but DC used to release these longer-than-usual comics, 48 pages in this case, under a heavier card cover and a spine binding. They're called "prestige format." There isn't anything prestigious about the story. It's an uninvolving entry from the publisher's Vertigo imprint with art by Rick Mays, an artist with whom I'm not familiar.

It's really in-one-eye and out-the-other stuff. Zatanna, a stage magician and superhero, is shown to be playfully promiscuous in a way that superhero ladies usually aren't. An old boyfriend, the popular character John Constantine, shows up for help removing a hex, leading Zatanna into conflict with another sorceress. It's all really unimaginative; drawn without the occasional bare butts, then the comic could have been an all-ages book published by DC's regular imprint.

I'm not sure why I bought it at all. Maybe Brian Bolland's cover swayed me, or maybe I was, then, hopeful of a regular Dini-scripted Zatanna series from Vertigo? I don't remember. Based on the evidence, this might have made an acceptable $3 comic, but not $6, and certainly not the $30 and up that some Amazon sellers want for their copies. Not recommended.

Judge Dredd: The Restricted Files 01

What I try to do with reviews at this Bookshelf blog is keep it simple and spoiler-free, and let you know whether I'd recommend you pick up a copy of what I just read. Seems to work okay. This time, a brief review of Judge Dredd: The Restricted Files 01 (Rebellion, 2010)



I guess that every so often, things work out for the best. You probably know that Rebellion has been publishing a series of "Complete Case Files" for the long-running Judge Dredd feature. (The first of these was finally released in a special edition for the US market just last month.) These include the stories from the weekly progs and, from the most recent volume, the monthly magazine, but they have skipped the stories from Fleetway's old hardcover Christmas annuals and summer special issues.

Fans had asked at the time to have the annual and special stories added to the Case Files collections as bonus features, but only a handful trickled in. Finally, however, Rebellion has given the stories a two-book collection of their own. The first volume covers the first seven years of extra features from these specials along with stories from the 2000 AD, Dan Dare and Dredd solo annuals. After a pretty shaky start, there is some amazing material in the first book.

About the first quarter of the 400-page collection is really more interesting to archaeologists than to contemporary fans. While Dredd's stories were settling down into a single continuity orchestrated by John Wagner, the annuals were typically churned out by Fleetway editors with just a glance at the source material. Several of the stories are uncredited, and some of the artwork bears just a faint resemblance to the source material. There's a tale about a city called "Mega-Miami" which looks like the city in the 1970s with a future cop running around, and a deeply unfunny, early attempt at a "House of Tharg"-styled crossover where most of 2000 AD's characters of the first couple of years throw a Christmas party in Dredd's apartment. It looks like the artist, Keith Page, knocked those six pages out before lunch.

But a hundred pages in, we get to the point where Alan Grant takes a job with Fleetway editorial and Wagner takes an interest in what's going on with these books. The greatness starts with a Steve Dillon-illustrated episode from 1980 and doesn't waver after that. It includes dozens of fully-painted pages by Mike McMahon and Carlos Ezquerra, along with Brian Bolland's "The Alien Zoo," possibly the only example of Bolland coloring his own work.

Some of these Wagner and McMahon collaborations had been compiled by Titan in a 1985 collection, but most of the book has never been reprinted. One of this duo's stories is a 16-pager called "The Fear That Made Milwaukee Famous," and it's wonderful, simply one of the wildest, goofiest and most inventive adventure comics I've ever read. In it, Dredd rides out in the desert to apprehend a mutant criminal who really does not want to be called "Chickenhead" and the two of them are besieged by thousands of skeletal ghosts of a dead city. Elements of this amazing story would resurface in the creators' later Last American miniseries.

Packed as it is with so many inventive and clever stories, none of which outstay their welcome, it's difficult to point out the highlights or notable moments. Interestingly, John Byrne has a short story in here as well. At the time, the artist was very popular for his Marvel Comics' work inked by Terry Austin. I don't know that there are many other examples from the period of Byrne inking himself, but his line was altogether too heavy back then, as it remains today. On the other hand, Byrne drew a really impressive Mega-City One, and I think it's a shame he did not contribute again.

Byrne at his best, however, is a wholly different prospect than McMahon or Dredd's co-creator Carlos Ezquerra. His pages are really thrilling and full of life and wild, vivid color. The scenes of Dredd and Cursed Earth cowboys warring against giant tarantulas are really impressive, and nobody draws unbelievably obese men eating themselves sick as well as he does.

It's likely that the strange and ill-formed Judge Dredd of the book's first quarter might put off new readers, and so this might not be a good introduction to the character unless you know the circumstances and jump over those stories. Skipping past them, it's a very solid 300 pages of excellent comics at a reasonable price, around $30 in the US. The production is up to Rebellion's very high standards, and the artwork is reproduced very faithfully on very nice paper. It's a labor of love and exactly what the fans had hoped for, and I recommend it very highly.

Fanboy

Here's how this works. I read a book or two and tell you about them and try not to get too long-winded. This time, a review of Fanboy (DC, 2001).



When Fanboy, a very silly miniseries by Mark Evanier and the great artist Sergio Aragonés, set in the sidelines of the DC Universe and featuring a hero-obsessed comic shop employee fighting censorship and being oblivious to the girl who loves him, was originally released in 1999, I was not interested in trying it. That's despite all the fun guest art by the likes of Russ Heath, Gil Kane, Dave Gibbons, Brian Bolland and Bruce Timm illustrating various fantasies and daydreams of our hero, the geeky Finster. I plead being a boring person and not really noticing it, and not having been led back to the usual Mad Magazine gang of idiots by my son yet.

Well, three months back, we went to see the artist give a lecture and receive the Jack Davis Distinguished Artist award at UGA and popped by Bizarro Wuxtry beforehand so that my son could get something new signed beyond the older books he owns. (You did read about that, didn't you?) Bizarro had the collected edition of Fanboy along with several of Sergio's other books, so I bought a copy for my son, and he finally let me read it a couple of weeks ago.

I think the most honest way to describe this book is that it's incredibly sweet, with a relaxed pace and a desire to make readers smile. I don't believe I laughed out loud while reading it, but I spent a lunch hour with it and grinned from start to finish. There are points where the motions are not at all original - hey, Finster, guess what, the girl you're crazy about will never feel the same for you - but it's all done with such style and such a light touch that it seems fresh and different. In some ways, it feels like the inverse of Kyle Baker's fabulous Plastic Man comic from a few years back. There, Baker was bludgeoning the sacred cows of the DC Universe in a wild, over-the-top manner. Aragonés and Evanier's decision to gently tease conventions results in something nowhere as raucous, but nonetheless very satisfying. Recommended for all ages.

Albion: Origins

Here's how this works. I read a book or two and tell you about them and try not to get too long-winded. This time, a review of Albion: Origins (Titan, 2007).



A couple of weeks ago, I told you about Albion, a misfire of a series which sought to resurrect a number of classic British comic characters. In a neat bit of cross-company promotion, the good fellows over at Titan Books assembled a hardcover tie-in volume called Albion: Origins which presented some of the characters' original appearances. Featuring new artwork by Brian Bolland on its dustjacket, it's a good introduction for curious readers and a fine nostalgia property for people who've sampled this sort of material previously.

It's a little uneven, and I think the indestructible hero of Kelly's Eye gets a few pages more than he really warrants when everything else in the book is more entertaining, but it's a perfectly nice sampler. Kelly's Eye is represented by a single, 22-part serial written by Tom Tully that has him fighting a mad Seminole warlord in the Everglades. It's fun, albeit incredibly dated.

Three other stories are featured: House of Dolmann is represented by four one-off adventures and a two-parter. Victorian escapologist Janus Stark gets two one-offs and a two-parter, and the mysterious mage Cursitor Doom features in a terrific six-part story. I've read some of Doom's adventures before, renamed for some reason as "Amadeus Wolf" in the old horribly-colored Quality Comics anthology Spellbinders, and would love to see more of this gorgeous Eric Bradbury artwork.

I think it's a pretty good sampler, but personal petulance does color my overall feelings about it. I'm still hoping for second volumes of The Steel Claw and King of Crooks from Titan, but there's a feeling that this book is effectively "volume three" of Titan's look back at old characters, with nothing new on the horizon. I really hope Titan ramps up production on heritage books like this. Even with the Kelly's Eye story being the weakest of the four features, I still recommend this for all readers.