Adventures in Thrill-Power #3: A new year means new endings in the ‘2000 AD-verse’!

Christmas may be over, but Santa Dredd ain’t done giving just yet! Welcome to the third edition of Adventures in Thrill-Power!

If you somehow missed editions #1 and #2, this bi-monthly (?) offering is where we celebrate all things related to 2000 AD. The long-running British comics magazine has basically set the watermark for important indie comics since the late ’70s. (The magazine is also the birthplace of the eternally entertaining, often terrifying Judge Dredd.) In recent years, we’ve tried to lend a spotlight to 2000 AD‘s important work, and Adventures in Thrill-Power should help to open up this work to an increasingly hungry and ravenous comics audience.

After some true Halloween horrors, followed some yuletide dispatches from Mega-City One, the latest edition of AITP centers around one very important new storyline: “Death of a Judge.” Yes, this week’s Prog 2464 (out January 7!) sees Dredd co-creator John Wagner team up with artist Mike Perkins for a story in which Judge Dredd is “targeted by a mysterious assailant.”

Wagner’s not only one of the architects and driving forces behind Dredd, but he’s written some of the most vital and compelling stories about Dredd (see “America” and “Necropolis”) in 2000 AD and beyond. So expect something truly cutting and wholly unfettered from what’s likely to be Wagner’s final Dredd story. But don’t be sad it’s over; be happy it’s going to spin-kick you in the heart and intestines on the way out.

Oh, but wait, there’s more 2000 AD-centric goodies to explore beyond Wagner’s swan song. Prog 2464 also sees the debut of a new Dreddworld series from artist Simon Coleby (whose done work on various Judge Dredd and Rogue Trooper stories) and a very special writer, filmmaker Ben Wheatley (A Field in England, Kill List). Together, they explore Judge Dee, a “psi-operative with a shocking secret.” Given both creators’ pedigree, expect their collabo to feel especially visceral as they offer up a new level of emotionality and intensity from some of your more “standard” 2000 AD tales.

And if you thought we were somehow done, you are a charlatan and a fool! Later this year, Rob Williams, Arthur Wyatt, and Henry Flint will team up for “Judge Dredd: The New Future.” That story spins directly out of the trio’s “A Better World,” in which Maitland (mirroring some real-world trends) sought to divest funding from the Justice Department into housing and education. The resulting story “changed the face of one of Britain’s most famous comics characters,” and “New Future” could be even more of the same. In the meantime, enjoy the trio’s novel (but also slightly silly) insights alongside an exclusive first page.

We’ll be back later this winter/early spring with even more 2000 AD goodness. Until next time, fellow Adventurers: read comics, punch bullies, and howl at the moon.

John Wagner and Mike Perkins, “Death of a Judge”

AIPT: John, I hear this may be your final Dredd story. Why are you opting to step away now?

John Wagner: I’m old and tired and finding the thought of coming up with a storyline I haven’t done or touched on before increasingly daunting, so I’m very pleased to be able to wake up in the morning and realize, afresh, “Gey! I don’t have to do anything today! Or this week, or this month.” No deadlines, no one shouting at me for a script, no knotty plot problem to sort out, no banging my head against the wall because the damned story just won’t play ball.

At present, I have one more script to write – the final part of “Rok the World” – and no particular intention of doing anything after that. But nothing is carved in stone. A great idea that absolutely demands to be written may pop into my head, or boredom may take hold, so I’m not promising you’ve seen the back of me just yet. In fact, I’ve been toying with the thought of coming up with something absolutely new, so, well, we’ll see…

AIPT: John, how do you think the character’s evolved since his creation? Has Dredd gone in directions you could have ever predicted?

JW: Sure. I didn’t really give the future of Dredd much thought at the beginning anyway, didn’t imagine the story would still be running 50 years later. Had I been able to see into the future, I’d have been amazed at how Dredd’s world had blossomed in so many weird and wonderful ways, not just through my work but also through that of other editors, writers and the team of fantastically talented artists that have given it flesh.

AIPT: Mike, what’s it been like to work on the possible “final” Dredd story? Does collaborating with the character’s co-creator add any extra pressure?

Mike Perkins: That’s not really how I’ve approached it. Just imagine you did tackle it like that! You’d totally freeze. I mean, the pressure was bad enough when I illustrated my first Dredd strip back in 1994 (my second piece of professional comics work!)… and that wasn’t with John!

I went into this as a chance to: A) Work on Dredd and B) Work with John.

…and not necessarily in that short order. I’ve wanted to work with John for a long, long time., and had approached him about doing so, and John would tell me that he was pretty much semi-retired. After he’d seen my work on The Bat-Man: First Knight, he let me know that he was going to write a Dredd for me. There was no second-thinking on my part, that’s for sure. Every now and then I like to convince myself that I could squeeze something else out of him.

I’ve worked with a lot of “creators” and “co-creators” and have done a bit of that “creating” myself, so there’s no added pressure in that regard. I’m just glad that I’ve been able to somewhat redeem myself after my previous Dredd work!

AIPT: What can we expect from “Death of a Judge” – what might come from this potentially final word on Dredd?

JW: A damned good story, I hope, and if you’d seen the art you’d have no doubt about that. I’ve seen a lot of speculation about which Judge’s death the title is referring to. I’m giving nothing away. 

MP: I’m not going into specifics here, obviously — read the story! What I will tell you is that it’s certainly explosive. It revolves around certain past judgements by Dredd. It’s not everything I’ve wanted to get into a Dredd story, but it’s certainly a lot of it! I’ve been immersed in Dredd since I was 7 years old, and I’m sure that a lot of that now internal Dredd DNA has seeped onto these pages.

AIPT: For both of you: What’s been your favorite Wagner-penned Dredd story over the years?

MP: Gah — that’s just not fair! John’s Dredd stories have covered the whole gamut. Comedy, horror, [the] personal, emotional, deep thinking, absurd futurism (which has become present-day fact), mystery, thought-provoking. You name a genre, and John’s Dredd has been there. You could probably break it down into those different sections and then I’d still have trouble naming one in each category.

“America” stands towering over a lot of it…just like the Statue of Judgement in that story…But smaller stories such as “Bury My Knee at Wounded Heart” are equally as powerful.

JW: “America” was a very important story for me, and Carlos’ work on “Necropolis” was just amazing. Cam Kennedy’s art stands out, too, on stories like “The Midnight Surfer” and “The Art of Kenny Who” – so sad to have lost his talents on Dredd, far too early.

But if I had to choose a single story it would be one of the one-offs. I’m very fond of “Slow Crime Day” – it’s a story that epitomizes the callous indifference of the judges, and I love Peter Doherty’s art on Dredd.

But my absolute favorite would have to be another of Pete’s stories, “Bury My Knee at Wounded Heart,” where Dredd himself shows that he has a heart. Not much of one, but it’s there.

Ben Wheatley, “Judge Dee”

AIPT: Ben, I’m a huge fan of your work. What distinctions and/or similarities do you see between working in comics versus filmmaking?

Ben Wheatley: Both involve sequential storytelling. Both are a marriage of different art forms/ Comics has drawing/painting/writing, and lettering; film has acting, writing, music, lighting, set design, make-up, costume, and a whole bunch of other crafts. The major difference is that comics are not as constricted by a time base as Film is. You can stop reading a comic and flip back…or look at just the pictures or experience it any way you like. Film is a bit more rigid. You can skip through a film but it’s not much fun!

AIPT: What can you tell us about Judge Dee – how does she compare to the other Judges?

BW: Judge Dee is trapped in the world of the Judges. She is a bit more ambiguous. She is struggling to keep quiet the affliction she has because she knows what will happen to her if she lets slip what is inside her.

AIPT: What roles do Dredd and Mega-City One play in this story? Is Dee just moving about the same world, or might we see some familiar landmarks/characters?

BW: It’s the same Meg that readers will know and fear, but seen from a slightly different angle. Dee is a Judge that Dredd would happily bust.

 

What do you both think are the most important aspects of a good 2000 AD/Judge Dredd story?

BW: For me, the most important aspects of a good 2000 AD/Dredd story is to keep the anarchic tone and humor — but also have fun in the future. It’s brutal and punishing, but always questioning and satirical.

Rob Williams, Arthur Wyatt, and Henry Flint,“Judge Dredd: The New Future”

AIPT: What was the reception like for “A Better World.” Did you accomplish everything you’d hoped you would?

Arthur Wyatt: People have really taken to it! And it’s beautiful to look at. I tend to be hypercritical reading my own work and have a hard time enjoying  it, but what with it being an exercise in co-writing and my memory having thoroughly blurred who wrote what I can actually read it and be impressed by the writing side of things. So, yeah, well done us — comics is a team sport and I think together we scored pretty well there.

Also, I had some 2020 events in Portland in mind when I was writing it, and some Portland natives have spotted some of that poking through and been excited by the parallels, and that’s really gratifying.

Of course, our own enjoyment of all this has been somewhat muted by the world completely turning to shit, plus every so often people saying, “Wow, this shit is just like your book,” which can be unnerving, and also makes me hope my name isn’t on a list somewhere.

Rob Williams: I was somewhat surprised with the weight of the reception to the story. It was really a natural progression of the Judge Maitland stories that Arthur and I had been telling for a few years. We’d laid a lot of the threads over time, so it was a natural thing to bring them all together. I think Henry coming onboard, and Henry’s choice to break down our scripts into a more incremental visual storytelling style, elevated already very strong material to another level.

And then, when Henry’s pages started coming in, we started scripting off of a realization of what Henry was doing here. So it became script inspiring the art style which then inspired the script approach. We ended up with a story that thematically felt very prescient for its times and, creatively, was something of a “lightning in a bottle.”

AIPT: How does “The New Future” spin out of “A Better World”? Can folks come in fresh?

Henry Flint: The script has been written, and we’ve got the first few episodes of art under our belts. I’m very interested in seeing where this next story takes us; like last time, I’m only reading one episode at a time to keep responses fresh. I’m loving the contemporary comparisons. I find it uncanny — moments in the first book, the conspiracies, people in power lying to the public, the overall contempt for others.

RW: I think people should read “A Better World” first because “The New Future” is more a natural progression than it is a crowbarred-in sequel. Simply, there were characters’ actions and plot threads that were unresolved at the end of “A Better World.” We pick them up in “New Future” and drive them to the finish line. It’s sort of a book one and book two of the same storyline.

AW: It’s clearly a sequel following from that story’s events, but we try to set up the story in such a way that it gives you it’s own context for what you’re reading, so I don’t think anyone’s going to be unable to follow it. At the same time, there’s been a whole sequence of stories, including some before “A Better World” and some between it and “The New Future,” that all interrelate and build and give you aspects of the bigger picture…

Flash Gordon artist/writer Dan Schkade once talked about doing a daily newspaper strip and all the weird considerations for that…in some markets they only get weekday stories, [and] in other markets only the weekend one…Some markets, the panels get moved into a vertical or horizontal format and the first panel sometimes gets omitted. It has to be really flexible and make sense whichever of these formats it gets pressed into.

Writing our story isn’t quite like that, but every Prog might be someone’s first, and people can drop in and out of the stories and it’s not guaranteed the reader has read every one, so it’s really on us to make it a cool, fun engaging experience regardless it of how much prior exposure they’ve had.

There’s also a pretty nifty trade of “A Better World,” so I’d hope that if somehow hadn’t read that story but found themselves intrigued by “The New Future” they would be inspired to go back and pick it up and read it.

AIPT: Where is Dredd at mentally, emotionally, etc. following Maitland’s death/the shake-up and corruption on the Council of Five?

AW: Between the first episode of “New Future” and the little stories we did as build up, I think Dredd’s emotional and mental state is going to be pretty well laid out, and it’s going to be “pissed off as all hell.” We’re going to rattle him, try shaking him out of his icy machine-like demeanor and give you some gritted teeth, snarling Dredd.

RW: Dredd’s angry. Very angry. I mean, Dredd’s always angry, but here he’s extremely angry. You get the picture. I’d also say that he feels somewhat at a loss here, which is an important factor. The times are spinning out of his control. The world used to be as linear as his daystick made them. Now he’s seeing a binary world fracturing. Different forces bleeding into numerous aspects of Mega-City One life [that are] out of his control. Things that were solid foundations turning into schisms; in this case, [the] Justice Department itself. “The New Future” is a good “Dredd getting old” story, I guess.

But where is that anger going to be directed? And given everything we’re doing to get him there is it going to go towards making things better or help make things far, far worse? We’re pushing him to some limits and taking the city with him.

AIPT: Did you intend for this story to be so darn prescient? What do you think you’re ultimately trying to say in terms of themes, motifs, messages, etc.?

RW: I think it’s just the times we’re living in, sadly. They reflect in the art, in the themes, in some of the characters. Dredd was always decades ahead of its time; now the times have sort of caught up to Dredd. When you’re dealing with a world of authoritarianism and media control of news narratives, etc., that’s an extremely scary thing. But ultimately we’re telling a tale of ambition and an attempt to grab power for personal benefit. And those tales are as old as the human race.

HF: I’m not sure if the first book (“A Better World”) was a reflection or a prediction; a little bit of both probably. From what I’ve read of the story so far, the guys are stirring it up again with a big messy stick with more of the same but a lot more besides!

AW: Absolutely I do not try. Honestly, I just write about stuff going on around me and try and make it bigger and more dramatic, and somehow it keeps catching up. Right now, I’d like to be the opposite of prescient… just dumbest motherf**ker you ever heard of, writing ludicrous stuff with no bearing on anything going on in the future. Silly fool thought it would all be fascism and catastrophe, and it’s actually all turning out cool and groovy.

AIPT: Here’s a dumb but fun question: If “The New Future” was a ’90s action flick, what would the tagline be?

RW: “Gaze into the Future of Dredd. The New Future.”

AW: For some reason, I’m thinking of Tom Clancy films. Or, at least some kind of the adaptation of an airport thriller where there’s some kind of politics stuff going on, but its primarily through the medium of yelling and explosions. “It’s a clear and present sum of all fears, and it’s going to red games all your Octobers.”