Judge Dredd #5 (Mar 2013)

JUDGE DREDD #5
Mar 2013
Writer: Duane Swierczynski
Artist ("The Big Fail"): Nelson Daniel
Penciller ("The Brains of the Outfit"): David Williams
Inker ("The Brains of the Outfit"): Gary Martin
Colorist ("The Brains of the Outfit"): Ronda Pattison
Cover (A): Zach Howard
Cover (B): Langdon Foss

IDW Publishing, colour, $3.99 print, $1.99 digital

It's big story time. Which means, I suppose, that I should ramp up my pretentiousness in an attempt to match the weight of the story. I don't have to, but this is my prose and I've got to find a voice. Bear with me, please.

Alea jacta est. Oh yes. We've had four issues in which to get used to the basics of this version of the Judge Dredd universe, so here's where that first wave of world-building starts to pay off.

So why does the cover have nothing to do with the story? It's still a nice cover: Zach Howard does a good Dredd picture, but Grud-drokking-dammit! With a storyline this important, I'd want robots flipping out, ATMs spewing cash, vending machines scalding customers half to death with hot synthi-caf, anything like that. The variant cover by Langdon Foss is nicely quirky. Again, it has nothing to do with 'The Long Fail', but the giant figure made up of lots of people looks good. I don't want to spoil, but — well, let's just say this cover would work much better for issues 17 or 18. Anyone up to date with this comic knows why.

From the first page in we see Swierczynski and Daniel's growing comfort with the Big Meg. Souvenir shops and tattoo parlours rub shoulders with stores offering 'NUCLEAR WEAPONS 20% OFF', all bathed in sickly artificial light. Child prodigy Lee Preteen takes us to the Urban-Garland Block. This is from Mega-City One World-Building 101: give each block a topical and pop-culture-related name. In this case, Karl Urban and Alex Garland. Easy when you know how. Preteen narrates, his robot bodyguard Crumley criticises, and the narrator exposits. The captions are short and don't break the flow up too badly.

Lee Preteen writes 'thrillies' for the 'Kundles': that is, he records adventures for people to enjoy vicariously though a brain implant. It's a bit silly, but attempts to predict how we'll stave off the crushing ennui of life are doomed to appear so. Most future-slang automatically dates itself (no drokking stomm, spugwit!); and the more we use it, the cheesier it can get. Still, we have to indulge it. So long as the idea looks different enough to appear futuristic, but similar enough to current entertainment and attitude to appear halfway plausible, we can suspend disbelief and stifle our giggles.

Never trust a robot who doesn't drink.
Or not, as the case is today.

One thing on which I have to congratulate the author is his broadening my horizons. If there's something I don't know about, I have to look it up. I didn't know about James Crumley, on whom the robot is based. I had to see if he was a spoof of anyone in particular. since hard-drinking detective writers (Hammett, Chandler, etc) are a trope in themselves. Swierczynski writes crime novels, so we shouldn't be too surprised that he'd name-check the guy. Crumley also did some drafts of the (spit!) 1995 Judge Dredd film, so I suppose he was an obvious choice, given the coincidence.

But I digress. Remember the 'robot rebellion' plot? Unlike 2000AD's 'The Robot Wars', there's no Call-Me-Kenneth going nuts and leading an army against the Fleshy Ones: instead we have a mystery to solve. Machines malfunction, then it's shown to be deliberate, and then we get to see the effect on society before we even get a sniff of the culprit. This is ultimately for the best. If IDW's Dredd is to be any good, it has to innovate rather than slavishly follow the original timeline. That said, Messrs. Swierczynski and Daniel are perhaps playing it safe by taking old plot ideas and then coming up with their own take on it. Hopefully they'll get bolder as time progresses.

Wocka wocka wocka!

For now Crumley embodies the revolt: he slugs it out with Dredd while quoting sage advice from The Wrong Case. This gives the metal bastard a likable streak, even if he's beating our hero up and has just bribed a load of mercenaries and other violent criminals into torturing the boy he's supposed to protect!
Other machines go rogue too: a hoverbus autopilot, an automated door, even Dredd's gun, and Nelson Daniel shows us a city in chaos once the robotic labour finds on which it relies is turned to malice. The idea of Dredd's gun messing with its wielder stands out as my favourite moment of the issue. It's just as taciturn as Dredd can be, and shares his comic timing. With just three words that Lawgiver (Lawbreaker, in this case?) makes a game attempt at stealing the show.

And it took a team of lumberjacks
six hours to do it, too.

'The Brains of the Outfit', takes place away from the main action, but shows us the Kundle at work. It's the old VR gimmick. Have you ever noticed how we hardly ever see games like this work as intended? Whether it's the Holodeck, Better than Life or any other I'm-not-really-there-but-bugger-me-sideways-if-it-doesn't-feel-like-I'm-there-o-tron™, the shit hits the fan, the device backfires and the user's life hangs in the balance. It's not the most original scenario and it doesn't pretend to be; but, again, what's important isn't necessarily what happens but how it happens.

Scoats Lodger's fantasy is a crime spree with John Dillinger, Patty Hearst and the Sundance Kid. Said entities are coloured in old greenscreen shades; a nice way of illustrating how they're just caricatures of their former selves. Only when the Long Fail hits does Dillinger develop self-awareness. Refreshingly, this is just played for laughs: he learns what happened to him, how his most famous part made it (allegedly) into the Smithsonian Institute. Frankly it's a relief. It's hardly the time for clever-clever epiphanies that could have overtaken the story. Is 'John Dillinger' a person? Has he become self-aware? Who cares? To quote the man: They cut off my winkie.

I'm quite fond of this story's artwork. The heavy shading, Scoats Lodger's darkened room, the silhouetted judges chasing Scoats down an alley, they all help add to the noirish feel of the piece. I'm not familiar with Williams, Martin and Pattison's work, but I certainly wouldn't object to seeing more of it, finding it similar to Adrian Salmon's art. They manage to evoke the feel of the Big Meg, and, baggage from the IDW Dreddverse aside, this piece wouldn't be out of place in an issue of the Megazine. Even without the setting of Mega-City One, it's easily the equal of any Future Shock in 2000AD.

On the whole, a worthy effort. 8/10.