Judge Dredd vs Judge Death
And due to my interest in metal in the late 80’s, this song by Anthrax introduced me to the world of Judge Dredd and my introduction to Dredd was through an anthology on his adventures with Judge Death, a Judge from another dimension who declares that all crimes are committed by the living and therefore living is a crime and punishable by death.
I’m not sure what happened to my copy of this comic, I mean graphic novel, maybe it wasn’t even mine to begin with but a loaner that I kept for an insanely long time. At any rate it vanished and just recently as I was ebaying I gave a search (I think also because I recently watched that Big Four DVD which contained a set by Anthrax) and purchased Judge Dredd vs. Judge Death. After receiving it, I noticed a couple of things. This wasn’t the same thing I had back in the early 80’s although it contained the same stories plus a few more and two, I thought the copy I had was in full-color but this is only black and white and three I guess I don’t really dig the comic format as a storytelling device. The art was cool and Dredd was kicking ass as per usual but Death and the other Dark judges really steal the show and are under utilized. While I guess most people seem to get introduced to comics via Marvel or DC, 2000AD titles like Dredd and Bad Company were the ones that caught my attention and maybe I'm judging the entire comic world based on their work primarily, what I noticed is that I require a bit more depth to enjoy a story and the comic world just leaves too much up to the imagination or comes across as shallow if you don't fill in the blanks yourself. For me I think it’s inability to really portray emotions realistically is what keeps me from being engaged. It was fine when I was a teenager when just the cool artwork was enough but I’m just not into it anymore, despite still digging the art and general idea of the book.
A brief run down of the plot line: As hinted above, Judge Death skips over to MegaCity-One to lay down the law of his world which is Guilty of Life, Sentenced to Death hard line stance. The Judges of MegaCity-One have to figure out how to stop him and fast. A Psi-Ops Judge, Judge Anderson, traps Judge Death in her mind and Judge Dredd uses some futuristic bonding spray called Boing to seal both her and Judge Death in a capsule of some sort. Fast forward to Judge Death Lives, his three compadres from his dimension sneak over, Judge Mortis, Fear & Fire and con some Megacity Dweller into cutting a hole in the capsule for Death to escape. This goes off without a hitch but the Judges are of course alerted and take on Judge Death again eventually following the Dark Judges back to their dimension to make sure they don’t return. In the end it wasn’t Dredd that saved the day but the souls of all of Judge Death’s victims on his own world using Judge Anderson as a medium to exact their revenge. Cool huh? When I was 16 definitely but not so much now. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying this is a bad comic just that comics aren’t really my cup of tea. 1 for Nostalgia 0 for me. There’s also a few more stories added at the end, like the War Games against the Sovs.
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6 comments:
The Judge Dredd comics (like most comics) probably work best in their original format. I think those JD stories were probably released six pages at a time once a week in 2000AD. Dredd is like Batman; cool character with some cool backing cast, but generally flat writing. I have a couple comics I can loan you if you like. The ones I think you might get a kick out of are Grendel: Black White & Red (gangster book for lack of a better description), Life on Another Planet (sci-fi comedy from Will Eisner)& mainly because I know where it is Batman Secrets (Batman/Joker/Psychiatrist story by the guy who did The Maxx).
Fuck graphic novels, they're called comics.
Anyhoo, if you're looking for emotion and depth in a comic, Judge Dredd isn't where you're going to find it, and definitely you shouldn't be basing your opinion of all comics on J.D. It's like what you said about metal. Depth and emotion aren't going to be found in most sci-fi, horror or superhero comics, those are the metal bands of sequential art.
That said, I dig Dredd if viewed as a sci-fi comedy of what British creators thought of the USA and American comics in the late '70s.
it's not Dredd specifically, I find as the issue, it's that i don't think the format lends itself to depth nor emotion unless the reader projects it. I think the series of still frames lack the capacity to do so (much like screenplays are fairly lifeless unless you project how the movie is going to play out). I don't think there'll be a difference in 2000ad comics vs. everybody else in this regard. And oddly enough it's also the same reason I lost interest in metal, no longer found what it offered in it's limited range interesting even if it's still fun to hear songs from old days.
I would highly recommend Craig Thompson's BLANKETS or David Mazzuchelli's ASTERIOS POLYP as comics that would offer the depth you might be seeking out.
I haven't read Blankets, but I hear if you read it that it you can use it to help score points with geek girls.
That's false. Strangers in Paradise, though...
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