What the Author Says - John Wagner
The first writer from the comics genre to kindly write a few words on their work for our What The Author Says has just sent in some thoughts... And that writer is none other than 2000AD. Judge Dredd Creative Genuis and all-round British Comics God John Wagner! I'm already making the universal "I'm not worthy, I'm not worthy!" gestures here! I doubt John knows just how big an influence his work has been on my book and comic reading habits as I grew up with his tales, clutching 2000AD from the very first issue in my then dainty little hands (with its free space spinner gift). Who would have thought I'd end up selling them?
I've really been enjoying re-reading the first of the Judge Dredd Case Files, Rebellion's new series collecting all of Dredd's tales in chronological order (except for parts of the Burger Wars which will never see the light of day again as long as certain fast food companies have their way - for shame). The first volume begins with the first published Dredd (and has the original but un-used first strip too). It is always odd to go back to the start of a long-running series; you become so used to the way a character has developed that even readers who were there for the first strips can forget that the characters have evolved over the years, that they weren't always as we see them now.
Early Dredd has most of the qualities we expect in the later Dredd - his iron dedication to the law, his incredibly fast reactions from years of training (he even out-draws a robo gunslinger at one point!) but in the early tales he is a little more human, as is his surrounding cast (landlady Maria, Walter the Wobot... Sorry, robot). There are elements that would vanish, like the ordinary police force who worked alongside the Judges but there are many elements there that would grow and become important to the Dredd mythos and later tales: we get our first glimpse of the Academy of Law, where cadet Judges begin training at the age of five, the fantastic Lawmaster motorbike which is almost a character in itself, Judge Giant (son of the early 2000AD future sport strip Aeroball's Giant) and Mega City One itself.
MC-1 or the Big Meg as fans know it has changed a lot over the decades - not least due to huge disasters such as volcanoes and the little matter of the Apocalypse War nuking much of the city - but here are the ideas in embryo that would grow to support what would become Britian's top comics character. Carlos Ezquerra's magnificent black and white inked artwork is amazing; asked to design the look of Dredd for the first strips he couldn't resist drawing a fascinating background for those test images of Dredd's uniform, a glimpse of incredibly tall tower blocks called starscrapers - later cityblocks - which tower over old buildings like the Empire State (now a run-down old ghetto for criminals).
Roads curved and spiralled for miles up and around these towering edifices with no visible means of support, multi-lane highways full of fantastic vehicles thundered past so fast violent criminals were dumped in a modern Devil's Island between the lanes, hover vehicles flew in the sky, bizarre citizens, face-change clinics, spaceports... Years before Blade Runner would take the stunning visuals of Metropolis Ezquerra's brushes and pens had sculpted the definitive futurescape of the ultimate SF city, the Mega City. Can you imagine how cool this was in the late 70s? It still looks brilliant today.
As if that wasn't enough we even get to see off-world living when Dredd becomes the Judge Marshall of the Luna-1 moon colony. He tackles mutants, crooks and a robot rebellion. Volume 2 has just hit the shelves hard on the heels of a delayed volume 1 and it is my next comics port of call. If you are an old fan like me or a later reader curious about the beginnings of the character then you have to buy this series. If you are a British comics fan then this series is as important as the Classic Dan Dare series in terms of Brit comics history and in terms of sheer enjoyment. Here's what John Wagner said about the first volume:
"Here it is, the Law in Order, as they say – Judge Dredd, one of the 20th century’s most enduring and popular characters, from genesis to the present day, all wrapped up in beautifully-produced volumes to pore over, to savour, to tuck away for a rainy day. Where it all began, what made the great man tick, how Dredd’s world grew and developed – a veritable trip down nostalgia lane and a must-have for comic buffs, budding right-wing dictators and comic writers whose collection is locked in a steel cabinet for which the key is lost and who can never get hold of the references they want!"
I've really been enjoying re-reading the first of the Judge Dredd Case Files, Rebellion's new series collecting all of Dredd's tales in chronological order (except for parts of the Burger Wars which will never see the light of day again as long as certain fast food companies have their way - for shame). The first volume begins with the first published Dredd (and has the original but un-used first strip too). It is always odd to go back to the start of a long-running series; you become so used to the way a character has developed that even readers who were there for the first strips can forget that the characters have evolved over the years, that they weren't always as we see them now.
Early Dredd has most of the qualities we expect in the later Dredd - his iron dedication to the law, his incredibly fast reactions from years of training (he even out-draws a robo gunslinger at one point!) but in the early tales he is a little more human, as is his surrounding cast (landlady Maria, Walter the Wobot... Sorry, robot). There are elements that would vanish, like the ordinary police force who worked alongside the Judges but there are many elements there that would grow and become important to the Dredd mythos and later tales: we get our first glimpse of the Academy of Law, where cadet Judges begin training at the age of five, the fantastic Lawmaster motorbike which is almost a character in itself, Judge Giant (son of the early 2000AD future sport strip Aeroball's Giant) and Mega City One itself.
MC-1 or the Big Meg as fans know it has changed a lot over the decades - not least due to huge disasters such as volcanoes and the little matter of the Apocalypse War nuking much of the city - but here are the ideas in embryo that would grow to support what would become Britian's top comics character. Carlos Ezquerra's magnificent black and white inked artwork is amazing; asked to design the look of Dredd for the first strips he couldn't resist drawing a fascinating background for those test images of Dredd's uniform, a glimpse of incredibly tall tower blocks called starscrapers - later cityblocks - which tower over old buildings like the Empire State (now a run-down old ghetto for criminals).
Roads curved and spiralled for miles up and around these towering edifices with no visible means of support, multi-lane highways full of fantastic vehicles thundered past so fast violent criminals were dumped in a modern Devil's Island between the lanes, hover vehicles flew in the sky, bizarre citizens, face-change clinics, spaceports... Years before Blade Runner would take the stunning visuals of Metropolis Ezquerra's brushes and pens had sculpted the definitive futurescape of the ultimate SF city, the Mega City. Can you imagine how cool this was in the late 70s? It still looks brilliant today.
As if that wasn't enough we even get to see off-world living when Dredd becomes the Judge Marshall of the Luna-1 moon colony. He tackles mutants, crooks and a robot rebellion. Volume 2 has just hit the shelves hard on the heels of a delayed volume 1 and it is my next comics port of call. If you are an old fan like me or a later reader curious about the beginnings of the character then you have to buy this series. If you are a British comics fan then this series is as important as the Classic Dan Dare series in terms of Brit comics history and in terms of sheer enjoyment. Here's what John Wagner said about the first volume:
"Here it is, the Law in Order, as they say – Judge Dredd, one of the 20th century’s most enduring and popular characters, from genesis to the present day, all wrapped up in beautifully-produced volumes to pore over, to savour, to tuck away for a rainy day. Where it all began, what made the great man tick, how Dredd’s world grew and developed – a veritable trip down nostalgia lane and a must-have for comic buffs, budding right-wing dictators and comic writers whose collection is locked in a steel cabinet for which the key is lost and who can never get hold of the references they want!"
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