Comic Review: 2000AD PROG 1919- Feeding on the souls of the alienated, television entranced masses.

Writers and artists: Various
Publisher: Rebellion
Released: 25th February 2015


Last week I reviewed PROG 1918 of 2000AD to discover whether or not it’s narrative content resonated with a 2014 UK that has been hit by a cross party consensus of neo-liberal austerity policies. The review was a little longer than I would have liked, but I feel like I managed to make at least a few interesting points along the way.

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Because I enjoyed writing that review, and also because I feel that it’s worthwhile me doing so, I’ll now be reviewing 2000AD on a weekly basis.  My goal is to monitor whether or not the writers are dealing with issues that resonate with what is happening in the UK today. That is the only reason for the review, and I’ll leave discussion of narrative and artwork to others. So with that intention in mind here’s what I made of PROG No 1919 of 2000AD.

Judge Dredd ‘Dark Justice’ is a narrative with zero complexity. The state (as represented by the Judges) is protecting defenceless civilians from villains. The Judges are the law, the court, the jury and executioner. Villains talk about the unfairness of this, but are attacked with violence and eventually subdued. The message of the piece is that you must obey those in positions of authority. You will obey, the Judges are the law, and if you disagree then that makes you the villain. It’s always been this way with Judge Dredd, and that’s probably why I instinctually disliked him as a twelve year old boy reading this comic. To love Judge Dredd is to love the state, and to love the state is to love slavery. That’s why I dislike him, and even when the artwork is as beautiful as it is here, I still feel great unease when reading a tale in which he and his order following, uniform wearing authoritarian gang members are portrayed as the heroes. Cops are not heroes like the television would have you believe. That is why whenever a country goes into tyranny it’s referred to as a ‘Police’ state. Don’t let the programming fool you. The Police are there to protect and serve, but it’s not you or your family who they are protecting or serving, it’s the state. It is their job to maintain the status quo and to protect the rich and powerful. That is their role, always has been and always will be.

‘Survival Geeks- ‘SteamPunk’d’ is the comedy relief strip in 2000AD. The characters are dorks, and girls are not interested in them, but you know that eventually they’ll get the girl, and unlike real life (girls are repelled by men who lack confidence and hide in geek culture) they’ll prove that being a geek is cool (it’s not) after all. This issue had a geek being rejected by a girl who very understandably (and real life convincingly) decided to procreate with a self-confident male instead. It didn’t make me crack a smile, but perhaps that’s just me.

‘Station to Station’ had a great panel where contemporary city dwellers were referred to as ‘Alienated, disconnected people.’ It suggested that a people so alone, so controlled by mass media disinformation and so isolated from humanity would be easy to control and manipulate by an external alien threat. Indeed they are, and that is why the UK is in the mess it is today with the alienated masses busy watching football, soaps and celebrities rather than getting together to do something about the austerity policies that are destroying the lives of them all. It’s an excellent script, and it’s worth purchasing PROG 1919 of 2000AD just to read this one story alone.

‘The Order’ features a moment where Christians are telling the truth and trying to help people who are being deceived by a manipulative alien threat. What? Christians as the good guys in a contemporary comic book? Yes, and even though I’m not a Christian myself that’s such a refreshing thing to read, especially when I’m used to reading Christianity bashing on a weekly basis coming from my US comic books. I’ve read enough crazy Christian bigot and cult leader story lines to last ten lifetimes, so it’s nice to see Christianity portrayed in a heroic light for a change.

‘Savage-Grinders’ features a panel with a character stating that he is going to get revenge for all of the children abused in the UK ‘care’ system. That sounds very familiar to me, and if you don’t know what I’m talking about just spend five minutes on the Internet and read about the dozens of recent cases involving establishment level paedophile rings and cover-ups involving children in UK care homes. This is one of the biggest scandals of our times, and I’m very heartened to see it obliquely referenced to in this excellent comic strip.  By referencing it writer Pat Mills has shown that he is in touch with the growing wave of unease in the UK as the public wakes up to discover that their political ‘masters’ are nothing more than a criminal gang of psychopathic, immoral, perverts, thieves and murderers.

That’s another great week from 2000AD then, and out of the five stories there were positive messages in four of them. Police state indoctrination, male ‘geek’ culture emasculation, city alienation, Christian truth and care home abuse, that’s quite a bag of goodies for anybody to get their teeth into.

2000AD is celebrating ’38 Thrill-Powered Years’ this week, so get yourself a copy of this Thargtastic title and let’s keep them going for at least another 38 years, and long into what will hopefully be an austerity and neo-liberal free future. 


Best story: Station to Station- 9/10 (Alien parasites feed on the alienated, television watching masses)
Worst story: Judge Dredd- 3/10 (I always find myself cheering for the ‘villains’ in Dredd stories)
Special mention: Grinders 8/10 (Our hero is starting to question the morality of the state) 
Overall rating: 9/10 (You need to get this one)


* Tharg is the fictional (or not?) editor of 2000AD, and it’s his voice that introduces each week’s collection of stories. Thargtastic is (probably) not even a word, but I feel that it fits here.

Comic book analysis- 2000 AD PROG 1918- The State of 2000 AD in 2015 AD

Writers and artists: Various
Publisher: Rebellion
Released: 18th February 2015


2000AD is a weekly UK comic book that exists in a 2015 context of neo-liberal consensus politics where the rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer and the middle-classes are being deliberately destroyed by ‘austerity’ policies that are coming straight from central bankers down to their puppet politicians and regurgitated by largely unquestioning mainstream journalists.

The official narrative is weird, and consists of Orwellian doublethink, that makes no sense whatsoever. It's a well known, and over-told tale, but I think it needs to be told again, so here goes:

The banks lost a lot of money due to their own dodgy activities. To keep them afloat our governments gave them billions in free cash. That money came from the public, from our taxes. Now the banks are back to making lots of money (for themselves), all subsidised by tax-payer money, and in order to help them continue to make lots of money (for themselves) everybody living in the UK has to suffer ‘austerity’ cuts.

That means cutting funding on vital things like health and education. What do the public get out of this? Nothing, that’s what they get, whilst the banks get to carry on business as usual, and if we don’t like it, well tough luck because ALL of the democratic parties in the UK have the same policies of supporting the banks and supporting austerity cuts.

That is the context of life in 2015 for the people living in the tax net known as the UK, so should 2000AD be reflecting it, or ignoring it? The later would happily please a lot of comic book fans, who would passionately argue that comic books are about ‘escapism’ and that they offer a brief respite from the harsh realities that they have to contend with in their every day lives.

My response to that kind of mindset is SOD OFF. How can anything change if cultural texts don’t even engage with the reality that surrounds them? Do comic book readers not want anything to change? Are they happy with their families living in poverty whilst they read books that tell them that political correctness is the most pressing concern of our times, rather than dealing with the actual things that impact their lives? Do you know what that kind of mindset is called? It’s called IGNORANCE. Deliberately ignoring the world around you because it’s painful and you’d rather not look at it.

Well keep on ignoring reality comic book fans. Keep ignoring the march of state enabled corporate fascism and you’ll wake up one morning either in a ditch or in a government camp. That’s not alarmist thinking, that’s historical thinking. If you keep on ignoring reality then one day reality will kick down your front door and smash your teeth down your throat, that’s what reality does, so stop ignoring it before it’s too late.

Here’s my question, my reason for doing this piece of textual analysis- Does 2000AD engage with the reality of austerity UK in 2015?

Here are my conclusions-

I’ve read this week’s issue of 2000AD (PROG 1918) and found it to be a combination of ignoring reality, statism, political correctness, feminism and (tentative) real world analysis. The magazine contains five stories, and I’ll review them here for signs of contemporary real world relevance.

Judge Dredd was pure statism and fear of freedom (anarchy). The Judges are there to protect poor innocent civilians from nasty villains who just want to see the world burn. It really was that simplistic, and in that sense it’s a perfect synthesis of the real world dynamic where people will happily give up their freedoms for the illusion of safety that is offered by government. This script reminded me that a lot of people live their lives based on fear, and will happily live in a cage, just as long as they have their iphones and television shows about serial-killers and zombies. That’s the mindset that every totalitarian state wants to keep it’s people in, the mindset of fear and paranoia, and it’s on perfect display here in this excellently drawn but horribly statist and cowardly comic book strip.

Survival Geeks is a new series in 2000AD and features a bunch of supposedly loveable loser geek types in a dimensional travelling house. The tone is light, the characters are silly, and I guess the reader is supposed to identify with the assorted loser protagonists of the tale. To me it read like fan fiction, or pandering to readers, and it had no relevance whatsoever with ANYTHING that is actually happening in the UK today. Pointless, weak, fluffy and silly, it’s a tale for the ignorant, a tale for those who want to close the curtains and hide from encroaching reality. Having said that, I recognise why it was included in this magazine. It’s comedy relief, and even though I disliked it, I can recognise that many other readers will see it as quick giggle in-between all of the other more serious minded stories, and thus will justify it’s conclusion. I’m not a fan of the emasculated ‘Geek’ culture, so I was never going to be a fan of something like this, and in that respect it’s a personal thing related to my own preferences, and not an indictment of the actual story itself.

The next tale was much better. ‘Station to Station’ was actively trying to engage with the issue of Syrian refugees begging on the streets of the UK in a contemporary context, so massive props to writer Eddie Robson for going there. It came from a predictably left wing perspective with all of their overblown fears of racism and sexism, but I can live with that, and the inclusion of a story that actually acknowledged reality in the UK was a (cliché alert) refreshing breath of fresh air in the comic. This particular story has a bucket load of potential, and I can’t wait to see where writer Eddie Robson goes with it. I particularly enjoyed the teasers that are given in the book that humanity is joined by a collective consciousness, as that is something that I have been looking into myself personally, and I feel that there is a great truth there that needs to be further examined.

The third story (The Order) also came from a feminist liberal perspective, but this time the heroic young girl protagonist (it’s always a heroic young girl in left-wing comics) was fighting worm villains in some kind of strange medieval/futuristic setting. She had your predictably statist Daddy issues to deal with, was taking on the masculine role (of course) but at least she appeared to acknowledge that she was messed up because of these issues, and it really shocked me to hear her admit that she would have liked to have children of her own. That’s quite a statement to make by any feminist hero, as that entire movement is so anti-man and anti-family that any talk about having a normal family life is quite a break from the norm. The story itself was in colour, and that’s quite a good way of describing the themes, as its not all black and white here, it was a lot cleverer than that. The feminist liberal stuff is looking weak, and there’s a hint that perhaps having all of the young women acting like young men isn’t really such a good thing after all.

The last story was the best, and that’s probably why it was kept to the end, giving the reader a good impression of the magazine as a whole as s/he concludes his/her weekly read. ‘Savage’ by Pat Mills, is about political deception and how not everything is as it appears to be. It’s set in an alternative parallel time to our own, a time where the UK has been invaded, taken over by an alien race, and now newly ‘liberated’ by the US and their drone technologies. The main protagonist is that rarity of rarities in these politically correct, neo-liberal, feminist times, a strong, independent, morally upright man who tries to do what is right rather than unquestioningly following government/corporate orders. Amazing, hey? I was starting to think that such a man didn’t exist in comic books anymore.  Deception is everywhere in this tale, and mercenaries controlled by US intelligence agencies (Hello ISIS) are carrying out assassinations, and corporate powers operate just behind the scenes, manipulating their political puppets to further their own agendas. It’s the UK in a parallel reality, but things there are not so different to how they actually operate here, outside of the mainstream media Decepticon narrative, obviously.

The first story was pure, unadulterated statism. The second was geek culture (comedy relief) irrelevance. The third used a real world scenario with a sympathetic feminist liberal character. The fourth had the same kind of empowered female protagonist but in a futuristic setting, and the final story dealt with political/corporate deception through the lens of a positive male protagonist.

That’s five stories, with four of them coming from a traditional Marxist/Feminist/ Neo-liberal view-point, and the fourth having a bit of testosterone about it by using a freedom loving bloke as the main protagonist. So, going back to my original question- Does 2000AD engage with the reality of austerity UK in 2015?

No, it doesn’t do that, but there are signs that reality is forcing its way into the narratives. A mention of Syria, a mention of drones, a mention of corporate complicity in staged ‘terrorist’ events. It’s there, lurking in the background, banging on the door, yet the geeks still have their headphones on. They are still happily asleep, convinced that reality won’t harm them, and all the time the corporate controllers thank them for their apathetic help in building a fascist, totalitarian, corporate new world order.

2000AD is still a bit sleepy, and the influence of cultural Marxist/Feminist indoctrination is all-too apparent, but we are coming close to a time where the writers will be hurt so much by reality that they will have to write it into their stories. Just like the readers, they can’t hide inside themselves forever. The day will come when they are forced to acknowledge what is going on in the world around them, and the only question is whether or not it will be too late when they finally do wake up.

I will keep on buying 2000AD, because I can sense that it is changing. Two stories out of five had contemporary relevance, and that’s a lot better than most of the US comic books that I read on a weekly basis. I understand that it’s trying to strike a balance between seriousness and humour, so I can skip over the ‘Geek Loser’ irrelevance, and enjoy the stories that are starting to get real and deal with the issues that have contemporary socio-economic- political relevance. There’s no austerity yet in 2000AD, but I see signs of reality lurking, so I’ll keep on checking it out for the near future at least.


Best story: Savage/Grinders- 8/10 (Looking at the dehumanisation caused by drone warfare)
Worst story: Judge Dredd- 4/10 (Gloriously graphic and brutal art, terrible story)
Special mention: Station to Station- 8/10 (More stories like this are needed in contemporary comics)
Overall rating: 8/10 (Worth buying)

Book review: Austerity (The Demolition of the Welfare State and the rise of the Zombie Economy)- Or, how a cross-party neo-liberal consensus continues to screw you over for corporate profit.

Author: Kerry-Anne Mendoza
Released: 15th January 2015
Publisher: New Internationalist
Website:
http://newint.org/books/politics/austerity/


I’m well aware of how annoying it is to read a review that begins with a sentence going something along the lines of ‘You have to read this book,’ but that’s exactly what I need to do here. You need to read the book. There you go, done it, sorry.

Having said that, we humans are notorious for acting in ways that are obviously detrimental to our own well being. We all need to reject the mainstream political parties in the UK this year, but what do you reckon will happen? My bet is that compromise will be the name of the game, and the sadly duped and propagandised masses will vote for the same old criminals that got us into this austerity mess in the first place.

Prove me wrong. Please, please, please please prove me wrong.

Anyway, so reading this book is something that you should do, and I guess it’s my job now to try and convince you that doing something that is good for you is a good thing.

Should be an easy sell for me, but humans are very strange creatures, and they’ve been programmed so well by their masters to not do what is good for them. So, whilst being fully aware that most people who read this review will spend their money on something frivolous rather than this eye-opening, essential, powerful, well-researched, concise and easy to read book I’ll nonetheless attempt to convince them to give it a chance.

So, why should you read the book?

Because it lets you know exactly why the world is so screwed up, tells you how it was screwed up, and names the people that actually did it, and continue to do it today. There’s no mention of the occult, of secret groups, of the new world order, of the globalists, or any of that stuff, instead the book talks details, and tells you what the political puppets did, who paid them to do it, and why continuing to vote for ANY of them is a total waste of time.

Why is it a waste of time? Because they are all following the same ‘neo-liberal’ policies that basically amount to using taxpayers money to subsidise private banks and corporations that are screwing us all over. The politicians are doing this with help from their complicit buddies in the educational institutions, mainstream media and (obviously) in the banking/regulatory (same thing) business.

Why are they doing this? Because they work for private corporations, not for the people who are conned into voting for them every four years or so, that’s why.

There’s no ‘conspiracy,’ they simply do what’s best for their own careers, and what’s best for their careers is to privatise everything, empowering the private sector through deregulation and to create cartel monopolies to maximise corporate profit. People are irrelevant. Load your pockets whilst you still can lads/ladies.

That’s how it works, and that is what this book is all about. It details how our elected political puppets follow neo-liberal economic policies that are destroying the world, all for corporate profit, screw the people, they don’t count anyway. That is the world, and that is what you are voting for in the ballot box, no matter where you put you little cross.

The book is extremely easy to read, and is broken up into short, easy to digest sections. These sections place the current situation in it’s proper historical context and detail how every institution in the UK (education, welfare, health, criminal justice) is being destroyed by a cross-part neo-liberal economic consensus.

It’s a quick read at just under 200 pages long and arms you with essential FACTS that will help you to disentangle yourself from the web of lies that has been woven by politicians as they blame easy targets for the consequences of their actions. These facts will make it clear that a lot of scapegoating is going on, and that vulnerable groups (single mums, asylum seekers, the unemployed etc) are victims of neo-liberal policies, rather than the villains as portrayed in the disgustingly complicit corporate whore mainstream media.

If you care at all about the world around you then get the book. If you don’t care then keep on reading comics, watching football, playing video games or whatever the Hell you do to distract yourself from the things that are important in life. I’m sure that what happens in the world around you will have no impact whatsoever on your life, and that you and your family are going to be immune from everything that is happening around them.

Yeah, I’m being purposefully provocative. Just get the book, read it, learn, and lets start doing something about these scumbags who are screwing us all over. If we continue to do nothing then they’ll continue to get away with what they are doing. They are making a fortune, whilst we are arguing amongst ourselves, blaming the blameless and grinning for the NSA with lonely, self absorbed selfies. It’s time to wake-up, and time to sort this mess out.

Rating: 10/10