Comic review: 2000AD PROG 1940- Is Judge Dredd a Nazi?

Writers and artists: Various
Publisher: Rebellion
Released: 22nd July 2015


There’s some fun to be had in PROG 1940 of 2000AD. Here’s a quick scan of what it has to offer:

Judge Dredd is all snowy this week, and snow always looks good in comics. It features a poetic omniscient narrator telling the tale, and the voice works really well, injecting moments of philosophy and poetic colour into the tale as the story unfolds. It’s still a book about order followers though, the worst kind of people, villains that are routinely portrayed as heroes within out toxic corporate culture.

This has always been my main problem with Judge Dredd, the fact that an authoritarian order follower is portrayed as a cool, empowered hero. This portrayal drips down into our own world where cops and soldiers are routinely portrayed as heroes, when in reality they are dogs on a leash, a leash controlled by corporate/ banking interests. Judge Dredd makes wearing a uniform look cool. That is very dangerous.

Having said all of that, I read Judge Dredd very closely this week, and noticed an acknowledgement of reality, a sentence that reminds readers of what Judges actually are:

‘They were all ‘yes’ men. They’re Judges after all. Respect the chain of command. Respect the badge.’

Do you know what that sounds like to me? It sounds like an acknowledgement that Judge Dredd is an order following Nazi. Am I calling Judge Dredd a Nazi? Yes, yes I am, because that’s exactly what he is. All order followers are Nazi’s. As long as you do what you are told, with no regard to whether it’s right or wrong, that automatically makes you a Nazi.

Absalom has a cheap pop at the IDF this week and references a television personality (Frank Bough) who last had a presence on UK television in 1993. There are lots of references in this story, and they’re all old, or safe. This is a perfect example of how to appear edgy, whilst pushing views that wouldn’t be out of place on suicide inducing daytime television. This is bland, bland stuff, and the veneer of rebellion is as see-through fake as Question Time on BBC One.

Helium is better, mainly because the main protagonist is likeable, and the dialogue is fun, as opposed to self satisfied and irritating. The art is big and colourful and I’d have to be a right old grump to dislike it. I don’t. It’s good, enjoyable stuff.

Outlier is better this week. The story is easier to follow and I’m finally getting into it. This one took some time to get going, but it has its hooks in me now.

Jaegir still isn’t doing anything for me. It’s still a daft story about an order follower investigating other order followers. It’s pretty stupid, as we all know that those in uniforms pretty much do whatever they like, as long as they follow the dictates of their masters. The only order followers ever thrown under the big bus of statism are low level morons, and pretending that is not the case just means that you are deliberately not paying attention to reality, and how things actually work.

I don’t like to admit it, but I actually enjoyed Judge Dredd this week. The snowy art helped, but there was something about the omniscient narration that made it more enjoyable than usual. Helium and Outlier also read well this week, so that’s good enough for me, and enough for me to give PROG 1940 of 2000AD a ‘thank goodness it’s not all about feminism this week’ thumbs up.


Rating: 7/10 (Not great, but better than it has been recently)