America : Lost & Found

In lockdown, Luke though he’d read more. But what he’s done is bought more to read, leaving him with a teetering, potentially cat flattening tower of books and comics next to the bed. In amongst that, he’s drawn out this new(er) edition of the Dredd classic.

By John Wagner, Colin MacNeil & Annie Parkhouse

Review by Luke Williams

“America” is possibly the most well known Judge Dredd strip. Notable in being beaten only by “Slaine :  The Horned God” in the reprint stakes. Including the original run and this edition in the Megazine, yours truly has at least 4 versions of this scattered (catalogued obviously) around chateau Williams. Numbers of editions in print of this story probably get into double figures if you include Classic 2000AD, Hachette and now the Penguin Random House audio book adaptation (shout out to Pete Wells & Eamonn Clarke’s excellent review of that release at Mega City Book Club).

To all intents and purposes Rebellion tout it as Dredd’s “Dark Knight”, where Dredd gets really gritty and realistic, although the strip had been building to this for quite a few years, arguably since a “Question of Judgement” if not before. It’s certainly significant as a turning point in the Dredd strip’s development despite the title character being absence for a significant part of the story.

If you’ve been missing in action for the last 30 years, America follows the lives of Bennett  Beeny and his friend America Jara from child to adult hood, tracking significant events in Mega City Ones’ history and how their lives diverge, Bennett  into hugely successful  light entertainment, America’s into hardcore political activism, with the shadow of the judges looming over them, and reunited in violence. It’s often seen as part of the democracy storyline that ran in the strip, whereas in fact it’s more adjunct, but strongly tied to it.

As a showcase for what can be done with comics it’s exemplary, but let’s face it, (an overused word) despite being  an excellent story, it’s not the best Dredd story ever and not representative of the strip and certainly not the strip up to that point. So, in case you were wondering; like DKR is not the best introduction to Batman, “America” isn’t the newbie’s best introduction to Dredd.

 Good, that’s settled then.

 It is a lovely edition reprinting the original, beautiful strip in a hardback alongside Wagner’s scripts of 5 episodes, the other two sadly being lost to time / house moves / bad filing / a failure to plan for the future and fandom’s willingness to by the same story multiple times. Wagner bridges the gaps with commentary on the published strip and what he may have asked MacNeil to draw with panels from the original strip are reprinted in a red hue.

 

It’s the equivalent of buying your favourite album in an expanded edition with scratchy 4 track demos of your favourite tracks tacked on the end. Interesting, but it can diminish the mystique of the original work. To mix metaphors, you don’t always need to see what goes on under the bonnet. But then, nor do you have to buy it (or so I try to tell myself.)

As a 30 year old story that I probably read every two years or so, it still holds up. Beeny is a bit whiny, MacNeil’s art is still shockingly violent, but beautiful. There are lots reviews out there that point out the stories failings and perhaps that ending is a little problematic now, but it is still a classic.

Wagner’s famously terse scripts are effectively behind the scenes footage of the creation of the story and gives some insight into the creative process, but also how much free reign Wagner gives his artistic partners. A prod here, a poke there, but without being too dictatorial or prescriptive, just a general overview of what he wants. MacNeil doesn’t seem to move much from what his writer asks of him, and his work here is amazing – and yes, those exit wounds, quite spectacular  What is also interesting is that there didn’t seem to be a credit for letterer Annie Parkhouse, omission? Or is is it there and your reviewer is as blind as a bat?

 

This package isn’t aimed at newcomers to the story. If you hadn’t read America before, try and seek out a copy of Classic 2000AD issue 1, you can usually pick it up for a £5 on Ebay, or even the recent Hachette editions before forking out 20 nicker for this,  and then, if you like it that much, buy this edition. This is aimed at those who are familiar with the story and clearly don’t have enough editions on their shelves / long boxes / crates in storage. An oversized edition would have been preferable, kind of like DCs Absolute editions. To continue the analogy, this is for existing fans who want the demos to go along with the album, “the making of” to go with the original release.

Not the definitive edition, but lovingly packaged  and an interesting insight into the creative process behind a classic.