2000ad was always a comic that revelled in ugliness. Its roster of anti-heroes constantly did ugly things to ugly people and the ugliest of them all is iconic lawman of the future, Judge Dredd, whose mug adorns the dust jacket of this hefty tome (painted by the inimitable art droid, Greg Staples). But "ugly" is not a word that would describe this scrotnig volume celebrating 35 years of Dredd cover art from the pages of Tharg's illustrious organ. (No accident, of course, that its release coincides with the zarjaz new Dredd movie with Karl Urban in the titular role.) Of the few coffee-table books (the other notable one being 2007's "Thrill-Power Overload" by David Bishop) that the house of Tharg has produced, this is perhaps the finest in terms of production vlaues, with glossy colour pages depicting high-quality scans of the very finest Judge Dredd covers and artwork from 1977 to the present.
The book is divided into three sections - "The Newsprint Era", "The Painted Years" and "The Digital Age". Of these, the Newsprint Era is my personal favourite, perhaps because it taps into the vestigial depths of my subconcious. My weekly dose of 2000ad started not with the reading of the stories (or rather, "thrills",) but with the trip to the newsagent (or "thrill-merchant") where my eyes (or "thrill-receptors") would scan the shelves for that week's prog. Can I forget such legendary covers as prog 61's explosive Mike McMahon cover that kick-started the Cursed Earth saga with such raw verve? Or the shocking Brian Bolland cover from prog 82 where the affable alien Tweak is being man-handled by slave traders? Or McMahon's famous "You're Next, Punk" cover that adorned prog 148 or...or...or...
Yes, this book is full of those seminal Dredd moments and more besides. There is artwork from all of the good Judge's art robots over the years, including Carlos Ezquerra, Kevin O'Neill, Ron Smith, Steve Dillon, Cam Kennedy, Cliff Robinson, Will Simpson, Colin Wilson, Dylan Teague, Kevin Walker and dozens more. Old skool and new, the gang's all here, their top-notch artwork presented in glorious, thrill-receptor melting full-colour. As if this wasn't enough, there is also a selection of interior art as well as commentaries on the covers by the artists, writers and editors that have been involved with Dredd one way or another in the last three and a half decades. It really is a sumptuous tome, a time-capsule of truly thrill-powered Dredd art. A definite must-have for all Squaxx dek Thargo out there and for people who like their heroes ugly but their books beautiful!
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richard barry
Dredd in all his glory!
Reviewed in the United States on 16 February 2013