The Comicon Monthly Megazine Preview – Issue 406: Vengeful Vegetation Takes Over!

The Judge Dredd: Megazine hits the stands every month with extended tales from Judge Dredd and the world of 2000 AD. And each month, with the Monthly Megazine, Comicon gives you a thrill-packed preview!

This month, that means five excellent strips, from Judge Dredd needing to do a little pruning of the Mega-City plant life, Psi-Judge Lillian Storm brings her usual cheer to another Brit-Cit murder investigation in Storm Warning, Whilst off-world we explore the bizarre and brutal world of Blunt and the positively Deathly goings on with Judge Death and the gang in The Torture Garden. And, in the highlight of the issue, Lawless sees Dan Abnett and Phil Winslade continue to do a beautiful job of ripping our hearts out wondering just what’s going to happen next.

So, enjoy the preview. Megazine Issue 406 is out in the UK and on digital on 20th March. You folks in the Americas will need to have a little patience, as yours get there later.

JUDGE DREDD: PLANTED – PART 2 – FINAL PART – Rory McConville, Dan Cornwell, colors Jim Boswell, letters Annie Parkhouse.

The science experiment gone wrong is a classic Dredd storyline, and Planted is just that, as a group of very pissed plants do a slow march across the big Meg to get revenge on the bio-tech boss responsible for their transformation. Dredd meanwhile has called in the techs, with their very own brand of pest-control.

Two-parts done particularly nicely by McConville and Cornwell, two relatively new names here on Dredd, but two who should be around for a long time.

LAWLESS: ASHES TO ASHES – PART 7 – Dan Abnett, Phil Winslade, letters Ellie De Ville.

An older Lawson is the last one left in Badrock and is living a life haunted by familiar ghosts. Right now though, she’s having a chat with the alien Zhind before the planet of 43 Rega gets nuked by SJS.

And what a chat it turns out to be, with Lawson learning so many things, realising that it might just be worth one last attempt to make things right. All it’s going to need is for SJS to be reasonable. Oh, hell. Not good.

Lawless continues to amaze, it has from the start and now, as it all comes to an end, it’s promising to end in a glorious, possibly heartbreaking, manner. Abnett and Winslade are doing wonderful things.

STORM WARNING: GREEN AND PLEASANT LAND – PART 3 – Leah Moore, John Reppion, Tom Foster, colours – Eva Del La Cruz, letters Simon Bowland.

The continuing adventures of Psi-Judge Lillian Storm takes us to another multiple murder and ends up interrogating a tree. Yes, just another day on the job, eh? But, she does end up with a name and the next stage of the procedural begins.

The joy of Storm Warning is in the details, such as the clever way Moore and Reppion deal with Storm’s chats with the dead, and the artwork, with Foster really channelling his inner Brian Bolland here.

BLUNT II – PART 7 – TC Eglington, Boo Cook, letters Simon Bowland.

So, it turns out the planet is colonising the colonists as much as they’ve been colonising the planet. Fungal invasion of the brain that grows to connect any animal consuming it to the planet… a real planet wide link and, for the colonists, a real life-changing experience… bodies twist and mutate into something more in keeping with the planet. It’s not a pretty sight. And Boo Cook really captures the nightmare in full-on technicolour…

And things keep getting worse and worse on the planet, as Blunt and Ilya are about to find out. It’s a spectacular series, based on the fascinating ideas of genetic manipulation, mass consciousness, very different models of evolution, all incredibly complex ideas, but here, with Eglington and Cook, these wild ideas all fit, beautifully, inside a thrilling sci-fi romp. Definitely one that I want to see return when this second series has run its course.

THE DARK JUDGES: THE TORTURE GARDEN – PART 7 – David Hine, Nick Percival, letters Annie Parkhouse.

Judges Death, Mortis, and Fire are having a fine old time on Dominion, working their way through the population with glee. But, there’s one missing from their little gang. And here he comes… Judge Fear!

Yes, the rescue mission from the Mega-City One marines was meant to save the world of Dominion, but all it’s done so far is bring Judge Fear closer to the other three Dark Judges, complete with a new Dark Judge, Judge Whisper. This is not the rescue Hershey had planned, that’s for sure. And as for where it’s going, well the final page is a real doozy.