The Stop Button

It’s an inoffensively weak issue. Finley-Day handles both Invasion and Dredd and doesn’t do well with either of them. Invasion has some really complex layouts from Dorey, which are cool, but the story’s pretty lame. Dredd is oddly not particularly busy–McMahon spends more time on little details than city designs–and Finley-Day doesn’t have a good punchline.

Harlem Heroes actually talks about the game again and has a very strange ending with the Brain player being viciously cruel. Rather racist installment too. Guess no one worried about offending Japanese readers.

Shako’s idiotic. It should be a lot more fun too, but Arancio doesn’t go for realism so instead it comes off silly.

The Dan Dare wraps up; Moore sets Dare against the Mekon for a very boring finish. Belardinelli does both Dare and M.A.C.H. 1. His art on the latter’s better.

Though inoffensive, it does plod.

CREDITS

Invasion, Tyne Tunnel; writer, Gerry Finley-Day; artist, Mike Dorey; letterer, John Aldrich. Harlem Heroes, Part Twenty-three; writer, Tom Tully; artist and letterer, Dave Gibbons. Shako, Part Four; writers, Pat Mills and John Wagner; artist, Arancio; letterer, Jack Potter. Dan Dare, Hollow World, Part Twelve; writer, Steve Moore; artist, Massimo Belardinelli; letterer, Aldrich. M.A.C.H. 1, Spy Plane; writer, Robert Flynn; artist, Belardinelli; letterer, Aldrich. Judge Dredd, Smoker’s Crime; writer, Finley-Day; artist, Mike McMahon; letterers, Tom Frame and Peter Knight. Editor, Kelvin Gosnell; publisher, IPC.