Who's Who in the CBU 2009

Name: Regie Rigby

Regie is a strange, almost ethereal creature. Who can plumb the hidden mysteries of his dark and murky past - a past which contains a terrible secret. A secret that taught him that with great power comes great responsibility, that criminals are a cowardly superstitious lot and just who exactly knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men.

By day, he assumes the appearance of a mild mannered teacher, bringing the joy of literature and the English Language to classes of enthralled and enthusiastic students. But by night?

By night he goes home and writes lesson plans. Sorry. That's as interesting as he gets. Really.

The rumours about rooftop struggles with underworld uberfiends, the gossip about the hidden cave filled with hi-tec equipment and the suggestion that his car might be fitted with turbo lasers are all nonsense.

When he's not teaching he reads comics. Sometimes he combines the two activities. When he's not doing that he's either playing computer games or asleep.

Still MMAD For It!

By Regie Rigby

So, previously on FoolBritannia, we had a bit of a chat about the way 2000AD is expanding its audience by collecting the finest examples of its vast archive and getting the aforementioned reprints into regular bookshops. I also, by way of example explained to you just how awesome the collected Button Man: The Confessions of Harry Exton is*.

I also suggested that I wasn’t sure that the ease with which new readers can get hold of classic thrill power isn’t an entirely good thing, and I promise I’ll get to that later, but for now, I reckon it’s only fair that I get on with my review of the trade paperback collections that started this whole train of thought.

The second collection out of the envelope was Nicolai Dante: Sword of the Tsar, originally published in 2000AD between progs 1468 and 1516. Now, I have to admit that I’m more than a little biased. I’ve been a fan of Dante for some time – since before I even read one of his adventures, truth be told. I first came across the man who is literally “too cool to kill”** as a picture in the back of the UKCAC Programme in 1997***. The tradition back then was for pro artists who were attending the Convention to produce a black and white sketch for the convention booklet, the original being auctioned for charity and the end of the event. I actually bid on Dante. I couldn’t help myself.

You see, Nicolai Dante is quite simply an irresistible character. He’s more dashing than Gable, more swash-buckling than Flynn, and his success with women makes Cassanova look like a librarian!**** Above all though, however much of a thieving, womanising, show-off he is, he’s also a decent guy trying to do what’s right. Like so many swashbuckling heroes of yore, Dante has a core that is honest, loyal and decent without ever being overly worthy, pious or dull.

And then there’s his world. Dante lives in a far future on an Earth that is dominated by the Imperial houses of Russia. I don’t think that the strip has ever bothered to explain whether this is an alternate Earth where the 1918 revolution never happened, or whether the lines have somehow regained the power and influence they once enjoyed. Whatever, it doesn’t matter. As a premise it gives the whole thing a slightly unusual flavour. Let’s be honest, most futuristic fiction imagines a world where the future is basically American.***** Dante’s world is about as unamerican as they come.

In Dante’s world the Russian Empire is global, and ruled over by the ruthless Markov dynasty. In an attempt to seize power the rival house of Romanov made a deal with some technologically advanced extra-dimensional beings for a set of genetically exclusive “weapons crests”. These super computers give the wearer special powers, tactical assistance and offer help with sensing opponents and so on, and will only bond with somebody of Romanov blood.

Dante didn’t know this when he robbed the ship which was taking the crests to the Romonov family. Nor did he know that he was the illegitimate son of the head of the Romanov clan. The crest merely recognised the DNA and bonded. Now Dante bears the crest and enjoys all of the advantages it brings. He finds it quite handy – particularly the ability it gives him to create bladed weapons at will. That’s got him out of trouble on quite a few occasions.

The Romanov revolution came to naught however, and the Markovs tightened their grip on the globe. Any surviving Romanovs are public enemy number one – and so far as the Markov Dynasty is concerned, that definitely includes Dante. That, pretty much, brings you up to date with the start of Sword of the Tsar.

The book itself collects a sequence of stories which start with Dante on the run from the Empire and up to his old thieving tricks in a South African Supercasino. We follow his misadventures as he escapes one scrape after another, in the process uniting the ships of the various Pacific Pirate fleets, usurps his mother’s position as a pirate leader, falls foul of her loyal crew, is reunited with an old flame, and ends up making a bargain with a man who should be his worst enemy.

Along the way script writer Robbie Morrison delivers a lot of laughs, a lot of tension, some tragedy and above all, excitement. I read these stories when they were originally serialised in ‘Tooth and I honestly can’t imagine how the hell I managed to wait between instalments. I guarantee you this is one book you’ll read from cover to cover at one sitting – you won’t be able to stop yourself, I know I couldn’t.

Art chores for the first two thirds of the book are handled by the wonderfully retro brush of John Burns, whose water colour style painting is somewhat reminiscent of the sixties, and fits perfectly with the mood of this section of the book. There’s a lot of slapstick and action here, and Burns really makes it move. The final third, the titular story arc “Sword of the Tsar” is graced by the more modern linework of Dante’s Co-Creator (with Morrison) Simon Fraser.

Now, I love Fraser’s work – I reckon he’s one of the best artists to work for ‘Tooth in recent years, and “Sword of the Tsar” really is Fraser at his finest. It’s not just dynamic, although it really does capture the pace of the action extraordinarily well, but it also has great expression. Simon Fraser is possessed of that most important skills in the arsenal of the comics artist – the ability to convey exactly what a character is thinking with a few strokes of the pen. The final view of Dante’s face is a work of particular genius, and would require several pages of type to explain so effectively in prose what Dante is feeling.

You owe this book to yourself, you really do, and, just as with the Button Man volume we looked at last week, it is a truly wonderful thing that this material is being made easily available to readers whether they be new or old. And yet, I do still find myself conflicted about just how accessible all of these classic stories are now.

But for now, believe it or not, we’re out of time again, so more about that, and the final volume of the three collections that stoked up this train of thought and set it on the rails next week. And after that, hopefully, we’ll have a real treat for you involving one of the greatest icons of early twentieth century science fiction and one of the most exciting comics artists to emerge in the early part of the twenty first.

Seriously – how much more excitement can you take?!

See you in seven!



















*If you missed it, the answer is “very awesome indeed”, and you should rush out and buy it, if you haven’t already.

**At least, so far…

***Or possibly 1996. I could check, but it would take a while to find the right book, and it’s immaterial to my point.

****Yes, I know. The question is, did you?

*****I think the only major exception in recent times is Firefly, which imagined a solar system where Chinese influence was pretty marked, but even there the predominant force seemed to be rather US centric. Mind you, the fact that it was basically a western may well have had something to do with that. Over here we’ve had both Dan Dare and Warren Ellis’ Ministry of Space, but unless you have some other ideas I think we’ve established it’s a pretty short list.