Reviews

Meltdown Man by Alan Hebden

thecommonswings's review

4.0

Overly long, rambly and with an ending as sudden as Poochy leaving the Simpsons, there’s still something glorious about Meltdown Man. Hebden creates a sort of Dr Moreau universe but instead focuses on the Yujees as real, emotionally involving characters - certainly they’re the real meat of this as Stone and Leeshar are so monolithic they’re pretty dull. But it’s knotty and involving and full of incredible details - the sacrifice of the cowardly Slagheap and death of King Seth; the meetings with humans who Stone repeatedly - and happily - humiliates to make the point as the cruelty of how the Yujees are treated; and particularly that awful cliffhanger of a row of skewered predators shown in shadow which must have been one of the darkest things the prog ever did. Belardinelli gets a lot of grief for his failings as an artist - I don’t think his humans look that weedy but they do tend to face either forwards or in profile at all times - but the Yujees are incredible: weird yet familiar, ugly and brutish but with a real individualism to each one Stone meets. It’s not a classic 2000AD story as such but absolutely crackles with the energy the prog radiated in those crucial early years