And this is Sinister Dexter, the adventures of the best damn Gunsharks in the sprawling European metropolis of Downlode, where criminal gangs rule, violence comes in a variety of affordable prices to suit every pocket, and where ex-Russian military-grade cybernetic alligators are considered an appropriate response to home intruders.
The year is 1995. A youngish man named Dan Abnett has been employed by Tharg the Mighty, editor of 2000AD, to write a strip about two cool hitmen inspired by the recent film Pulp Fiction. That strip was Sinister Dexter, and it was to become one of the longest running ones in the comic. Most of the stories are one-shots that can be used almost exactly as they appear for PC missions - protect the cryogenically frozen heir to a CEO for a couple of days, bump off the guy who's been schtupping the bosses girlfriend, or even try to keep a group of extremely ambitious mob bosses from killing themselves before they can work out a territory dispute. Downlode’s dialect is characterful enough in its own right, and can be very handy when you need new streetslang, shorthand and swearwords.
For anyone who was reading along with The Fall of Deadworld and was expecting this on Saturday, I really did plan to do this over the weekend. Turns out Grudd (and his agents at BT) had other ideas.
Brody Reed
...
Dominic Rogers
...
Leo Cruz
...
Jonathan Butler
...
Lucas Gonzalez
...
Charles Morris
The 90s was quite a dark period for 2000AD. Quite literally, in the case of all those strips using dark, muddy colours. As a cost-cutting measure it was also policy for a lot of the time to use absolutely all material submitted, no matter what the quality or stage of completion. As you can imagine that did lead to some standards slipping.
Sinister Dexter survived relatively unscathed, but it did take quite a while for them to hit a groove and pin down the signature look of the characters. The murky artwork does eventually improve - these aren't poor scans, this is more or less what it looked like in print.
Kayden Nguyen
...
Jeremiah Howard
...
James Young
...
Owen Nelson
...
Aaron Stewart
...
Ethan Thomas
>rage against the machine >sad
Heh. I like the trope inversion.
Lucas Evans
...
John Adams
...
Benjamin Thomas
...
Parker Young
...
Anthony Hill
As mentioned above these early stories are mostly one-shots, but they are also fleshing out the world bit by bit and introducing new characters in the background: Floppy, the Czar, Holy Moses Tanenbaum on the Mount of Olives...
Isaiah Collins
... and the lovely Demi Octavo.
Colton Murphy
...
Evan Perry
...
Nathan Gray
...
Justin Turner
...
Jose Harris
...
Dylan Ortiz
Does the story get more interesting later on? Because the one-shot gags are wearing thin.
Nathaniel Cook
...
James Fisher
...
Cooper Cruz
...
Juan Gonzalez
Okay, this is hilarious.
Cooper Ross
It does around about the time Simon Davies starts doing the art semi-regularly and we start getting into longer stories rather than the week to week page fillers. The groundwork for the first major arc about the rise of a new crime lord is actually already being laid in the background, but it won't be immediately apparent for a little while yet.
Alexander Lee
...
Juan White
...
Adrian Miller
...
Sebastian Long
...
Tyler Reed
...
Jaxson Ward
In case you were wondering, I'm pretty sure the number Demi sings here was written by Dan Abnett rather than an existing song. I'd be very interested to hear if its real though.
Juan Lopez
...
Julian Morris
...
Tyler Morales
...
Justin Hall
...
Jacob Martin
...
Wyatt Nelson
...
Jayden Taylor
...
Evan Bell
...
Chase Barnes
...
Jonathan Diaz
...
Benjamin Brooks
...
Ayden Hall
Holy crud, she looks like she was drawn by a fourteen year old trying to imitate Liefield.
Isaiah Nelson
it_was_the_90s.jpg
For what its worth she is drawn much more realistically very soon, albeit with skin the colour of a drowned albino.
Nicholas Sullivan
The wheels of plot begin to turn here.
Parker Martinez
...
Kayden Lopez
...
Xavier Myers
...
Jaxson Howard
...
Samuel Foster
...
Nicholas Brooks
...
Colton Martin
...
Justin Martinez
...
Brandon Lee
...
Gavin Turner
...
Elijah Sanchez
Did you spot Wallace and Gromit in the last story? Hint: Portraits
Gavin Richardson
Yep.
Austin Morales
...
Joshua King
...
Wyatt Nguyen
...
Luke Perez
...
Tyler Campbell
...
Oliver Sanchez
...
Joseph Wilson
...
Jeremiah Moore
...
Owen Reyes
...
Nicholas Cox
...
Logan Bell
...
Samuel Peterson
...
Joseph Adams
This next story marked the debut of Simon Davis on Sinister Dexter, who to this day is considered the definitive artist on the strip. Davis uses an interesting combination of close photo-referencing with ink and paint, leading to really vivid images starring realistic looking people. His propensity for painting pale people as corpse white continues to baffle, however.
Kayden Brooks
Davis continues to work for 2000AD, most recently on Ampney Crucis Investigates and Slaine: The Brutania Chronicles.
Jonathan Lee
...
Camden Baker
...
Carson Hall
...
Matthew Martinez
...
Luis Smith
The Sawn-Off Shogun is such a good name for a Yakuza crime lord. The others aren't bad either. I also like how all the gangs have their own distinct look, even if they only appear for a single panel.
Logan Diaz
...
Liam Lee
...
James Lee
...
Andrew Baker
...
Jason Parker
...
Jaxon Peterson
...
Lincoln Hughes
Welcome back! Long time no see! Thanks for the dump!
Jaxon Stewart
So long as there is Thrill Power in your heart I will always be with you, Anonymous. Always.
James Edwards
In case you missed it, I did the recent Deadworld stories last Friday. This story was illustrated by a young Henry Flint, who in addition to doing things like Zombo and Shakara for 2000AD has followed the time-worn path of his predecessors and done some work for Marvel and DC (most notably The Omega Men)
Matthew Murphy
...
Jose Nelson
My God... taxmen.
Sebastian Phillips
...
David Miller
...
Jayden Evans
I'm not 100% sure, but I suspect that this was one of the original run of stories and was held back till now so that delays in finishing the next major story, Gunshark Vaction, weren't apparent.
