Review by Frank Plowright

This collection gathers the Rogue Trooper material from early 1985 to mid-1988, by which time Rogue was appearing more regularly in Annuals and Specials, hence credits for several writers not generally associated with the feature. However, this is a period of transition, with creator Gerry Finley-Day’s final strip appearing in 1985. New writer Simon Geller’s contributions aren’t as frequent, indicating Rogue’s days of challenging the popularity of 2000AD’s headliner Judge Dredd were long gone.

The Complete Collection 2 closed with the end of Rogue’s search for the General who’d sold out his troops, a background plot that sustained the series since the start. Finley-Day, though, had always run other future war stories alongside what was in effect a narrative piece of string, and immediately introduces a new quest. The final strips drawn by Cam Kennedy have Bagman, Gunnar and Helm’s personality chips contaminated with a virus that disintegrates any replacement body they’re downloaded into.

It takes Rogue away from his ongoing war and into a series of encounters with alien races. Finley-Day extending slim plots becomes even more apparent as he winds down his involvement, but art from José Ortiz makes the stories look better than they are. His colour work for an annual is also notable (sample spread left). Finley-Day’s swansong has spirit and surprises, and thereafter Geller takes over with Rogue back in the middle of the war.

That changes, though. Geller’s plan is to have Rogue assassinate key figures without whose direction and influence the war will grind to a halt. As an idea at least it’s a viable new direction, converting Rogue into an assassin, but it becomes formulaic as Geller falls into the same trap as Finley-Day by dragging matters on too long.

Rogue is never mentioned when Steve Dillon’s best art is discussed, but he puts a lot of effort into these stories. He uses smaller panels than usual, and plenty of them, and has to pull out all his storytelling expertise to enliven material that rapidly loses its way.

Of the additional material, the most unusual is ‘Killothon’, which is Pat Mills devising a plot led by rolls of the dice. It still stands up as both story and game over a taut 95 panels, with art team of Mike Collins and Mark Farmer managing pages with impact despite individual panels so often not connecting due to the twists of the game.

As in previous volumes: art good, stories dull. Will The Complete Collection 4 see better material? All the strips from the regular 2000AD comic previously saw print in Rogue Trooper: Tales of Nu-Earth 02 and 03.