February 27th, 2007
2000AD: How do you say ‘Happy Birthday’ in Quaxxann?
Last week, upon discovering that legendary comic 2000AD would be turning 30 tomorrow, I thought the occasion should be marked. Now, apart from the fact that I’ve been reading a lot of graphic novels lately and went to see Ghostrider this morning (Nicolas Cage with scary hair plugs), my knowledge of comics is very basic. Thankfully, I have absorbed a lot of info through some weird comic osmosis from my Graphic Designer, Sci-Fi geek and comic book fanatic older brother. He also has every single issue of 2000AD (that’s him to the right clutching Issue #1), so who better to ask for an opinion on the mag’s 30th birthday? Over to my bro, Martin…
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Wednesday marks the 30th anniversary of the launch of seminal British sci-fi anthology comic 2000AD.
Elsewhere the BBC and the UK Independent have chronicled the birth and development of the comic so I thought I’d bring a little personal reflection to the party. In the early ’70s, though only a tot, I was obsessed with science fiction and comics. TV was feeding me Star Trek, Space 1999, Doctor Who, (although a lot of that was going over my head), Planet of the Apes and the (animated) Fantastic Voyage among others. British ‘boys’ comics were abundant and great. Comic snobs will tell you that the scene was stale until Action and then 2000AD arrived but I loved all those titles - Hotspur, Bullet, Warlord, Battle, Tiger, the Marvel UK reprints and the brilliant Alan Class anthologies (Astounding Stories, Creepy Worlds et al) not to mention the funnies (by the way The Beano and The Dandy are still going too).
Occasionally a newsagent would get an American title in, usually a Marvel, I don’t remember seeing many DC titles in the pre-comic shop days and my head would spin from FULL COLOUR! And those weird Hostess ‘Twinky’ ads.
1977 though - what a great year to be a sci-fi comic geek. We got Star Wars AND 2000AD. I saw the weird animated ad announcing its arrival and had to have it right away. I was in heaven. I’m still buying it, and yes I have a complete collection. Sure, it went a bit rubbish in the ’90s when all the writers were being so post-post-something and all the artists were ripping off Simon Bisley’s (admittedly good) rip-off of Frank Frazetta’s fantasy style, forgetting they couldn’t mix paint and giving us a spectacular palette of browns and purples. However, the last few years have seen a return to form, if not the heights of the early ’80s. In a period from about 1979 to 1986 2000AD was stunning. So stunning to me that I have a double set of that run - one kept and bagged comic saddo style and the other, picked up for a song when you could still get crazy bargains on Ebay, well thumbed and regularly being re-read.
Not just a nostalgia trip though, there was amazing creativity going on then and a sizable group of those writing or drawing at that period have gone on, not just to do well, but become comic industry giants - most famously Alan ‘Watchmen’ Moore, arguably the greatest comic writer of all time and subject of a BBC Culture Show last year. Moore’s five-page Future Shocks and Time Twisters one-offs are nothing short of amazing, like a little Twilight Zone episode every week. And in only five pages! Some of today’s comic writers could learn a thing or two from this economy and punchiness (I’m looking at you Marvel Civil War #7 - 20 page fight scene indeed!)
So reflecting on 2000AD this week I’ve realized just how much it has influenced me. I’m a graphic artist and although I was creating my own little comics (an early Fantastic Four rip-off springs to mind) it was 2000AD that really set me off. I must have doodled Judge Dredd thousands of times in the last 30 years. When I did my first interview for Art College, when asked who the artist that influenced me the most was I replied: “Mike McMahon”. I wasn’t trying to be a smartarse, naming someone the panel might not have heard off, it was the truth. McMahon drew the first Dredd published and although artist Carlos Ezquerra first visualized Dredd, it was McMahon who developed Dredd’s defining visual characteristics - the huge chin, massive boots, unwieldy shoulder, elbow and kneepads. All done in a frankly outrageous line style that blew my mind. As for when he shifted to yet another unique style for his early SlaÃne run… more brain stuff popping in my head.
Like I said, there’s other media coverage around this week for the history and cultural influence of this great comic. It just so happens I’m re-watching my Spaced DVD’s right now and 2000AD is all over it the series, but I like to think that there’s also lots of people like me out there, some working in comics but more likely in the wider graphics industry that started out out just like I did, slavishly copying frames from those inky pages.
If you’re curious 2000AD is still available weekly from some newsagents and all comic shops. For the weirder, older reprints pick up the quarterly Extreme issue (current issue has a complete run of 1986’s brilliant ‘The Dead’ ). The quality stuff though can be found in the ‘Complete’ series of trade paperback collections - including one of all Alan Moore’s short stories and The Judge Dredd Case Files - search out the McMahon/Bolland/Smith-era Dredds. €20 from comic and book shops for lots of continuous law giving fun - you can’t go wrong!
So will it still be around in another 30 years? Or even 10? I don’t know, but the fact is there’s 1526 issues of 2000AD out there now and we’ll always be able to read them… and its place in comic history is more than assured.
Splundig Vur Thrigg!
Links:
February 27th, 2007 at 5:30 pm
A while back I came across some sketches from 2000ad signings in Dublin and London I went to…
Those were the days…
February 28th, 2007 at 12:28 am
Nice to see the occasion marked with such affection Martin/Sinéad.
I have a much more modest collection of progs. It probably only stretches from (about) 1984-1993 but I complemented it with various Titan reprints of older stories. I stopped collecting around the time I went to college. Partly due to other distractions, and partly because (as Martin points out) the 90s was possibly the worst decade EVER for comics in general.
Stand out moments (for me) are many: Halo Jones, The original “Summer Magic�, all of “Zenith�, Dredd’s Dead Man/Necropolis double bill , Johnny Alpha biting the dust in the final mutie solution (*sniff*), Chopper’s “Song of the Surfer� etc., etc.
All stories that proved the alchemical magic that happens when comic art and comic words are perfectly fused.
February 28th, 2007 at 9:31 am
Halo Jones - thank you! I was trying to remember the name of the girl character that was obviously meant to appeal to women readers. My brother bought 2000ad and being a typical girl I used to only read the Halo Jones bit.
February 28th, 2007 at 9:52 am
Ha! The Spaced I watched last niight had Nick Frost saying to Simon Pegg “Who’s shoulder did you cry on when Johnny Alpha was killed by that weird flying thing in 2000AD?”
Halo Jones - more Moore excellence…
February 28th, 2007 at 1:49 pm
Unexpected but welcome post. I used to read my cousin’s stash- a complete set until the mid-90’s. I think Moore’s Future Shock about the guy with the two-tiered brain is the moment that I realised that there were people out there who were paid to make stuff up. I mean I read a lot as a kid but somehow had never put that together. I drifted away from comics once i realised that Halo was never going to have another book and Moore was off writing those pricey US comics, probably just as Zenith started up, but by then the magazine had bent so badly out of shape that I’ve never looked in on it since. I eventually gave in and started reading Sandman and the black and white Titan Swamp Thing reprints but nothing really matches that early 80’s 2000AD run. Something about the anthology format, I think, made it special. The Grant Morrison 7 Soldiers stuff seems to try to capture some of the wilful mucking about with genre that 2000AD had then.
Thanks again for the post- Mike McMahon, you know I’d completely forgotten him.
March 1st, 2007 at 8:55 am
It did a huge amount for comics world wide. Wonder if Alan Moore would ever have emerged if not for it. It also brought through the next generation of English writer with the likes of Grant Morrison, Pete Milligan etc. I haven’t read it in years actually, must go back to D.R and Quich and Halo Jones etc one more time…
March 4th, 2007 at 7:25 pm
When I did my first interview for Art College, when asked who the artist that influenced me the most was I replied: “Mike McMahon�.
Ha, when I applied (unsuccessfully, I might add) to NCAD, I named Dave McKean and Jamie Hewlett among my influential artists. I don’t think that (and the fact that a huge chunk of my portfolio consisted of my comics) helped my case much, although I’m pretty sure I just wasn’t good enough to get in anyway.
I was never a huge 2000AD reader, but I always thought Halo Jones was fantastic, although my favourite Alan Moore contribution to 2000AD is still DR and Quinch. And I really love Jamie Hewlett and Peter Milligan’s Hewligan’s Haircut - one of my favourite ever comics. I wish Hewlett would do more comics now instead of Gorillaz videos.
March 5th, 2007 at 9:32 pm
Good oul’ Martin. I remember the Sundays he watched in teeth-clenched horror as I thumbed through his 2000 AD collection. My favourite cousin
And congrats on the award Sinead!