It's a pictorial treasure trove which has also measured the passage of the last 38 years of my life - all the way back to 1977. Like my life, the comic has had it's ups and downs and the quality has varied. It would be impossible to produce a weekly publication containing five (sometimes more) strips without some duffers sprinkled through it's history. But, as with many other comics, 2000 AD also has had a period where all the stars were in alignment and every single story and every single issue was just about perfect. An era of the magazine that is fondly remembered and spoken of in hushed tones of reverence. A Golden Age.
Now it could be argued that 2000 AD has had several 'Golden Ages' throughout its long history. Every time it seems to lose it's way, it regenerates itself and comes back with renewed vigour. It's always gaining new readers who have discovered it's delights for the first time and losing others as people grow up, change and move onto other things. The Progs published right now in 2015 may well be someone's Golden Age.
My own personal one had a long gestation period - around three and a half years in fact, dating all the way back to those first fledgling issues in 1977. In this multi-part post I'm going to be taking a look at my favourite things from those early days and then examining in depth each story from my Golden Age and trying to explain why I thought it was so perfect. It all started with:
The Bronze Age (well I had to call it something...):
It's easy to say when this Age began - it's Prog 1. My view is that it ends with Prog 85.
Why here? Well it's the final issue before the merger with "Starlord". It's the first time we get all the stories concluding at the same time (admittedly Robo-Hunter had just just ended Part 1 of the "Verdus" storyline the previous week before going on a 15 issue break). Plus of course it's the last part of the very first Judge Dredd mega-epic "The Cursed Earth".
When you look at many of the strips in this first period, they could be considered as spiritual successors to the types of stories from the original run of Action comic - the war story told from a new perspective (Invasion), the future sports story (Harlem Heroes / Inferno), natures creatures getting their own back on man (Flesh / Shako), even a rip off of a popular TV show (M.A.C.H.1). But to class these as mere carbon copies of previous ideas is doing a disservice to the huge imagination and power contained in these issues. I read this first run of comics over and over again during 1977 / 1978, probably more than almost any other before or since. It might not yet be my Golden Age but it sure as hell made a huge and lasting impression on me.
There are so many highlights - images than have stayed with me for decades. That back-page reveal of Harlem Heroes team member Louis Mayer as a disembodied brain.The huge hairy spiders invading the Trans-Time base in "Flesh". Shako biting a man's head off in his first episode. The early work from Brian Bolland on Prog 23's Supercover Saga "The Plague From Pluto". Sam Slade blasting his way through crazed robots with a gun-toting baby on his shoulder. I could find something to talk about in every one of those first 85 Progs. But rather than just reproduce all the comics, I'll share two pages:
That's Artie Gruber, cyborg nemesis of the Harlem Heroes. I found this picture just terrifying. Perhaps shades of Al Rico from "Death Game 1999" in Action comic?
I can see a pattern developing here. My 10 year old self sure didn't like cyborgs!
Here we have friendly Frank Hart, The Visible Man. Just a genius idea with fabulous art by Carlos Trigo.
Of course there were some more "average" strips during these first 85 issues as well (although nothing in 2000 AD could ever really be called average): Colony Earth, Death Planet, Ant Wars, M.A.C.H. Zero, Walter The Wobot, the first ever Future Shocks, Bonjo From Beyond The Stars. Not every one can had astounding art or a ground breaking story but they were still damn good fun.This is also the time when Dredd starts to become firmly placed as the most popular character in the comic. The origins, history and early stories of the Dredd universe have been covered many times by others better than me, so I don't intend to dwell much on them here. However being there from the very start meant I got to read those infamous 'Cursed Earth' episodes featuring Ronald McDonald , the Jolly Green Giant, the Michelin Man and Colonel Saunders. Due to copyright infringement these can never be reprinted, so future generations will miss out on some stunning art from Mick McMahon and Brian Bolland. The thing is though, amongst all the plaudits for 'The Cursed Earth' and the fleshing out of Dredd's world, it's easy to overlook the other real gem from that first year and half - Dan Dare.
The purists might say that the character debuting in Prog 1 was Dare in name only. He had a different face (explained away by an accident), lived in a different time, had none of his normal supporting characters. With that widows peak and Spock-like eyebrows he looked almost as alien as the creatures he faced. I didn't care. I knew nothing about that other Dare from the 1950's. I was only ten years old - and my father was born too early to read it himself. All I cared about was that those first two Dare tales featured some of the strangest worlds, weirdest technology and most exotic creatures I had ever seen in in a science fiction story. And the art - oh my goodness the art! The genius that was Massimo Bellardinelli was the perfect fit. Just take a look at this selection of colour double page spreads if you need any convincing:
See what I mean? Just mind-blowing stuff. The stories (predominately by Pat Mills and the late great Steve Moore) matched the art for weirdness. Forgive my indulgence but here's a brief (ish) synopsis:
In the first tale, Dare loses his ship and crew over Jupiter's Red Spot, although no on believes his explanation about an alien force hiding there. Awaiting court-martial, he escapes and stows away on the Odyssey, commanded by Martian Mr. Monday. While in orbit around Jupiter, Dare tries to explain himself to Monday, just as the ship is attacked by a bizarre looking "Thing" which appears from nowhere. Dare manages to subdue it and travels with Monday down to Jupiter's surface to investigate, where they find the alien "Biogs". Hailing from the planet Zircon, these utterly strange bug-like creatures communicate by changing colour and have developed a society on a biological basis - even their craft and weapons are alive! The Biogs intend to subjugate the Earth to convert it's population into living fuel for the Mother Biog.
Meanwhile up in orbit on the Odyssey, the Thing (known as a Shepard) awakens and seizes control, piloting the cruiser inside one of the Biogs living spaceships. Fighting his way free using a living axe, Dare manages to get into space and inside the alien craft. He tricks the spaceships telepathic brain into thinking he is betraying his race, before using the Odyssey to burn a half mile wide hole in the living flesh and escape - only to find that this ship was just the advance party of a whole Biog fleet.
An insane battle with the Earth defence force ensues, in which the Biogs fling the moon's of Jupiter around like pebbles to decimate the Earthmen. Desperate, Dare embarks on a suicide run firing tachyon torpedoes at the grotesque Biog vessels but it's not enough. Commander Monday realises there is only one option and sacrifices himself and the Odyssey by activating his star drive and sucking the Biogs behind him into the heart of the sun. Back on Earth, Dare is discredited and lets Monday take the posthumous credit for the victory. He has a bigger concern - who told the Biogs where to find Earth?
Prog 12 starts with Dare returning to the UK, now a theme park circling the world every three years and home to hundreds of alien tourists. He meets the wolf-man Rok, and agrees to join his ship, the Titan 1C, as navigator. Meanwhile beyond the galactic rim, a Skash boarding party finds a drifting prison ship containing just one occupant - Dan Dare's infamous nemesis, the Mekon!. Taken before the dual headed creature known as The Two of Verath, the Venusian genius persuades them to join forces with him to conquer the galaxy.
Out in space, the Titan 1C's 's Faster-Than-Light drive breaks down and the crew are flung into the heart of a red giant star, only to find a planet hidden within - the Two of Verath's secret base (that was lucky!). Captured by the alien / weapon hybrid Skash, Dare is brought before the Mekon, who fails to recognise him due to his new face - until the Titan's captain O'Grady rats him out. Subjecting Dare to the telepathic powers of "the Blob", the Mekon confirms that this is indeed his age old enemy before feeding him to flesh eating maggots...
Escaping the trap thanks to help from wolf-man Rok, Dare realises that the Mekon's plan is to allow a hypnotised Two of Verath to be captured and interrogated by the Galactic Council, before detonating a huge bomb hidden in their body. Fighting their way free of the Hollow World and past sceptical guards, the heroes make their way to the council chambers on the planet Congress only to discover that it was a waste of time as the council members (composed of pure thought) already knew the Mekon's plan and have sent the (un-hypnotised) Two of Verath back for revenge. Stowing away on their ship, Dare and Rok make a deal with the mutant and together they attack the Mekon, as the Hollow World's forcefield is destroyed and the planet starts to explode around them.
Narrowly escaping the starquake, Dare and Rok think that is the end of the Mekon, not realising that he and the Two of Verath are trapped in an escape capsule with no way out and only each other for company...
Sincere apologies for those lengthy recaps but I love these two initial storylines so much that its easy to get carried away. The sheer ingenuity and artistry on display is staggering. Forget Dredd. For those first 23 issues Dan Dare was the number one character, and deservedly so. He even got his own separate Poster Magazine which reproduced some of Belardinelli's artwork in stunning glossy full colour along with a history of the character.
Following this titanic battle, Dan Dare disappeared (as Tharg says above) from the Progs for a "rest". Returning from this brief hiatus in Prog 28, the strip undergoes something of a metamorphosis. Having previously worked on the future sports strip 'Harlem Heroes', rising star Dave Gibbons becomes the new artist, with Bellardinelli swapping places to illustrate the 'Heroes' sequel 'Inferno' (and a great job he did of it too). Gone as well is the undercurrent of bizarre alien outlandishness, replaced with a more traditional set of gritty stories pitting Dare and his new crew of thugs and criminals against the 'The Lost Worlds'. This longer run of loosely linked episodes is a bit more "generic SF", with the hero flying through space in his 'fortress' starship, encountering an array of aliens and monsters such as living sand storms, carnivorous plants, undersea monsters, vampires on a Rome-inspired planet (complete with heart shaped continent), doppelgangers and ice world denizens.
The strip began in it's usual spot in the centre colour spread but part way through moved to the front cover, mirroring the position the original Dan Dare occupied in the 'Eagle' comics of the 1950s. At the heart of the 60+ issue run was a 16-part epic pitting Dare against the might of the Star-Slayer Empire and their emperor, the Dark Lord (replete with goatee beard and twirling moustache).
(Not influenced by Star Wars, no not at all...)
Dan Dare lost the cover and any colour in the strip in Prog 59 but Gibbons remained the artist for almost the entire run, excepting a beautiful hallucinatory three-part fill in by Brian Lewis on the "Nightmare Planet"
Despite the strip no longer being the outlandish marvel of those first 23 issues, it was still a great read. The scripts by Gerry-Finley Day and Jack Adrian were full of peril and thrilling cliff-hangers and some excellent supporting characters in "Bear" (a Russian giant) and "Hitman" (who had a gun welded to his hand). Even though the Dave Gibbons art is perhaps more traditional compared to Bellardinelli, it's still undeniably excellent. What's also interesting is that even with the more episodic nature, the strip did have an underlying narrative as the constant dangers of the Lost Worlds began to take their toll on the crew. Although you had the usual "red shirt" characters suffering grisly deaths in the name of plot twists, as time went on it turned out that no one was safe. Dare was also loosing ground to Judge Dredd in the popularity stakes and the "Cursed Earth" saga was just around the corner in Prog 61.
Things began to turn dark and come to a head when the crew visited a supposed "Garden of Eden" which turned out to be a trap by the giant worm-like Sleetha and their brain-sucking plant creatures. "Pilot" is seriously injured and Gunnar Johannssen left mindless and extremely violent. The stresses of this battle spill over when the recovering "Pilot" is shockingly killed by being crushed between two asteroids and chief tech Haskings leads a mutiny to take control of the space fortress, turning the crew against each other. To make matters worse Gunnar breaks loose and has a obsessional desire to kill Dan Dare.
I vividly remember being shocked by that panel. This is long before killing off popular characters was a common occurrence and it lent a real sense of unpredictability to the strip. With Dare reduced to hiding in the conduits and crawlspaces of his own ship and half the crew plus a homicidal maniac out to get him, you really didn't know how the hero would get out of this one. Of course after several episodes and with help from the loyal "Hitman" and "Bear" Dare did survive, and the journey through the Lost Worlds continued. But the worst (and the strangest) was yet to come.
Suddenly in Prog 79 things changed. Dave Gibbons clean art is replaced by the moody linework of Trevor Goring and Garry Leach. The script is by "Henry Miller", who seems to have watched too much Star Trek as the story even starts with a "Captain's Log" and shore leave for the crew plus a talking ships computer! (Nick Landau & Roy Preston soon take over). The sombre tone continues as the planet Altair IV is blown up and as the crew search for a cause, "Bear" goes berserk for no reason and four crewmen are expelled into the vacuum. All power to the space fort then vanishes and it is sucked into a interior of a gigantic starship floating in deep space. What follows is one of the most famous panels in the story as they enter a spaceship graveyard.
It's just a fantastic cornucopia of Science Fiction ships and creations of the past including nods to the very first Biog story 80 issues ago and even the Dare strips of the 1950s (the Anastasia). There's even the hint of an X-Wing in the bottom left.
Encountering other trapped humans and a race of primitive wildmen, Dare and what's left of his colleagues find no trace of a crew, just a strange mechanical creature and what looks like exhibits in an extraordinary alien zoo. Led deeper into the ship by a mysterious voice communicating with youngest team member "The Kid" (who strangely had never even been mentioned before this story), they only escape the clutches of a gigantic furry creature when Russian strongman "Bear" sacrifices himself. Finally they reach the inner sanctum to find what's controlling the ship - The Last Of The Golden Ones.
As you can see above, Dave Gibbons returned for the final double length episode in which the history of the Golden Ones and their terrible ship is revealed. Activating a self-destruct mechanism, Dare and his friends dash for the space forts shuttle craft (they still have power), but "Hitman" is stabbed by the primitives and holds them off so Dan can escape. Slipping through the air lock hatch at the last second, Dare makes it into space, but the "Doomsday Machine" explodes around him...
It's an odd story to end the run on, and it's scripted almost as if the writers had the names and basic outlines of the characters but had not read any of the previous 50+ issues worth of stories - and just dropped them into a somewhat basic Star Trek plot. As much as I have accused the "Lost Worlds" run of stories of being more generic SF than the craziness of the first two strips, they still had creativity and flair and more than a little of the "daring-do" of the original 1950s tales. By comparison "The Doomsday Machine" doesn't quite feel the same. It's a brave try nonetheless at something a bit more melancholy and is saved of course by the stunning art of Goring and Leach. Plus you have to admit that it's one hell of a cliffhanger to end the story on!
Happily, 2000 AD owners Rebellion have recently announced that these early "hyper-hero" Dare strips will finally be collected in two hardback books, complete with full colour pages. I can't wait. Dan Dare wouldn't return until the landmark Prog 100 and despite valiant efforts by some excellent creators would never achieve the same levels of greatness, nor would it ever be my favourite strip again. We'll get to that in the next part of this journey towards my Golden Age...
N.B. All images used in this post are copyright Rebellion / the creators / the Dan Dare Corporation / whoever owns them and are used for review purposes only. Thanks.
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