2000AD reprint books & spinoff comics
In my first couple years as a convert to Judge Dredd and 2000AD, the bridge was not yet fully built between comic publishers in the UK and comic dealers in the US. The American-formatted reprint comics from Eagle that grabbed my attention in 1983 were the first plank in that bridge, along with stray progs that somehow landed on this side of the ocean. Until the weekly 2000AD comic itself was picked up for American distribution in the mid-80s, I had two options: either order back issues via international mail or pick up the dedicated reprint books that represented the second plank.
Both options were pricey for a guy just starting out on min wage, but I was still living with my parents then, so I didn’t have to pay rent yet. That gave me just enough wiggle room to get a collection started. Getting a big bundle of back issues was pure heaven, but I couldn’t do that very often. In the meantime, black and white reprints from Titan Books were a godsend. Unlike the Eagle comics, they the art was completely unaltered. Unlike the progs, the printing quality was pristine. They also contained articles and concentrated on one strip at a time, so you got a full course meal (with extras) instead of bite-size samples.
Getting a new one was a kind of exquisite torture; they averaged between 60 and 80 pages, so I could easily read the whole thing in one sitting and the experience would be over in a flash. The trick was trying to make it last until I could afford another volume. The content was so good, I failed that test every time. I later gave them up as I filled in the backlog and started getting weekly progs at my local shop. Titan paid me no mind and kept right on going, gradually publishing nearly 60 volumes.
These two are a couple of oddballs. Charley’s War wasn’t a 2000AD strip, but instead came from another IPC weekly comic called Battle. It was highly respected, so I gave it a try and did not regret my choice. Metalzoic debuted as a color graphic novel from DC and was later serialized in B&W in 2000AD, a rare instance of reverse import. As it turned out, the same writer wrote both of these wildly different titles: the very gifted Pat Mills, founding editor of 2000AD.
Few Judge Dredd fans disagree on which first-generation artists belong in the top-tier pantheon: Carlos Ezquerra, Brian Bolland, Mike (Mick) McMahon, and Ron Smith all laid down the foundations for everyone to follow. But after 1984, I noticed that I was seeing less and less of Ron Smith. What I didn’t know is that he had largely switched over to drawing Judge Dredd for a whole different audience: the readers of the Daily Star newspaper.
Smith did a large-format Dredd newspaper strip for every Sunday edition for years until it was eventually replaced by a daily strip drawn by others. I first learned about this when selected strips were reprinted in 2000AD annuals and specials. Much later, I was overjoyed to find reprints of this amazing body of work.
48 pages
IPC Magazines, 1985
48 pages
IPC Magazines, 1986
48 pages
IPC Magazines, 1987
48 pages
Fleetway Publications, 1989
40 pages, daily strips
Fleetway Publications, 1990
190 pages
Fleetway Publications, 1990
When new publisher Rebellion acquired 2000AD in the year 2000, they got busy with all new reprints in multiple formats. I bought very few of them, since by that time I pretty much had the entire back catalog at my fingertips, but once in a while I took a dip. Here’s what I found:
All Judge Dredd stories from progs 2-60
All Judge Dredd stories from progs 61-115
(Cursed Earth and Judge Caligula)
All Rogue Trooper stories from progs 228-281
Titan Books, 2002
All Rogue Trooper stories from progs 228-317
Rebellion, 2010
Nemesis the Warlock Volume 1
2000AD Definitive Edition
Complete reprint of Books 1 and 2 with spinoff and bonus material
176 pages, B&W with some color
Rebellion, 2023
2000AD spinoff comics
The 2000AD creative community never seemed to want a break. The weekly progs gave rise to annuals, specials, the Judge Dredd Megazine, and a host of other products. As you may expect, some of them didn’t last long or were simple one-shots. Here’s a small sampling from that category…
Dice Man magazine
This series grew out of an experiment within the progs to turn comics into games. The writers came up with variations in which a dice throw, a mathematical tally, or some other mechanism would guide you through a story involving a 2000AD character. Whether or not that character survived depended on your luck. There was a total of five bimonthly issues, published from February through October of 1986.
A 16-page bonus from 2000AD in 1995, one of many projects that introduced Judge Dredd to comic-curious viewers of the new Judge Dredd movie (starring Sylvester Stallone). It was essentially a mini encyclopedia that gave you the comic book history behind characters and concepts seen in the film.
A biweekly comic that overtly capitalized on the movie by continuing it in comics form, essentially reskinning Dredd’s world to match the film’s production design and taking off from there with stories mainly aimed at younger readers. It debuted in July 1995 and ran for 23 issues, ending in May 1996. Issue 5 is shown here.
A one-shot spinoff of Lawman of the Future, possibly a stand-in for the final issue.
Dredd got his own Playstation game in 1997, a first-person shooter with a handgun you’d aim at your TV screen. 2000AD published this poster prog as a game tie-in with a 6-page comic by Simon Bisley on one side, and a poster by him on the other. Nine previous poster progs dedicated to individual characters appeared from 1993 to 1995.