On this day, 18 June 1977: 2000AD (Prog 17)
Cover artwork: Brian Bolland
On this day, 18 June 1977 ... Happy Saturday! Welcome to the weekend. I hope you find some peace and quiet and comfort wherever you are and whatever you're doing. My regular Saturday morning indulgence is the arrival of my subscription copy of 2000AD, and the pleasure of immersing myself in its pages of wonder, audacious thrills, subversion, razor-sharp humour, intelligent scripts and astounding art. Thus it ever was, and today's 'On this day' takes us back 39 years to the very first year of The Galaxy's Greatest Comic.
The cover. There are no words. Well, apart from: Ha ha ha ha ha ha Wow! Just imagine finding this Brian Bolland zinger on the newsagent's shelf as a kid in 1977. I'm sure many of you did. I didn't, and I'm jealous!
Inside. Well, there's a great range of strips here, although what struck me most was the number of fantastic full-page layouts. My approach with this blog is to include a few full-page scans when it seems right to do so (the overall effect of the full page demands that it's shown as a whole, or there's particular interest to be found in seeing the complete sequence of panels), but more commonly to show just one or two frames in isolation - to give a prompt to or echo of our memories, and also because it directs attention to a more appreciative study of the detail of each frame. For this issue of 2000AD, however, I've found it difficult to pick out many single panels. Most of the pages have been designed in such a way that they only make sense as a whole. That's a compliment rather than a criticism: the combination of epic scale, character detail and narrative progression is awesome.
So make yourself a coffee, a tea, a bacon sandwich, triceratops-burger or whatever your Saturday morning poison, and feast your eyes upon thrills from the Class of 77. Here is Bill Savage leading the British resistance against the occupying Volgan army in Invasion!, Earl Reagan and the Trans-Time Corp workers overrun by beasts in the ruins of their prehistoric time port in Flesh, the Harlem Heroes meet Artie Gruber and Gorgon's Gargoyles in the third round of the World Aeroball Championship, the Mekon cavorts like a demented alien Ant or Dec as Dan Dare undertakes a bush tucker trial, M.A.C.H.1 is sent I recover missiles from a crashed NATO fighter jet deep in the mountains of Central Asia and Judge Dredd reaches the final, victorious instalment of his first multi-part storyline, Robot Wars.
Invasion!: Gerry Finley-Day (writer), Mike Dorey (artist)
Flesh: Kelvin Gosnell (writer), Felix Carrion (artist)
Flesh: Kelvin Gosnell (writer), Felix Carrion (artist)
Harlem Heroes: Tom Tully (writer), Dave Gibbons (artist)
Harlem Heroes: Tom Tully (writer), Dave Gibbons (artist)
Harlem Heroes: Tom Tully (writer), Dave Gibbons (artist)
Dan Dare: Steve Moore (writer), Massimo Belardinelli (artist)
Dan Dare: Steve Moore (writer), Massimo Belardinelli (artist)
M.A.C.H.1: Nick Allen (writer), Jesus Redondo (artist)
M.A.C.H.1: Nick Allen (writer), Jesus Redondo (artist)
Judge Dredd: John Wagner (writer), Ian Gibson (artist)
Judge Dredd: John Wagner (writer), Ian Gibson (artist)
Judge Dredd: John Wagner (writer), Ian Gibson (artist)
Judge Dredd: John Wagner (writer), Ian Gibson (artist)
