pat mills

Moonchild was one of the strips that ran in Misty, which was originally conceived by Mills as a sister title for 2000 AD, complementing the sci-fi directed primarily at boys with supernatural spookiness aimed at girls. Unfortunately, Misty wasn't as successful, and was later merged with a similar title, Tammy, before finally getting the axe in the mid-'80s. The good news, though, is that thirty years after its last issue, Misty finally saw a reprint this year, and while its take on the popular horror of the day isn't quite as over-the-top as, say, Judge Dredd's take on America as a concept, it's still well worth checking out.

With 2000 AD hitting its monumental 2000th issue today, there's no better time to look back on the history of the title We reached out to the people who have shaped the Galaxy's Greatest Comic, from founding editor Pat Mills to current editor Matt Smith, and more, to find out not just how they came to 2000 AD, but the stories they think you should start with.

Classic UK comic Misty was one of many teen focused titles published by Fleetway, with a specific focus on telling supernatural and horror-tinged stories for girls. UK publisher Rebellion today acquired the rights to Misty and other Fleetway comics of the '70s and '80s, but reprints of Misty were already in the works. Next week sees the release of the first collection, featuring the stories "The Four Faces of Eve" and "Moonchild," and we have a preview of chapter one of "Moonchild."

Nowadays, I think we can all agree that Thrillpower is for everyone, but that was not always the case. In the late '70s, with 2000 AD a success after its first year of publication thanks to strips like Judge Dredd, the publishers decided that the world needed "2000 AD for girls," and thus Misty was introduced to the world. The weekly magazine ran between 1978 and 1980, directed at girls with a focus on supernatural horror, and is still remembered fondly despite its relatively short 101-issue run. Now, for the first time in 35 years, it's set to be reprinted starting next September, starting with stories from Pat Mills, John Armstrong, Malcolm Shaw and Brian Delaney.

If you've ever read through Judge Dredd: The Cursed Earth, the sprawling epic that took the future's most brutal lawman outside of Mega-City One on a journey across an atomic wasteland in the years since its original publication, then you may have noticed that there are a couple of strips missing from the paperback collections. Four strips from the original story, the two-part 'Burger Wars' and 'Soul Food' arcs, featured versions of Ronald McDonald, the Burger King, the Jolly Green Giant, and other corporate icons, twisted into post-nuclear villains. As you might expect, that caused a bit of a problem back in 1978, and under fears of a lawsuit, those four strips were excised from later reprints of the landmark story. Until now, that is. Today, 2000 AD announced the upcoming Judge Dredd: The Cursed Earth Uncensored, a new printing of the story that will restore the "banned" strips for the first time in almost forty years.

Comics have seized center stage at the venerable British Library in London this summer in an exhibition celebrating the history of British comics and the work of British creators. Subtitled, 'Art and Anarchy in the UK', the Comics Unmasked exhibition places an emphasis on protest, outsider culture, and anti-authoritarian voices. Curated by Adrian Edwards, Paul Gravett, and John Harris Dunning, Comics Unmasked draws heavily on the British Library's own collection to establish and define Britain's relationship to the comics art form -- stirring up nostalgia, scandal, and some surprising discoveries along the way. And Kieron Gillen's giant head.

As it is prone to do perhaps more often than some of its American competition, British sci-fi weekly 2000 AD has designed its latest issue to be especially welcoming to new readers. Four brand new stories begin in this week's 2000 AD Prog 1850, each meant to introduce audiences to the unique blend of art, attitude and insanity that can typically be found every week in "the galaxy's greatest c

Launched earlier this month in the pages of the weekly 2000 AD anthology, "Sláine: The Book of Scars" is an all-new serial celebrating the 30th anniversary of writer Pat Mills' Celtic myth-inspired barbarian fantasy hero whose adventures have made stars of some Britain's best comics artists including Mike McMahon, Glenn Fabry and Simon Bisley...

A few weeks ago at HeroesCon, I was going through quarter boxes when I found a run of Punisher 2099. I bought the whole thing as soon as I saw it, and while that might just sound like a normal comic-con impulse buy, keep in mind that I was so excited that I forgot I already owned a full run of Punisher 2099. Admittedly, that might say more about me than it does about these comics, but I don't really mind having extras, because Punisher 2099 is amazing. Seriously.

Okay. You've watched the trailer for Dredd, the upcoming feature film featuring Britain's own Judge Dredd of 2000 AD fame. You're digging the kind of authoritarian/Dirty Harry thing Dredd has going on. It's pretty cool, I agree, but you want to see a little more of how he gets the job done...