2000 AD #1
Prog 1 of 2000 AD, published on 26 February 1977 by IPC Magazines, launched the most durable and creatively influential British comics anthology of the twentieth century — a weekly science-fiction anthology that introduced an entirely new editorial voice, fictional alien host Tharg the Mighty, and a debut lineup of strips including Dan Dare, M.A.C.H.1, Invasion!, Flesh, and Harlem Heroes. Although the title's most celebrated character, Judge Dredd, debuted one week later in Prog 2, Prog 1 nonetheless planted the seeds of a publication that would serve as the incubator for generations of British talent — Alan Moore, Brian Bolland, Dave Gibbons, Grant Morrison, and Garth Ennis among them — before many crossed over to redefine mainstream American comics. The comic's irreverent, anti-authoritarian editorial stance, embodied in the fiction of Tharg's alien editorship and the satirical thrust of its strips, broke sharply from the genteel 'uncle editor' tradition of UK boys' weeklies and helped legitimise a harder, more politically aware mode of genre storytelling for young readers.
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The concept originated in December 1975 when Kelvin Gosnell, a sub-editor at IPC Magazines, read a London Evening Standard article predicting a coming wave of science-fiction films and proposed that IPC capitalise with a new SF comic; IPC publisher John Sanders commissioned freelance writer-editor Pat Mills — fresh from creating Battle Picture Weekly and the controversial Action — to develop it, with John Wagner brought aboard as script adviser. The title '2000 AD' was chosen by Sanders himself, ironically, because no one involved expected the comic to survive long enough to make the name seem absurd. Preparations for the first issue were shadowed by the moral panic that had surrounded Action, which IPC had been forced to sanitise after a tabloid campaign; Mills and Gosnell consciously redirected the energy of that controversially violent title toward science fiction, reasoning that readers and censors would object less to violence visited upon aliens and robots than on human-seeming figures. Pat Mills wrote or edited every story that appeared in Prog 1, with Gosnell — whose idea for an 'imperious alien' editorial host had shaped the Tharg concept — serving as a key creative partner; Gosnell co-wrote the Dan Dare strip that led the issue and later took over as editor with Prog 17.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Prog 1 was published on 26 February 1977 by IPC Magazines; each issue was called a 'programme' (later shortened to 'prog'), and the cover carried the tagline 'in orbit every Saturday.'
- The issue included five stories in its debut lineup: Dan Dare (a heavily revamped version of the classic Eagle hero, now set in the year 2177 after suspended animation), M.A.C.H.1, Invasion!, Flesh, and Harlem Heroes.
- Tharg the Mighty — the fictional green-skinned alien editor from Quaxxann in the Betelgeuse system — made his first appearance on the cover of Prog 1 and has appeared in virtually every subsequent issue, making him one of only two constants alongside Judge Dredd.
- M.A.C.H.1 (Man Activated by Compu-Puncture Hyperpower), starring British secret agent John Probe and created by Pat Mills and artist Enio, debuted in Prog 1; the strip was visibly inspired by the then-popular American TV series The Six Million Dollar Man.
- Judge Dredd did NOT appear in Prog 1 — the character was still being developed and first stories tried out on multiple writers and artists; he debuted in Prog 2 (5 March 1977), though a teaser illustration of Dredd appeared on the 'Meet Tharg' editorial page inside Prog 1.
- The Dan Dare revival was written with contributions from Kelvin Gosnell and drawn by Italian artist Massimo Belardinelli, completely reimagining the Frank Hampson original; Dare had last appeared in Eagle roughly a decade before.
- Prog 1 came with a free cover-mounted 'Space Spinner' disc (a frisbee-style toy), referenced in Tharg's in-fiction mythology as 'Thargian space spinners' brought from his home planet.
- The name '2000 AD' was chosen by IPC publisher John Sanders as a deliberate joke — he expected the comic to be cancelled long before the millennium, saying it would be 'dead and buried' by then; it outlasted that date and continues to publish to the present day under Rebellion Developments.
Cast · 5 characters
Full credits
Full plot ⚠ may contain spoilers
▸ Reveal full plot — may contain spoilers
Dan Dare's space freighter Sirius is destroyed and he spots something "alien" in the red spot of Jupiter. Facing court martial for losing his ship, he escapes onto the Odyssey, which will be passing Jupiter before entering star drive.
Plot details indexed by the Grand Comics Database (CC BY-SA).