Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
Another week, another Zarjaz Prog cover – this week featuring the blue boy, for the last episode of Rogue Trooper: Souther Belle, all drawn by Dan Cornwell…
Artist Dan Cornwell’s certainly come a long way from driving a bus a few years ago – first there was the email from John Wagner asking him to be part of John and Alan Grant’s Rok of the Reds (which you’ll be seeing in the Judge Dredd Megazine soon), and then he established himself at 2000 AD with some really stunning artwork, whether that was on Judge Dredd or taking over from the much-missed master, Carlos Ezquerra, on Spector. Now, he’s just finished the six-part run on the Geoffrey D. Wessel written Rogue Trooper: Souther Belle, which wraps up right here in Prog 2391.
So, it’s only right that Dan’s here on the cover of the Prog to give us the boy in blue in full-on action…
DAN CORNWELL: When Matt asked if I’d like to draw a new six-part Rogue Trooper story (which I obviously said yes to!) he also asked if I could do a pin-up to promote the story before it’s publication.
He probably also wanted to see how I’d approach the character and if my style would suit. Anyway, I asked if he had any ideas or preferences for the pin-up and he suggested an image of Rogue on a pile of dead Norts. Hell yeah, not a problem.
I did a few sketches and sent them his way and he chose one…
And here are those sketches and the final sketch chosen by Tharg’s Earthly representative…
Yes, that’s what Dan calls a ‘sketch’ – We really need to reevaluate what sketch means here!
Okay then, with the sketch in the bag and approved, back to Dan for the next stage…
DAN CORNWELL: I then pencilled the image on a piece of Bristol board, and at some point I was losing focus on certain areas of the image, more on that later.
When I was happy with the image I then inked it traditionally. Added a few textures and splatters then I scanned it into Photoshop and adjusted the levels and generally tidied it up.
Then I laid out all the flat base colours. I knew I wanted a red background and the foreground to be a blue/green as a stark contrast. Rogue himself would be a brighter blue, so he should pop.
For the background tank and explosion I added a new layer so I could do colour holds, effectively colouring the inks which helps push the background back in the image.
Then I added all the highlights and effects. I also brightened the colours in and around Rogue, so it made him front and centre in the image.
When I was happy, I flattened the image and sent it to Matt for approval. It was after this I noticed some mistakes in the image.
Sometimes you can get sidetracked by focusing on one part of the image and not noticing other mistakes in the image as a whole. In this case, there were some glaring ones.
First it was Rogue’s head. It was too high on his body, and this in turn made his shoulder too low on one side. I had also forgotten to add the other grenade to Bagman’s shoulder strap. Thank God for Photoshop. These mistakes were all rectified and I sent the new revised image to Matt. No harm done…. I hope.
Tharg can be merciful some times Dan! I’m sure when Earthly representative Matt sent him the final cover, TMO was impressed and will probably only reduce your oil rations for a few weeks over the mistakes!
And just so you can see what Dan’s talking about, here’s a zoom-in on the before and after… moving the head, adding that extra grenade…
Well, there you go, another ghafflebette cover from the pen of the always-wonderful Dan Cornwell! Prog 2391 is out right now and available in all the usual places you find your Thrill-Power, including the 2000 AD web shop.
For more of Dan’s excellent covers, you should go look at the Covers Uncovered for Prog 2217, Prog 2241, Prog 2277, Prog 2279, and Prog 2345. And you can also watch and listen to Dan chat to Molch-R on the 2000 AD Thrill-Casthere, all about the bus driving, getting that fateful email from John Wagner, drawing Rok of the Reds (which is coming to the Megazine soon!), all the way through to Judge Dredd and Spector, not to mention what happened when his mum threatened to phone Tharg!
Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
Grabbing the cover and shaking it this week is Dave Kendall, giving us a glimpse into the new thrill you’ll find inside… Silver: Unearthed…
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Yes, something mysterious and brand-new starts in this Prog, as Mike Carroll and Joe Currie begin their tale of… well, we’re not going to be spoilering it for you. After all, when our Lord and Master Tharg writes in the editorial this week that he’s keeping details about Silver‘vague’ and tells us that ‘you’ll gain the most from this ghafflebette debuting strip, Terrans, going into it knowing as little as possible, so plunge away!’ we know when it’s in our best interests to keep schtum.
All we’ll say is that it’s set in England, 2001, where a group of armed survivors have arrived in the depths of the night at the ruins of a burned-out house. They’re on a catch and cage mission, so it’s time to break out the shovels and start digging for something they’ve been told could be the key to saving the human race.
What are they digging for? How will it help save humanity? Just why does humanity need saving? Well, all will be revealed as Silver unfolds over the coming weeks.
But, if everyone promises to tell TMO, we can share this one teaser panel from part 1 of Silver: Unearthed…
Who’s this? What’s got him round the neck? Who’s Bishop? Whose defences are they talking about? Only one way to find out and that’s by picking up Silver in the prog!
Dave Kendall’s cover gives you some subtle clues as to what you can expect, drawn in his incredible style that’s most recently made his and Kek-W’s Fall of Deadworld such a strange, enthralling, and just plain magnificently dark view of a world falling apart, something Kendall’s lushly drawn style suits so well.
But enough, time to welcome you to the world of Sliver, the latest in a series of Zarjaz new thrills that have debuted in 2024. Here’s Dave Kendall to tell you all about the cover…
DAVE KENDALL: The brief for this cover was quite indistinct. It was a new story with very little reference provided for the story. The story concerns a ███████ taking on █████ ████████. Tharg wanted a saucer breaking up under the effect of the ███████ ████.
Too much Dave! Too much!But here are his sketchbook pages… see if you can work out what we can’t have him telling you from theses…
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DAVE KENDALL: I always start with lots of sketchbook designs. It’s probably my favourite part of any process. It’s when the possibilities and excitement is highest. I tend to work purely in ink. I like the lack of safety net and the need to concentrate so you make better decisions. My sketchbook pages tend to be a flow of ideas one thing warping into another. I think keeping ideas genuinely sketchy is important.
I see so many people presenting near finished art as sketches. For me that destroys the whole concept of sketching. It has to have that meandering feel. Sometimes the best ideas will come from a mistake or random mark. I work very fast and just fill the page with designs.
The bulk of the cover is the ███████ ███ and the saucer. As I had no real reference, I just designed the elements with an organic feel. The saucer, particularly, having pipes and organic-feeling aspects.
In fact, you can see the germ of an idea for the cover right there on the third double-page of the sketchbook…
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And this is Dave’s colour workup of the saucer that dominates the cover…
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DAVE KENDALL: The brief asked for the ███ and Saucer to be front and forward. Using the sketchbook designs I put together a couple of different designs.
One is symmetrical while the other has the elements tilted. Tharg went for the symmetrical design…
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Once the final concept is decided I then pencil out the cover with full details...
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This cover is an acrylic painting with some small digital enhancements. When painting I tend to have a print out of the colour rough so the final image is as close to the approved rough as possible.
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Wow. That is a stunning cover! Thanks so much to Dave for sending those bits along and letting us into how it was made. Prog 2390 is out right now and available in all the usual places you find your Thrill-Power, including the 2000 AD web shop.
For more brilliant – if disturbing – covers from Dave, check out his Covers Uncovered for Progs 2029, 2210, and 2237.
Now, because they’re so damn good, the full-size versions of each of Dave’s sketchbook pages for you…
Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
It’s the summer spectacular of stories from a sideways universe! Yes, it’s July and that means the 2000 AD Sci-Fi Special is back for 2024! On the fabulous Mike Perkins cover – Judge Alpha!
It’s a 48-page spectacular of zarjaz strips with a difference – beamed from another dimension and harnessed by the power of Tharg where the five strips take familiar characters from the GGC and mixes, merges, melds, and smashes them together to give you something special, spectacular, and strange!
So expect to see the new Law in MC-1, when you get to meet the kick-ass Judge Alpha; uncover an all-new way of robo-hunting with Sinister and Dexter, the Robo-Sharks; experience Search/Destroy bounty hunting like never before as Friday is hunted for a crime he didn’t commit in Rogue/Dog; take to the high seas for adventures on the Red Wench with Stickleback; and gasp in amazement/bewilderment at the most violent sport of the future, taking Aero Ball to incredible/ridiculous heights with The Harlem Zombos!
All of that’s inside the 2024 Sci-Fi Special. But first, to talk us through a thriller of a cover… Mike Perkins…
MIKE PERKINS: ‘Judge Alpha? Johnny Alpha as a Judge? And you’re asking if I’d be interested in producing a cover of this? – Who do I pay?’
Okay… I didn’t say that last bit but I’m sure it shot around my brain.
Art droids everywhere wince at words such as these as they know Tharg will take note of the whole idea of the droids paying him instead of the other way round!
But we absolutely get what Mike means – who wouldn’t jump at the chance of showing us JUDGE ALPHA?!?!
Okay, back to Mike…
MIKE PERKINS: Tharg kind of knew what he was looking for, but I cobbled together a few roughs playing with established Strontium Dog images.
I, kind of, really wanted the crossed holster but it would have obscured too much of the Judge uniform.
I DID want the Westinghouse, though, and found the perfect image on the Termight Replicas page...
The single Alpha image was chosen from the roughs but the two previous recent covers I’d illustrated for Rebellion had been medium-range, straight-ahead shots, and I was wary of repeating that so I approached it as a more confrontational pose.
I did finish up a full-colour version of the cover too – but then decided on the gray and red version as it stood out much more strongly.
Johnny Alpha wasn’t in the Prog when I first starting getting it every week (from Prog 240) …probably because Carlos was busy on The Apocalypse War – BUT I was aware of him from the annuals and it wasn’t long before I’d bought all the previous issues and caught up with those other 239 Thrill-packed progs.
He’s always been a firm favourite …now if only I could get a Robo Hunter cover…
Well there you go – next up for the Perkins droid – Robo-Hunter. Tharg can make it so!
Thank you so much for Mike for sending along all that – it’s a ghafflebette cover worthy of the once a year magic that it the 2000 AD Sci-Fi Special! You can find it on the shelves right now – everywhere Thrill Power is sold, including the 2000 AD web shop.
If you want more Covers Uncovered from Mike we’ve a couple of gorgeous ones for you – here’s his most recent, the 2023 Christmas Judge Dredd Megazine, issue 463. There’s also his splendid 2017 FCBD cover here.
Seriously, he’s just not done enough for 2000 AD! Tharg, Tharg… Mike’s after a Robo-Hunter, you can sort that, right?
Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
It’s the absolutely final EVER episode of Proteus Vex as Michael Carroll and Jake Lynch bring you the zarjaz double-length conclusion of Devious – and it’s Toby Willsmer bringing you a suitably thrilling cover for that finale…
Over the last few years, Proteus Vex has delivered perfection as a ghafflebette epic sci-fi saga, documenting the galaxy-spanning events of the empires of the Imperium Alliance, the Scorchers, and the Citheronians, and just what part Imperium Alliance agent Vex has to play in it all. It’s been a stunning series, full of everything you could want from something truly vast in proportions.
Originally co-created by Michael Carroll and Henry Flint, artist Jake Lynch has been onboard since the first tale, and now Carroll and Flint bring the whole thing to a suitably thrilling conclusion in Prog 2389, under that fittingly perfect cover from Toby Willsmer.
Although Toby’s a New Zealand-based artist, his formative years in the UK gave him a love of 2000 AD that he’s been regularly bringing to the cover of the Prog for a few years now, not to mention dazzling your eyeballs on several strips, including Robo-Hunter in the zombie takeover tale The Darkest Judge, Cadet Dredd in Prog 2325, and a Regened Future Shock in Prog 2346.
But now… as we say a fond farewell to Proteus Vex… over to Toby to tell you all about the cover…
Some wonderfully rough initial sketch ideas for the final Proteus Vex cover
TOBY WILLSMER: Matt asked if I’d like to do a Proteus Vex cover and as this was to be his last appearance he was after an action-packed idea.
I’m a big fan of Jake Lynch’s work on Vex and jumped at the chance to go all out on a farewell cover.
I start with the usual mess in the sketchbook to get the ball rolling. I had a lot of ideas for different action scenes but settled on three that I thought I could pack some action into.
I took the ideas, opened up the trusty cover template and loosely drew them into something that Matt could choose from…
Matt chose number 1 and, as happens more often than not, I went back to my original scribbles as I felt they captured the dynamic I was looking for and refined the idea from there.
I wanted to use some vibrant colour in this and I put together a colour scheme that I intended to use and sent them off to Matt to run them past his eyes.
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With Matt happy I went ahead and drew up the line work and added some basic shadows and values...
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From there it’s onto all the fun stuff, adding the planned colour, lighting and details until it’s all done.
As I painted it I changed the exploding robot at the bottom making it a little more curvy in places as I felt it was too ‘boxy’ looking...
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As this was to be the last outing of the odd-looking Mr Vex. I wanted to do something to give it a little extra oomph.
I asked Matt if he was up for shattering the logo to connect the action and logo together. Matt was down for the idea and sent me over the logo for some shattering.
I had way too much fun doing this one!
Oh yes, there’s always something very special to see that logo-smashing going on. And Toby’s delivered a cover that really does mark that final Proteus Vex perfectly – thanks so much to Toby for sending it to us.
Prog 2389 is out on 3 July 2024 and available anywhere and everywhere Thrill Power is sold, including the 2000 AD web shop.
As for more on Proteus Vex – we interviewed Mike Carroll and Henry Flint about the very first story here, and you can read a ‘Who is Proteus Vex?’ character primer here.
You can read Proteus Vex’s first stories in a collected edition, Another Dawn, which collects the first two storylines – Another Dawn and Shadow Chancellor. And no doubt the rest of Vex’s incredible, galaxy-spanning, epic sci-fi adventures with get the collected treatment in the months to come!
Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
Inside the Prog we’re up to part 3 of Rogue Trooper: Souther Belle by Geoffrey T Wessel and Dan Cornwell in a return to Nu Earth and the never-ending war between the Norts and the Southers. Created by the Southers to survive the poisonous wastes of Nu Earth, Rogue is the last of the Genetic Infantrymen. Together with the biochips of his fallen comrades in arms, Helm, Gunnar, and Bagman, they’re searching for the traitor that sold them out.
But along the way to finding the Traitor General, there’s more stories to be told and we’re right in the middle of one of those here, as Rogue is on a rescue mission to track down the mysterious and deadly voice of the Nort propaganda broadcast Souther Belle. Rogue and the bio-chips have identified the voice as one of the female G.I. ‘Dolls’ – but will Rogue get there in time? And is all really as it sounds? Well, for that you’re going to have to be reading Souther Belle
But now, let’s peruse the incredible artwork from Andy Clark for this week’s Prog cover… the return of the big blue Nort-killing machine…
According to Andy, the brief for this one was simple…
‘I think Matt’s brief for this one was something like “Rogue kneeling firing towards us”.’
And with that in mind, the Clarke droid set about working up a couple of rough cover ideas…
First roughs – pick one!
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Tharg – or at least his Earthly representative, Cyber-Matt – gives the nod to version 2 and Andy sets about doing his thing.
Just for a change for the art droids, this one was all pretty simple – going from pencils to figure inks to putting it all together with greytones…
On to the pencils
Next come the Rogue figure inks
And then the really big step of adding greyscale, textures, details, the works
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Then comes the final stages, adding colours, first flats and then final colour before doing what Andy’s previously described as poking and prodding until it all starts to come together or ‘A lot of mucking about and hoping, in other words.’
Colours stage 1 – flats
The near-final colours for the cover
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Of course, despite it all sounding wonderfully simple, the art droids always manage to find a bit of a black cloud on an otherwise beautiful day and it seems the Clarke droid is no exception, signing off the latest missive with all this gorgeous art with this…
‘It didn’t come out as I hoped – but I like the texture in the landscape.’
There’s just something about artists that makes you want to give them a big hug and tell them it’s all good. And then you send in Mek-Quake to get them back to work, expecting them to make something this damn good…
And the final cover – everything coming together perfectly
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So thank you so much to Andy for sending along the art that all went into creating such a great cover that you’ll find on shelves galaxy-wide from 26 June, as well as the 2000 AD webshop.
As for more Covers Uncovered action from Andy, be sure to have a look at his covers for Prog 2287, Prog 2290, Prog 2312, and Megazine 444. And then there’s that gorgeous triumvirate of covers for the soon-to-be-collected and rather excellent Smash! that Andy was responsible for– issue 1, issue 2, and issue 3. Oh, and you can get hold of Smash! The Broxteth Devil on 11 September.
And finally, here’s the full size versions of those initial roughs from Andy plus a little close-up Rogue… but before those, just something that Andy drew our attention to already, the rather strangely beautiful textural work on the landscape behind Rogue – greytones, flats, colours, and final version…
Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
We’re off to take a look at the new Judge Dredd Megazine cover now – with the return of zarjaz cover star Alex Ronald and Mega-City 2099, taking us back to the earliest days of Dredd in 2000 AD!
Mega-City 2099 takes us back to the very first Dredd strips in the Prog, with a whole new set of adventures imagined by some of the finest script and art droids with that classic 1977 look and feel!
The new Mega-City 2099 inside Megazine 469 is by Ken Niemand and Conor Boyle, but on the cover this month, giving his very finest classic retro Dredd, we have superstar 2000 AD cover artist extraordinaire… Alex Ronald.
After an initial spell at 2000 AD in the mid-90s, Alex left for a second career in computer graphics, only to find the lure of Tharg too all-powerful, returning with a very different digital style and becoming one of the Mighty One’s specialist cover artists. And speaking of covers, here’s Alex to tell you all about this one…
ALEX RONALD: This cover is based on the Mega City 2099 strips so my first port of call was back to ZBrush to re-work the Dredd model I use for composition...
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ALEX RONALD: As you can see from the headshot, the early 70s style helmet is more rounded like a biker helmet and I reworked Dredd’s face to bring it more in line with the early look defined by Carlos Ezquerra and Mike McMahon.
My first draft for the cover was very close to what happens in the featured story, a giant superhuman lifting a Mega City police vehicle above his head and attacking the officers.
I have Dredd checking the pulse of an officer as the giant is reflected in a nearby window.
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ALEX RONALD: In the end, I felt this might work okay as a story page panel but didn’t necessarily make a good cover image.
The final cover idea came from a panel from the very first Dredd story, but not the first printed.
Yep… this one in fact, from the master, Carlos Ezquerra…
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ALEX RONALD: There’s a great low angle on Dredd drawn by Carlos firing his lawgiver. I based my cover on this but flipping the side so Dredd would be facing the right of the page rather into the spine.
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ALEX RONALD: My rough has Dredd on his own but by the time I went to painting up the full-colour image I thought it would add more value to add in the cops who had featured in the story.
Anyway I hope you like it, I had a lot of fun doing this one.
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Oh, we like it a lot! A mighty fine retro-inspired cover there from Alex! Thanks so much to Alex for taking the time to send over his art and talk to us about what he did. You can find the new Judge Dredd Megazine, issue 469, on the stands at your local newsagent, comic shop, and on the 2000 AD web shop right now!
Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
This week, as we get to the ghafflebette finale to Ken Niemand and Nick Percival’s six-part run of Judge Dredd: Iron Teeth, it’s time to experience the classically grotesque art of another Percival cover…
Over six parts, Iron Teeth has taken Dredd (and us) down to the depths of the Undercity in a search for missing juves and to uncover the horrors to be found down in the darkness. And there’s no better artist when you’re looking for horrors and darkness than Nick Percival.
Between them, Ken & Nick are on a mission to bring even more of all things truly terrifying to Dredd, having started with The House On Bleaker Street(Progs 2247-2249) and then with Iron Teeth for the last six weeks. And as for what’s next… well, there are plans and there are plots, and then there’s the final page reveal that you’re all going to love on in this week’s Dredd!
Nick recently had this to say about what ‘s coming… ‘But yeah, we know what comes next and if The Mighty One is game, we’re ready to start scaring folks once again. I have some seriously dark stuff ready that will make Iron Teeth look like Aunt May, so I’m good to go.’
But no more teasing, over to Nick for the skinny on his latest cover…
Dredd Vs Iron Teeth – it’s all been building to this!
NICK PERCIVAL: It’s the final episode, so nothing hiding in the shadows anymore and we fully reveal Iron Teeth. For this cover, I wanted a little more action than the previous two cover paintings, since this is the climax of the story and Dredd and Iron Teeth finally face off.
So, in best panto tradition, “he’s behind you!”
I thought a nice shot of Iron Teeth leaping out the darkness, attacking Dredd would work. (Full disclaimer – this actual scene doesn’t happen exactly like this in this episode but I did the cover before I got the final script, so there you go)
Anyway, you can see from the loose rough that all the elements are there for Tharg to approve. Big Dredd as the central image and a bit of a Dutch angle to the image to give it a more dynamic feel.
I guess this scene is the moment just before Dredd reacts to the attack – the second before he’d start blasting away with his Lawgiver – I should do a before and after image but in the episode you see how Dredd manages to take down the evil creature -with a little help from his Poundland C-3PO robot sidekick.
I wanted a cool palette for this one, so blues and greys, hopefully giving it a nice moody, spooky, almost mystical feel, keeping the tone that’s been established for the whole story and sticking with the underground setting.
So, that wraps it all up (for now) with a slightly longer episode and our reveal (spoiler!) on the last page as a certain evil, supernatural fella makes his return. I had a lot of fun working with Ken on this and taken as whole, you can see this is just the set up for much more terrifying things to come for Dredd…
Thanks to Nick for sharing yet another cover to send a proper chill all the way down your spine – you can find it right now wherever Thrill Power is sold, including the 2000 AD web shop.
We’ve talked to Nick twice here about Iron Teeth, with a great interview about the storyline here and his Covers Uncovered for Prog 2382 here.
Now, for more of Nick talking all things comics and art, there’s plenty more interviews waiting for you – He talked about his six years drawing those Dark Judgeshere, plus Nick and David Hine talked Dark Judges: Deliverancehere and Death Metal Planethere. And if you’re after something all together more audio and/or visual, Molch-R talks to Hine and Percival about all things Dark Judges in the 2000 AD Thrill-Cast Lockdown Tapes here.
And finally, Nick was good enough to send along some of his process work for a select few portions of Iron Teeth part 6… He even sent along images of the final page very special reveal that will no doubt play a BIG part in all things fearful for future Niemand & Percival Dredds. But there’s no way I’m risking the wrath of our Betelgeusian overlord and beloved purveyor of all things Thrill Power by showing you that! You’ll just have to enjoy the big reveal in this week’s Prog!
Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
This week it’s another ghafflebette cover by the one and only John McCrea (with colours by Jack Davies) for Prog 2386, so overflowing with Thrill Power that it’s turned into a special extra-length 48-page Prog with seven zarjaz strips inside.
One of the new strips – you’ll have guessed from the cover – is a brand-new multi-part thriller featuring everyone’s favourite blue-skinned G.I. – the return of Rogue Trooper in Souther Belle by Geoffrey D. Wessel and Dan Cornwell. We’re back on Nu-Earth and back with Rogue, Gunnar, Helm, and Bagman, investigating a mysterious and familiar voice that’s going to send Rogue off on a rescue mission deep into Nord territory.
For those of you worried about the mental health of the McCrea art droid after that slight circuit meltdown with the last cover, you’ll be pleased to know in advance that this one went a LOT more smoothly…
JOHN MCCREA: This cover was originally a commission that I did about four years ago. I was very pleased with it and after the news of the Rogue Trooper film, and guessing that there would be new material appearing in 2000 AD, I decided to send the picture in to Matt and see if he wanted to use it. Happily he did.
I often look around for a visual cue or idea that I think might give me the hook on which to base my cover. I Googled pictures of Vietnam as that’s the real conflict I think of when I think of Rogue’s war. This was the photo that made me sense the image that I wanted.
As you can see it’s just not simply tracing the drawing but just the idea of it that I needed to jump off, and this was the pencil drawing that resulted from that picture.
I’m not entirely sure why I made Rogue left-handed, but I’d imagine all Genetic Infantry are ambidextrous. It’s certainly a trait I would build in if I was creating the perfect soldier. There, I’ve solved my problem.
I lightboxed my pencil sketch, and tightened it up, getting Gunnar right. He’s a tricky gun to draw, and I am sure I got the perspective wrong on the ammo clip. Not that I noticed at the time, sadly.
As with most things I’m doing when I’m inking myself, I kept the pencils reasonably loose and energetic, even in the redraw. The background is just shapes, an idea of the masses involved – rubble strewn ground is my bread and butter!
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Next I started inking, using a Mitsubishi unipin fine line pen…
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I finished the inking with a Zig Scroll and Brush for the heavier black areas and for thickening up the outlines. I dropped a gas mask in on the ground to imply the Nort menace…
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I then added a grey wash using watered down Indian ink. I thought this gave the picture more of a swirling, hazy feel that suited the subject. You can also see here that I altered Rogue’s right foot at this stage, it needed widening to give it more weight.
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When Matt confirmed that he was going to use the picture, I realised that I had not drawn it to 2000 AD proportions, so I extended the scan image using Photoshop. You can also see I finally remembered to clean up the correction lines on the right foot!
Once that was done it was off to Jack for colouring.
I loved what Jack did with the color palette, but as you can see from this picture I am a fussy bastard! However, I think the end result was worth it.
Thankfully a hell of a lot simpler than the monumental exercise in getting it just right as the last cover! Thanks so much to John for sending all that through and it’s yet another in a series of really great character portraits of the finest of 2000 AD.
Prog 2386 is out right now and available in all the usual places you find your Thrill-Power, including the 2000 AD web shop.
If you want more Covers Uncovered from John, there’s plenty here to bring before your eyeballs – Prog 2024, Prog 2224, Prog 2328, Prog 2351, Prog 2361, not forgetting the near-breakdown inducing cover for Prog 2380’s Aquila cover, and his fabulous Armitage for Judge Dredd Megazine, issue 467.
Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
This week it’s not one but two art droids – Pye Parr and PJ Holden – collaborating on the brand-new Intestinauts cover to 2000 AD Prog 2385…
Pye Parr and Arthur Wyatt’s Intestinauts have returned for more bowel-bothering brilliance in their latest series – Busted Flush – that reaches part 4 in this week’s Prog 2285.
Usually called in for oral application for those tummy troubles, the Intestinauts are miraculous micro-droids who do battle in the nightmarish conditions of your GI tract. But in Busted Flush, they’ve found themselves in unfamiliar territory, as the Instestolab is compromised and they’ve no choice but to do battle with the terrifying Omega-Genocide-Four.
As for the cover and why it’s both Pye and PJ Holden involved… we’ll let Pye & PJ tell you the tale…
PYE PARR: Initially I was going to draw this myself, but deadlines being what they are (and my time-keeping being what it is…), I realised about a week from the print date I was never going to get it drawn in time, so I asked PJ if he could save me from the wrath of The Mighty One and do all the hard work for me.
Luckily he could, and did it with style!
I sent him the rough Matt had approved, plus some ref from the strip pages and we went from there.
Three roughs sent to Tharg’s Earthly representative by Pye
PYE PARR: Nobody else has drawn Intestinauts before, so I was quite excited to see what he came up with. I think the only thing I asked for was the brain on a separate layer to the dudes so I could knock back the linework.
Being a TruePro(tm) he smashed it, improving on the rough by bringing one of the robots forward to give it a bit more depth. 10/10, no notes.
PJ HOLDEN:So Pye phones me, and says “Oi! Mate, can yer do me a cover, quick like, for the mighty one doth protest mightily at my tardiness!” and I says, “But you don’t have a TARDIS” and he says, “No, tardy – TARDY” and I says, “Wow, mate, I don’t think you can use that word no more, as it’s pretty offensive”.
So then he emails me, asking if I can do him a cover, and the fool that he is attaches his rough, and I take one look at it and think – but I can bang this out in 10 minutes? And he’s gonna pay me for that? What an eejit.
PYE PARR: HA!! I think the important thing is: it may have taken you 10 minutes, but it would have taken me about 4 hours, and I didn’t have ’em!
PJ HOLDEN: So then I drop his rough into clip studio, drop an image from Wikipedia of a brain over it, and then just sort of trace it and turn it around in an hour and a half (because I had to stop halfway through to have a sandwich and do some messages, and have a nap) and send him the inks.
Greyscale art of Pye’s rough with PJ’s redrawn robots on it
PJ HOLDEN: Largely I just inked over his roughs, but I did think the two little ’nauty bots floating side by side could do with a bit of jussin’ up, so I drew one like he was a bit closer and one a bit further. We talked a little about trying to get some depth in to the picture.
PJ’s black and white inked lineart
PJ HOLDEN: My email to Pye about this read “Bit busy-looking in the centre but all elements are layered, so you can play with that a bit and blur some of it…” – i.e., fix it in the colours, mate!I knew no matter what a mess I made Pye was gonna colour it lovely and it would look great, and I was right.
PYE PARR: He did it with days to spare too, but time was so tight at my end I had to colour it on the day of the print deadline.
The next stage, really close to deadline… Pye adding flats over PJ’s inks
And a final cover at last!
PYE PARR: I remember phoning Matt at about 5.30, and the way he answered the phone very much suggested he was expecting bad news…
“H-hello…” “IT’S DONE!!” “OH, thank God!”
Hah.
Very much taking it to the limit – but sometimes greatness takes time! Thank you so much to both Pye and PJ for taking the time. Hopefully the punishment from Tharg won’t be too damaging to mind, body, and soul!
You can see what nearly gave Tharg’s Earthly representative conniptions on the shelves, real and virtual, everywhere the Mighty One’s finest is sold, including the 2000 AD web shop.
For more about those incredible Intestinauts, always there to alleviate your alimentary ailments, look no further than this interview with Arthur and Pye from 2021 and you can see & hear them chat all things Intestinauts on the Thrill Casthere and here.
For even more of Pye Parr’s artwork on Covers Uncovered – take a look at these – Megazine 443, Prog 2230, and Prog 2275. And to see how PJ Holden puts his covers together, we have these for your consideration – Covers Uncovered work, complete with the previous exploits of Chimpsky – Prog 2178, Prog 2221, Prog 2234, Prog 2301, and Prog 2308.
Time for a chat with the artist hell-bent on bringing some of the deep, dark horrors back to the world of Dredd – Nick Percival.
Nick’s latest dark dive on Dredd, Iron Teeth, written by Ken Niemand, is running in 2000 AD right now and we’re already up to episode 3 in Prog 2384, out right now! It’s classic lone Dredd, venturing into the Undercity after a group of juves who’ve got some dumb idea about confronting one of MC-1’s urban legends, the mysterious and mythical Iron Teeth. Their problem, and now Dredd’s problem, is that there’s nothing mythical about this particular urban legend. Iron Teeth is very, very real and very, very dangerous.
Nick, lovely to talk to you. How the devil are you?
NICK PERCIVAL: Bloody tired to be honest – but of course, living the dream creating those comic books!
Your new Judge Dredd series with Ken Niemand, Iron Teeth, began in Prog 2382 and it’s turning into a great Dredd horror, the classic Dredd against the monster, having to do it all on his own. Can you give us your idea of just what Iron Teeth is all about?
NP: It’s a full-on horror strip which was something I was keen to do. It focuses on Dredd searching for some missing juves that have gone on a quest to find the sinister creature known as ‘Iron Teeth‘ – an urban legend if you will – he’s a supernatural being, living deep underground beneath Mega City who preys on children foolish enough to wander into his lair.
It’s classic visual horror – all dark shadows, things hiding in the dark, limited light sources and so on with a great, creepy slow build written by Ken.
This runs for just six parts but we have an extended final episode and it intentionally doesn’t end cleanly -we’re setting up some cool spooky stuff that’ll pay off in the future.
From Iron Teeth part 1 (Prog 2382 – introducing the legend of Iron Teeth
When did you come on board for Iron Teeth?
NP: I was finishing up on the Dark Judges and after nearly 400 pages of those guys, I was looking for something new and was already thinking about some possible horror-related things I could do next for the House of Tharg. This was around the end of 2023, I think.
So that led into you and Ken working together on The House On Bleaker Street (Progs 2247-2249) Was it always the plan to work together again and was it a case of you and Ken working this one up together after Bleaker Street had finished?
NP: Oh yeah, we wanted to work together again after Bleaker Street – we’d been meaning to work together before that and at one point I was going to be involved doing some of the Zombie Dredd stuff in the first 2000AD/Megazine crossover event a while back – I did get to paint the cover art for the Megazine issue at least, which was good fun. I also illustrated his Dredd script for the most recent 2000AD/Battle Action crossover last year, so we’re getting to know each other better from a work point of view.
We’d been messaging back and forth about what to do next and wanted to expand the horror/supernatural side of Dredd’s world, which we’d started to dip our toes into with the Bleaker Street story and Iron Teeth kind of grew out of that.
From The House On Bleaker Street – Prog 2248 – the place Niemand and Percival first took us down deep into the Undercity’s horrors
In Iron Teeth you really up the ante by making it all about Dredd alone with just a group of MC-1 juves for company in the underworld beneath the city – no other Judges, it’s just Dredd versus the monster under the city.
NP: I do love stories that take Dredd a bit out of his comfort zone and see him isolated, not being able to rely on tech or other judges, which is perfect for supernatural-themed stories.
It’s a good change of pace for me with the limited cast of characters, since working on the Dark Judges stories felt like doing a team book like the X-Men or something -it had a very large cast which can be very draining to do on a regular basis.
In your Covers Uncovered for Prog 2382, you mentioned that you and Ken had talked about the film ‘Stand By Me’ as a starting point. It’s one of the great films of its time and one of the few really great Stephen King adaptations. Are you a fan or was it just that you and Ken figured there was a way to transpose the themes and tone into Dredd?
NP: I’m a big fan of that film (and the original story) but the main influence we took from it was the dynamic of the four kids and maybe a couple of visual ticks here and there. I wanted each kid to be distinctive both in physicality and personality which was all there in Ken’s scripts from the start.
I know that for Ken, the biggest influence came from Scottish folklore, particularly the story of the Gorbals Vampire, “In September 1954 in Gorbals, Glasgow, rumours had spread among the school children of a terrible, 7-foot tall vampire with iron teeth. Rumour had it that this vampire had kidnapped and murdered two young boys and feasted on their corpses. Despite the adults and the police trying to calm the hysteria, the children decided that action had to be taken to bring this terrible ‘Gorbals Vampire’ to justice.” – I found that fascinating and it really set the tone for what we were going to do with the series.
First look at a monster in part 1 of Iron Teeth (Prog 2382)
As far as the titular monster of Iron Teeth is concerned, where did the idea for the imagery of him come from and what was your thinking when creating the new character?
NP: We talked a little bit about Nosferatu (one of my favourite films and movie monsters), so I wanted to lean heavily on that but also adding a few modern horror elements – things like the Slender Man, the creature from Sinister and so on but with a twist and putting my own visual spin on everything.
I also imagined him somewhat spider-like, crawling around his lair, all gangly limbs and wild hair. I worked up a teaser painting first, just to demonstrate the kind of style and tone I was going for which was ultimately used as a pin-up to promote the story.
Nick’s teaser painting for Iron Teeth to give an idea of the style and tone
You’re certainly well-known for bringing a horror element to the Dreddverse, most notably with your Dark Judges saga (written by John Wagner and then David Hine) that recently finished in the Megazine. But here and in The House on Bleaker Street you’ve brought the horror to Dredd right in his back yard.
NP: Yeah, it’s something I really wanted to do and would want to continue. It’s nice sometimes to move away from some of the sci-fi slickness of the Mega City and delve a bit deeper into the darker and hidden, grisly places that maybe the Judges don’t know too much about. I’m more than happy to be typecast as the horror guy for sure.
Oh yes, Nick Percival – Horror Guy. You should have that on your business cards!
A perfect example of Nick Percival – Horror Guy – the big Iron Teeth moment from episode 2 (Prog 2383) – all done with a page-turning break to really make it the equivalent of a jump scare.
It’s something that’s hard-coded in the DNA of Dredd right from the start – whether it’s the horrors of the world Dredd exists in or, as here, the horrors that exist in Dredd’s world, all those insanely dark things that come up from the depths, that sort of thing.
Indeed, going back to that Covers Uncovered for Prog 2382, you talk about how you and Ken are not only linking this one back to Bleaker Street and how it is all part of a plan to ‘expand the horror side of Dredd’s world and are sowing some dark and crusty seeds that will hopefully pay off down the line.’
So first of all, do you fancy sharing just how you’re going to link it into Bleaker Street – we doubt you will, but hey, always good to ask!!
NP: Ha. Well, since the series is still running I can’t give too much away but obviously we’re back underground again in areas of the Undercity (and we go even deeper this time) but things do link up and there’s a nice reveal on the very final page that might get fans talking. You’ll see from that, we’ve been playing the long game and there’ll be many more horrors to come…
Bleaker Street was about the horror of the dispossessed in MC-1 after Necropolis and how the city lets its Cits down way too often. Oh, and it was about something damn nasty in there as well. Could it be that the nastiness that infected Bleaker Street is bubbling up in the underworld of Iron Teeth?
NP: It’s linked in some ways but a lot of this is deep-rooted in horror much older than Necropolis. I can say no more.
Tight-lipped art droids living in fear of Tharg… no fun!
More of Nick Percival – Horror Guy – Iron Teeth part 3 (Prog 2384)
As far as expanding the horror side of Dredd – do tell! How far have the plans got so far? Anything concrete, anything big and juicy you can tell us about?
NP: Ken and I were talking throughout Iron Teeth about what would come next. It’s crazy but in Part 3 of this story, you’ll see some new horror/supernatural elements that we just throw out there and any one of them could easily link into their own series, so we’re doing some new horror world-building with this.
But yeah, we know what comes next and if The Mighty One is game, we’re ready to start scaring folks once again. I have some seriously dark stuff ready that will make Iron Teeth look like Aunt May, so I’m good to go. The response I’ve had back just from the first two episodes has been fantastic, so it does seem that most people are liking it and hopefully we can do more.
Yep, across a couple of pages of part 3, I reckon you’ve got the makings of any number of new horror Dredds exploring the folklore of the Undercity!
One of the pages from Iron Teeth Part 3 in Prog 2384 where Niemand and Percival show us Undercity folklore
Now, I’ve long described your art as beautifully grotesque. Would you be happy with that as a shorthand for your art or can you think of something you like more?
NP: Grotesque is fine, I guess – I do like classical horror rather than out-and-out gore, though. It’s the things hiding in the dark, the strange creatures and disturbing narratives that I think make the perfect package. So… Classically Grotesque, maybe…?
Classically grotesque it is!That’s perfect!
And presumably, given the classically grotesque horror of your art, horror’s been something you’ve been interested in for a long time?
NP: I’ve always been a horror fan since I was a kid, I have a huge horror collection (many life-size busts of the Frankenstein Monster, Nosferatu, etc) – my house and studio are like mini horror museums with the amount of collectables on display – I’m trying to compete with Guillermo del Toro but I have a very understanding wife who puts up with all this! I love the Universal Monsters, old pre-code horror films through to the modern stuff, when it’s done well. The 50s EC horror comics, 70s Marvel (Tomb Of Dracula, Werewolf By Night, Man-Thing, etc.) the old Warren horror mags – the list goes on and on. I just absorbed it all and still go back to it regularly for inspiration
As long as it’s a good story with good characters, then I’m always interested. As an artist you spend so many hours at the drawing board that it has to be stuff that you’re into to produce good work and not go mad!
More from part 3 of Iron Teeth, more of that Undercity folklore, and more of the incredible detail Percival gets into every page
As for your art in general, how would you describe what you do and how has your art developed over the years?
NP: I got my first professional work when I was pretty young (19 years old), so even though I’d been drawing comics since I was a kid, I basically developed through my published work, so was learning the craft in public, so to speak. It was a trial-by-fire learning curve with all your novice mistakes there forever for everyone to see, unfortunately. Can’t do anything about that but it’s all a process and shaped me into the artist I am today.
I think I’ve finally got the hang of it, maybe. I suppose the biggest artistic evolution was going from using traditional paints to painting digitally but ultimately, the technique and thoughts behind it are all the same.
Again, in that Covers Uncovered you did for Prog 2382, you said this about your art – ‘I wanted to experiment a little more with my style, getting a bit more scratchy and raw in places, rather than keeping everything super slick’. So what was the impetus for making that change in your art and are you satisfied with the results here?
NP: Yeah, I wanted to get a bit looser and not as tight and slick in the imagery. I’m getting there but it’s a slow process since I don’t want to shock people with an instant, radially different style from what I’m known for. It has to be gradual and has to work for the story I’m working on at the time, not just for the sake of it.
Some of the changes are slight and may only really be noticeable to me. I’m working a few things into the Iron Teeth work and the teaser image had more elements of that. When I finally move over to just drawing stick men, then I’ll be sorted but I’m not sure how pleased Tharg would be!
I would say, however, that if you really want to see how the art was intended to look, you need to pick up the digital versions of the comics as well. So much of the detail and subtle colour work is lost on the printed page (I’d say a good 40%), which is always a huge pain when you’ve put so much effort and time into the pages (especially with painted art). It can be quite disheartening seeing it in print sometimes but I’m used to it and at least we do have digital copies now that are nearly perfect. Buy both – keep those sales up!
Oh absolutely – it’s one thing that is such a highlight when looking at your work in digital, the ability to zoom in to see absolutely everything you put on every page. Like this, a blow-up from that last page we showed from page 3 of Iron Teeth…
For something new like Iron Teeth, does it all start off with talking to the writer and seeing what sort of visual vibe you’re picking up for the piece?
NP: When Ken sends me his ideas and influences we always tend to be in agreement. I may come back with some other film or art references and so on, just to to indicate some the visual mood and tone we could go for. I do tend think cinematically with my art in regards to lighting, textures, framing, etc but the storytelling and pacing is all good comics.
Dredd’s always Dredd no matter what environment he’s in or what genre of story you’re working on which is useful, since you know where you are at all times. We may beat him up, maim him and fuck up his uniform now and again but he’s always so rock solid and consistent.
For me, as an artist it’s more working on things like the metallic effects, visor reflections and so on -just little stuff that keeps him interesting to illustrate. I never get bored of painting a big close-up of his grumpy old face.
Is there plenty of sketching and drafting of characters and the like to get into the right place prior to actually sitting down for the very first page of script?
NP: I don’t do a lot of prep work, since I don’t have the time and deadlines can be tight. I also like to keep things fresh, so I don’t bore myself by doing a ton of sketch work before hand – you’ve seen how loose my cover roughs are.
To give you an idea of Nick’s loose roughs are compared with his finished digital paints, he sent over some pages from Iron Teeth (small versions here, but we’ll show you them in all their glory below).
First, Nick’s very rough roughs and very polished finished pages – Iron Teeth Part 2, page 1 above and page 5 below (Prog 2383)…
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NP: If it’s something super important, I may try out a few things but with something like Iron Teeth, the creature felt fully formed right from the start, so I knew what I wanted to do. For each page, I will create thumbnail layouts before getting to tighter pencils just so I know where I’m going and to check that the storytelling all flows but that’s about it.
And once you do sit down to start, what media do you work in – what’s the breakdown of physical – pen on paper – stuff to working digitally now?
NP: Each page is still pencilled traditionally – pencils on paper – and then scanned in to be painted digitally.
Again, you talked about the colour palette you used in Iron Teeth starting as very cool and slowly becoming hotter as the story goes on. What was the thinking behind this choice?
NP: I wanted to experiment more with the colours and use them creatively to help with the storytelling and to draw focus to certain things. It helps that my work is fully painted, so there’s a lot you can do with shades, colour values, textures, FX and so on.
The palette is much cooler at the beginning – lots of blues, sombre shades to reflect the mood of the story. When the kids are exploring, we’ve also got very limited light sources from their torches, so I wanted to reflect that -the same with Dredd and the droid using his light beam – a little bit like the movie, ‘The Decent’, where when they’re underground, the helmet lights were the only source of illumination.
Obviously, I cheat in few places for dramatic effect (artistic licence) but I wanted to keep it pretty consistent. As the story progresses and the danger increases where we slowly introduce Iron Teeth, we move into hotter colours – reds and hot yellows, especially in his lair.
Yep, we saw the cooler palette in the pages you sent over from part 2, and here we have pages 4 and 5 from part 3 (Prog 2384), where the palette’s changing and things are really hotting up…
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NP: When we’ve got these colours in play, Dredd stands out because of his blue/black uniform, signifying he’s an intruder and shouldn’t be there. It’s all a bit ‘A’ level art wanky colour theory but there you go. I never did finish my art ‘A’ level anyway, so what do I know?
Now, nearly at the end, but a fun one for you – if there’s one 2000 AD strip or character you’ve always fancied doing, how about pitching something to our lord and master, the Mighty one himself?
NP: I was asked this recently and I mentioned a horror Rogue Trooper series could be good fun and I always loved the old Harry Twenty series. I did have ideas for a Dark Knight Returns style Leopard From Lime Street series and even got close to doing a teaser painting, but then the character made his comeback elsewhere. There are some other series ideas knocking about that are in the early stages and Dredd of course, so hopefully much more to come.
Oh yes, horror Rogue would be a blast and the DKR-style Leopard From Lime Street – well we just had to ask Nick if we could see that one and here it is…
That’s definitely not the Billy Farmer we all know and love! Who knows, maybe there could be some Treasury Of British Comics alt-universe title some time and you could dust off the idea!
Nick, you’ve presumably finished with Iron Teeth now – or hopefully you have, Tharg can be a harsh master on those who turn in the art late – so can you let us know what to expect next and further down the line from you – both here at 2000 AD and elsewhere?
NP: Yep, Iron Teeth is all done and dusted. I’m just finishing off a strip for a new 2000AD later this year (combining two famous 2000 AD strips which has been fun) and I’m also busy pencilling out a cool Dredd one-off written by Mike Carroll – as well other stuff which we can’t talk about yet.
Elsewhere it’s some film concept and production art, commissions and the usual cover artwork amongst other stuff.
Hang on… which two famous 2000 AD strips?
Nick? Nick?
Oh dear. The spoiler alarms went off with just the barest mentions of a crossover and all I heard after that was something that sounded very much like multiple Rigelian hotshots and then screams of the Percival droid being taken away to face the wrath of TMO. Oops.
Dredd being Deredd – A sneak peek from next week’s Prog 2385 and Iron Teeth part 4
Thank you so much to Nick for taking the time to answer all that – hopefully Tharg will be merciful and not have you spending too much time in the special rooms reserved just for droids who give that little bit too much away!
You can find Judge Dredd: Iron Teeth running right now in the Prog – it began with Prog 2382 and will end in Prog 2387. It’s really a great horror Dredd and it sounds like Niemand and Percival are planning a lot more trips into the nightmares of MC-1 for the future.
As for interviews – Molch-R talked to David Hine and Nick all about the Dark Judges in the 2000 AD Thrill-Cast Lockdown Tapes here and we’ve interviewed Nick a few times, with David Hine discussing Dark Judges: Deliverancehere and Dark Judges: Death Metal Planethere. And there’s a great chat with Nick about wrapping up the six years worth of work on the Dark Judges work here.
Finally, here are the full-sized versions of Nick’s roughs and final versions of the pages we showed you in galleries through the interview…
