Preview: ‘2000 AD Sci-Fi Special’ Brings The What-If Mash-Up

by Richard Bruton

Stories from a sideways universe – meaning it’s a special mash-up theme for the 2024 2000 AD Sci-Fi Special.

This year’s Sci-Fi Special continues a theme of recent years and goes for a one-off, standalone thing. And this time it’s all about the mash-ups, and it’s out now from Rebellion/2000 AD.

Here it’s jamming together all the popular characters and strips to give us five all-new, loads of fun, don’t take them too seriously things mixing and mashing with alacrity.

It used to be that special events in 2000 AD were few and far between – things like the times Judge Dredd and Johnny Alpha met each other few and other crossovers and special events were rare as hen’s teeth in a comic that’s coming up for its 50th anniversary soon.

But lately, not so much. It’s now something of a regular thing to have special events, whether that’s themed tales, alternate imaginings of stories from the past, or crossovers with a difference it does seem it’s become a regular thing for both the annual Sci-Fi Specials and the pretty regular crossovers between 2000 AD and the Megazine.

And yes, there’s always a risk of event fatigue with things like this.

Thankfully, we’re nowhere near that yet, particularly as these events are kept outside, with all the usual 2000 AD stuff carrying on. They’re interesting what-ifs, to enjoy for what they are and nothing more or less than that.

All of which brings us to the 2024 Sci-Fi Special, the what-if things were different takes – so we get the Strontium muties taking their place in MC-1’s Justice Department with Judge Alpha leading the way, we have Sinister Dexter falling into the Robo-Hunter business, there’s revenge in a world of Strontium Dog; Friday bringing SD and Rogue Trooper together, Stickleback joins the cast of the Red Seas, and a Zombo-fied aeroball adventure to end that’s absolutely as silly as you’d want it to be.

Frankly they’re all exactly what you’d expect, we’ll put together bits of wish fulfilment fun with plenty of real good creators having a blast.

The Judge Alpha opener, bringing the Strontium muties into the Mega-City One Justice Department and all led by Judge Johnny Alpha, is pure look at how cool all this is stuff.

But hey, it is cool, it is kick ass, and it’s all really great. Karl Stock neatly condenses a lot of Stront history and fits Johnny neatly and logically into a MC-1 that’s never been too fond of muties at all. And all this with some super bright, really kinetic Ben Willsher artwork.

After that, it’s Robo-Sharks with Dexter and, in a roundabout way, Sinister getting out of the gun shark/hit man business and into the robo-hunting business. Dan Abnett at the reins of his creations and doing the business, plus Anthony Williams really delivering some nice artwork. Great to see an old, bitter Sam Slade getting a supporting role as Dexter and Sinister dive into a problem where the robots are able to disguise themselves as humans, with only – shades of They Live of course, as Dexter’s the only one capable of seeing the robots under their facewipe disguises.

Rogue/Dog is a mashup G.I. Friday, the other, not so popular Rogue Trooper, with the world of the Strontium Dogs – so it’s a blue-skinned Dog framed for a crime he didn’t commit and hunted by his former comrades in the Search/Destroy agency in something that’s very heavily Strontium Dogs more than Rogue.

And you also get a great bit of space western, complete with shoot-outs, where Friday plays the role of Clint Eastwood perfectly and Nicolo Assirelli brings his very best Spaghetti Western vibes.

Stickleback sees the already connected Edginton-verse takes a sideways twist as Ian brings together the cast of the Red Seas and the napoleon of crime (and also, spoilers, a certain Victorian consulting detective) Stickleback in a tale of the high seas.

A voyage into the Devil’s Triangle brings peril and adventures to the crew of the Red Wench, including a close encounter with a certain shark with a hook in its jaw, all to get Captain Stickleback to a place of ancient history, a secret history, the wheel of worlds – but has Captain Stickleback factored in the foibles of the pirate life, not to mention another guest appearance that will bring him face to face with huge trouble.

If Robo-Sharks was Blade Runner without the pomposity, this version of Stickleback manages to be Raiders and Pirates with a lot more weirdness and Paul McCaffrey doing the whole sea-faring adventure bit nicely on art.

Which brings us to the finale, Harlem Zombos, with Al Ewing returning, sort of, to his finest creation, Zombo – well, lots of Zombos – in the out-and-out highlight of this special, with Zombo co-creator Al Ewing back to muck about some more of 2000 AD and muck about to pure comic effect.

Ewing and Boo Cook, doing his usual excellent thing with the art, take the undead daftness of the great Zombo and mixes it up with classic future sports strip Harlem Heroes to answer the question no one was asking, what if the world of Aero-Ball was made up of undead, flesh-eating teams?

Sure, Marvel might pay Ewing better but he knows where he’d be okay to get away with playing something for out and out ridiculous laughs like this – and it’s always great to see him back.

It’s all future sports meets undead combatants, zombo-chess, a competitive baking phase, the fourth wall taking a beating, and Tharg making an appearance at the end to bring everything to a close.

Super silly and a perfect end to another perfect one-off Sci-Fi Special.

JUDGE ALPHA – PORTRAIT OF A JUDGE – by Karl Stock and Ben Willsher, letters by Annie PArkhouse