The Weekly 2000 AD Prog #2468: Welcome To The Wastelands Of Junkfall In The Discarded

Taking a look inside the UK’s greatest sci-fi comic, the Galaxy’s Greatest, fast approaching 50 years of brilliance —it’s the Weekly 2000 AD.

So, we’re already a month into 2026, which means plenty of greatness in 2000 AD‘s 49th year already. Seriously, the greatest sci-fi anthology of the last nearly 50 years. You definitely should be reading this.

Inside, five continuing strips are at various stages of their stories. We’ve got the penultimate episode of ‘Death of a Judge‘, which will be John Wagner‘s final Dredd, a monumental moment, as we bid farewell to not just the greatest of all Dredd writers but one of the finest writers in comics. Alongside that Dredd, there’s more from Herne and Shuck and The Discarded, deep into their tales right now. Then we’ve got second parts for two new strips, the first being Judge Dee, where movie maker and writer Ben Wheatley brings his storytelling to the Prog. And finally, there’s the second of three parts to the latest Tharg’s 3Riller, Money Shot, where Kek-W and Rob Richardson are already making a case for a damn good strip that demands more than just three parts.

So, there we go, five great strips, packed with all the invention and variety that 2000 AD has always been full of.

And it all starts under something typically incredible from Cliff Robinson and Dylan Teague…

Again, Cliff Robinson does bad things to the logo. Always a joy to see artists messing with things that way. And of course, Robinson (and Teague) just deliver great detail, sumptuous stuff amongst the detritus of Junkfall in The Discarded.

2000 AD Prog 2467 came out in the UK on the 4th of February. I’m not too late here, just for a change. As for getting hold of the Prog further afield, well, that’s just a touch difficult right now with the troubles with comic distributors these days. However, there’s always the digital option from the 2000 AD web shop. As for getting physical copies, well, the recent announcement that 2000 AD will be distributed by Lunar, with the first graphic novels and collections and the monthly Megazine getting to American shops next month. Hopefully, they’re going to work out a way to get the weekly Prog into the Americas as well.

So, with all that, time to get into this latest Prog…

JUDGE DREDD: DEATH OF A JUDGE – PART 5 – BY JOHN WAGNER AND MIKE PERKINS, COLOURS BY CHRIS BLYTHE, LETTTERS BY ANNIE PARKHOUSE

Yes indeed, the penultimate episode. And the penultimate of Wagner’s writing for 2000 AD. End of an era indeed. I’ll wax lyrical on that next week.

As for ‘Death of a Judge‘, it’s been, as you’d expect, quite the most brilliant exercise of doing a Dredd procedural. As I said last week, it’s fitting that Wagner bows out this way rather than a Dredd epic. Sure, he’s been responsible for so many of those epics, but the simple procedural is the meat and bones of Dredd, the thing that’s meant that the character still feels fresh and vital after all these years. They’re the stories that add to the rich life of Mega-City One, they’re the stories that fill out the legend of Dredd, the stories that have filled out the character over the years. And Wagner does them better than anyone else.

And so it is here with Death of a Judge. Simple brilliance, all coming from Dredd being a complete bastard. His heartless devotion to the law turning a traumatised kid into a killer with a score to settle. It’s exactly the sort of complex characterisation of Dredd that Wagner’s always written, never the hero, that would be far too easy, but instead the face of the regime that grinds down the people. And on top of that, Wagner writes the latest in his exploration of what it means to be a Judge in MC-1, through the lens of the Mechanismo units, a new breed of Judges, the perfect foil to contrast with the old school ideas and actions of Dredd.

Well, this time, one of those he’s ground down has gone on a killing spree, targeting Dredd, wanting him dead for his cruel actions all those years gone by. The perp’s been in touch and wants to get Dredd alone. Completely against regs, as Mechanismo poins out, but Dredd takes the bait, ordering Mech Judge Ronald to stand down – but Ronald’s still got what it takes to be a Judge, so the stand down order isn’t exactly followed as Dredd would have wanted it.

Across the six pages, it’s a beautiful lesson in how to tell a tale, how to set things up towards next week’s finale. Wagner and Perkins doing it all so well. And I know I’ve been concentrating the lion’s share of my praise on Wagner’s storytelling, and I hope Perkins will forgive me for that. But his art, a rare thing at 2000 AD and Dredd, is just so damn good. He’s an integral part of what’s made this such a grand finale for Wagner on Dredd, perfect storytelling across panels and pages, the flow so good, the body language just right, the character moments expertly captured.

Yes, just the one episode to go. Damn it, it’s all too soon. This one could have run so much longer. But, for just these last couple of Progs, let’s just enjoy this perfectly done Dredd, the epitome of what makes the character so compelling.

HERNE & SHUCK: POWER TRIP – PART 6 – BY DAVID BARNETT AND LEE MILMORE, COLOURS BY GARY CALDWELL, LETTERS BY ANNIE PARKHOUSE

Herne’s quest to get the votes of the old Gods and Goddesses of Britain continues, as he attempts to win back the mantle of Herne the Hunter. After all, the alternative is death, so you can’t blame a crusty magician type for trying, can you?

It’s time for an audience with the King-Without-A-Castle here, and yes, I did have to Google this one – it’s Brân the Blessed, Welsh Giant and King of Britain. Although here, he’s a rather dapper-looking gent who claims dominion over the open road and of freedom. Herne, not too impressed, gets set a challenge, one which he throws himself into, with all of us seeing just what a mess he’s making of it.

Of course, that failure pales into insignificance when he realises just who the King-Without-A-Castle’s assistant is…

Oh, and meanwhile, Shuck and Jordy are on the trail of those who have taken Caris, presumably the return of those nasty St Michael folks.

As always, the joy of Herne & Shuck isn’t so much in the adventure itself, more in the way that it’s done. Sure, the quest storyline is one that’s long been done, but the quest is merely an excuse for Barnett and Milmore to play around with the ancient lost myths and legends of Britain, bringing a rich tapestry to things, filling the pages with strange magics. But always with a sense of tongue firmly in cheek, never letting us forget that Herne, bless him, is just that bit of a deadbeat, a magician thrust into things that he’s ill prepared to deal with, an old crusty who’s just not all that good at what he’s meant to be doing. That Barnett and Milmore have spun this out into several highly entertaining series is a testament to how well they’ve crafted this strange little magician’s character.

PSI JUDGE DEE – PART 2 – BY BEN WHEATLEY AND SIMON COLEBY, COLOURS BY JACK DAVIS, LETTERS BY SIMON BOWLAND

Okay then, well, we got two firsts for this one in the debut episode last Prog. The first episode written by Ben Wheatley for the Prog – that’s Ben Wheatley, the writer/director of many great movies you should really put on your must-watch list – and the first appearance of Psi-Judge Dee, a high-performing Judge with a dark secret.

Said secret is that Dee’s phenomenal clear-up rate is down to her hosting a purple tentacled demon, Klato, all thanks to an exorcism gone wrong. And it’s that demon who helps Dee get her cases solved, all for the price of the guilty perp’s soul.

So far, so strange, right? But it’s a good strange, a well-written strange, one that fits nicely into all the strangeness that’s gone on down the years in 2000 AD. That first episode read so well, Wheatley getting the intros out the way with aplomb, all made so much more attractive with a welcome return to the Prog for Simon Coleby on art, doing that thing he does incredibly well, his thick lines and sense of style coming through real well.

Now, we’re on to episode 2, where Senior Psi-Judge Geller is having his own problems, another spirit or demonic presence making itself known, rather fatally. As for Dee, well, she’s off on the case handed to her by Geller, in his old Sector, one where there’s weird cult-y things happening. The Judges think it’s all over once the cult goes up in the explosion they’re blaming on too much power being channelled.

But Dee… well, Dee and her demon, not so sure…

You know, with that ‘Dee and her demon’ line, I just realised something, this is truly the 2000 AD equivalent of the sort of Brit humour comics of the template ‘someone and his/her something.’ There were so many of them back in the day, things like Martha’s Monster Make-up, even down to the parodies, like Viz’s Felix and his Amazing Underpants. Here, it’s just a modern, 2000 AD version of that. And it works so far, works damn well. Wheatley and Coleby doing great things, introducing something new into the Prog.

THE DISCARDED – PART 6 – BY PETER MILLIGAN AND KIERAN MCKEOWN, COLOURS BY JIM BOSWELL, LETTERS BY SIMON BOWLAND

Six parts into this already, and we’re deep into the world of Junkfall, the orbiting scrap heap where a new, fascist Britain sends both its junk and its unwanted citizens. Here, amongst the piles of rubbish, those discarded souls, the criminals, the dissidents, those this new Britain sees as dangerous to the new regime, make their home.

One of those discarded has been taken over by ‘the chip,’ itself cast off accidentally from an experimental lab. It’s transforming Junkfall to ends we really don’t know quite yet. But we do know that that particular dissident’s daughter, a cop, and the cop that put him here, is on Junkfall on official business, undercover and looking for both dad and ‘the chip.’ She’s already fought hard, gladiatorial combat in amongst the various clans that make up the population here, and she’s got the words of Sister Trash ringing in her ears, telling her of ‘the toxic lake,’ a forbidden zone on Junkfall, where scientists are forced to manufacture the special brew that keep the poor compliant and make the governement elite a fortune in the process.

So, The Discarded is running an interesting couple of threads here. In the foreground, we’re with the cop, Veera, doing the whole quest thing, making her way through the tribes of Junkfall, plenty of action, all of it done well by McKeown. And then, in the background, there’s everything else, the political stuff simmering, the idea of a dark and dystopian Britain, the gathering of the tribes on Junkfall, the mysterious ‘toxic lake’ and what it means for Britain…. all of them adding a hell of a lot to The Discarded, elevating it far above the simple quest storyline we’re getting weekly right now.

This first series has worked damn well at introducing the concepts, working hard to give us both the foreground and background stuff, all of it gelling really well. But there’s still a big bit of me that thinks that the really interesting stuff is going to happen once this first series is done – and I really hope there’s already a second series in the works. Because that second series may well – and I hope it does – take things from the simple tale of Junkfall to the more complex things happening back in Britain. I think – although I have no idea where this is going – that that’s where this is heading. I could be wrong, but damn, I’d love to see The Discarded crashing down in this hideous new Britain that Milligan and McKeown have been seeding all the way through this.

THARG’S 3RILLERS: MONEY SHOT: HIGH STAKES – PART 2 – BY KEK-W AND ROB RICHARDSON, LETTERS BY ROB STEEN

Okay then, the Tharg’s 3Riller, a three-and-out story, beginning, middle, end, all wrapped up in three five-page episodes. Sometimes that’s it, one little story for your enjoyment, sometimes it’s the prelude to something bigger. Case in point, Herne & Shuck started out as not on but two 3Rillers, leading to a couple of bigger series now. It’s a nice way of giving us new strips, new concepts that might work out as something bigger.

But with a completely new 3Riller, the key thing is to grab you from the out, and that’s just what Money Shot did with that first episode last Prog. We got thrown into things at speed — it’s the USA, the ’90s, and accountant Carla Dietrich, accostomed to dealing with both the clean and the not so clean clients, and not really caring either way, getting a new job that’s taken her well into strange environs, pursued by blue-skinned goons, going from bright technicolour surroundings into the stark black, white and red of ‘The City’.

And of course, kudos to Ron Richardson, a new favourite artist of mine, doing so much so well here, his art just looking so good, giving style and form in equal measure.

So, where we left this one, Carla ended up in ‘The City,’ with an offer she really couldn’t refuse, where those she’s maybe working for have a whole heap of cash they need to clean, and she’s the woman they’ve chosen to be that cleaner. And when she refuses… well, things go very strange and very vampish, very quickly…

So, yes, we’re in a strange little world here, where the vampires have fled to ‘The City,’ and they’re not too keen on taking no for an answer. Suddenly, we’re deep in a misogynistic world of control from the vamps, keeping their blood stock of females captive, slaves to serve…

So, Kek-W and Richardson make this a fascinating second/middle part, where suddenly we’re all about Carla fighting to free her imprisoned sisters, all against the asshole male vampires. And then – well, let’s just say there’s a big guest star who appears on the final page – one who long-time readers with a better memory than I might have been thinking of when we had mention of ‘The City.’ Frankly, I don’t think Money Shot needs this sudden nostalgia trip of a returning character last seen in the 90s, it was doing things pretty damn well all on its own. But hey, let’s see where things go with this one, it’s been a bloody good couple of episodes so far.