Nemesis the Warlock is a comic series created by writer Pat Mills and artist Kevin O'Neill which appeared in the pages of the British weekly comics anthology 2000 AD. The title character, a fire-breathing demonic alien, fights against the fanatical Torquemada, Grand Master of the Terran Empire in Earth's distant future, and his attempts to exterminate all alien life.

Publication history

The series began in 1980, in prog 167 of 2000 AD, with a story called Comic Rock "The Terror Tube", in which a freedom fighter called Nemesis escaped from Torquemada, the chief of the Tube Police, after a protracted chase through a complex travel-tube system on a planet called Termight, later revealed to be Earth ("Mighty Terra"). All that was seen of Nemesis was the outside of his streamlined organic spaceship, the Blitzspear. In "Terror Tube" the police were portrayed as a cross between the Spanish Inquisition (Torquemada is named after the notorious inquisitor Tomás de Torquemada) and the Ku Klux Klan (or from Spanish Easter penitents), making it easier to position them as the villains. "Terror Tube" was the first of a planned series of one-offs inspired by popular music, called "Comic Rock" – in this case The Jam's "Going Underground". The series never got going, but did produce a second Nemesis story, a two-parter called "Killer Watt", in which Torquemada chased Nemesis through a bizarre teleport system based on telephone lines. These stories proved popular, prompting Mills and O'Neill to develop a regular series, Nemesis the Warlock, which combined the early high-concept science fiction with fantasy in the "sword and sorcery" mould. Torquemada was promoted from chief of the Tube Police to Grand Master of Termight. Nemesis was revealed as a demonic alien with a horned dragon-like head based on the finned nose of his Blitzspear, fighting to protect aliens from Torquemada's genocidal tyranny, although his inhuman attitude and anarchic "Khaos" philosophy gave him an ambiguous morality; for example, in Book Five, "The Vengeance of Thoth", Nemesis is forced to hijack a bus full of children, which he then deliberately crashes, killing all on board as he escapes. Book Nine concluded in 1989, and the character barely appeared for ten years. Finally, in 1999, Mills and artists Henry Flint and O'Neill wrapped up the series with Book Ten: The Final Conflict, and an epilogue of sorts, Deadlock, which explored the political state of Termight in the aftermath of Nemesis' and Torquemada's deaths.

Production

O'Neill's imaginative, grotesque art helped to establish the popularity of the series, but the efforts he put into creating it led to a low rate of productivity. There were a number of delays in the publication of Book One, and a second book was drawn by Jesus Redondo. This and the higher rates of pay available in America led O'Neill to leave the series prior to Book Four - although a handful of episodes he had drawn just after "Killer Watt" introduced the fourth book. O'Neill was replaced by Bryan Talbot. Other artists to draw the series include John Hicklenton, David Roach, Clint Langley and Henry Flint. O'Neill returned to the strip to illustrate its intended last-ever episode and later for a special anniversary story.

Characters

Warlocks

Warlocks are a sexually dimorphic species of aliens who are capable of sorcery. Both males and females are horned, fire-breathing and of demonic appearance; females have a centaur-like quadrupedal morphology while males are bipedal but have unusual combination plantigrade / digitigrade leg joints, somewhat resembling satyrs.

Humans

Other aliens

Robots

Stories

Most of the saga was told in 'books' of between 9 and 20 episodes, with additional stories told in one-offs, which appeared in annuals, specials, or in the weekly comic. There are a number of collections of the original instalments available, which roughly follow the books as they were originally published. The first four books were not given individual titles upon their original publication. a. This Prog 2000 was a special edition outside the comic's normal numbering scheme released to mark the year 2000. Another issue numbered 2000 was published within the comic's normal numbering scheme in 2016. The series Deadlock, by Pat Mills and Henry Flint, was a direct sequel to Nemesis. Prog 2000 (20 September 2016) featured a follow-up Nemesis story (written by Mills and once more drawn by O'Neill) 'Tubular Hells' which reversed the destruction of Nemesis but it has to this point not led to further exploration of the character.

Collected editions

The series has been collected into a number of trade paperbacks, including:

In other media

Computer games

Nemesis the Warlock: The Death of Torquemada was released as a game made for the Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC and ZX Spectrum. The C64 version of this game was made by Martech in 1987, programmer Michael J. Archer, musician Rob Hubbard

Music video

The video for Shriekback's 1985 single "Nemesis" from the album Oil & Gold features Nemesis the Warlock.

Toys and games

Wizkids / NECA have released three figures of Nemesis the Warlock as part of their Heroclix collectable miniatures game (Rookie, Experienced and Veteran versions). These were only released in the United Kingdom, alongside other 2000AD related figures, as part of the "Indy" expansion to the game. This led to something of an outcry from the American fans of both the game and the character, and this style of "regional" figure-release was not continued in later sets of Heroclix.