Sunday 12 June 2016

2000 AD - May 1978.

If the internet's to be believed, in May of 1978, the world's first spam email was sent.

It just goes to show exactly how futuristic 1978 was.

And that's why IPC's 2000 AD was able to so accurately predict what life in the early 21st Century was going to be like. I often ruminate upon this fact as I sit here in my Mega-City, fighting off attacks by revenge-hungry polar bears and preparing to pop back in time to hunt dinosaurs.

As always, I remember nothing at all about these issues' contents but, from their covers, I conclude that the Cursed Earth is full of people who have a thing about rats, M.A.C.H. Zero is back and as stupid as ever and that UFOs were big in 1978.

I'm sure this last fact had nothing at all to do with the release of Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind and had everything to do with increased alien activity on our planet, caused by the aliens' realisation that our use of spam meant we were ready to join the intergalactic brotherhood predicted by the Carpenters. Sadly, although I recognise the UFO cover, I don't recall just what the feature/story was that it related to.

But, while I'm here, don't forget to vote in the, "How many super-heroes can you shake your fist at?" poll. Remember, your vote could be the one that swings it.

Swings it towards what, I have no idea.

2000 AD Prog 63, Judge Dredd

2000 AD Prog 64, UFO
2000 AD Prog 65, M.A.C.H. Zero
2000 AD Prog 66, Judge Dredd

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

With all due respect to my friends from the U.K., I believe that our U.F.O. problem in the '70's was much more serious here in the U.S. They were abducting people and probing them, in often uncomfortable ways, as well as mutilating ranch cattle.
Not only that, but we had the Bigfoot problem to deal with.
They were all over the place back then, whereas the U.K. has been Sasquatch-free since William the Conqueror slew the last Bigfoot in the British Isles in 1067.
M.P.

Steve W. said...

The weird thing is that there really are occasional Bigfoot reports in Britain, despite the countryside only being about ten foot wide at any point. Exactly where all those Bigfoots are living is anyone's guess.

Anonymous said...

MP, you had Bigfoot but we lived in abject terror of the Loch Ness Monster. And somebody MUST make the movie "William The Conqueror, Bigfoot Slayer" - with Chris Hemsworth or Vin Diesel as William :D

Steve W. said...

I still live in abject terror of the Loch Ness Monster. I have good reason to think it's reading my mail. Can I get the police to do anything about it? No I can't.

TC said...

I'd be afraid to pop back in time to hunt dinosaurs. Might accidentally step on an insect and change history, then come back to the present time and find out that the Nazis won WWII or something.

IIRC, the Judge Dredd strip took place in a future where the North American continent had major cities and civilization on its east and west coasts, but everything in between was a vast wasteland, inhabited by subhuman savages. But then, Hollywood and our news media think that America is like that now.

Anonymous said...

TC, the political ascendancy of Donald Trump leads me to believe that somebody DID go back in time and accidentally step on a bug, thus dooming us all to a nightmarish alternate future.
I expect to see talking gorillas with machine guns any day now, maybe one riding on a tyrannosaur down the middle of my street.
M.P.

Warren JB said...

Wasteland tribespeople wearing ceremonial skins of giant rats? All the time I'm finding things that Games Workshop ripped off 2000AD. (and other sources)