Nemesis the Warlock
Cover of Nemesis the Warlock trade paperback collected edition. Art by Kevin O'Neill.
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| Character information | |
|---|---|
| First appearance | 2000 AD No. 167 (July 1980) |
| Created by |
Pat Mills Kevin O'Neill |
| In-story information | |
| Team affiliations | Credo, the Cabal |
| Partnerships | Chira (wife) Thoth (son) Great Uncle Baal |
| Abilities | Extensive magical powers, Powerful Psionic, Alien Anatomy |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | IPC Media |
| Schedule | Weekly |
| Genre | |
| Publication date | July 1980 – December 1999 |
| Main character(s) | Nemesis the Warlock Torquemada |
| Creative team | |
| Writer(s) | Pat Mills |
| Artist(s) |
Kevin O'Neill Jesus Redondo Bryan Talbot Tony Luke John Hicklenton David Roach Paul Staples Clint Langley Henry Flint Carl Critchlow Chris Weston |
| Creator(s) |
Pat Mills Kevin O'Neill |
| Reprints | |
| Collected editions | |
| The Complete Nemesis the Warlock | |
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.
The series began in 1980, in issue 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 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 face based on the 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.
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