The NEARLY Complete Nemesis
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It's great seeing one of the finest sagas 2000AD has produced being reprinted in this way. The story itself is wonderful, the art is wonderful (including some of the shorter appearences by Clint Langley and others), and the characters by this point are just fascinating. It has always struck me as a tragedy that Nemesis lapsed into a hiatus for such a long time with occasional 'filler' stories stating it would be back soon... Book 10 left me with a slightly bitter taste since Mills initially had several further books planned. But as it stands, wonderful.
However, I do have one or two gripes... it would have been nice to see all the covers and related artwork reprinted... The 2000AD Winter Special containing the Candida story for example contained several interesting 'poster'-style interpretations by unusual of Nemesis by guest artists and a great Nemesis cover by Kevin Walker.
My only real problem with the volume, however, is that the publishers have shot themselves in the foot somewhat by not reprinting the strip which appeared in 'Nemesis - The Poster Prog', a one-off special from the nineties. While it is undoubtedly a minor episode in the series, it is a fun run around and features full colour art by the original series artist Kevin O'Neill. This is presumably quite difficult to get hold of nowadays and it's unlikely there will be an opportunity to reprint it anywhere else in the forseeable future. It's ommission renders the three volumes of 'the Complete Nemesis the Warlock' just a tiny but frustrating!
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The Final Conflict
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This book wraps up and completes the collection of Nemesis the Warlock strips originally published in 2000AD, if you've already bought the first two you have to buy this one, and if you haven't bought the first two, get to it! This is one of those comics that deserves to be put up there with V for Vendetta and Watchmen.
In this book we get the last three "books" of the Nemesis saga.
Book Eight is Purity's story with close to photo-realism by David Roach. If in the previous volume Pat Mills placed the focus firmly on Torquemada, in these last books he pulls back to look at Nemesis again - but what we see isn't very pretty. In Purity's story we learn that Nemesis has made Purity forget their first meeting and what he had her do. It changes the light we see Nemesis in. Always more an anti-hero than a hero, he begins to move towards villain, a move that is expounded in...
Book Nine, in which Nemesis and Purity go to Earth in the 1980s in search of Torquemada. Of course, while he's been there, Torque has turned Britain into a fascist state - an obvious satire and commentary on Thatcher's rule, with obvious parallels to the Jaspers Warp storyline in Captain Britain by Alan Moore. John Hicklenton provides art for this story, which is improved over his offering in the last volume. Again, his work is twisted and dark and inconsistent, but there is a greater understanding of anatomy and better use of background to convey the environment and the twisted nature of reality and it comes off really well. As does the tale of a young girl who becomes the focus of Torquemada's attentions because she looks like his wife Candida.
There is then an intermission with gaudy painted art by Paul Staples in which Torquemada learns of the Hammer of the Warlocks, a weapon so powerful it can defeat even the now god-like Nemesis, before we head into the Final Conflict of Book Ten, in which having returned to the future and the world of Termight, Torquemada is deposed and put on trial before attempting to put his final solution to aliens into play and the final fates of Nemesis and Torquemada are decided. Art in this part of the story is by the Kev O'Neill inspired Henry Flint and is as exciting to look at as his forbears work (Kev himself draws the final chapter in the story). It is in this chapter that we see the depiction of Nemesis at his lowest, he appears evil at points, only for some redemption at the end. Also, there is a scene that offers an explanation of Torquemada's evil too.
In fact, by the end Mills has gone beyond the idea of a traditional saga of good and evil, to suggest that everyone is capable of good or evil if the situation demands it. The saga has been a morality play, but a much more intelligent digression into morality and amorality than your average superhero story and I think there is much to be drawn from going back to it.
As extras, we get the Deadlock/Nemesis strips, again painted but by Carl Critchlow. The art is sometimes a little murky and hard to read but features an interesting story of magic that seems to put occultism to the sword and is fun if you know a little of Aleister Crowley. Finally comes a story by Chris Weston of Candida that seems like it should have been slotted in earlier in the book, as it is referenced in Book Ten.
This is the complete Nemesis and it is also essential. I cannot recommend this highly enough. It's blood and guts and demons, but it's making an intelligent point too.
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