The resistance to Russian conquest in the ‘2000 AD’ comic strip ‘Invasion!’
On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a massive military invasion of Ukraine; Russia’s aggression against a democratic European nation drew swift international condemnation, and the ongoing conflict has generated global admiration of the Ukrainian people’s bravery and resistance. Forty-five years earlier, the weekly British science fiction anthology comic 2000 AD envisioned a similar grim scenario — the Russian conquest of the United Kingdom, and the British people’s resistance to the resulting military occupation — in the strip Invasion!
Debuting in the first issue of 2000 AD (dated February 26, 1977), Invasion! was conceived by publisher John Sanders as a military thriller depicting Russia’s subjugation and occupation of the United Kingdom. Sanders suggested the idea to 2000 AD’s founding editor and writer Pat Mills. Although Mills was initially cool to the idea, he apparently took great interest when Sanders suggested the possible narrative scene of the Russians executing then-Conservative Party leader Margaret Thatcher on the steps of St. Paul’s Cathedral.
As Mills notes in his introduction to the 2007 collection of the Invasion! strip: “Whatever my reservations, I knew that readers would love this concept of an invasion. It presses some deep primal button in us all: the injustice of foreign invaders marching down our High Street; wherever our High Street happens to be and whatever the invaders’ excuse.”
Mills, collaborating with editor Kelvin Gosnell and art designer Doug Church, set the strip in the then-future year of 1999, with artwork from Spanish artist Jesus Blasco, who rendered the Soviet-era Russian uniforms and military gear with authenticity. However, shortly before publication of the premier issue, Sanders informed the editorial team that upper management had vetoed depicting the invaders as Russians, as it might cause controversy.
Instead of Russia, the invaders would come from the fictitious Volgan Republic of Asia; assistant art editor Kevin O’Neill had to remove any Soviet iconography from the artwork. Sources differ regarding the origin of the name “Volgan.” In his introduction for the 2007 collection, Mills states that “Meantime, I renamed the Russians ‘Volgans’ which I figured was as close as I dared go.” However, in the book Thrill-Power Overload, which explores the history of 2000 AD, Gosnell recalls that O’Neill created the name.
Regardless, the Volgans are clearly analogues for Russian invaders, with skull insignia replacing the Soviet hammer-and-sickle iconography, and with leaders such as Marshal Vashkov, Field Marshal Zinski, and Colonel Rosa Volgaska. The Volgans are brutal conquerors, defeating Britain and Western Europe in a matter of hours, with the United States reluctantly accepting the Volgan occupation of Europe. With the exception of Britain’s monarch, King Charles III, who manages to escape to Canada, the Volgans execute the UK’s political leaders, including an analogue for Thatcher, Lady Shirley Brown.
The strip’s protagonist is Bill Savage, a coarse East-End lorry driver who returns home to discover his house destroyed and his entire family killed by a stray Volgan tank shell. Savage retrieves his double-barreled shotgun from the wreckage and commences to kill Volgans, eventually becoming a leader of the British resistance movement.
Savage is an anti-authoritarian character, often at odds with the formality of career-military Resistance leaders like Brigadier Bentley Pearson, and his instincts always turn out to be better than those of his upper-class superiors. Savage is eager to fight and kill Volgans, and he has no patience for Pearson’s cautious leadership. Mills acknowledges that Savage’s portrayal as a maverick working-class hero was inspired by 1970s British television dramas like Callan and The Sweeney, and some modern readers may find Savage an uncomfortable, boorish character.
Mills’ vision for Invasion! was even more intense than what was printed; he had wanted the first installment to end with Savage shooting a Volgan soldier in the back, but management demanded that the scene be changed so that the soldier faces Savage as the shot is fired. Invasion! immediately garnered public attention; the British newspaper The Guardian publicized the strip’s provocative premise and questioned the strip’s appropriateness for juvenile readers.
Mills passed the writing duties for Invasion! to Gerry Finley-Day, who wrote most of the strip’s serialized four-page installments. Blasco provided the initial artwork, with subsequent artists including Ian Kennedy, Mike Dorey, Pat Wright, Carlos Pino, and Eric Bradbury, among others. While Blasco’s artwork is arguably the strip’s best, all of the artists render a gritty, oppressive post-invasion Britain.
Finley-Day’s stories provide Invasion! with a sense of realism. The strip gives consideration to the Resistance fighters having to locate shelter, food, and weapons. Savage has to contend not only with enemy Volgans, but also collaborators and fearful citizens willing to betray their country. There are consequences to heroism; freedom fighters die in combat, and the Volgans kill innocent civilians in retaliation for Resistance attacks.
Modern readers may consider Invasion! simplistic in its character portrayals. All Volgans are presented as obnoxiously evil and crass; similarly, British collaborators are portrayed unsympathetically, generally cooperating with the enemy out of greed. Little poignancy is generated from all the death and loss, and there are few problems that Savage’s swagger and shotgun cannot solve.
The strip’s few emotionally impactful moments come from the sacrifices of marginalized characters. In one installment, handicapped former speedboat racer Commander Robb is inspired by Savage to put aside his cynicism and take action against the Volgans; in another, former footballer Jock Steel is considered a has-been by his comrades, told that he is of no use to the Resistance, and yet his bravery and sacrifice prove everyone wrong.
Invasion! is a grim strip, especially given that its intended audience was juvenile male readers, ages seven to eleven. Inspired by such works as Constantine Fitzgibbon’s When the Kissing Had to Stop and Clive Egleton’s A Piece of Resistance, novels which also imagine a Russian-occupied Britain, Invasion! arguably reflects contemporary British anxieties about the UK’s national security amid the machinations of the two Cold War superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union; the strip provides a cathartic machismo assurance that the British people can fight alone against subjugation, if needed.
Invasion! ran for an initial 51 installments in 2000 AD, with additional one-off tales in early annuals or specials. The strip was followed by a prequel series, Disaster 1990!, written by Finley-Day with artwork primarily from Pino, featuring Savage fighting to survive in a flooded London, as well as the sequel series Savage, written by Mills with artwork from Charlie Adlard and Patrick Goddard.
The Cold War anxieties that inspired Invasion! ended with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. But with Russia’s current aggressive actions against neighboring democratic countries like Ukraine, Invasion! remains a compelling fictional portrayal of resistance to foreign invasion and tyranny, and the strip reminds readers that every individual can make a difference in the fight for freedom.
NOTES AND FURTHER READING:
“Want to support the people in Ukraine? Here’s how you can help” (Jeff Dean and Jonathan Franklin; www.npr.org, February 25, 2022) — this article lists organizations assisting people impacted by the conflict in Ukraine.
Invasion! (Pat Mills, Gerry Finley-Day, Jesus Blasco, et al.; Rebellion, 2007)
Thrill-Power Overload: 2000 AD — The First Forty Years, Revised and Expanded (David Bishop and Karl Stock; Rebellion, 2017)
2000 AD Encyclopedia (Scott Montgomery; Rebellion, 2022)
“Time for Action: when comics hit the headlines” (Paul Fairclough, The Guardian, July 20, 2011)
Attention, Secret Dictionary Club members — use Code Three to decipher the following message: WKH XNUDLQLDQ SHRSOH DUH EUDYH!
POST-CREDITS SCENE:
THE BLACK TERROR WILL RETURN…
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