Best Moment

Gavin Hanly: The last panel of Origins. Plenty of foreboding, and just what we needed after a rather lacklustre epic.

Adam Crabtree: “Foul frigger! Fetid fornicator! Lewd libertine! Fruit of the stalk of the man of blood! I have sold my soul to be avenged on ye, Charles Stuart, for the loss of my guts, limbs and privy member!” The severed, rotting head of Oliver Cromwell everybody.

Charles Ellis: Several good choices here (including every third panel in Defoe – the severed head of Cromwell VS the King was classic). But I’m going with the moment in 1525 where we find out Stickleback did kill Valentine’s family. Everything we thought we knew about the conflict, the strip and the Pope of Crime gets overturned, and then Valentine gets no justice or revenge. Only in 2000AD…

Outside of the issue, the 2000AD 30th Birthday party in Soho was great fun.

James Mackay: PJ Maybe’s mayoral parade. We’ve followed the loveable dyslexic psychopath on a long journey – a very long journey – and finally he’s where he should be, in position to one day prove his might as Judge Dredd’s true nemesis. To have it lovingly rendered by Henry Flint in his Beardsley phase was the sugar on the cherry on the icing on the cake.

Sadly for the Prez, Joe’s a lot less “creative” with his sentencing these days.

Alex Frith: I think the moment when the first City Block came to life, and we realised just how big the robots in Judge Anderson 'Big Robots' were going to be. Or maybe it was just the sumptuous first cityscape spread from series artist Dave Taylor.

Daniel Payne: Nikolai Dante's brother Arkady surprising everyone with unaccountable special abilities was a captivating event. But Judge Dredd saw the most important development this year. There are several moments that illustrate the subject, but Dredd turning away his mutant cousins in prog 1545 was the best. John Wagner's script and Colin MacNeil's art deliver Joe and his kindred's torment perfectly, portending fundamental changes in this epic tale.

Pete McCosh: A few very close runners up here: the last page of Origins, “Mind ma batter ya fud!”, finally seeing what Arkady Romanov has under the hood.

However, the thing that really made me sit up and snort came on the second page of Spurrier’s first Angel Gang story. The Mean Machine butting out a Triceratops is one of the most ridiculous things I’ve seen all year, and I mean that in a good way. The series was a bit of a misfire for me, but I enjoyed that.

WR Logan: My best moment comes in the twilight of 2007 and Prog 2008, after laying the groundwork for over year we finally see Dredd’s grim determination and stubbornness coming through. This tale mentions characters from years ago, ties in with ‘Origins’ and the mutant storyline and sets the agenda for another year.
I’d like to say that my fave moment is the panel where Dredd leaves Vienna’s apartment:

"Short and sweet, that’s Uncle Joe. Are you all alright?"

"Scared the kack out of me. Look, if it's all right, I don't think I'll hang around for Rico."

But it really has to be the last page and even the last panel of the festive Dredd story:The Spirit of Christmas

Steven Denton: It may just be that it’s fresh in my mind but when Judge Dredd’s small talk to Vienna’s friend in “the spirit of Christmas” is classic Joe Dredd and classic Wagner. No one has a handle on Dredd like John Wagner and the Christmas story is pitch perfect even if every new story dose bring with it the fear it may be his swan song. Wagner is irreplaceable and it’s with a sense of fear that I see his retirement approaching 

Martin Charlton: The whole of episode 8 of ‘Caballistics inc.: Ashes’, given that Cabs started in my first prog, the ‘assumed’ climax was something I’d been building towards for years. Imagine my joy then when it reappeared in Prog 2008. Stunning.