John Wagner awarded an M.B.E.

Congratulations to the celebrated comics writer John Wagner, who was awarded an M.B.E. in the King's birthday honours. John co-created 'Judge Dredd', 'Strontium Dog' and 'Robo Hunter' for 2000 A.D. writing many of their most popular stories. For the 1980s EAGLE he co-wrote the early episodes of the 'Dan Dare' strip (with Pat Mills) and co-created and wrote 'Doomlord' and 'Computer Warrior' (with Alan Grant), which were EAGLE's most popular strips. Prior to his work on 2000 A.D. he worked as a sub editor for D.C. Thomson's comics, before going freelance with Pat Mills, a fellow sub editor.  They submitted stories to I.P.C.'s humour comics Cor! and Whizzer and Chips, before moving on to both boys' and girls' adventure comics, including Lion and Tammy. John subsequently edited the girls' weeklies Sandie and Princess Tina. In 1974, he and Pat Mills developed Battle Picture Weekly, creating the line up of opening stories themselves, with the help of Gerry Finley-Day. John moved on to edit the ailing Valiant weekly, creating 'One Eyed Jack', a successful strip about a tough American cop. 2000 A.D. launched in 1977 and EAGLE in 1982 and while contributing to these weeklies he also wrote stories for Battle, Scream! and Roy of the Rovers, usually with Alan Grant. With Pat Mills, he wrote the first four 'Doctor Who' serials for the weekly of the same name. With Alan Grant, he also wrote 'Batman' stories for D.C. Comics and created the independent comic The Bogie Man. John's 1997 graphic novel A History of Violence was filmed by David Cronenberg in 2005. Sadly, Alan Grant died in 2022, but John still contributes occasionally to 2000A.D.