History ComicBook / NemesisTheWarlock

* AFoolForAClient: During his trial for war crimes and and xenocide, Torquemada defends himself and uses it to grandstand about the justness of his tyrannical regime and his obsession with exterminating aliens. Unlike most examples, it actually works for him, as the witnesses are all too scared of the former master of torture to testify against him. When the court recognizes that the trial is going nowhere, they hand him over to Nemesis instead.

* AFoolForAClient: During his trial for war crimes and and xenoxide, Torquemada defends himself and uses it to grandstand about the justness of his tyrannical regime and his obsession with exterminating aliens. Unlike most examples, it actually works for him, as the witnesses are all too scared of the former master of torture to testify against him. When the court recognizes that the trial is going nowhere, they hand him over to Nemesis instead.

* AFoolForAClient: During his trial for war crimes and and xenoxide, Torquemada defends himself and uses it to grandstand about the justness of his tyrannical regime and his obsession with exterminating aliens. Unlike most examples, it actually works for him, as the witnesses are all too scared of the former master of torture to testify against him.

* BlackAndGrayMorality: ''Nemesis'' verges on BlackAndBlackMorality. BigBad Torquemada, leader of the human race (in the ''Nemesis'' universe, something like a cross between the heretic-burning medieval Catholic church turned UpToEleven and the Nazis), is a psychotic genocidal religious fascist god-dictator pledged to exterminate all non-human life--but Nemesis himself, who's ''essentially Satan'', has done things like openly lust for genocide right back at humanity and, at his worst, [[WouldHurtAChild intentionally kill a school bus full of children]]. Afterwards, he doesn't even seem to understand why it was a bad thing to do. Meanwhile, Nemesis' uncle Baal has a hobby of vivisecting humans and performing Mengele-ish experiments on them and his son Thoth hates and wants to destroy everything, including his father. Nemesis' allies the ComicBook/ABCWarriors are also extremely morally shady, given they've conducted massacres and frequently display genocidal urges towards humanity as well.

* AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence: After a billion years of traversing the cosmos with Torquemada's evil soul contained inside until Earth's sun goes supernova, the [[CoolShip Blitzspear]] ascends into Nemesis' pandimensional mothership the Milchspear, allowing Torquemada a chance to escape.

* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:Nemesis dies but sacrifices himself to take down Torquemada once and for all. Torquemada's empire falls apart and Purity Brown becomes the new leader of Termight, renaming it Terra. Ultimately Nemesis and Torquemada continue to appear as spectral entities tied to the Blitzspear, ensuring that Nemesis and his actions will never be forgotten.]]

* BizarreSexualDimorphism: Female Warlocks are much larger than the males, mostly because of their centaur-like lower bodies (the guys, for the record, are bipedal).

* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: After he's overthrown, Torquemada is rescued by a group of die-hard Terminators. Before activating his weapon of mass destruction, he drives his sword through his last follower after he has served his purpose.

''Nemesis the Warlock'' takes place in the distant future where Earth (called now Termight) and much of the known galaxy is ruled by the authoritarian and expansionist Termight Empire, which follows the ideology of human supremacy and genetic purity to the extent of a KillEmAll policy towards alien lifeforms and [[HalfHumanHybrid offspring of humans and aliens]]. This empire is led by [[MeaningfulName Tomás de Torquemada]], whose power is backed by a cult of personality and religious following revolving around him. The Termight Empire keeps expanding in the galaxy, taking over one planet after another and massacring their alien inhabitants. Despite the might and humancentric ideology of the Empire, the life of the average citizen ("Termite") in Earth tends to be controlled, repressed and likely to end violently (literally: in one short story it is said outright that deaths from natural causes are few and far between).

''Nemesis the Warlock'' takes place in the distant future where Earth (called now Termight) and much of the known galaxy is ruled by authoritarian and expansionist Termight Empire, which follows the ideology of human supremacy and genetic purity to the extent of a KillEmAll policy towards alien lifeforms and [[HalfHumanHybrid offspring of humans and aliens]]. This empire is led by [[MeaningfulName Tomás de Torquemada]], whose power is backed by a cult of personality and religious following revolving around him. The Termight Empire keeps expanding in the galaxy, taking over one planet after another and massacring their alien inhabitants. Despite the might and humancentric ideology of the Empire, the life of the average citizen ("Termite") in Earth tends to be controlled, repressed and likely to end violently (literally: in one short story it is said outright that deaths from natural causes are few and far between).

* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: The first two Nemesis stories were part of a short-lived experiment called "Comic Rock", where ''2000AD'' would feature one-shot stories inspired by rock songs. In those two strips, Termight looks much more futuristic (resembling Mega City One of ''Comicbook/JudgeDredd'') than how it would later be established, Torquemada is merely the Chief of the Tube Police, and Nemesis himself is [[TheVoice only heard but not seen]], with no indication that he's a demonic alien rather than a human being.

* GuiltFreeExterminationWar: Subverted. Torquemada's holy war to exterminate all alien life is treated as very bad, but this does mean that Nemesis has no qualms about exterminating humanity right back. His ally Purity has to convince him that there's something worth saving after all, reminding him that she's human too.

* ColdBloodedTorture: Saying that Torquemada and the Termight Empire employ torture to some extent is like saying that [[AcceptablePoliticalTargets American government spends some of its monetary resources on army]].

The title got its start in the form of "Terror Tube" and "Killer Watt", two short stories taking place in the Earth under Termight Empire. At this point much of the setting and backstory wasn't yet fleshed out with Torquemada being described as "chief of the tube police" rather than "grand master of Termight" and with Nemesis spending both stories [[TheFaceless in his ship with no clues about his identity or appearance]]. Currently "Terror Tube" is available for free at the [[http://www.2000ad.org/?zone=thrill&page=thrillviewer&choice=terrortube current website]] of ''2000 AD''.

* BlackComedy: Oh ''yes''.

* CrapsackWorld: While this may not apply to the rest of galaxy, the Earth/Termight during the rule of Torquemada and Termight Empire is pretty much this.

* TimeAbyss: [[spoiler:It says a lot about Nemesis that he only got tired of fighting Torquemada after doing nothing but fighting him for ''one billion years.'']]

* EarnYourHappyEnding: The epilogue story sees Nemesis [[spoilers:finally get over his addiction to fighting Torquemada and free himself from the seemingly endless cycle of violence. And it only took ''a literal billion years'' to get it out of his system.]]

* EarnYourHappyEnding: The epilogue story sees Nemesis [[spoilers:finally get over his addiction to fighting Torquemada and free himself from the seemingly endless cycle of violence. And it only took *a literal billion years* to get it out of his system.]]

* TimeAbyss: [[spoiler:It says a lot about Nemesis that he only got tired of fighting Torquemada after doing nothing but fighting him for *one billion years.*]]

''Nemesis the Warlock'' takes place in the distant future where Earth (called now Termight) and much of the known galaxy is ruled by authoritarian and expansionist Termight Empire, which follows the ideology of human supremacy and genetic purity to the extent of KillEmAll policy towards alien lifeforms and [[HalfHumanHybrid offspring of humans and aliens]]. This empire is led by [[MeaningfulName Tomás de Torquemada]], whose power is backed by cult of personality and religious following revolving around him. Termight Empire keeps expanding in the galaxy, taking over one planet after another and massacring their alien inhabitants. Despite the might and humancentric ideology of the Empire, the life of average citizen ("Termite") in Earth tends to be controlled, repressed and likely to end violently (literally: in one short story it is said outright that deaths from natural causes are few and far between).

The Termight Empire is resisted by alliance of alien races of galaxy as well as resistance movement of human dissidents opposing the rule of Torquemada. Both of these are more or less led by an alien known as Nemesis. Belonging to the race of powerful, demonic aliens known as Warlocks, Nemesis is both a [[MagicKnight fearsome warrior and mighty wizard]], who in several occasions brings forth his view of humans as PunyEarthlings. While Nemesis and his allies gain several important victories over Termight Empire, they constantly fail to bring down the entire Empire with Torquemada managing to get away with his life and Nemesis' plans to finish Torquemada failing [[NiceJobBreakingItHero or backfiring spectacularly]].

Stylistically Nemesis the Warlock combines dark fantasy, gothic imagery and science fiction in a manner which can occasionally remind the reader of [[TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}} another well-known British franchise]], especially in the case of Termight Empire. While several tropes are played straight, many others are subverted or averted. Aliens are mostly depicted as sympathetic although not always flawless, while humans outside the resistance tend to be either docile "Termites" or fanatical "Terminators", the army of {{Knight Templar}}s following Torquemada and his ideology to the point of suicidal behaviour.

Termight Empire is resisted by alliance of alien races of galaxy as well as resistance movement of human dissidents opposing the rule of Torquemada. Both of these are more or less led by an alien known as Nemesis. Belonging to the race of powerful, demonic aliens known as Warlocks, Nemesis is both a [[MagicKnight fearsome warrior and mighty wizard]], who in several occasions brings forth his view of humans as PunyEarthlings. While Nemesis and his allies gain several important victories over Termight Empire, they constantly fail to bring down the entire Empire with Torquemada managing to get away with his life and Nemesis' plans to finish Torquemada failing [[NiceJobBreakingItHero or backfiring spectacularly]].

''Nemesis the Warlock'' takes place in the distant future where Earth (called now Termight) and much of the known galaxy is ruled by authoritarian and expansionist Termight Empire, which follows the ideology of human supremacy and genetic purity to the extent of KillEmAll policy towards alien lifeforms and [[HalfHumanHybrid offspring of humans and aliens]]. This empire is lead by [[MeaningfulName Tomás de Torquemada]], whose power is backed by cult of personality and religious following revolving around him. Termight Empire keeps expanding in the galaxy, taking over one planet after another and massacring their alien inhabitants. Despite the might and humancentric ideology of the Empire, the life of average citizen ("Termite") in Earth tends to be controlled, repressed and likely to end violently (literally: in one short story it is said outright that deaths from natural causes are few and far between).

* KnightTemplar: Torquemada fully believes that his genocidal crusades to purge the universe of all alien life and ruling humanity through terror is the 'right' thing to do. Noted by the man himself in a 2000 AD pin-up after winning The Eagle Award for best comic villain of 1984: