History[]
The V.C.s (or "Vacuum Cleaners") were a squad of spacefaring commandos from the various colonised planets of the Earth's solar system in the year 2531 AD, who were tasked with fighting the Geeks, a hostile alien race intent on conquest. The original squad consisted of Jupe (the sergeant), Hen-Sho (the missile man), Ringer (the pilot), the mutant Dwarf Star (the port gunner) and the mentally unstable Loon (the starboard gunner), supported by a ship's computer called Brother. They were joined by Steve Smith, the only V.C. actually born on Earth, something which provoked resentment from his comrades (particularly Ringer) who nicknamed him "Earthworm".
The squad were generally hated by their superiors (in particular "the Dishwasher", a senior member of the Diplomatic Corps) because of their undisciplined ways, and received little support from them in their mission. In fact, the Dishwasher's attempts to get rid of them by sending them on a number of insanely ill-advised missions eventually caused the deaths of Dwarf Star, Hen-Sho and Loon, and resulted in Jupe being blinded and Ringer driven insane. Ringer finally decapitated him after discovering he had sold out to the Geeks. Despite all this, however, the surviving V.C.s (Smith and Jupe) eventually succeeded in ending the war by destroying Geek High Command with the assistance of the cyborg General Moore and the ghosts of their dead comrades (who might just have been the result of Smith hallucinating because of blood loss, but were still freakin' awesome).
New series
Years later, Smith (now a Major) rejoined the army to lead a new squad of V.C.s comprising Kali (the pilot), Ronsalle (the missile man), Diderot (who replaced Ronsalle when he died), Lin-Fu (the turret gunner), Ryx (the starboard gunner) and the Geek Keege (the port gunner) when hostilities broke out again thanks to the manipulative actions of the alien alliance called the Polity (who also turned out to have been behind the first Geek war). They were later joined by starboard gunner Tommy Hoff (Ryx switched to main gunner) and missile man Tycho (because Diderot had to leave the V.C.s when he discovered that he was a robot).
Paraphernalia[]
Equipment
Spacesuits with their names on.
Transportation
A starship controlled by the artificial intelligence nicknamed Brother (later destroyed).
Weapons
Yes, lots of them, including Hades grenades, land torpedoes, blitz cannon, spark guns, las-lances, fusion cannon and nova bombs.
Notes[]
- The original series was created by Gerry Finley-Day, with the opening episode drawn by Mike McMahon. Later instalments were drawn by Garry Leach, John Richardson and Cam Kennedy. Writer Steve MacManus also worked on the original series (which ran from 2000 AD progs 140 to 178 in 1979-80), while the revived series (which ran from 2000-2006) was written by Dan Abnett and drawn by Henry Flint and Anthony Williams.
- The V.C.s had a cameo in 2000 AD prog 2000 (published September 2016) which was drawn by Dave Gibbons. They were shown shooting some hapless Geeks while shouting "Vape em!"
Links[]
- Appearances of The V.C's
- Character Gallery: The V.C's
- Images that feature The V.C's
- Fan-Art Gallery: The V.C's
- The V.C's quotations