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“Swamp Thing was Just a Vegetable who Lived in a Bog, after All”: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 18

Continued from last week. For almost a decade, Wein and Wrightson’s estimable if brief spell on Swamp Thing would prove impossible to follow. At best, the character would feature in some mildly suspenseful tales marked… [more]

Starting Out Again at the Top: Swamp Thing (1994 to 1996) — The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 17

Continued from last week. It’s no overstatement to say that Mark Millar’s first major breakthrough at DC Comics owed everything to Grant Morrison.  Offered the chance in 1993 to write Swamp Thing, Morrison assumed the… [more]

(Almost) the World’s Finest Team: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 16

Continued from last week. Millar was hardly the first comics scripter to bridle at the constraints of continuity. But few can equal his predilection for heedlessly flouting the more obvious aspects of a property’s backstory. The… [more]

“Nice to Meet You, Big Guy”: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 15

Continued from last week. November 1998′s Superman Adventures #25 gave Millar one last substantial shot at depicting The Batman. Putting the overwrought misjudgements of the JLA Paradise Lost mini-series behind him, he returned to the conception… [more]

“Forgive me, Superman. I’m not very good at losing.”: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 14

Continued from last week. Some in the UK fan community saw Millar as Morrison’s heir apparent on the JLA. But despite later claiming that he’d once turned down the chance to write the Justice League, Millar… [more]

“An Arrogant, Aristocratic Batman?”: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 13

Continued from last week. But how were Morrison and Millar to explain away the Batman’s aloof and frequently contemptuous attitude towards even his fellow super-heroes? If the Dark Knight was to be cut away from the… [more]

“This is Not a Dream, but a Plan”: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 12

Continued from last week. There are other indications that Millar might have been a major contributor to the new JLA’s origin tale. In the Justice League’s own title, Morrison had scrupulously ensured that his innovations were… [more]

The Secret Origin of the JLA, and of “Mark Millar” Too: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 11

Continued from last week. It would be another seven months until Morrison and Millar’s next public collaboration on the Batman. In that time, the new JLA title would establish itself as a remarkably successful reboot. Its… [more]

The Batman As Father Figure: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar Part 10

Continued from here. DC’s post-crisis, Dark Age portrayal of the Batman had long been a source of aggravation for both Morrison and Millar. Years before Morrison landed the job of scripting the JLA, the two men… [more]

“A Semi-Unhinged, Essentially Humourless Loner Struggling with Rage and Guilt”: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 9

Continued from last week. Grant Morrison’s ambition was, it appears, to free the DCU from the constraints of both wonder-killing editorial dictats and the conventions of the Dark Age. Yet unregulated creative anarchy doesn’t seem to… [more]

A Thousand Batmen Blooming: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 8

Continued from last week. The superhero genre had become more and more susceptible to the myth of the definitive version. It was a fan-consuming fallacy which presumed that each character possessed an irreducible core of utterly… [more]

Pulling Out of the Dark Age?: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 7

Continued from last week. It’s only to be expected that Millar’s work on the JLA would mesh with Grant Morrison’s agenda. But it is remarkable how closely and effectively Millar’s contributions reflected his friend’s wider ambitions… [more]

“How Can You Possibly Live in a World Without Superheroes?”: The American Superhero Comics Of Mark Millar, Part 6

Continued from last week. Who was responsible for what in Morrison and Millar’s many collaborations? Credit boxes are often little help at all. Stories which carried the Morrison/Millar by-line were on occasion the product of an… [more]

“Nice to Meet You, Big Guy!”: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 5

Continued from last week. Though he’d never again see one of his scripts feature in any of the Batman’s many headlining titles, Millar would return to the character over and over again throughout the Nineties. It’s… [more]

“Just Don’t Do It Again”: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 4

Continued from last week. How was it possible for Millar to show so much respect for Bruce Wayne’s back story while portraying such a deeply unconvincing Dark Knight? Though the writer’s take on Wayne was ludicrously… [more]

“There are Some Things in Life It’s Best not to See”: The American Superhero Comics of Mark Millar, Part 3

Continued from last week. The suspicion that Millar idled his way through his years at 2000AD is at least in part countered by the contents of Favourite Things. For it seems unlikely that he would have… [more]

“Yes, Alfred. Time for Bed.”: The American Comics of Mark Millar, Part 2

Continued from last week. Favourite Things was the first mainstream superhero tale that Millar had ever sold. Previously, he’d depicted the costumed crimefighter as a horror-hybridised symbol of corruption and cruelty, as with The Saviour and… [more]

Enter Mr. … Miller?: The American Comics of Mark Millar, Part 1

Continued from here. Exactly when Grant Morrison landed Mark Millar the job of scripting Swamp Thing is hard to pinpoint. Millar has hinted that the GLASCAC comic convention in the late April of 1993 may have… [more]

The Best of Millar: The 10 Most Enjoyable Examples of Mark Millar’s Work for UK Publishers, 1989-1997

As in last week’s “worst-of”, the following selections are presented in no order of preference; 1. Tales From Beyond Science: Long Distance Calls, with artist Rian Hughes, from 1992’s 2000AD #776. Just as I could… [more]

The Worst of Millar: The 10 Least Commendable Examples of Mark Millar’s Work for UK Publishers, 1989-1997

Shameless? will be moving on in the new year to discuss Mark Millar’s post-1993 career with a host of American publishers. But before setting out in the direction of Swamp Thing, Skrull Kill Krew and… [more]

“Our ‘War-is-Fun’ Attitude”: Shameless? Part 37

Continued from last week. Hindsight suggests that Canon Fodder marked the beginning of the end of Millar’s relationship with 2000AD. It was by no means the last of his scripts to appear in the comic,… [more]

“Where’s Canon Fodder?”: Shameless? Part 36

Continued from last week. Though pinpointing exactly when Millar stopped working for 2000AD is an difficult business, he’d most definitely moved onto the American market by the time Canon Fodder returned without him in 1996. With the… [more]

“I Only Wanted To Be Loved”: Shameless? Part 35

Continued from two weeks ago. Canon Fodder reads as if two distinct stories had been awkwardly spliced together. In its first half, it’s the tale of how the Canon, Doctor Watson and Mycroft Holmes desperately combine… [more]

“Keep Calm. I’ll Wrap This Up Quickly.”: Shameless? Part 34

Continued from last week. The world-building that Millar had begun to invest in Canon Fodder was unusually rich, distinctly quirky, and full of promise. Yet that surprising combination of Catholicism, Holmesian characters, alt-world SF and superheroes… [more]

“Bones Gnawed to the Marrow”: Shameless? Part 33

Continued from last week. “I had no idea what I was doing for the most part and just learning how to do very basic stuff then. Only good stuff I’d recommend would be Big Dave (which… [more]