Mark Millar(ish)

John 187 · 16-04-2010 10:06pm #1

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2010/03/29/mark-millar-to-guest-edit-relaucnhed-wizard-magazine-228/

I read a bit of Mark stuff and some hit some miss, but this is a funny pardoy of some of Mark over the top comments over the years.

MikeC101 · 16-04-2010 10:25pm

I laughed at quite a few of those. Millar seems to be believing his own press a bit these days, and the saying "controversial" things online shtick is getting a bit tired. "Look at me, I'm Mark Millar, I'm outrageous, look what I'm doing, look what I'm saying - aren't you shocked?!!"

Probably just good publicity.

Edit: And on a side note, anything anyone would recommend by Millar?

I've read Wanted, Kick-Ass, his run on The Authority, Superman: Red Son, Chosen, Old Man Logan.

Anything I'm missing that I should read? Not really a fan of most superhero stuff, unless it's fairly self contained and a little "different" - Civil War is probably out, I made an attempt to start on it and just gave up.

Fysh · 17-04-2010 10:36am

Superman: Red Son, Chosen and Ultimates & Ultimates 2 are the only things of his I would genuinely recommend. Ultimates is a good reinvention of the Avengers which is nicely self-contained, and Ultimates 2 is a good sequel (though it loses the run of itself a bit in the second half and goes all propagandist). That being said, if you're not too fussed about superheroes one way or the other you'd not be missing anything much by skipping it.

I hated his Authority run, because I read it after reading the Warren Ellis Stormwatch & Authority runs - and in the words of Steven Grant, where Ellis was writing about politics and history, Millar was just writing about superheroes.

As for Millar's public statements, pretty much anything coming out of his mouth or keyboard these days appears to be a publicity stunt. He's very good at raising his profile, but as I don't find his writing to be very good it's usually irrelevant to me...

John 187 · 18-04-2010 8:45am

The only thing to add to that is 1985 a what if type story where the Marvel bad guys end up in our world and a young lad has to stop them. It's ok and the art is very good.
I know its superhero stuff but Logan Enemy of the state is great and a lot of fun.
I don't understand what you meant by propagandist in realtion to Ultimates 2?

Fysh · 18-04-2010 9:33am

The Grand Theft America story featured a bunch of characters responding to the American use of superheroes as living weapons of mass destruction.

The story wraps up in a way that basically says "it's fine for the USA to create WMDs and use them against other countries, but if anyone else does the same thing they're clearly evil and backward"

.

It was too much of a "you think this a on my head stands for France?" moment. It's fine when it's presented as one character's opinion (especially when it's already shown that said character is a bit of a gobsh*te), not so much when it's the whole point of your story...

John 187 · 18-04-2010 9:57am

I see your point and it recalled the book he wrote War Heroes. Same kinda idea but set in the "real World" where american soldiers are given pills that give them superpowers and they go off and fight in Iraq. Only read the first three issues as don't think it was ever finished(To the best of my knowledge.) He made a odd choice in terms of the main plot of the story:

A bunch of regular americans decide to sign up to the army to get the superhero drugs so they can steal them and sell them to the taliban. Why would you care about this lot if there willing to turn on their country and help the Taliban.

MikeC101 · 18-04-2010 1:00pm

Fysh wrote: »

Superman: Red Son, Chosen and Ultimates & Ultimates 2 are the only things of his I would genuinely recommend. Ultimates is a good reinvention of the Avengers which is nicely self-contained, and Ultimates 2 is a good sequel (though it loses the run of itself a bit in the second half and goes all propagandist). That being said, if you're not too fussed about superheroes one way or the other you'd not be missing anything much by skipping it.

Cool, thanks. I might pick it up at some point in the future then.

Fysh wrote: »

I hated his Authority run, because I read it after reading the Warren Ellis Stormwatch & Authority runs - and in the words of Steven Grant, where Ellis was writing about politics and history, Millar was just writing about superheroes.

Plus, to add insult to injury, the art is just godawful. Quitely turned the majority of the male characters into these weird square jawed Schwarzeneggeresque creatures. And the female characters too, oddly enough. Generally the art is the least important thing to me in a comic, as long as it's functional. Maybe the intention was to distract readers from the plot.

At one point one of the bad guys remarks that Apollo looks kind of like Richard Gere when you meet him in person:

Eh, no.

I'm hoping it was some sort of ironic comment on the Ellis run character, because he did look a bit like Gere.

Fysh wrote: »

As for Millar's public statements, pretty much anything coming out of his mouth or keyboard these days appears to be a publicity stunt. He's very good at raising his profile, but as I don't find his writing to be very good it's usually irrelevant to me...

I enjoyed Wanted, and Kick-Ass, (is Millar writing everything with an eye to movies being made of them these days?) and Red Son, but more for the ideas behind them than the strength of the writing.

Ridley · 18-04-2010 7:14pm

No love for Millar's Marvel Knights Spider-Man run?

Mr. K · 18-04-2010 9:10pm

Ridley wrote: »

No love for Millar's Marvel Knights Spider-Man run?

I really enjoyed this, probably my favourite of Millar's work. If anyone is interested, his run is collected in the first three MK Spidey trades, entitled Down Among the Dead Men, Venomous and The Last Stand.

It's fun reading...in fact, I'm gonna read again soon!

niall mc cann · 19-04-2010 11:50pm

Fysh wrote: »

Superman: Red Son, Chosen and Ultimates & Ultimates 2 are the only things of his I would genuinely recommend. Ultimates is a good reinvention of the Avengers which is nicely self-contained, and Ultimates 2 is a good sequel (though it loses the run of itself a bit in the second half and goes all propagandist). That being said, if you're not too fussed about superheroes one way or the other you'd not be missing anything much by skipping it.

I hated his Authority run, because I read it after reading the Warren Ellis Stormwatch & Authority runs - and in the words of Steven Grant, where Ellis was writing about politics and history, Millar was just writing about superheroes.

I don't understand how anyone could claim that...

Millar seems to me a much more political writer than Ellis... I'm really struggling to think of anything from Ellis's Authority run that was 1/10th as political as Millar's run. And The Authority wasn't 1/10th as political as The Ultimates, which was a hugely political book.

Ellis's Authority was all supervillains and alien invaders... It was Millar who actually introduced political intrigue into that book (unless the politics of fictional empires is enough to count a book into the "political" sphere, in which case Harry Potter is political). But neither of those runs are as explicitly political as The Ultimates, which was clearly and indisputably a vitriolic attack on US foreign policy at the time.

I have never, ever read an Ellis story that left me thinking "Wow... what an interesting take on the politics of >insert topic here<". I'm not a huge Millar fan, but he's clearly a much more political writer than Ellis.

MikeC101 · 20-04-2010 12:07am

niall mc cann wrote: »

I have never, ever read an Ellis story that left me thinking "Wow... what an interesting take on the politics of >insert topic here<". I'm not a huge Millar fan, but he's clearly a much more political writer than Ellis.

I really don't agree with this - I'm not sure on the Authority run because the various authors arcs have started to blend into one in my mind, so I'll need to give them a look over again.

Part of it may be that Ellis has written a lot more than Millar to date, but Ellis is an incredibly political writer (especially obsessed with transhumanism), he even blogs about politics - I'd say Transmetropolitan alone knocks anything I've read by Millar out of the park as far as social and political commentary go. Add the amount of original science fiction with political themes he's created and I don't think Millar is even in the same league as Ellis.

I'm not saying Ellis is better than Millar (though I prefer him as a writer), but when it comes to political writing, I don't think there's a comparison.

Fysh · 20-04-2010 6:54am

niall mc cann wrote: »

I don't understand how anyone could claim that...

Millar seems to me a much more political writer than Ellis... I'm really struggling to think of anything from Ellis's Authority run that was 1/10th as political as Millar's run. And The Authority wasn't 1/10th as political as The Ultimates, which was a hugely political book.

Ellis's Authority was all supervillains and alien invaders... It was Millar who actually introduced political intrigue into that book (unless the politics of fictional empires is enough to count a book into the "political" sphere, in which case Harry Potter is political). But neither of those runs are as explicitly political as The Ultimates, which was clearly and indisputably a vitriolic attack on US foreign policy at the time.

I'm not comparing the Ultimates to The Authority, but Ellis' Authority had the team confronting a terrorist nation, enabling a mob to kill a tinpot dictator, and confronting a destructive god-like alien. This followed on from the team's prior days in Stormwatch, where they had already addressed such problems as the inherent conservatism of humans in a world populated with superheroes, the dangers of corrupt authority (not just in Henry Bendix, but also the US government) and the questionable need for several levels of response to such threats (stormwatch black etc).

Millar's Authority, on the other hand, featured such wonderful political themes as "Imagine Jack Kirby was a mad scientist making superheroes", "What if we brought back a deranged Doctor for some reason in a story that makes no sense?" and "What if we had the team fight evil versions of themselves?".

The Ultimates has political undertones - but like most things Millar writes, they weren't subtle and they weren't particularly internally consistent. (A run that ends in the way "Grand Theft America" ends cannot be considered a scathing attack on US Foreign Policy any more than 24 could be).

niall mc cann wrote: »

I have never, ever read an Ellis story that left me thinking "Wow... what an interesting take on the politics of >insert topic here<". I'm not a huge Millar fan, but he's clearly a much more political writer than Ellis.

I couldn't disagree more. Perhaps it's because the first thing I read by Ellis was Transmetropolitan, but as far as I've seen he's a much more politically-aware writer. If you haven't read Transmet, it's well worth doing so.

niall mc cann · 21-04-2010 2:07am

MikeC101 wrote: »

I really don't agree with this - I'm not sure on the Authority run because the various authors arcs have started to blend into one in my mind, so I'll need to give them a look over again.

Part of it may be that Ellis has written a lot more than Millar to date, but Ellis is an incredibly political writer (especially obsessed with transhumanism), he even blogs about politics - I'd say Transmetropolitan alone knocks anything I've read by Millar out of the park as far as social and political commentary go. Add the amount of original science fiction with political themes he's created and I don't think Millar is even in the same league as Ellis.

I'm not saying Ellis is better than Millar (though I prefer him as a writer), but when it comes to political writing, I don't think there's a comparison.

Ellis blogs about politics, sure, but Millar's actually written speeches for the Scottish Labour party.

I mean, I blogged about politics, occasionally, back when I had a Bebo page, doesn't mean I had anything interesting to say.

Ultimately, Ellis' writing always strikes me as adolescent and tired. His stories are always, but always, about an angry disenfranchised idealist fighting terribly corrupt cardboard power figures.

You always know that in an Ellis story the angry misfit will turn out to be the last incorruptable, and will be right in the end. which for me just makes the story a chore to get through. Planetary's fun and all, but if I close my eyes and listen to them speak, there's no difference between Elijah Snow and Jenny Sparks.

niall mc cann · 21-04-2010 2:33am

Fysh wrote: »

I'm not comparing the Ultimates to The Authority, but Ellis' Authority had the team confronting a terrorist nation, enabling a mob to kill a tinpot dictator, and confronting a destructive god-like alien. This followed on from the team's prior days in Stormwatch, where they had already addressed such problems as the inherent conservatism of humans in a world populated with superheroes, the dangers of corrupt authority (not just in Henry Bendix, but also the US government) and the questionable need for several levels of response to such threats (stormwatch black etc).

Millar's Authority, on the other hand, featured such wonderful political themes as "Imagine Jack Kirby was a mad scientist making superheroes", "What if we brought back a deranged Doctor for some reason in a story that makes no sense?" and "What if we had the team fight evil versions of themselves?".

Ellis' Authority fought a supervillain launching attacks on western cities, in no way different than the umpteen times Doctor Doom's sent Doombots into New York, a race of alien invaders led by an 2D dictator in no substantial way different from the Emperor from Star Wars, and an alien out to teraform earth into it's perfect habitat. I'm not sure what political ideas were being tested. In what way, for example was Kazan Gamorra (not sure of his name, I think that's right though) a commentary on the actual problem of rogue states? I'd be genuinely interested in seeing what I've missed there.

The Ultimates has political undertones - but like most things Millar writes, they weren't subtle and they weren't particularly internally consistent. (A run that ends in the way "Grand Theft America" ends cannot be considered a scathing attack on US Foreign Policy any more than 24 could be).

I'm not sure what inconsistencies you see in The Ultimates. It's easily the most polemical (and best by a wide margin, imo) thing Millar's ever written. The american government create a new kind of weapon that in the first run they totally lose control over, have to take down at enormous cost of life and property, and then demand (and receive) public kudos for doing so, despite the fact the whole thing was their fault in the first place. They then parlay a repelled alien invasion into an excuse to deploy these new weapons for their own political advantage on the world stage, and when they are opposed by apparently defenceless peoples, they noisily and violently trample them into the ground to re-establish a status quo that puts them in charge and subjugates those nations that, in the context of the comic, have a very legitimate fear of the power wielded by the United States, always to it's own advantage.

Now, that's a highly leftist and alarmist position for me, but I can't deny it was superbly drawn in the Ultimates, and being released concurrently with the invasion and occupation of Iraq, it espoused fears that never seemed as real and legitimate.

You keep bringing up the end of the story, where the tellingly-named Liberators are annihilated by the US and her allies, as proof that it's not a political book... I need you to explain to me what you mean by that. To me, I was surprised and impressed that the guy had the stones to follow through on his ideas with such a dark and telling ending.

I couldn't disagree more. Perhaps it's because the first thing I read by Ellis was Transmetropolitan, but as far as I've seen he's a much more politically-aware writer. If you haven't read Transmet, it's well worth doing so.

I've read some Transmet, never got very far into it. Spider Jerusalem was a gruff, obnoxious idealist out to take on the corrupt power figure. It didn't take me long to realise "Oh, he's doing that again. No need to finish here, I've read this before".

ztoical · 21-04-2010 3:00am

niall mc cann wrote: »

I've read some Transmet, never got very far into it. Spider Jerusalem was a gruff, obnoxious idealist out to take on the corrupt power figure. It didn't take me long to realise "Oh, he's doing that again. No need to finish here, I've read this before".

Well then you've missed out big time on one of the best comic book series of the last 10 years. It's also very political with a number of the characters being based off British MP's and comments on the state of British politics. Spider himself is a good take on the hunter s tompson/gonzo reporters and far more original then what your giving him credit for.

Millar's work is alright but to compare it to the likes of Ellis when it comes to politics and social commentary? Please.

Fysh · 21-04-2010 12:03pm

niall mc cann wrote: »

Ellis' Authority fought a supervillain launching attacks on western cities, in no way different than the umpteen times Doctor Doom's sent Doombots into New York, a race of alien invaders led by an 2D dictator in no substantial way different from the Emperor from Star Wars, and an alien out to teraform earth into it's perfect habitat. I'm not sure what political ideas were being tested. In what way, for example was Kazan Gamorra (not sure of his name, I think that's right though) a commentary on the actual problem of rogue states? I'd be genuinely interested in seeing what I've missed there.

Ellis' Authority was a follow-on from his Stormwatch run, so you have to view the two together. Between them, they addressed the following:

The rising need of covert-ops teams and high-destruction deterrent teams as well as straightforward combat teams (mirroring this development in national security and military bodies). (eg deploying Stormwatch Red to exact vengeance killings on Gamorra Island after Kaizen Gamorra admits causing a plane crash that killed 133 people)
The conflict between respecting human rights and gathering information (eg Bendix operating cryogenic prisons on Skywatch, or using surgically-implanted neural-interface technology to sequester information from prisoners)
The fictional history of the superhero in the 20th century, and the failure of superheroes to make the world a better place
(including the issue homaging Superman, The Spirit, Dan Dare, Kirby's Avengers, Robert Crumb, and Watchmen; also the storyline in which The High, The Doctor, The Engineer, Smoke, Wish and The Eidolon attempt to push human civilisation forward using their powers)
The dichotomy of US policy where the US assert the right to foreign military intervention, but foreign agencies on US soil are hated and feared
The impact and politics of domestic US terrorists
The arms-race between terrorists and those they fight against, including the need to put them down hard (the return of Kaizen Gamorra's terrorist nation)
The politics of invastion and empire-building in the 20th/21st century (the cross-dimensional invasion of Earth)
The relationship between humanity and a wrathful/destructive god

The best thing about how Ellis presents these ideas is that none of the characters involved get to avoid the consequences of their actions and/or failures - even when they think they've succeeded (eg Batallion escaping a domestic US terrorist plot to bomb a federal building and frame Stormwatch for it) they still have to deal with the fallout (widespread perception that Stormwatch aggravated the situation and should not have been allowed to act alone on US territory).

I'm not sure how Millar's contributions to the Authority were in any more nuanced, since what I saw was:

A Jack Kirby analogue attacks the world with an army of superheroes including analogues of many established Marvel/DC characters (ostensibly dealing with the same "change the world" ideas presented in Change or Die, but all couched exclusively in the context of what superhero-type characters can do)
The earth goes mad at the hands of a renegade Doctor, who can only be stopped by regaining his powers
Earth Governments replace the Authority with even more violent government-friendly analogues

There didn't seem to be any big ideas to the majority of Millar's run, and what few there were appeared only in the context and form of superheroes - whereas Ellis managed to present the superpowers as a tool to be put to good use, just like any other tool, and separate the team's goals from their powers.

niall mc cann wrote: »

I'm not sure what inconsistencies you see in The Ultimates. It's easily the most polemical (and best by a wide margin, imo) thing Millar's ever written. The american government create a new kind of weapon that in the first run they totally lose control over, have to take down at enormous cost of life and property, and then demand (and receive) public kudos for doing so, despite the fact the whole thing was their fault in the first place. They then parlay a repelled alien invasion into an excuse to deploy these new weapons for their own political advantage on the world stage, and when they are opposed by apparently defenceless peoples, they noisily and violently trample them into the ground to re-establish a status quo that puts them in charge and subjugates those nations that, in the context of the comic, have a very legitimate fear of the power wielded by the United States, always to it's own advantage.

Now, that's a highly leftist and alarmist position for me, but I can't deny it was superbly drawn in the Ultimates, and being released concurrently with the invasion and occupation of Iraq, it espoused fears that never seemed as real and legitimate.

You keep bringing up the end of the story, where the tellingly-named Liberators are annihilated by the US and her allies, as proof that it's not a political book... I need you to explain to me what you mean by that. To me, I was surprised and impressed that the guy had the stones to follow through on his ideas with such a dark and telling ending.

It seems that you're saying the anti-american/anti-Bush streak of the story is consistent throughout all four volumes. I disagree

You do remember that the second volume of the story features a coalition of Middle-Eastern Liberators let by a guy who refers to the US as "the Great Satan", yes? And a variety of European nations that for some reason just go along with the US deployment of human WMDs without at any point questioning this?

It didn't read to me like any kind of subversion of anything - it just read like another action story where the bad guys were foreign freedom-hating devils and American wins again because AMERICA! F*CK YEAH!

niall mc cann wrote: »

I've read some Transmet, never got very far into it. Spider Jerusalem was a gruff, obnoxious idealist out to take on the corrupt power figure. It didn't take me long to realise "Oh, he's doing that again. No need to finish here, I've read this before".

Given that it's one big story told over 10 volumes, you're not really in any position to meaningfully comment on it if you haven't read the whole thing. The political content kicks into high gear between volumes 3 and 4, and there's a lot of commentary on technology, society, the globalisation of culture and commerce, gonzo journalism and the relationship between journalism and politics.

niall mc cann · 21-04-2010 10:29pm

ztoical wrote: »

Well then you've missed out big time on one of the best comic book series of the last 10 years. It's also very political with a number of the characters being based off British MP's and comments on the state of British politics. Spider himself is a good take on the hunter s tompson/gonzo reporters and far more original then what your giving him credit for.

Millar's work is alright but to compare it to the likes of Ellis when it comes to politics and social commentary? Please.

Sure, Spider's Hunter S Thompson, Smiler's Tony Blair, I'm sure there's loads of analogues- as I said, I didn't read very far in. I'm not sure what was being said beyond if at all possible, don't elect psychopaths.

People keep telling me there's insightful social commentary in all of his work, but I gave up looking for it.

CrazyTalk · 24-04-2010 6:23pm

No one has mentioned The Unfunnies yet, which is a good thing. It's probably the most tasteless, purile and self-important piece of media (of any kind) I've ever sat through/watched etc.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Unfunnies

The thing about it is that Millar probably thinks he was being intelligent about the whole comic, and most of his works. He wrote Red Son, which is excellent, and is now spending the rest of his career doing thinly-vieled 'what if?' stories.

Fysh · 24-04-2010 6:42pm

CrazyTalk wrote: »

No one has mentioned The Unfunnies yet, which is a good thing. It's probably the most tasteless, purile and self-important piece of media (of any kind) I've ever sat through/watched etc.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Unfunnies

The thing about it is that Millar probably thinks he was being intelligent about the whole comic, and most of his works. He wrote Red Son, which is excellent, and is now spending the rest of his career doing thinly-vieled 'what if?' stories.

It struck me very much as something that would've worked best as a single issue - once it was dragged out beyond that it felt like Millar was just seeing what other shocking thing he could throw at us.

CrazyTalk · 24-04-2010 6:50pm

Seeing as he went out of his way to tortue every character in the series, besides one, I'd have to agree with you.

24-04-2010 8:40pm

Millar is little more tan a self publicising, ego maniacal liar who sees himself as some shinning beacon of originality when in fact he is little more than an infantile child whose best work is generally based on ideas given to him by his friends. I do believe that it was Warren Ellis, and Grant Morrision who gave him the start and ending to Red Son with Millar simply filling in the blanks.

While I'll still read Millar's work now and again I quickly grow tired of his tired attempts to offend, he seems to think that poo jokes and bad language is not only witty but daring.

edit: stupid broken H key.

MarkHall · 30-04-2010 12:20pm

I do believe that it was Warren Ellis, and Grant Morrision who gave him the start and ending to Red Son with Millar simply filling in the blanks.

What makes you believe that?

John 187 · 05-05-2010 9:35pm

From Bleedin Cool:

CLiNT is a new anthology magazine from Mark Millar. Published with Titan Magazines, it will feature a number of new comics, from the likes of British comedians Jonathan Ross and Frankie Boyle, as well as including the sequel to Kick Ass, Kick Ass Volume 2: Balls To The Wall by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr, appearing for the first time.
Mark Millar is calling the 100 page magazine “The Eagle for the 21st Century”and it will feature comic strips, interviews, features and more. He’s quoted as saying “I want this to be edgy and irreverent, the kind of thing guys will be passing around lunch-halls and common rooms, and there’s nobody I’d rather have creating new characters for CLiNT than Jonathan and Frankie. They’re both brilliant writers and will surprise a lot of people with this stuff. The last thing you’d expect from Jonathan, for example, is a vampire strip, but he pulls it off amazingly. People are going to love this.”

Seems like a intresting idea trying to tap into 16-30 mainstream lot that won't go into a comic shop but would pick up Empire/FHM/Nuts etc at best it might bring a new group to comics at worst it die on it's ass.

24-05-2010 2:02am

MarkHall wrote: »

What makes you believe that?

To quote Grant Morrison "The best Superman idea I ever had, I gave to Mark Millar for the conclusion of Red Son"

Mark Millar(ish)

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