Mark Millar

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Millar was first inspired to become a comic book creator after meeting Alan Moore at a con in the mid-1980s. Years later, when an 18-year-old Millar interviewed Scottish comic book writer Grant Morrison for a fanzine, he told Morrison that he wanted to create comics as both a writer and an artist. Morrison, who then-recently returned to comics after spending most of the decade touring with his band The Mixers and had limited experience both of writing and drawing stories earlier in his career, suggested that Millar focus on one of those career paths, as it was very hard to be successful at both, which Millar cites as the best advice he has ever received. Soon after, Millar sold his first script, Saviour, to an independent Leicester-based publisher Trident. Illustrated by Daniel Vallely, Morrison's former bandmate in The Mixers and, earlier, The Fauves, Saviour provided a mix of religious themes, satire and superhero action that quickly brought Millar to the attention of the wider British comics industry and resulted in several script commissions for the long-running anthology 2000 AD and its sister title Crisis.

In 1992, Trident's owner Neptune Distribution went bankrupt, leaving both Saviour and The Shadowmen, Millar's second series at the publisher, unfinished. By that time, Millar already became a semi-regular contributor to 2000AD and its adjacent titles, and his output included several Robo-Hunter serials, a six-part prison story "Insiders" for Crisis, a Judge Dredd spin-off series Red Razors, as well as numerous newspaper strips starring Dredd himself for Daily Star. The following year, Millar, Morrison and writer John Smith were given editorial reins over 2000AD for an eight-week run titled "The Summer Offensive". The controversial initiative resulted, among other things, in the first major story co-written by Millar and Morrison, Big Dave.

In 1994, Millar crossed over to the American comic book industry, taking over the long-running series Swamp Thing, published under DC Comics' Vertigo imprint. The first four issues of his run were again co-written with Morrison, who, according to Millar, "came on board to make sure that DC selected me above anyone else pitching for the gig". Although Millar's further work on Swamp Thing brought some critical acclaim to the ailing title, the book's sales were still low enough to warrant cancellation by the publisher. For the next few years, Millar continued to write sporadically for 2000AD and various American publishers, often co-scripting the stories with Morrison, with whom he shares the writing credit on the mini-series Skrull Kill Krew for Marvel, a short run on Vampirella for Harris, a year-long run on The Flash as well as Aztek: The Ultimate Man for DC.

Several of Millar's unrealized projects of this period include a revamp of Marvel's 2099 imprint and an "end-of-the-world" storyline for Marvel Tales, both co-created with Grant Morrison. In late 1998, Millar and Morrison, along with Mark Waid and Tom Peyer, developed an extensive proposal for the Superman titles that was scheduled to launch in January 2000. The proposal was greenlit, and the team's tenure as collaborative writers was scheduled to begin with upcoming editor Eddie Berganza's first issue. Upon returining from his vacation, then-current DC editor Mike Carlin was shocked to discover that big changes were being implemented to Superman without his knowledge and vetoed the project. In 1999, Millar also developed pitches for Phantom Stranger and Secret Society of Super-Villains as well as a revamp of his debut series Saviour.

In the late 1990s, Millar made the first attempt to branch out from comics into screenwriting with a vampire-themed black comedy-drama Sikeside. The script was eventually picked up by Channel 4 with Millar as both writer and director, and, although it was initially written as a TV movie, the production company asked Millar to develop it into a six-episode series instead. Described as "Buffy meets Trainspotting" and planned to be filmed in Millar's hometown of Coatbridge, Sikeside was ultimately cancelled during pre-production. In a 2010 interview, Millar mentioned that he has sold the rights to the script to producer Angus Lamont who wanted to turn it into a film for a theatrical release.

In 1999 and 2000, Millar wrote a newspaper column for The Evening Times.

Millar started gaining notice at DC Comics for his work on the all-ages comic book series Superman Adventures, which featured stories set in the continuity of Superman: The Animated Series. Millar, a self-proclaimed Superman fan, stayed on the title for two years and received two Eisner Award nominations while penning one-off stories featuring the version of the character from the mainline DC Universe. Millar's best known Superman story, the three-issue Elseworlds mini-series Superman: Red Son, was first announced in 1998, even though Millar finished most of the script two year prior. As the series' original artist Dave Johnson fell behind the schedule, Millar opposed the idea of using other artists for the remaining pages. DC eventually brought in artist Kilian Plunkett to complete the book in 2002. Red Son, which Millar first came up with as a child after reading Superman #300, was published the following year and later adapted into an animated film of the same name.

In August 1999, it was announced that Millar and Scottish artist Frank Quitely will be taking over The Authority, an ongoing series published by DC Comics' Wildstorm imprint, on the recommendation of the outgoing writer and series' co-creator Warren Ellis. Millar's trademark style of over-the-top violence mixed with satire, pop culture references and mature themes was met with critical and commercial success while the book itself suffered from censorship enacted by DC starting with the new creative team's very first issue and continuing into Millar-written spin-off mini-series focusing on the team's former leader Jenny Sparks. As a result, the creators repeatedly requested a "Suggested for Mature Readers" label for the series but the idea was vetoed by then-Publisher of DC Comics Paul Levitz. Meanwhile, DC published a "lost" Superman Adventures script by Millar to capitalize on his newfound success, while Millar himself considered a move from his native Scotland to the United States, deliberating between staff position offers made by Wildstorm and DC Comics' main competitor Marvel.

In June 2000, Marvel announced that Millar will join its then-upcoming "Ultimate" line of comics as the writer on Ultimate X-Men, since Brian Michael Bendis, who was previously attached to the series, decided to focus his attention on the inaugural "Ultimate" launch of the Spider-Man title. The line, designed to simplify and streamline the company's long-running fictional continuity for mainstream audiences, was met with instant critical and commercial success and, soon after the launch of Ultimate X-Men, Millar announced that he had signed a two-year contract for a staff writing position at Marvel. As part of the deal, Millar and his family relocated to New York.

In November 2000, Millar and Quitely announced their plans to leave The Authority after the third story arc, which was supposed to run in issues #22–25 (cover-dated March–June 2001) if the series was to maintain a monthly schedule. However, soon after the first issue of the arc was published, it was announced that Quitely had signed an exclusive contract with Marvel and would therefore leave the title earlier than planned. Wildstorm assigned Art Adams to finish the last issues and hired writer Tom Peyer and artist Dustin Nguyen to create another four-issue story arc that would fill the publishing gap while Adams worked on his portion of the series. Then, following the 11 September 2001 attacks, Wildstorm decided to postpone the release of the remaining three issues and further edit the completed but not yet released work for sensitive content, which eventually drove Adams away from the title. The Authority #29, Millar's last issue on the series, was published with art by Gary Erskine and the cover date of July 2002. Another Millar-written The Authority spin-off, a one-shot story tentatively titled Apollo/Midnighter, was announced for a 2000 release but never produced.

In 2002, Millar and artist Bryan Hitch further expanded Marvel's Ultimate line with The Ultimates, a reimagining of the company's Avengers team. The title also proved highly successful, although it suffered from delays in shipping due to Hitch's personal issues. The Ultimates was eventually cancelled after 13 issues and two years of publication with the aim of relaunching the title so that more issues could be produced in advance. The Ultimates 2 launched shortly thereafter and also suffered from delays, this time due to Millar's newly-diagnosed chronic condition and increased workload at Marvel. The second volume as well as the creative team's run on the title ended in 2007 with another 13th issue. Millar and Hitch's work on The Ultimates inspired two Marvel Animated Features titled Ultimate Avengers and the subsequent 2012 Marvel Studios feature film The Avengers, directed by Joss Whedon. Actor Aaron Taylor-Johnson, who portrayed the character Quicksilver in the 2015 sequel film Avengers: Age of Ultron, stated that it also drew inspiration from the Ultimate comics.

In 2002 and 2003, Millar wrote a column for Comic Book Resources. Around the same time, Millar's website included a teaser for a 6-issue Punisher series with artist Steve Dillon, although no official announcement was made by Marvel. In 2003, Millar and artist Terry Dodson launched Trouble at Marvel's newly-revived Epic imprint, a series meant to re-popularize romance comics that ended up both a sales and critical failure. That same year, Millar renewed his exclusive contract with Marvel for two more years. The following year, he penned two 12-issue runs for titles published under the Marvel Knights imprint, launching Marvel Knights Spider-Man again with Dodson and taking over the Wolverine ongoing series with artist John Romita, Jr. Millar and Ultimate Spider-Man writer Brian Michael Bendis launched a new ongoing series for the Ultimate Marvel imprint, Ultimate Fantastic Four but left it after just six issues due to scheduling problems. Millar and artist Greg Land were announced as the creative team for a new Thor ongoing series but the pair took over Ultimate Fantatic Four instead. Millar's return to the title introduced, among other things, the concept of Marvel Zombies. During this period, Millar was assigned to write a trilogy of mini-series that would introduce Galactus to the Ultimate Universe but he left the project due to other commitments at Marvel and health issues.

In 2006, after renewing his exclusive contract with Marvel for two more years, Millar launched the most well-known and best-selling work of his career, the 7-issue mini-series Civil War with artist Steve McNiven that acted as the centrepiece of the company-wide crossover storyline of the same name. The story revolved around the passing of the Superhuman Registration Act in response to the death and destruction unintentionally caused by superheroes on a regular basis and the resultant schism in the superheroic community, with Captain America and Iron Man taking opposing sides of the debacle. The storyline had lasting impact on the fictional Marvel Universe and served as the inspiration for the 2016 Marvel Studios film Captain America: Civil War.

In 2007 and 2008, Millar attempted to pitch a new series of Superman films to Warner Brothers but the studio went with David S. Goyer's pitch for Man of Steel instead. During that time, he also had two pitches rejected at Marvel, a Blade story with Richard Corben and a Ghost Rider story with John Romita, Jr., as both characters already had ongoing series at the time and Marvel did not believe either property could support more books. In 2008, Millar returned to the Wolverine ongoing series for an extended dystopian storyline "Old Man Logan", illustrated by his Civil War collaborator Steve McNiven. Elements of this story inspired the 2017 20th Century Fox film Logan. Also in 2008, Millar reteamed with The Ultimates co-creator Bryan Hitch for a run on the mainline Fantastic Four series and launched the mini-series Marvel 1985 with artist Tommy Lee Edwards. The three titles, running concurrently, are notable in that Millar purposefully wrote them as interlinked through the introduction of the character Clyde Wyncham, who also appeared in Millar's creator-owned series Kick-Ass that was published under Marvel's Icon imprint. In 2009, Millar returned to the Ultimate Universe with a number of limited series released under the Ultimate Comics: Avengers banner, his last Marvel work to date.

In 2011, Millar abandoned work-for-hire in favor of working full-time on his creator-owned properties.

In 2003, Millar introduced Millarworld, a unified label for his future creator-owned comics. The initial line-up consisted of Wanted (published by Top Cow and subsequently adapted into a feature film starring Angelina Jolie and Morgan Freeman), Chosen (published by Dak Horse), The Unfunnies (published by Avatar) and the unreleased one-shot Run. Another unreleased project was King and Country, a political drama involving the British royal family repurposed from a TV series pitch Millar created in 2005. According to Millar, the book was supposed to be published in the form of a fully-painted graphic novel by a "big book publisher". In 2008, the Millarworld line expanded with two new releases, War Heroes at Image and Kick-Ass, which was published under Marvel's Icon imprint and adapted into a feature film two years later. The ownership of the Millarworld series is split 50/50 between Millar and the collaborating artist.

In 2010, Millar and British publisher Titan launched a pop culture-themed magazine CLiNT that featured serializations of Millar's creator-owned comics as well as a number of short stories by up-and-coming creators submitted via the Millarworld forum. Other magazine contributors include Frankie Boyle, Stewart Lee, Jonathan Ross and Jimmy Carr. In 2011 and 2012, Millar organized the Kapow! Comic Convention in London. The 2011 Kapow! event was notable for setting two Guinness World Records, the "Fastest Production of a Comic Book" and "Most Contributors to a Comic Book". Millar began work at 9 a.m., plotting a 20-page Superior story, followed by more than 60 comic book creators—including Sean Phillips, Dave Gibbons, Frank Quitely, John Romita Jr., Jock, Doug Braithwaite, Ian Churchill, Olivier Coipel, Duncan Fegredo, Simon Furman, David Lafuente, John McCrea, Liam Sharp—who appeared on stage throughout the day to create a panel each. The black-and-white book was completed in 11 hours, 19 minutes and 38 seconds, then published through Marvel's Icon imprint on 23 November 2011, with all royalties being donated to Yorkhill Children's Foundation. In 2015 and 2016, Millarworld held Talent Contest events where entrants had to write and/or draw short stories based on some of the company's properties. The winning entries were published as two anthology specials in 2016 and 2017, respectively.

Most of the Millarworld series have enjoyed interest from Hollywood over the years. In 2008, Michael De Luca optioned War Heroes for Columbia Pictures. In 2010, Nemesis was optioned by 20th Century Fox with Tony Scott attached to direct. Three years later, Fox optioned Starlight. 2014 saw the release of Kingsman: The Secret Service, directed by Matthew Vaughn. That same year, Superior was optioned by Fox with Vaughn attached as producer. The following year, Huck was picked up by Studio 8, while an adaptation of Chrononauts was announced to be in development by Universal. In 2016, Waypoint Entertainment optioned both Supercrooks and American Jesus (which had previously been optioned by Matthew Vaughn's Marv Films in 2009), while Lorenzo di Bonaventura began development on Jupiter's Legacy. That same year, Joe Roth and Jeff Kirschenbaum signed on to produce Empress with XXX: Return of Xander Cage writer F. Scott Frazier set to pen the screenplay.

In August 2017, it was announced that Millarworld has been purchased for an undisclosed sum by Netflix. Millar noted it was the third time in history a comic book company had been purchased by a production studio, comparing the buyout to the 1967 purchase of DC Comics by Kinney National Company (subsequently renamed to Warner Communications) and the 2009 acquisition of Marvel Comics by The Walt Disney Company. As part of the deal, Millar and his wife Lucy continued to run Millarworld as President and CEO, respectively, developing new properties to be produced by Netflix. Comics adapted to film before the deal, such as Kick-Ass and Kingsman, were not included in the package. The first of Millarworld properties to be adapted at Netfilx was Jupiter's Legacy, which premiered in May 2021 with an eight-episode first season. It was followed by Super Crooks, an animated spin-off series released in November 2021.

Over the years, Millar has earned a reputation as a controversial and outspoken writer. In interviews, he openly criticized the business practices of the American comics industry in the 90s, the comic book writing trend of decompression popularized in the early 00s, the tendency of Big Two publishers to oversaturate the market with tie-ins and spin-offs in the mid-00s as well as the DC Comics' management of The Authority during his tenure as the title's writer. In his writing, Millar has incorporated the themes of domestic abuse (The Ultimates), teenage pregnancy (Trouble), child molestation (The Unfunnies) and rape, the latter sometimes for comedic effect. In August 2013, when asked by Abraham Riesman of The New Republic about the use of rape as a plot device in more than one of his comics, Millar responded, "The ultimate [act] that would be the taboo, to show how bad some villain is, was to have somebody being raped, you know. I don't really think it matters. It's the same as, like, a decapitation. It's just a horrible act to show that somebody's a bad guy." The comment drew criticism from industry peers and comic book journalists. Similar incidents include Millar publicly expressing amazement at the fact that non-caucasians can get Down's syndrome and referring to all gamers as "pedos" in an interview.

Millar frequently employs unusual tactics to promote himself and his work, such as the public bet with Harry Knowles regarding the casting of the lead actor in then-upcoming Superman film in 2004, which Millar used as a way to advertise his run on Wolverine. That same year, Millar claimed that rapper Eminem was in talks to take the lead role in the film adaptation of his creator-owned series Wanted which resulted in public denial by Eminem's management via Variety. In 2006, Millar auctioned the right to name the protagonist of his then-upcoming creator-owned series Kick-Ass. In 2016, he organized a "treasure hunt" for advance copies of Jupiter's Legacy hidden in ten cities around the world. In 2017, Millar established a charitable foundation and launched a multi-year campaign to promote it.

Throughout the 90s and early 00s, Millar was close friends with fellow Scottish writer Grant Morrison. The pair frequently collaborated on works published by British and American publishers and appeared together at various events. Morrison was seen as the mentor figure in their relationship, as evidenced by a humorous strip created by Garth Ennis and Dave Gibbons for an anniversary issue of 2000 AD in which Millar appeared in the form of a small droid repeating a single phrase, "me and Gwant". The pair was also parodied in an issue of Simpsons Comics written by Gail Simone, shown fighting over whose then-ongoing X-Men series—Millar's Ultimate or Morrison's New—is more important. Sometime around 2004, Millar and Morrison seemingly cut all communication and never interacted in public again, which, according to Morrison, happened because Millar wanted to break away from the image of Morrison's protégé after the success he had with The Authority and Ultimate X-Men. When asked about the state of their relationship in a 2011 interview, Morrison responded thus, "I wish him well but, no, there is no good feeling between myself and Mark Millar for many reasons most of which are he destroyed my faith in human fucking nature."

In August 2011, Millar appeared in his native Coatbridge to unveil a superhero-themed steel archway beside the Monkland Canal, created by sculptor Andy Scott with the help from the students at St. Ambrose High School, Millar's alma mater. The six-metre-high archway, created as part of the efforts to reinvigorate the canal, was inspired by Millar's work, depicting a superhero named Captain Coatbridge and two superheroines.

In June 2013, Millar was appointed a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) for services to film and literature on the Queen's Honours Birthday list.

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