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Underground > Comic Books >

Waiting For Tommy Interviews Grant Morrison

15:33 / 27.01.03

On Wednesday, Waiting for Tommy at Dynamicforces will feature an interview with Grant Morrison, about X-Men, art and pornography... and Zenith, according to Comicbookresources' Lying In The Gutters. Wanted to let ya know in any case.

15:38 / 27.01.03

While this interview might cast some light on the details of the dispute between Rebellion/2000AD and Morrison. It is unlikely to bring the publication date of the Zenith trades forward any sooner. Johnston knows this but is always willing to dangle the obvious bait in search for hits. Nothing wrong with that, just don't start getting excited that Zenith might be coming out soon.

A

14:10 / 29.01.03

Zap!. It's up.

I'm midway through reading it and it's quite good so far.

14:23 / 29.01.03

Gaaaaaaaaaaahhh! DC has scuttled LeSexy?!?

Cameron Stewart, please confirm!

Oh, God, what shall become of me now?

Regrettable Juvenilia

14:27 / 29.01.03

If nothing else, it's good to see some unfounded rumours scotched once and for all - he's *not* leaving NXM after #150, he's *not* fallen out with Millar or Marvel - although of course it was Johnston who started these rumours in the first place. And how many freakin' times do people need to have the "superheroes actually less 'mainstream' than stuff like Kill Your Boyfriend" idea explained to them?

The bad news: LeSexy is on hiatus. The good news: Morrison plans to do something else with Cameron Stewart in the meantime...

The Natural Way

14:31 / 29.01.03

I know, Fly. The whole "but aren't superspandex books, like, not deep, guy?" thing is starHARarting to grate.

A

14:37 / 29.01.03

So Vertigo won't publish LeSexy, by famous jetsetting playboy Grant Morrison and Rising Talent Cameron Stewart, but they will publish The All-New Adventures of Some Prick who Appeared in Four Panels of an Issue of Sandman, by some guy and some other guy? Makes sense to me.

Matthew Fluxington

14:51 / 29.01.03

I think it is very clear now that Vertigo's editors are a bunch of tasteless fools now. Let me get this straight - one of the biggest celebrity comics writers in the business, who has written some of the best selling Vertigo comics as well as one of the top selling comics in the industry wants to put out a comic that would be, by far, the most accessable comic published by Vertigo in spite of being very British; and Vertigo says no while they continue to publish Y The Last Man, Fables, and Codename Knockout?

Right. Why doesn't Grant try to get it published by a different company?

Anyway....I told you all that Grant wasn't leaving after 150. Surely Grant has his math all mixed up, though, because going on the 13 issues-per-year schedule NXM is on right now, #152 should be in stores in April 2004, and April is not a summer month. I would guess that #152 is part of the storyline that Marc Silvestri is illustrating, though. It seems like the schedule is something like this:

137-138 : Quitely
139-146 : Jiminez
147-150 : Quitely?
151-15? : Silvestri?

15:03 / 29.01.03

Isn't Codename: Knockout cancelled? Vertigo needs a top-down editorial shakeup...

Matthew Fluxington

15:11 / 29.01.03

Well, thank heaven for small miracles, re: Codename Knockout.

Vertigo could really be something special, but editorial in-breeding really has killed it, at least til something is done about it.

15:21 / 29.01.03

Right. Why doesn't Grant try to get it published by a different company?

Because DC/Vertigo probably comissioned it. They bought the right to publish it AND the right to not publish it. I sure there is some sort of reversion clause in there whereby Morrison and Stewert do get the right to sell it again after a certain amount of time. But for the moment - that's it.

15:49 / 29.01.03

I know it's stupid of me to think this, as Grant could be doing any number of new projects with this avenue but something about "I've been doing a lot of games work, driven by the conviction that games are to comics what comics were to pulp" makes me squint my eyes and believe in an Invisibles game. Oh please oh please oh please.

16:11 / 29.01.03

Supposedly there's an Invisibles game in the works by Rockstar, who make the Grand Theft Auto series...

21:29 / 29.01.03

>>>Gaaaaaaaaaaahhh! DC has scuttled LeSexy?!?

Cameron Stewart, please confirm!<<<

Confirmed, sadly.

They didn't "get it."

As he says, it's very Brass Eye/League Of Gentlemen - that brand of deeply unpleasant, grotesque humour beloved of the British but frequently misunderstood my Americans. Vertigo ain't the place for it.

21:48 / 29.01.03

What, like THE FILTH, you mean?

00:24 / 30.01.03

and we thought only crossgen had a compound.

liked the interview and to see what's really mainstream and what's not.

A

06:31 / 30.01.03

Flux, I've never read Y- the Last Man, but it seems to be getting good reviews and selling better than any other Vertigo title (in single issues, anyway). That doesn't change the fact that Vertigo seems to be run by gibbons, though.

yawn - thing's buddy

07:16 / 30.01.03

Yeah. That asshole's done nothing of worth since Watchmen.

07:26 / 30.01.03

There's a bit of Grant's movie project here.

Sounds like Buffy meets Groundhog Day.

12:36 / 30.01.03

If they could be made much cheaper or else packaged as 200 page shinies, it might help, but compared to a game, a lad's mag, a CD or a DVD, a typical comic book is just too
damn expensive and esoteric for most non-specialist consumers.

Has any American publisher tried a "200 page shiny" omnibus comic? It could go on the newstands next to Maxim, sell for 5.95 a month, and you get your Spiderman, your Xmen, your etc. all in one. That seems like a great idea to me. Tell me why it wouldn't work.

12:50 / 30.01.03

Rebellion (the owners of 2000AD in the UK) do this every month in a title called The Megazine. Its an anthology title. Its available nationwide in the UK primarily through a pretty dominant chain of newsagents as well as in comic shops.

There is also Kevin Eastman's Heavy Metal anthology in the US.

13:15 / 30.01.03

Has any American publisher tried a "200 page shiny" omnibus comic?

I think Crossgen does this with their books. for around $8 or so. Marvel also used to have a newsstand magazine that ran various strips from their Ultimates lines.

I love the idea of a single monthly TPB that has the core X-Men titles in it, and a second monthly TPB that has the "satellite" X titles. You could easily expand this to cover any of the franchise lines like Spider-Man, Superman, Batman etc. I know in theory we should be fighting to get the good non-spandex books into the market like that, but I suspect if publishers played their their current strengths/audience expectations there could be some serious mileage in, say, a monthly spined book with 200 pages of new material for viewers walking out of X2 or last year's Spider-Man...

14:15 / 30.01.03

Yes, but would newsagents stock it next to Maxim, or would they just stick it on the bottom row with Postman Pat?

14:22 / 30.01.03

Might get stocked in with all the PS2 mags...

The Natural Way

14:33 / 30.01.03

Prolly.

14:34 / 30.01.03

Unfortunately not. PS2 magazines are placed next to other computer magazines. As it ever was and seemingly ever shall be.

14:59 / 30.01.03

All the comics I've seen on the news stand have been racked with gaming magazines. Probably the manga covers PS2 always seems to have...

15:00 / 30.01.03

They bought the right to publish it AND the right to not publish it. I sure there is some sort of reversion clause
Reading the answer to the 'why wont you work for DC again' question on Bissettes
pages on Comicon, apparently creators have to buy back the right to use their 'creator owned' projects if dc decide to cancel.
"No, my key objection was over a clause that, in effect, meant that (a) if all contracted work was completed and (b) accepted for publication by DC, but they (c) DID NOT actually publish the completed work within --- number of years, (d) all rights reverted to the creator(s) upon (e, and this is the kicker) RETURN OF ALL MONIES PAID.
Got that? You do the work, they accept the work, they sit on the work for --
years, and then, if you want it back, you pay them money."
Maybe Cameron can say if the reversion is easier if its not accepted for publication.

Matthew Fluxington

16:05 / 30.01.03

Marvel's done a few experiments with packaging/anthologizing comics. They tried a few things in which about four or five recent comics from across the line would be published as one comic.

I think the better idea is closer to what Todd is suggesting, having a regular magazine that compiles the most popular Marvel comics characters in one go. You'd get the newest issues of New X-Men, Uncanny X-Men, X-Treme X-Men, Wolverine, X-Statix, Exiles, Hulk, Amazing Spider-Man, Spectacular Spider-Man, Daredevil, Punisher, Avengers, Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Elektra, all in one big comic. That seems like a very reasonable way of publishing the comics to me, a much more logical way of reaching the newstand/mainstream audience than individual issues.

17:41 / 30.01.03

Agreed.

But it's all pointless, cuz Grant says comics will always be a little niche market (unless, of course, he's in charge of marketing 'em, which ain't gonna happen). Um, whatever happened to, "The comics boom is coming!" stuff? Millar was still on-message re: the rise of comics in his Dynamic Forces interview, but Morrison's comics boosterism wasn't so much in evidence here. He seemed to emphasize, even more than usual, that he's doing far more than "just comics." (Though I suppose that was, at least in part, a reaction to Johnson asking if he was limiting himself).

Of course, no one needs Morrison to tell them that comics are yesterday's news, but he used to serve as more of an antidote to the doom 'n' gloom than he did here. Then again, he seemed kinda crabby overall this time out. Still enjoyed it, though.

19:24 / 30.01.03

Supposedly there's an Invisibles game in the works by Rockstar, who make the Grand Theft Auto series...

hoo. mayyyyybe good, mayyyyybe bad. i think electronic formats are actually really promising for stories like The Invisibles which are both very visual and screw with linearity, but i fear a "King Mob first-person shooter" without any of the, you know, Invisible-ness of it.

06:40 / 03.02.03

wow, this richard chap is the kind of guy who would ask Mike Patton why he isnt still making Faith No More albums

yawn - thing's buddy

11:26 / 03.02.03

About the game:

I think it might be a case of, 'How many times do you have to tella story before it becomes true?', cos currently I think this is all just a rumour.

Apparently GM hit it off with an animator from Rockstar at a Christmas party GM held at his house. The animator guy was a big Morrison Fan and they got talking. The Game idea was mooted.....

If that's all that happened (look, I know fuck all about this really), then I don't think we should get too excited about Rockstar making this game. Games are not usually made in this way, not any more anyway.

I'm so ashamed to be gossipping in this manner, but I thought you'd like to know.

Our Lady of The Two Towers

14:57 / 03.02.03

OK, was it just me, or did Grant suggest that The Filth is just the imaginings of a crazy person? Quite liked this one. He seemed to be in a bit of a bad mood, or just in a hurry at the time, so wasn't bullshitting around.

15:08 / 03.02.03

Well, he's suggested it several times in the comic itself: Greg/Ned is constantly questioning his own sanity, wondering if, instead of wandering around the Crack in his Freudian shagmonster suit, he's really in a mental ward wanking in front of his relatives. Didn't seem like a stunning revelation to me.