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Underground > Comic Books >

The Worst of Millar

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Regrettable Juvenilia

20:15 / 09.12.04

I think the current Wolverine run is one of the worst things I've had the misfortune to read in the shop in a long, looong time. "Ben Grimm. The Thing. I'm going to kill him. What? Why am I going to kill him? Stop asking questions, Wolverine. Remember your training. Kill for The Hand! No more reading books like what Brubaker did. Now we fight the Fantastic Four! I bet even Romita Jr is a bit embarrassed by this."

If I go back in time and dissuade myself from buying his Authority run, would the world be spared?

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

00:32 / 10.12.04

Actually, Wolverine under Millar is big, dumb fun. I'd take it over Rucka's dull plod any day of the week.

01:12 / 10.12.04

Yeah, the Authority run was dumb, wasn't it? Everyone was all "ooh they're going to tackle REAL problems now" and they had the token "killing Suharto" scene, which was supposed to be somehow politically insightful, and it got writeups in the papes and stuff, but they whaddayaknow, the whole thing turned into a big spandex splatterfight. Wheee!

He's boring. Always was boring. Always will be. Tries WAAAAY too hard.

m.

04:53 / 10.12.04

To me his current spider man series is the worst stuff hes written (safe for unfunnies which i wont even bring up. i just picked up issue 9 today which finally revealed the point of his run.... But nine issues of mediocre sluggish plot to get to this point?? I simply can't afford it. Red son and Wanted are by far my favorite. I think he does his best stuff when he is enencumbered by familiar characters and situations. He is a really good writer but his stuff is incredibly hit or miss.

Haus of Mystery

10:06 / 10.12.04

Good Millar - Swamp Thing
- SILO (2000 AD)
- Saviour (Trident)
- Insiders (CRISIS)
- Superman Adventures
- The Ultimates

But, yes, hack. Self-aggrandizing fat head, and heavyweight bullshit artist. The John Byrne of our times!

10:26 / 10.12.04

The Ultimates

And not all of that.

yawn - thing's buddy

10:55 / 10.12.04

troo bobosity, true.

thar ulties was really pretty shabby towards the end of the first run.

pretty shabby indeed.

first 5 or 6 issues, however, were great. it was if mark millar shoved watchmen thru the marvel mincer and sprinkled it with millenial mayhem.

matey.

Regrettable Juvenilia

11:48 / 10.12.04

"Do you think this A stands for France?!?" = "I am the Ben Elton of comics!"

Haus of Mystery

11:57 / 10.12.04

He can still write a good action comic when he wants and has a flair for dramatic reveals, but always has at least one moment that lets it down, one bit thats waaaaaaay over the top. He also has a habit of making his characters all sound the same. And he put the nail in the coffin of 'smart arse' dialogue, after Warren Ellis had filled the coffin up with shit.

12:29 / 10.12.04

Much brainache can be avoided with this simple conversion table:

Millar’s Authority = Quitely’s Authority
Millar’s Wanted = Jones’s Wanted
Millar’s Ultimates = Hitch’s Ultimates

you say he's done other things?

Haus of Mystery

13:20 / 10.12.04

I dunno. Hitch drew the JLA, and that was pants. Quitely drew 'Batmwan - The Scottish Connection', and, well, nuff said. Millar is capable of good work, it's just that he's a magpie, and can't do endings. Or much characterisation.
But The Ultimates, when it's good is a bracing and entertaining read; his Swamp Thing run was enjoyable, creative and a million times better than the mimsy eco-wank it had descended into, and his Superman Adventures were the best Supes stories I've read since Alan Moore's.
Yeah the guy comes across as a kingsized prick in print, and when he's lazy writes terrible pap, but I disagree that he's without merit.

14:00 / 10.12.04

>>>Quitely drew 'Batmwan - The Scottish Connection', and, well, nuff said.,<<

Hey now, it may not have the strongest script, but that comic features some of my favourite Quitely artwork. It's beautifully drawn.

14:12 / 10.12.04

>> Actually, Wolverine under Millar is big, dumb fun. I'd take it over Rucka's dull plod any day of the week.

I agree. Although I felt that some of the Rucka issues were OK.

The latest issue of Spider-Man was kind of silly, although I like most his Spidey run well enough overall.

I think Wanted is pretty stupid. And not in a fun way.

14:14 / 10.12.04

And yes, Millar's Superman Adventures are really great. Very well done. Those 2 digest-size paperbacks DC put out collecting Millar's run are well worth the $6 each or whatever they are.

Haus of Mystery

14:22 / 10.12.04

Cam, I wasn't saying anything about Quitely's art, rather that good art does not always equate a good book, and there's more to the Ultimates or the Authority than the artwork.

14:57 / 10.12.04

And I’m saying there’s more to them than the writing. Millar-the-writer/publicist is obscuring the better half. Quitely owned that Authority run. Millar’s just another writer. He’s *not* a superduperstar writer, he’s never sold me a comic book on his own, and I’m not exactly going to rush out to buy a book of his if it’s drawn by Igor Kordey. That’s all. It’s not a big point.

So, the worst of Millar? The stuff with the worst artwork.

15:16 / 10.12.04

So, my Superman Adventures stuff then.

16:00 / 10.12.04

You know, I’ve never seen it. I had no idea you’d drawn Superman. God, the things I miss. What issues, where? How do you rate your own work on it?

16:19 / 10.12.04

Bedhead, seriously, mate, we can all slag off Millar, but the man is a hell of a lot better than many, many writers when he puts in the effort. Sure, good artists help (don't they always?) but to suggest that he's only as good as his art is just silly.

I only point this out because you're making it pretty hard for me to take you seriously, which is unfortunate because you're a good guy.

Now, don't get me wrong, he's no Morrison, Miller or Moore, and he's a bit of a twat politically, but he sure is a superstar comixxxx writer, whether you like it or not.
It is not for us mere mortals to decide such things, that's up to the sales figures.

Suedey! SHOT FOR MEAT!

16:29 / 10.12.04

One day, I'm going to make "he's no Moore or Morrison, obviously" in to a compliment.

16:39 / 10.12.04

Dude, I bow to your superior judgement in these things. Seriously, no snark. I don’t read nearly enough comics to speak with great authority. I’m just saying that ‘written by Mark Millar’ isn’t in itself a selling point for me. Yes, he has good days and bad days and maybe his good days are better than [another popular writer whose comics I don’t read], but he’ll still fail the Kordey test every time. For me.

16:50 / 10.12.04

I hear ya!

17:52 / 10.12.04

I really enjoyed his Superman Adventures. I bought them for my niece and got a great deal of fun from them, which surprised me.

His worst work would have to be RoboHunter back in 2k. Je's expresslu stated that he never liked the character and was writing it so that he'd have something under his belt as a writer. Now I'm not saying you can't go into a series with that as your starting position and produce good work but Millar didn't.

He didn't seem to understand the character, the tone of what the story should be, just didn't seem to get the 'joke' behind the character and the set up. His characters were 2-dimensional, the plots simple minded and repetitive, and had nothing to redeem them. So bad that a sweet, funny, imaginative, well drawn original run of stories was black listed from any sort of reprint for over a decade. So bad that readers were actively hoping that a favourite character would just go away.

The same could be said about his writing of Dredd but other people have done worse and Dredd was always of variable quality. RoboHunter was not the greatest comic strip ever but it was huge fun. The Millar version wasn't fun in any way shape or form.

Though Anthony Williams was did some lovely pictures.

Haus of Mystery

18:43 / 10.12.04

Agreed. His and Morrison's Dredd was fucking appalling. One of the only times Grance has gotten it totally wrong with a character.
The man Millar does have a flair for the old ultra-violence though, something I'm quite partial to. That said 'Wanted' has for the most part been pretty dirgey and numbing in that respect.
He always writes killer first issues though - The Authority had me drooling after the appearance of the Bastard Avengers, and the Ultimates had a staggering prologue. What's worrying is that the quality drops so rapidly - in the case of The Ultimates it felt like editorial squeezing, but 'Wanted' is just plain bad storytelling. He's a frustrating writer because he can write dynamic spectacular super-hero comics, but his 'Millarverse' showed how crap his range is.
Fuck it, I'm still a sucker for him sometimes.

19:09 / 10.12.04

>>>You know, I’ve never seen it. I had no idea you’d drawn Superman. God, the things I miss. What issues, where? How do you rate your own work on it? <<<

There was a Millar-written issue of Superman Adventures that was 22 single-page stories, of which I drew two. I met Millar at San Diego the year after it had seen print and he told me that they were his favourite two in the bunch (he is actually a terrifically nice man in person, by the way). Mind you, he may say that to all the girls.

I also drew a full issue written by Dan "She Hulk" Slott.

Both of these were VERY early work of mine, around the time I'd done those few original Invisibles pages, what, 6 years ago? As such I think they're absolutely hideous in retrospect, but you know, early work always is and they were still very valuable for me in terms of experience. I would say that they are for serious hard-core obsessive Cameron Stewart completists ONLY.

And if you were one of those, I'd have to worry about you.

21:40 / 10.12.04

I can also confirm that Mr Millar is a very nice person in person, which, coupled with his flair for self-promotion, has certainly not hindered his career.

But, yes, for me, Millar's work is all the more unfulfilling because it often promises more than it delivers - it pulls all sorts of interesting triggers and then fails to follow through - such as the whole Authority getting involved in real-world politics..,

22:11 / 10.12.04

Quite honestly in the past year I'd pretty much concluded that Millar was a hack like Ellis, but I read Chosen (I dont care what anyone says, bad twist ending or no bad twist ending, I love it, and even that last page by Peter Gross is absolutely stunning), Red Son and thirteen issues of Swamp Thing. And now Ultimates 2, I have had to change my mind, the man is a lot better than Warren Ellis, I won't just buy something with his name on it the way I'd do with Grant, Dan Clowes and the like, but I'll definitely be interested.

The man lacks personality or class but his comics can be good on occasion.

Mister Six, whom all the girls

23:09 / 10.12.04

He IS terribly nice and great fun in person.

Online he seems so butch and bossy, I was pleasantly surprised to joke with him in the hotel bar at the wizard World Chicago-con (where Bendis seemed bloated and snooty and Cassaday had a hand that was sculpted to fit any lady's ass... I swear that guy was wading in puss all night). I felt very self-conscious around him, but we had a brief laugh over opening the pool up for late night dipping. I still like his Authority, but his Ultimates reads to me as trying too hard while I am currently enjoying his Spider-Man. I've heard nothing but good things about the Superman adventures, so I should check them out. I wasn't terribly impressed with Chosen #1, but it was generally fine.

01:13 / 11.12.04

Why weren't impressed with Chosen mate?

And while Millar does piss on the book's potential by doing the Twilight Zonish ending, I still think it's one of his strongest (yet flawed) and definitely one of his pretties works.

Have to track down the rest of his Swamp Thing.

Haus of Mystery

12:39 / 12.12.04

Swamp Thing's well worth picking up, especially the 'River Run' storyline. Rough around the edges for sure, but full of imagination.

Worst Millar for me was prolly the later Ultimate X-Men stuff and his execrable 2000ad stuff. Just plain bad.

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

15:03 / 12.12.04

UXM under Millar really was the shittest.

I liked Maniac 5 for 2000ad, as far as ultraviolence goes.

15:05 / 12.12.04

Like MacGyver says, though, the later UXM was horribly bad. He clearly did not give two shits about any of it.

Mister Six, whom all the girls

00:53 / 13.12.04

Oh and Chosen wasn't bad but I just wasn't really all that hooked, I guess. It might be because I work with a born afain Christian and have pretty much had it with the dogma.

But I do love Peter Gross and if I found the other issues cheap, I'd buy em.

I think the book that killed my opinion on him was Ult X-Men and reading the script as well. But again I think it's my own fault. I was SO excited about it at first and it is so very very dire.

08:32 / 13.12.04

Why did UXM kill your opinion of him, Six? Surely the guy is allowed to write shit from time to time as long as he puts out some good product? Or do you mean that it killed your opinion of him as a consistently good writer?

Our Lady Has Left the Building

09:43 / 13.12.04

When does this UXM drop-off begin in your opinion, because I've read until the end of 'Hellfire and Brimstone' so far and loved it.

And all of the first series of 'Ultimates' too, though my favourite point was when Fury and Banner go to meet Thor for the first time.

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