Is Marvelman Actually Coming Soon, After All?

So, as I mentioned here about a month ago, Marvel Comics’ Editor-in-Chief Axel Alonso has promised that there will soon be news about Marvelman. The thing is, despite my essentially casting a large amount of doubt on that in my previous post, this may actually be the case. A number of things have all happened at virtually the same time and, at the risk of looking like a good old-fashioned conspiracy theorist, it really does look as if they might all add up to something. So, here’s a chronology of events, with bit more exposition on my part afterwards:

31 October 2011: Mick Anglo dies at the age of 95. Kiel Phegley of Comic Book Resources [CBR] says ‘How Anglo's passing impacts the release of Marvelman material is unknown.’

13 January 2012: Axel Alonso, now Marvel Comics’ Editor-in-Chief, answers the question ‘Marvelman in 2012? on CBR by saying, ‘Sit tight. We'll have some additional news soon.’

26 January 2012: Geoff Johns announces that DC’s Captain Marvel character will henceforth be called Shazam.

27 January 2012: News breaks that Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane have finally settled their long-running legal dispute over Gaiman's share of Spawn properties.

Their attorneys filed notice Friday in federal court in Madison saying they've reached a deal that calls for declaring Gaiman a 50 percent owner of Spawn issues 9 and 26, the first three issues of a spin-off series on the angels and the issues' contents. Jeffrey Simmons, one of Gaiman's attorneys, declined to elaborate, saying the terms are confidential.

31 January 2012: Neil Gaiman Tweets this:

Lots of people asking ‘Who owns Marvelman/Miracleman?’ I thought that was already established: [link]

... with a link to the original story on CBR, dated Friday, July 24th, 2009, that announced that Marvel Comics had ‘purchased the rights to Marvelman from creator Mick Anglo’.

1 February 2012: DC Comics - sorry, that should be DC Entertainment - announces they will be publishing a number of comics series under the umbrella title of Before Watchmen, described as ‘all-new stories expanding on the acclaimed Watchmen universe’.

2 February 2012: Neil Gaiman announces ‘I'm off in hiding...’

------------------------------------------------------

What meaning can we squeeze out of all the above, apparently unrelated, events and announcements?

The thing about Mick Anglo and Marvelman is, in all the years I’ve been reading about this, I have not found one single instance of Mick Anglo stating that he owned Marvelman. Yes, he claims to have created the character - although I often think that ‘created’ is possibly too strong a word for running a quick coat of paint over an already established character at the behest of L Miller & Son, even if all parties involved were agreeable to it at the time - but he never claimed to have owned it, although this claim started being made on his behalf about five years back, or so. I’ve seen a few interviews with him, although these are by no means numerous, and the closest anyone got to asking him if he owned it was when George Khoury asked him about it in Kimota! The Miracleman Companion (TwoMorrows Publishing, Raleigh, 2001), where he answered,

‘I don’t know; that was [Len] Miller’s sort of thing.’

Later on he says,

‘All I was interested in was producing the stuff and getting paid on the nail, and that’s how it worked out.’

All pretty much as one would expect in the comics business in the UK in the 1950s: the publisher had the rights to what they published - it may not have been right, but that’s a completely different argument. So, how did Mick Anglo’s death change things? Well, I suppose it meant that he wasn’t around anymore to give potentially unhelpful interviews, or to be asked awkward questions. But, at the same time, over two years passed from Marvel’s announcement in July 2009 until his death at the end of October 2011 without anyone interviewing him about Marvel’s purchasing of his supposed rights to Marvelman, which in itself seems odd, now that I think about it. If he was the visionary creator people (mostly the likes of Marvel Comics, who had a vested interest in saying so) said he was, why wasn’t there a whole slew of interviews with him about his creation? Just another unanswered question to go on an already very long list...

Why would the renaming of DC’s Captain Marvel have any bearing on Marvel’s likely publication of Marvelman? Well, DC’s Captain Marvel was once Fawcett’s Captain Marvel, the middle part of the line of succession that runs ‘Superman begat Captain Marvel, who begat Marvelman,’ so the character certainly has a place in Marvelman’s history. Undoubtedly most of the reason DC renamed the character is because Marvel Comics actually owns the trademark to the name Captain Marvel, meaning that DC can never actually use it as the title of a comic, and also because, if DC decide to exploit the character further, as far as the movies, for instance, they’re hardly likely to want a character who, every time his name is mentioned, is as good as advertising their rivals - it’s one thing having it happening in comics, where the consumer has some idea about who owns what, but if the public go to see a character called Captain Marvel in the cinema, they’re probably going to assume he’s published by that Marvel Comics company they’ve heard about. Having said that, Marvel haven’t published a comic featuring their own Captain Marvel since 2008, and in particular not since their acquisition of Marvelman - a character whose origin is directly related to Captain Marvel, just not the one they own. So, the net result is that, certainly for the time being, there is no character called Captain Marvel currently active in either of the two major comics universes. Which may or may not be a sign of something else going on, or of people clearing the boards for what is to come.

Next along we have the news that Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane have resolved their long-running dispute over the rights to various characters co-created by them for Spawn #9, originally published in June 1993, nearly twenty years ago now. Very briefly, three characters that appeared in that issue - Angela, Olden Days Spawn/Medieval Spawn, and Count Nicholas Cagliostro/ Cogliostro - were later used by McFarlane in numerous ways that hadn’t been part of the original agreement between them, a situation made worse by McFarlane then claiming that he owned all the rights to them, rather than sharing those rights with Gaiman. In January 2002 Gaiman sued McFarlane, looking to have his position of co-creator legally established - the suit wasn’t about the money, as most of these things tend to be, as Gaiman has stated publically, more than once, that any money he gets from the case will be donated to various comics charities. There has been a huge amount of to-ing and fro-ing in the meantime, which I’m not going to go into (go here for a brief overview). Again, though, what bearing does this have on the story of Marvelman? Firstly, there’s the fact that Todd McFarlane bought up all the assets of the bankrupt Eclipse Comics in 1996, which was said to include Eclipse’s share of Miracleman, as Marvelman was known at that time. Whilst there has been doubt cast on whether or not Eclipse had any rights to Miracleman for McFarlane to buy, or indeed had any right to sell those rights, his having these - real or otherwise - rights to a portion of Marvelman was always an unspoken part of the interaction between him and Gaiman, and it seems unlikely that they will have reached a deal between them without this issue being part of it. But, as we are told that ‘the terms are confidential,’ this may not become public knowledge any time soon.

Another reason that the end of the case between Gaiman and McFarlane is significant is because all of Gaiman’s costs for these cases were being paid for by Marvels and Miracles LLC, a company set up by Gaiman and his friend and lawyer, Ken Levin. Marvels and Miracles was announced to the world at a press conference on the 24th of October, 2001, where Gaiman was joined by Marvel Comics’ then Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada, and their company president Bill Jemas. The actual funding of Marvels and Miracles itself came from two projects Gaiman did for Marvel, Marvel 1602 (2003) and Eternals (2007), with both Gaiman and Marvel putting their share of the proceeds into the M&M pot. It certainly appears that Gaiman and Marvel were hand in hand on this project, and presumably the pay-off for Marvel would be that, once Neil Gaiman got the right for Miracleman - such as they were - from Todd McFarlane, that he would make these available to Marvel, or more likely simply put them to rest forever. So, one outcome of the conclusion of action between Gaiman and McFarlane is undoubtedly the removal of Todd McFarlane and Miracleman from the board, tying off at least one of the many loose ends surrounding the Marvelman story. One caveat to all of this, of course, would be the fact that this pair have reached agreements before, going back over all those twenty years, and Todd McFarlane has broken his word on pretty much every single one of those agreements. So, it ain’t over ‘til it’s over, even at this stage.

Why do I think that Neil Gaiman’s tweet on the 31st of January is significant? Because he’s the only one of the creators of the 1980s version of Marvelman that speaks publically about it, and him referring to it, just after his positive trial result, seems to indicate that he’s still actively involved with it, and that he still sees Marvel Comics as where it’s all going to happen, and possibly even to indicate that, now that one particular roadblock has been successfully negotiated, we can expect to see some positive movement soon. It also adds legitimacy to the idea that, yes, Marvel do have rights to Marvelman, which they bought from Mick Anglo - or, more correctly, from Jon Campbell of Emotiv, who bought out Anglo. I concede that that’s a lot to read into 140 characters!

How could DC’s announcement that they’re going to start exploiting - and if ever there was a word that says exactly what it mean, exploiting has to be it - Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’s Watchmen have any bearing on this? Undoubtedly it doesn’t, but I’m fascinated by the fact that we have two major works by Alan Moore, Marvelman and Watchmen, both from early in his career, and both dealing with essentially the same idea: What would happen if superheroes were real, in a real world? In both cases we now have work based on those works: Neil Gaiman picked up Miracleman after Alan left, after being specifically hand-picked by Alan to do so, and the first six issues of his run, The Golden Age, are effectively responses to things from Alan’s run. Neil did all this at the very start of his career, before he was the major name he is now, but Moore chose him because he felt he had talent, and trusted him.

On the other hand, we have a series of sequels being produced to Watchmen, very much against the wishes of Alan Moore - and only receiving lukewarm support from Dave Gibbons, at best - by supposedly ‘top-drawer talent,’ who nonetheless seem to need to raid perhaps the most famous and important comics story there is, over a quarter of a century after its publication, because apparently they’ve all run out of ideas of their own. The fact that the announcement for this was made less than a week after a major development in the Marvelman story just seems like interesting timing: two major Alan Moore projects, from early in his career, still able to make the two major comic companies get excited. But not to actually treat him with respect, or anything like that - respect and earning money don’t seem to get to be in the same room, if you’re DC or Marvel, it seems.

And then poor old Neil Gaiman decided to go into hiding! He’s actually going on the road for a while in preparation for his new novel, but you couldn’t really blame him if he did go into hiding - I imagine that the time leading up to the announcement of the settlement with Todd McFarlane must have been fraught, for instance, and now that things might be forthcoming with Marvelman and Marvel, well, it’s possible that there could be some interesting things happening there, and he may just want to walk away from it all for a while. And who could blame him?

So, there you have it. A whole bunch of things happening in a short space of time, that may or may not be related, or have any bearing on one another. Or that may point to, as promised by Axel Alonso in the middle of January, 'additional news soon.' If there is to be news, I suspect we will not be waiting too long to hear it...


[Over the past many years, I've been obsessed with the story of Marvelman, so much so that I've written a book about it, called Poisoned Chalice: The Extremely Long and Incredibly Complex Story of Marvelman, which just keeps on growing. I managed to get it finished at one point, and had a contract with MonkeyBrain Books, who soon afterwards decided they were giving up publishing books. Curse of Marvelman, anyone? If you're a publisher, and you think you might be interested in publishing a really ridiculously long and detailed - I believe we use the word 'immersive' now - book about Marvelman, then leave a comment, and I'll get back to you.]

What's the News on Marvelman? Marvel Replies...

On Friday the 24th of July, 2009, Joe Quesada, then Editor-in-Chief of Marvel Comics, accompanied by Dan Buckley, Marvel’s publisher, made an announcement at San Diego’s Comic-Con International, saying that Marvel Comics had bought the rights to Marvelman.

That’s now two and a half years ago (or a bit over 900 days, if you like), and we’re all more or less still waiting for them to announce what their actual plans are. Without attempting to draw any conclusions of my own here (because I’ll be doing that somewhere else, before the year is out), I thought I’d try to find out what they have said in those two and a half years.

It seems that various different people from Marvel Comics regularly take part in Q&A sessions on Comic Book Resources, and these sessions are the primary source for very nearly all the information that follows.

So, here’s what I’ve found:

The first report on CBR was on Friday, July 24th, 2009, where a somewhat triumphalist Joe Quesada made the first announcement:

"Marvelman belongs to Marvel," said Quesada, saying that the company purchased the character from creator Mick Anglo – a process that started in 2007 thanks to word from Neil Gaiman. "Mick is 94 years old, and I talked to him on Wednesday for an hour and a half," said Buckley noting that Marvel had discusses plans for the character and its stories with Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Alan Davis and Mark Buckingham, who was in the audience.

"I'm excited to see this character not just at Marvel, but the continued adventures of Marvelman," said Quesada.

The next day, Saturday, July 25th, 2009, there was more:

The Marvel panellists had much to say on the subject, starting with Quesada saying, "Marvelman belongs to Marvel. Marvel has purchased the rights to Marvelman from Mick Anglo, who is the creator of Marvelman. He is arguably the JD Salinger of comic book characters. It is arguably one of the most important comic book characters in decades."

Publisher Dan Buckley went on to describe the process behind the purchase, saying, "I'm pretty sure if you go on the internet right now, within the next five minutes you'll hear every rumour associated with this character from the 1950s through the '80s to the '90s. We started talking to Mick Anglo's people in 2007 about this, and it was a very exciting prospect. I first became aware of it through our relationship with Neil Gaiman. I really didn't know much about Marvelman at that time, but the conversation started about how we could get involved with the character and bring him back. Mick Anglo and his folks are great to work with. John Campbell who represents Mick Anglo – I want to mention him because he's done a great deal to bring him back here. He's not going to get all the kudos because he's got to do all the negotiations with me.

"But it's very exciting for us to get this character that has so many great stories attached to it. We're working. We don't have a lot to say on the publishing right now. We will be publishing some Marvelman material next year. We are talking to all, besides having Mick on board – who by the way is 94 years old, and I spoke to him Wednesday for an hour and a half. It was a pleasure. We're talking to all the people who were involved in the '80s and '90s material – Alan [Moore], Neil [Gaiman], Garry Leach, Alan Davis – we've reached out to all these folks. Mark Buckingham, who is also in the house..."

"The impact of this story that the character had on the industry is akin to what happened with 'Watchmen,' and we're very excited about it. We'll have a lot more details in the near future."

Just over a week later, on Monday, August 3rd, 2009, CBR editor Kiel Phegley hosted CUP O’ JOE, a regular Q&A feature with himself and Joe Quesada, which included this:

This is our first edition of CUP O’ JOE after the madness that was Comic-Con International in San Diego, which we are still filing reports from even today. As you can see from our complete Comic-Con news index, there were a ton of announcements, but the biggest comic book news concerned Miracleman -- known originally as Marvelman when his adventures were serialized in Britain’s Warrior Magazine. Miracleman will be back under his proper Marvelman name and under the Marvel Comics banner, ending years of legal issues surrounding the character.

Kiel Phegley: In terms of news, we already spoke a little bit on CBR TV about the Marvelman announcement; that Marvel has obtained the rights to the character. How did you think the announcement went over with comics fans?

Joe Quesada: I think it went amazingly well. For most people it was a jaw dropping announcement. For other, younger fans, it was a bit lost on them until they went back and looked up exactly what the character means to the history of modern comics. All in all, the response was pretty amazing, even more than I anticipated and I was anticipating a lot.

[And later in the interview...]

Kiel Phegley: The one thing that was repeated over and over by Marvel staff about this deal was the fact that Mick Anglo, Marvelman’s creator, was getting his due. I know that Marvel Publisher Dan Buckley has been playing point man in talking to Anglo and settling the specifics of the deal, but what's been your take of the man and his art?

Joe Quesada: While most people in the States aren’t familiar with Mick’s work, over in the UK he is incredibly well respected. I actually spoke with David Hine about this a bit at one of the con parties. It was loud and crowded, but I could tell that David just had tremendous respect for the guy. I do believe that if Mick had been working here in the States, he would have been known within the American comics community as one of the classic masters. So, our hope is to expose Mick and his early work to a wider audience as well as introduce Marvelman to a whole new generation of readers who aren’t aware of how the character revolutionized how we write and draw characters today. But that’s the interesting thing about Marvelman, there has always been something magical about the character, something prophetic about it that even though he’s not a household name, he’s caused seismic creative changes within our industry on every shore.

A few days after that, on Thursday, August 6th, 2009, CBR spoke to Todd McFarlane, to see if he had any opinion on the announcement. He did:

CBR Executive Producer Jonah Weiland spoke with McFarlane during Comic-Con. When asked to comment on Marvel's announcement, McFarlane responded, ‘Here’s what I know as a guy who’s been living a complicated life: I will be having meaningful conversations with my lawyer when I get home.’

A few weeks later, on Friday, August 21st, 2009, Joe Quesada was answering more questions with Kiel Phegley, the last time they spoke about Marvelman in 2009:

Kiel Phegley: We've got an awful lot of questions about the status of Marvelman since Marvel's acquisition of the character. We know that for now there's nothing to report with respect to reprinting material that's already been seen in the US, but in terms of the classic character and his place at Marvel, Byzantine echoed a few readers when he asked, "Will we see the character brought into the Earth-616 continuity? Or will he be given his own universe to exist in?"

Joe Quesada: The simple answer to this is that we’ll be making announcements about this in due time. With the acquisition of Marvelman, we inherited a character with not only a long publishing history, but a character that over the years, due to its interesting history, has become a legend in our industry. It’s because of that that we want to take great care and really think through what we’re doing with the character and how we will present him. I know fans are dying to know all the whats and hows as soon as possible, but rushing into those decisions, at the end of the day, won’t serve the character. What I can say is that when we do start to announce our publishing plans, I think longstanding fans of the character will be pleased and fans unfamiliar with the character will be intrigued.

Kiel Phegley: hondobrode followed that up, wondering, "How would Marvelman be different than, say, the Sentry? I would think he would most appropriately fit under the MAX imprint, but I imagine that would also limit sales and exposure. Are you going to change his back-story? Can we expect Marvel to purchase any other properties?"

Joe Quesada: All of this will be revealed in good time, hondobrode. We’ve already had some pretty fantastic idea sessions internally here at Marvel about how to go about it all, but there are other cool ideas still on the way that we’re going to be throwing into the mix. Once we’ve gathered all of this, then we’ll start laying a groundwork and foundation for the character and that’s when fandom will get all of the info it’s starving for. I wish I could be more specific, but I think this is better than rushing into things and then hearing that we should have taken our time and thought it through.

Look, folks have waited for decades to see the character return. Heck, most thought he never would. So what’s a bit more time? Especially knowing that it’s finally going to happen!

Kiel Phegley: Finally, with all the praise sent towards Marvelman creator Mick Anglo and his contributions to the original British strips, Steve Bishop wanted to know, "Given that the Marvelman series that ran in Britain during the '50s and '60s was originally printed in black and white, does Marvel have any plans to put out an 'Essential Marvelman' series?"

Joe Quesada: Hey there, Steve Bishop. I would say it’s a very safe bet that you’ll see the older material printed. In what form, I couldn’t tell you just yet. This has also been a part of our internal conversations.

Eight months after the last piece, on Friday, April 2nd, 2010, we have Joe Quesada answering more questions submitted on the CBR message boards:

Kiel Phegley: Another piece of news ... was that Marvel is ready to release some Marvelman product starting in June with a Marvelman Classic Primer. You spoke at the convention about interviewing Marvelman creator Mick Anglo recently, and I'm assuming that was for the Primer. What was that experience like, and what can fans expect from this opening one-shot come June?

Joe Quesada: Meeting Mick was a huge thrill, and despite his age, he's still spry and sharp as a whip. What was interesting about Mick is that he really doesn't understand to this day what the big deal is with respect to Marvelman and his past work. It was just a job for him back in the day. While he is certainly appreciative, he is incredibly humble about the whole thing - but also incredibly eager to see his old work in print, which is what we'll be starting with.

Phegley: As exciting as this all is, many have been wondering what the classic material on tap for the summer means for the famed modern material? What can you say about the full rollout in terms of why you've started with the original British material and when readers might expect word on more plans for Marvelman at Marvel?

Quesada: A publishing plan has been set internally at Marvel, and we'll be making this all public very soon. But that said, we think it's important to put MM in historical context, so it only seems fitting that we start with the original Mick Anglo creation and run. While Mick is well known in the UK, I think this will help people here in the states realize what a great artist he was. It's a perfect primer for anyone wanting to really immerse themselves in the rich history of Marvelman. So, patience, grasshopper, patience.

The listing for the Marvelman Classic Primer on Marvel’s website says:

Who is the mysterious Marvelman? The answer to that question is one of the most mysterious in comics lore. Created in 1954 by writer/artist Mick Anglo, the character enjoyed a long run in the British comics market as one of its most powerful heroes. A few decades later, the character was revived with a dark, moody, deconstructionist bent, and produced one of the most important works of comic art in the medium's history. But now, miracle of miracles, Marvel has stepped up to the plate to deliver on the promise of Anglo's incredible characters. The Marvelman Primer will help readers unfamiliar with that character get up to speed on the past, present and future of Marvelman stories. We'll check in with Mick Anglo, Neil Gaiman and others who contributed to this character’s history over the years. It was the news that swept the 2009 San Diego Comic-Con and the Marvelman Primer explains why.

Despite this, there was no interview with Neil Gaiman, or indeed any ‘others,’ and the interview with the late Mick Anglo was sadly uninformative.

Just five days after the last piece on CBR, on Wednesday, April 7th, 2010, there was a quote from Axel Alonso, vice-president and executive editor of Marvel Comics, speaking at WonderCon on Sunday 4th April:

Another fan wanted to know if new Marvelman stories are coming soon, and when Marvel will reprint Alan Moore's run on the book. ‘I'm not at liberty to talk about that,’ Alonso said. ‘There will be an announcement soon about the reprint.’

He added that ‘there will be new Marvelman stuff. We will be meeting en masse, all the right people, to talk about how to do it. We've already begun some of those conversations. We're very excited about this, very excited about it. We want to make sure we have the appropriate game plan to roll forth.’

Four months pass before we next hear from anyone at Marvel. On Tuesday, August 31st, 2010, more than a year after Joe Quesada’s initial announcement, Marvel Comics editor Tom Brevoort was at Baltimore Comic-Con:

With respect to Marvelman, Brevoort said, ‘Not only do we need to make sure everything is right and proper with everyone associated with the character, but we need to do Marvelman right.’ Marvelman writer Neil Gaiman has spent some time with the Marvel staff to share his ideas. Brevoort is aware of people waiting for developments with the property, but said it is still some time off in the future. ‘Not a day has gone by that we have not worked on Marvelman in one way, shape or form,’ including the remastering of the early material.

Nearly a year passes, however, before we hear anything else. On Friday, June 3rd, 2011, now nearly two years after Quesada’s announcement, Tom Brevoort, now billed as Marvel’s Senior Vice-President of Publishing, is interviewed by comics retailer Jud Meyers:

Jud Meyers: When are we getting Marvelman?

Tom Brevoort: Honestly, the short answer is ‘As soon as everything is ready.’ It should come as no surprise that while we have overcome 80% to 90% of all the loop closing that we have to do, there's still more to be done. Everybody's ready and lined up, and now the book's been announced for two years. But we've spoken to Neil [Gaiman]. We've spoken to Mark Buckingham. Eventually, once every single thing is lined up, we'll get to a point where they can come back, finish The Silver Age and do the Dark Age story they always had planned, and we'll get the earlier four collections in some way, shape or form back into the marketplace. It should come as no shock to you that Marvelman has been screwed up in terms of one issue or another legally for decades now. So while we have gone over most of it, we really want to make sure that we have every hatch battened down before we try to roll any of this stuff out. We're getting there.

I'm sorry it's taken so long since we announced the whole thing - we were excited about it! And we thought other people would be too, but we didn't anticipate it would take this long. Things move slowly, particularly because we’re trying to make sure everything is done right and above board and everyone involved is satisfied. So have patience. We're getting to it. It is coming. We will get there. We're trying to do that thing that fans talk about every once in a while where they say, ‘Rather than having this come out haphazardly, couldn't you just get the whole project done and then release it?’ We're not quite doing that, but we're doing that sort of thing. We're making sure everything is as it should be before we start to roll these out so we don't have an enormous problem after we've put two issues out and then everything is jammed up again.

Meyers: Well, luckily it's no secret that every retailer in the world is just dying to give you all their money for this.

Brevoort: Me too! I can't wait to have those stories back in print as well. I have copies of all the old collections and the Eclipse issues. Hell, I have them in Warrior. I was buying Warrior back in the '80s! So I know that material forwards and backwards, and I'd love to have it back in a more modern package and in a more modern edition. We're making steady progress. One after another, things get done, but then some new complication will crop up. It's all behind-the-scenes legal stuff, and even the differences between American copyright law and UK copyright law make for a whole different set of issues to deal with. Back in the day, I don't know if Eclipse closed all those loops either. So we're trying to make sure that when we're ready to go, everything is as it should be.

Meyers: I had to ask, my friend.

Brevoort: That's what I'm here for. But for now the news on Marvelman is: We’re working on it!

Four more months pass. By now, Joe Quesada, who announced that Marvel owned Marvelman, is no longer Marvel’s Editor-in-Chief, but rather their Chief Creative Officer, whatever that actually means. On Saturday, October 15th, 2011, at the 2011 New York Comic and once again in the company of publisher Dan Buckley, they addressed the issue of Marvelman one again:

The perennial question about new stories for Miracleman/Marvelman received the standard response that things are in the works, but no hard news was announced. Buckley said, "I will give as much as I can give... there's a lot of very complicated things to navigate to ensure that every creator involved in said property [can be taken care of properly.]" He added, "If we're going to do it, we're going to do it right, and we're not going to have anybody questioning what we're doing."

And finally, on Friday, January 13th, 2012, Axel Alonso, now Marvel Comics’ Editor-in-Chief, answered the question, "Marvelman in 2012?" with this:

“Sit tight. We'll have some additional news soon.”

And that’s everything that Marvel have said about their plans for Marvelman. Which, as you can probably see, is a mixture of stonewalling, saying that things are complicated, and telling us that there’ll be news soon. In fact, we’ve been promised news ‘soon’ on a number of occasions, and told several times that we’d be given details on their plans for Marvelman, without ever being given any actual details. Will we ever actually be told anything? We’ll just have to wait and see.

Edited on the 12th of February, 2012, to add:- When the Forbidden Planet Blog posted a piece about this - here - an artist called Andy Turnbull posted to say that he'd like it if he got some recognition for image I used:

'No way of saying this without coming across as a bit churlish, but it would be nice to have some credit for the image. Its a cropped version of a cover design I did a few years ago.'

I did ask if he had any opinion on who he'd like me to attribute copyright to, but there has as yet been no reply. It's hard to know how to respond to this - On one hand, people are entitled to be acknowledged for their work. On the other hand, it's the digital equivalent of making a copy of an image on tracing paper, sharpening up the lines, and claiming it as you own. And, in a story that's all about copyright, and who might or might not own what, it almost beggars belief that someone would even want to thrust themselves into it. Still, what would I know?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Edited on the 18th of March, 2012, to add: Marvel have spoken about Marvelman once again. Marvel's Senior Vice President and Executive Editor Tom Brevoort, talking at his inaugural Talk to the Hat panel at WonderCon 2012 in Anaheim, California, as reported by Comic Book Resources, said:

In terms of reprints of "Marvelman" issues, "we're working on it," said Brevoort. "We don't want to do it halfway, so we really are taking our time … but it is our absolute intention to get that material back into print. … We appreciate your patience, so as soon as we have anything to tell you, we'll let you know."

So, when Axel Alonso said 'Sit tight. We'll have some additional news soon' back in the middle of January, we must presume that 'soon,' in this case, means 'not really very soon at all,' and certainly longer than two months. Then again, it's a word we've been hearing a lot, over the past two and a half years.

Alan Moore, The Magic Keyboard, and the NoHo Bowl of Harm

On the 8th of December 2011 an unusual item appeared for sale on eBay, titled Alan Moore’s Signed Computer Keyboard (May Have Mystical Powers). This listing further went on to say,

As you know, Alan Moore is the world renowned author of Watchmen, V for Vendetta, Swamp Thing and a load of other fantastical gubbins, and here for sale is his old computer keyboard. He definitely didn’t write any of the aforementioned works with this, and by the looks of things, it was mainly used as an ash tray.

I’ve had a go on the keyboard, and in doing so, felt the power of Alan surging through it. It immediately inspired me to write a fifteen chapter novel, comparable to the Russian Masters, which took no less than four and a half hours, without even stopping for a toilet break. Unfortunately, the keyboard was not connected to a computer at the time, and all the work was lost. Therefore I cannot verify the functionality of the keyboard, as it hasn’t been rigorously tested. Or even connected to a computer since Alan owned it.

How did I come to have this keyboard in my possession? It’s a long and convoluted story, but here are the highlights: Portrait painting mother; a wall of death; a lack of funds (for previously mentioned wall of death); Alan upgrading his keyboard (not sure which model he has now) and a heavy dose of serendipity.

A short synopsis would be: Whilst on a break from sitting for his portrait, Alan asked how the wall of death was going. My response was funds are low, but spirits are high. Alan then mentioned he was upgrading his keyboard, so I tentatively enquired as to what he was doing with his old keyboard, and asked whether he would be prepared to sign and donate it to the cause, hoping it would reach upwards of seven pounds fifity, as after all, it is akin to a modern day version of Shakespeare’s quill. In mind of it being auctioned, Alan was astute enough to sign it with a non-specific message of goodwill – with lots of love from Alan Moore.

So, the first question to ask myself was, is this genuine? The short answer is, yes, I have every reason to believe it is. This first came to my notice through a Facebook posting by a mutual friend of mine and the seller, and said mutual friend is also a friend and collaborator of Alan Moore’s, so there’s a solid and verifiable connection there between the seller and Alan himself, as far as I’m concerned. Also, the seller - who I now know to be called Bill Pollard - mentions his mother painting a portrait of Alan Moore, which he provides a link to. By pure coincidence, I’ve actually met his mother, Elke Pollard, who has indeed painted a portrait of Alan:-

Now, what’s all this about a Wall of Death? Bill Pollard told me,

The truth is, it's more a ‘Bowl of Harm’ than a ‘Wall of Death’. We've not yet graduated to motors; we prefer pedal power. A bunch of Americans gave me the idea. Whiskeydrunk Cycles, the link below is to the one they built, it's based on Keiths Board Track, a touring cycle display from the early 1900's.

There's also an answer to a question on the listing that sheds a little more light on this:

A Wall of Death is a bowl with vertical sides, about 20 feet in diameter - the idea is to ride motorcycles around it in a horizontal position. Seeing as we don't have any motorbikes, what we will actually end up with is more a bowl of harm... hope that clears things up for you.

So, so far, so good. While Alan was having his portrait painted by Elke Pollard in 2008, her son Bill got talking to him about the plan for a bicycle Wall of Death. A few years later they meet again, and Alan mentions that he's going to upgrade his computer (yes, he really does have one. It's not all quills and parchment and passenger pigeons in the Moore household, no matter how much you want it to be. He still won't have anything to do with the Internet, though.) Bill asks if he can have the old keyboard, and here it is, for sale, and all for a good cause.

So, how magical - or indeed magickal - is the keyboard? According to the eBay listing,

Pros and cons of owning Alan Moore’s old Microsoft Basic keyboard 1.0A

Pros:

DNA between the keys – you may be able to clone your very own Alan!

There are no computer viruses as it has never been connected to the internet.

Unique surface patterning.

Fag ash.

Sleek all-black casing with fetching violet coloured PS2 connector.

As an avid practitioner of Magick (Alan, not the keyboard), it may contain otherworldy powers (again, not tested), these have been protected by a magick circle and various dark items (as can be seen in the photos) since taking delivery of the keyboard, the dark items are not included in the sale, however I may be tempted to part with the empty can of Lynx if you really want it.

Interesting conversation piece – casually leave it lying around! Take it to parties! (Although I recommend vacuum sealing it first to retain fag ash and DNA samples)

Doubles up as a useful doorstop if found not to be working. (not tested as door stop.)

“Z” key has had very little use.

Cons:

According to videogame forums, it can’t be used to play Guitar Hero 3 above intermediate level, this apparently applies to all Basic 1.0As not just Alan’s.

Missing pop -up stand on left hand reverse.

Might not work.

Is there anything else we need to know? One questioner ask an important but often overlooked question:

What does the keyboard smell like? Please give a good sniff, especially of the bubbly, ashy left side, and detail back your thoughts?

Bill answered,

Deeply-scented cheroots fuse with toasted plastic, sweaty digits and house dust. Well-seasoned tab key supports the dry scent of musky violet ps-2 connector and a savory thorny understory like a briar growing through straw mulch after being urinated on. I hope this is of some help.

If you want to own Alan Moore's Magical Keyboard - and who wouldn't, really? - you can still bid on it here for the next five days. It is, after all, as Bill Pollard says, akin to a modern day version of Shakespeare's quill.

The last line on the eBay listing says Alan Moore Knows the Score, which leads me to Pop Will Eat Itself, and eventually back to a post that mentions me. It's a strange Alan Moore world out there, and we're all in it somewhere.

Alan Moore Knows the Score

Swamp Thing

A friend pointed me at the excellent Corpus Libris blog, where they're doing interesting with photographs of people and book covers, so I decided to have a go at it myself, with the help of my ever patient wife, Deirdre. So, here's me with the cover to the recently published hardcover edition of Alan Moore's Saga of the Swamp Thing (DC/Vertigo, 2009), featuring an illustration by Steve Bissette and John Totleben.

Books Bought

Amongst various thing picked up today are these two lovely gems:



Micilín agus an dá Leipreachán
Máiréad Ní Ghráda




Printing Reproduction Pocket Pal
Advertising Agency Production Association


This is the thing about hunting around in charity shops and the like: you just never know what you're going to find.

Bill Sienkiewicz speaks about Big Numbers #3

Bill Sienkiewicz originally wrote this piece for Heidi McDonald of The Beat, but she never used it, for reasons that are not clear. It was written in response to the large amount of interest that was generated after I managed to buy a photocopy of an apparently complete copy of Big Numbers #3 on eBay, and posted it online in March 2009. At the time I specifically sought out Alan Moore’s permission to do this, but didn’t have any contact with Bill Sienkiewicz, so didn’t speak to him about it. Time passed, and I even ended up ‘friended’ to Sienkiewicz on Facebook, but still didn’t mention it to him. However, after he commented on something I wrote, I plucked up the courage to actually write to him about it. As it turned out, not only was he in no way unhappy about my posting the forty pages of Big Numbers #3, but was actually looking for somewhere to post this piece publically. So, I offered to take it, particularly as we are hoping to do an interview about his work with big numbers to follow this up. Bill wanted to rewrite it somewhat, but I persuaded him to leave it as it was, as I felt that the somewhat chaotic nature of it nicely reflects the very essence of its subject matter.

So, enough from me: It gives me enormous pleasure to be able to publish this piece by Bill Sienkiewicz, one of the truly innovative comics artists, about one of the most ambitious comics projects I’ve ever seen.

----------------------------------------------------------------

I've been getting emails and links sent to me with a fair degree of regularity since the ‘Big Numbers issue’ over Big Numbers #3 hit the spotlight... again. I say 'again' because quite a few pages of issue #3 emerged a few years ago. There was speculation surrounding the pages then and, if anything, I've discovered that the ensuing years have done little to assuage, or diminish, that conjecture. And in the interest of full disclosure, I should note that having heard just about every conflicting ludicrous reason, every single link of spaghetti in the chain of events (somehow since miraculously renamed stainless steel rather than pasta), that no matter how inane the reasons given were, ultimately, each and every one - without exception - came from absolutely unimpeachable authoritative sources. Heeuuge air quotes around that phrase, if not actual boldface ones. By now if you haven't yet gleaned my admittedly sarcastic incredulity - yes, even at this late date - well, so be it.

The situation is still rife with speculation. Some folks who have been emailing me ask directly about the provenance / pedigree / credits / yayas regarding those recently resurfaced art pages from that issue. It certainly seemed to me that there are quite a few readers who are at least moderately curious as to what portion of issue #3's artwork is mine and what portion was drawn by Al Columbia, who was my assistant at the time. I'll clarify as best I can, in part because this matter of speculation has exceeded critical mass; it exceeded it ten years ago, but that's one guy's opinion.

So: Though only ten pages have been seen of Big Numbers #3, the entire issue was drawn and completed. All of it. Not merely the ten pages circulating. Now as to who drew what: Except for a few minor backgrounds (and to be completely honest, I don't think he drew anything in that issue at all - but I will admit I may be hazy on that point - I’ll simply say that I'm erring on the side of generous caution, or cautious generosity) that except for perhaps a few possible backgrounds, that ALL of issue #3 - repeat: ALL of the artwork on Big Numbers issue #3 was drawn by yours truly. Or, for those who prefer the obverse: NONE of Big Numbers #3 was drawn by Al Columbia (and again I add the caveat - except for possibly a couple of backgrounds). Certainly Al drew no figures in the background or anything story-related. I can't imagine he'd want to take credit for my work any more than I would covet credit for work drawn by him. I imagine he'd want to take credit for - and rightly so - the work that is completely his own: meaning that of issue #4 (I personally have never seen any of the issue. I hear Al destroyed it in its entirety, but I can't say I witnessed this destruction firsthand). So I freely admit that, except for the cover - I had done covers for approximately half the series at this point - I drew nothing at all in issue #4.

Perhaps the question as to who did what in issue #3 may have arisen due to the change in art style from the first two issues. Issues #1 and #2 were done in a more photographic, soft focus atmospheric airbrushed painterly style. While I loved the style and enjoyed working within those parameters immensely, I came to realize that by choosing to work that way for twelve issues, I was almost literally painting myself into a corner. This approach was incredibly time-consuming and ultimately proved overwhelming and unfeasible. Things were changing from issue to issue and becoming, by nature of the story, more interwoven and chaotic - the series was to have been painted completely in colour by issue #12, with each issue introducing more variables and approaches, colour being a dominant element. Adding to the workload for each issue was the necessity to thumbnail Alan's script thoroughly.

At this point I'd like to say that everything you've heard about Alan's scripts is true, and then some. Alan's a genius, an absolute gentleman. Plain and simple. Yes, his scripts are dense. They're brilliant, layered, nuanced, variegated, textural, beautiful and daunting. Simultaneously so. And although Alan is incredibly deferential and generous as to allowances for alterations made by the artist, the scripts veritably beg, no, demand, to be adhered to in their totality. It's practically sacramental.

So, I admit I found Alan's scripts a challenge of incredible dimension and beauty. Every page was a gauntlet of ornate opulence tossed at my feet, if not swung abruptly at my face, thwacking me a bloody good one. If I cursed him for this, I'm sure it was due to outright awe. Working with Alan was like going from the multiplication table to the periodic chart to quantum physics all in the space of one panel border. Concentrating only on the work Alan and I did collaboratively, foregoing for the moment his impressive oeuvre, just think of the depth and differences between his Shadowplay (Realpolitik via Kafka) and (though only a few issues), his Big Numbers (Reality via Schrödinger’s Kafka.)

So I'd do the thumbnails. I'd then use those thumbnails to choreograph, and then photograph, on average, forty five different people as characters, both primary and secondary. (I should mention that only one of these models was an actual model model. The rest of this Dickensian (Mooresian) cast was comprised of real people with real lives, many of whom, though not all, had little or less than zero interest in comics. Primarily, they held the preconception that comic books were Betty and Veronica, Superman or The Hulk. To them, The Avengers was less Captain America and more Emma Peel, bowlers and brollies. And some didn't even register comics to that minute extent. Some had never given a single solitary thought about comics. They had no relevance or import whatsoever in their lives. That said, I don't want to give the impression that this multi-ethnic ensemble was in any way some sort of artistically disinclined Diaspora. No, pretty much everyone actually seemed very open to this 'comic book experiment.' They were decidedly game, God love 'em, but that's not to say there weren't speed bumps and downright caldera-sized potholes en route. Several of the folks - like the sweet Indian gentleman, who posed for the role of the store owner /model train aficionado, wanted to make sure he wasn't being portrayed in any way contrary to his religious beliefs; the black father wanted to be portrayed with dignity. I understood his concerns but I tried to explain - and thus came up with a release form, that basically laid out that if the characters they were posing for did less than savoury things, it in no way reflected upon the models as people. I know this sounds exotic and extreme, but we have to remember that a great percentage of the populace have no clue as to what posing for another character means. They're simply who they are. It was an interesting adjustment. Time consuming, too.

Then there were the parents who were understandably less than thrilled by the prospect of some crazy comic-book punk taking photos of their little darlings making Molotov cocktails. Can't say I blamed them. But the fact that the town where I lived and worked - Westport, Connecticut - and environs, happened to be the inspirational setting for the novel The Stepford Wives did seem particularly apropos. The contrarian in me loved the wicked irony.

And the 'little darlings' learned a skill.

I was certainly in the thick of it, awash in actual ‘big numbers,’ where coordinating this monstrous and increasingly time-consuming photographic schedule would have been - in and of itself - more than enough lunacy for any sane individual to deal with. The key word here is ‘sane.’ My favourite local watering hole was a way-station for folks in a variety of entertainment and news arenas. Everyone knew everyone. Or knew someone who knew someone. It was two degrees of separation, not six. There were amazing illustrators (Bernie Fuchs, Al Parker, Bob Peak, Robert Fawcett), actors (Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Chris Walken, Keir Dullea), artists like Charlie Reid, Bob Baxter, writers like Erica Jong, and many comic book and comic strip artists and writers - too many to name. It was Heaven. An incredible artistic hub. I mention this because I realized that with the huge chunk of reference-gathering I'd bitten off with regards to the photography of so many people, I was negotiating my way around myriad potential landmines. I came incredibly close to calling the driving force of the Westport theatre scene - Joanne Woodward herself - with a plea to recommend actors-people who knew what it entailed to act a part. The only double-edged sword would be in paying so many people for their expertise, and as importantly: for their time. Financially, Big Numbers started to become a money pit. Too much time and effort was involved in getting the reference, leaving very little time to create the artwork. Time. The ultimate tool. The ultimate foe.

Still, as it was, many friends made themselves available as models, gratis. One, the phenomenal cartoonist Stan Drake, who was my father-figure, my dear friend, and artistic mentor, posed as Christine's father, the gent eating his dinner whilst seated on the porcelain throne. A helluva thing. But Stan thought it was great. Odd, bizarre, but fun. John Prentice also posed. He was the abused wife's landowner dad. Frank Bolle Jr. was the traumatized cabby. And at the watering hole, I'd asked a regular, a gent I'd occasionally drink with, a gent named Harry Reasoner, to play a newsman on the English telly. He laughingly demurred. C'est la vie.

Another friend of mine - the one who played the architect - actually was an architect. He'd formerly been a Navy Seal, and true to form, he brooked no shit. Here was as militaristic a guy as one could ever fret to meet in a dark alley or beachfront, and then there was yours truly: the most liberal confrontative wiseass comic book guy in a town of young republican bankers - needless to say, Mr. Seal and I got along famously. He loved comics. And it was he who suggested that I photograph his two sons as the architect's sons. Their ages were exactly as Alan had written. Order from chaos, indeed. (The architect's daughter was played by a friend of the woman from whom I was splitting, so tensions there were high).

Things seemed to escalate in direct inverse proportion to levels of sanity... More, they actually degenerated: Horribly, sadly, two of the models died. One good friend drowned in a freak boating accident. His passing was horrible on so many levels. Both he and his girlfriend worked at the watering hole. The entire town of Westport mourned. It was a death in the family. Another friend, Ray, and I were fellow members of the Loyal Order of Raccoons - yes, those Raccoons - with a nod to the great Gleason. Our once-monthly meetings were really an excuse for fifteen guys to get together to play pool, cards, darts, embarrass our fellow Raccoons by holding wildly inappropriate bachelor parties etc, all done under the influence of the demon rum. Ray died from pancreatic cancer and left a wife and a four year old daughter... Art and life were distilling to a quintessence of extremes. Chaos, love, loss, overwhelmingly intense experience of going through a war together. So many people, so many lives, intersecting as lives and under the rubric of the Big Numbers family...

The biggest challenge to the series was yet to come. The main character, my friend who modelled for Christine, chose that particular time period to get married. Now, that shouldn't have been a real problem, right? Well, normally, probably not, except that she married into the military, and her newly-minted husband was stationed in Germany. So, after the newlyweds cut the wedding cake, and washed it down with champagne, it was auf wiedersehen Christine. I couldn't very well deride her by exclaiming, “How could you do this to me?! To US? After all we'd been through?!” Even I'm not that much of a narcissist. But come on, how dare she presume to have a real life?

Additionally, the backdrop for this time period was chockablock with huge personal changes in my life, such as it was: the fairly well known rift with Al Columbia - well, in the comics universe, it was Peyton Place meets All about Eve . Outside of that arena, no one gave a damn, thank God. - which again only served to fuel greater levels of wild speculation. I should point out that Al and I have long since made our peace. I bear him no ill will. Chalk the feud up to the folly of youth.

Oh, and I just remembered: the musical soundtrack for this period was The Cure's brilliant album, Disintegration. Coincidence? The cut The Same Deep Water as You seemed to become a spooky mantra. In his lyrics, Robert Smith seemed to acknowledge the coexistence of entropy and resignation. I freely admit listened to that album for weeks on end, and tossed in a fair amount of hope and redemption, just because the music was too beautiful to be so overwhelmingly bleak. To this day, the song takes me back.

Anyway - Things couldn't continue to get more bizarre, I thought. No way.

Until they did: i.e., between issues #2 and #3, the Seal's youngest son grew six inches in height. Got very lanky. Endured the awkwardness a breaking voice engenders. Entering puberty will do that to you. He was hardly a ‘little kid’ anymore. More, he was hardly the ‘little kid’ I needed to pose for pix of the youngest son of the architect. I just had to roll my eyes.

Another digression: I should explain at this point that I'm not at all a slave to photography. I hate being a slave to anything that could become a crutch. Photos are tools to be used and modified for any specific need of any specific gig. I myself have posed as everyone from an old crone to a teenage alien. I would use the photo as basic position and proportional guide. Then I'd change things based on my accumulated knowledge from drawing from life - around forty sketchbooks of life drawings. Other times I'd simply 'make shit up'. Artist's prerogative. As Al Williamson once remarked to me about when he was trying to draw scenes from his imagination, rather than using photographs. He referred to it as having to ‘fall back on talent’.

But with Big Numbers one of the demands – prerequisites - I'd placed upon myself was to work almost exclusively from the model as possible. I was going for as great a degree of illustrative photographic verisimilitude as I could muster. Dammit, I was going to adhere to the accurate reference no matter what. It was, in retrospect, a vain attempt to control everything - everything - completely, as things swirled and collided in midair all around. This was my Stanley Kubrick period. Of course, the more I tried to control everything, the more Real Life kicked my ass. Up and down the Route 95 corridor.

So, the more time flew by, the more detritus was spawned, the thicker the sorghum got. I realized, after reading issue three, that a stylistic alteration seemed appropriate, as I'd done in Elektra: Assassin. The benefit would be showing the increasingly chaotic milieu that the characters inhabited, AND it would also speed up the process and output of pages. (Or so I'd hoped: I needed to gain - as I said - a semblance of control of this runaway behemoth.) So, I switched to doing the pages in pen and ink, with additional airbrushing, spatter, and pencil on Craftint board. The stylistic - or rather technical - switch felt incongruous to some, but I was determined to make the stylistic shift work in the contextual Gestalt of the series. Big Numbers was about finding Order in Chaos. And things couldn't have been more chaotic than they were right then and there. And besides, my work has always been about trying to make order out of messes. Or simply making messes - only messes - and nothing more than messes to my detractors' perceptions as in: “What's with all his scritchy-scratchy shit? UGH!” But I just did what I do. It was like breathing to me: making artistic corrections out of what to me were screaming errors begging to be addressed, making silk purses out of a sow's ear or cow sphincter, or creating a sow's ear out of silicone, molly bolts, and matchsticks... but you get the point.

Somewhere along the way, this secular book on mathematics and chaos had blurred the boundaries between religion, and real life – or, rather than religion, more appropriately, say, spirituality - like the Gnostic gospels and pagan idolatry being co-opted for political expediency by nascent religions of Christianity and Judaism (at the time they were probably the equivalent of ‘cults’ - until they went nova for the masses.) Art bled into commerce. Commerce just bled and bled, exsanguinating like crazy. Chaos as Theme met Chaos in Reality... and the clock continued to tick down, calendar pages whirled in a parchment-based purée around my drawing board - as if from some bad film montage. Deadlines were blown. To smithereens. I couldn't sleep, and it served me right. It was entrusted to me to pull it off, to 'suck it up', grow a sack, and I was going under for the third time... Money got tighter and tighter. Productivity suffered severely. Big Numbers became my life. Not just the series Alan and I were attempting, but Big Numbers the actual Petri dish of real life chaos. I'd lost a parent, a relationship, began a new one, went through the art assistant debacle, and realized just how far behind the proverbial eight-ball I'd placed myself. And placed Alan, Big Numbers, and the folks at Tundra - and of course, the all-important readers.

So in plain English, between issues #2 and #3, my so-called life went to complete Hell personally: I'm not saying this as a 'Woe is me’ scenario. Screw that pansy bullshit. I'm reporting it for another self-serving reason: I want to confront the speculators and all these ‘excellent unimpeachable authorities’ - who, please remember, weren't even there! - and who are still actually taking it upon themselves to - quite frankly, as I see it - talk out of their asses (which is a nifty parlour trick, but as a stand-in for expository accuracy it's, well, like talking out of one's ass. Things can get pretty rotten in Denmark. Or in Oz. Or in...) Yes, I know, I'm probably spitting into the wind, stressing all this stuff in an effort to end, once and for all, the speculation, presumption, and ‘he said - he said - she said’ innuendo. As if.

So - All this finally leads to the moment I finished up issue #3 in its entirety, after agreeing to release the reins on the series - and so I handed all the art for Big Numbers #3 to Paul Jenkins and Kevin Eastman, and moved on to doing advertising and illustration work... A break that was imperative... and in doing so, I effectively passed the torch to Al.

I thought that was the end of it.

In many ways it was only the beginning. The 'behind the scenes' tumult of Big Numbers was an amazing correlative to Alan's script. It became Art imitating Art imitating Life imitating... well, at the very least, severely blown synapses.

For those of you not inclined to take this in any sort of light of awareness, okay. I'm not looking for absolution. I'm not looking to duck responsibility, or to make excuses. I'm simply presenting the chain of events to the best of my recollection. To give my responses (good, bad and mezzo-mezz) to each situation that arose. I take full responsibility for losing control of things that should have been in my control. I was the de facto adult in my studio. My assistant was a kid, in many ways ill-equipped to handle certain responsibilities. I'm sure he'd agree things were pretty off the wall back then. We were all riding a wild bull-dragon that hated spurs in its ribs. I'm hoping Al and his family have a tranquil and happy life.

I'm blessed to count Kevin Eastman, Paul Jenkins and Alan Moore as my friends, and generous ones at that. I love these guys. They make my world brighter, both in comics and in life.

If I may be narcissistic for a moment (‘only a moment?’ some of you are no doubt thinking. ‘He's been writing a self-serving treatise since word one.’). Nevertheless, here goes: I pride myself on being a professional, - more than ever these days - and I felt like Big Numbers became my Moby Dick - the great white metaphysical whale that had gotten away from me.

To this day, I've lamented that Alan and I never finished the series. I actually literally can't stomach the thought of it remaining a hole in our creative lives, certainly in mine. And honestly, there's not a week that goes by that I don't think about completing it, about contacting Alan and saying, “Adult here. What say you? Let's kick out the jams!” I understand his great disappointment, though I've no doubt he's moved on. And gotten even more brilliant, if that's possible. I've apologized to Alan personally, and to the others, for my part. And I apologize to you - the readers. You're each and every one of you a diamond, a clear reason to strive, to give something back - a something that makes some small difference - via my limited abilities and in spite of my human failings. I'm by no means religious (as spirituality and religion aren't synonyms). Even so, I'm praying I'm older, wiser, perhaps even better, than I was those many years ago. That cooler, more mature heads have prevailed.

I've simply tried to present my side, the POV of one guy who was at the epicentre of the quake. I really doubt that what I've written will end speculation, or alter other folks' agendas. I'm not naive. I think that in hindsight, that there were simply many many factors that played a part in the Big Numbers implosion. I was but one. A big part, but only one.

I know what it would take to make completion of Big Numbers a reality. But whatever ultimately happens, this will stand as my own Chaos Theory.

Thanks for your time.

Bill Sienkiewicz
Somewhere in Connecticut

Flann O'Brien Writes Sexton Blake...?

All in all, there are three Sexton Blake titles that Flann O'Brien is supposed to have written under the name of Stephen Blakesley. I've recently bought two of these, and here they are.


Riddle of the Blazing Bungalow by Stephen Blakesley


Man with a Number by Stephen Blakesley

The other title, which I have as yet to get, is The Trail of Raider Number 1. There is one further, almost certainly apocryphal, Sexton Blake title he is meant to have written, called The Cardinal and the Corpse...