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83-522: Peter Milligan (born 24 June 1961) is a British comic book writer who has written extensively for both British and American comic book industries. In the UK, Milligan has contributed to numerous anthology titles including 2000 AD , Revolver , Eagle and A1 , and helped launch the magazine Deadline . In the US, he is best known for his frequent contributions to DC Comics ' Vertigo imprint, which include

166-453: A plot script the artist works from a story synopsis from the writer (or plotter ), rather than a full script. The artist creates page-by-page plot details on their own, after which the work is returned to the writer for the insertion of dialogue. Due to its widespread use at Marvel Comics beginning in the 1960s, primarily under editor-dialogist Stan Lee and writer-artists Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko , this approach became commonly known as

249-416: A 75-cent Vertigo Preview comic featuring a specially written seven-page Sandman story by Gaiman and Kent Williams . In addition, a 16-page Vertigo Sampler was also produced and bundled with copies of Capital City Distribution 's Advance Comics solicitation index. Vertigo publications generally did not take place in a shared universe. However, several of the early series which had begun as part of

332-685: A couple of paragraphs to something much longer and more elaborate". The Marvel method was in place with at least one artist by early 1961, as Lee described in 2009 when speaking of his and Ditko's "short, five-page filler strips ... placed in any of our comics that had a few extra pages to fill", most prominently in Amazing Fantasy but even previously in Amazing Adventures and other " pre-superhero Marvel " science-fiction / fantasy anthology titles. I'd dream up odd fantasy tales with an O. Henry type twist ending. All I had to do

415-404: A plot outline, and is almost always followed by page sketches drawn by a comics artist and inked , succeeded by the coloring and lettering stages. There are no prescribed forms of comic scripts, but there are two dominant styles in the mainstream comics industry , the full script (commonly known as " DC style") and the plot script (or " Marvel house style "). The creator of a script

498-536: A relaunch of Vertigo, independent from DC Black Label. Vertigo originated in 1993 under the stewardship of Karen Berger , a former literature and art-history student, who had joined DC Comics in 1979 as an assistant editor. Berger edited proto-Vertigo titles from the start of her time with DC, beginning in 1981 with House of Mystery . She took over editorship of Alan Moore 's Swamp Thing run from Swamp Thing co-creator Len Wein in 1984, and in 1986 "became DC's British liaison", bringing to DC's pre-Vertigo titles

581-536: A roommate with a modern-day superhero – blasphemous and offensive. The series was cancelled before the first issue was published; Russell and Pace later published the series through Ahoy Comics . Safe Sex by Tina Horn and Mike Dowling was also cancelled before its debut, and later published as SFSX by Image Comics . DC Comics discontinued Vertigo imprint in January 2020. The DC Zoom and DC Ink imprints for children and young adolescents were also eliminated. Under

664-481: A six-issue run in 1990–1991, and became the regular writer of Batman in Detective Comics in the same year. During an editorial meeting, Milligan presented the idea that led to the creation of Azrael , who became Batman during the " Knightfall " crossover. Skin (art by Brendan McCarthy) was the story of a young thalidomide skinhead in 1970s London, and his attempts to deal with his disability and

747-553: A sophistication-driven sensibility the comics fan media dubbed "the Bergerverse". In a 1992 editorial meeting with Levitz, publisher Jenette Kahn , and managing editor Dick Giordano , Berger was given the mandate to place these titles under an imprint that, as Berger described, would "do something different in comics and help the medium 'grow up'". Several DC titles bearing the age advisory, such as Green Arrow , Blackhawk , and The Question (the last two cancelled before

830-531: A spin-off of the Justice League franchise, starring John Constantine and Shade, the Changing Man . up to issue No. 8 (June 2012), following which he moved to Stormwatch from issue No. 9 (July 2012). In 2017 and 2018, he penned the revivals of two classic British properties for Titan Comics , Dan Dare and The Prisoner . Comic book writer In comics, a script may be preceded by

913-743: A title whose "sensibilities echo crime genre fiction ". Joining it was J. M. DeMatteis and Paul Johnson's 64-page one-shot Mercy . New series that began in the months that followed include Kid Eternity (ongoing) by Ann Nocenti and Sean Phillips (continuing from the earlier Morrison-penned limited series), Grant Morrison and Steve Yeowell 's three-issue steampunk limited series Sebastian O (another ex-Touchmark project), Skin Graft by Jerry Prosser and Warren Pleece , The Last One by DeMatteis and Dan Sweetman , Jonah Hex : Two-Gun Mojo by Tim Truman and Sam Glanzman , Black Orchid (ongoing) by Dick Foreman and Jill Thompson (continuing from

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996-418: Is known as a comics writer . In this style, the comics writer breaks the story down in sequence, page-by-page and panel-by-panel, describing the action, characters, and sometimes backgrounds and "camera" points-of-view of each panel, as well as all captions and dialogue balloons. For decades, this was the preferred format for books published by DC Comics . Peter David described his specific application of

1079-465: Is strongly associated with the imprint for his work on Swamp Thing and his creation of John Constantine, but he never produced work for the Vertigo imprint, having refused to work for parent company DC in the late 1980s. His Swamp Thing work and the V for Vendetta reprint-maxiseries were retroactively collected as Vertigo-issued TPBs. Grant Morrison left Animal Man and Doom Patrol before

1162-452: The Marvel method or Marvel house style . Comics historian Mark Evanier writes that this "new means of collaboration . . . was born of necessity—Stan was overburdened with work—and to make use of Jack's great skill with storylines. . . . Sometimes Stan would type up a written plot outline for the artist. Sometimes, not". As comic-book writer-editor Dennis O'Neil describes,

1245-544: The Paradox Press "Big Book" series as well as several other non-comics works. He edited Harvey Pekar 's Vertigo work: The Quitter hardcover and eight issues of Pekar's American Splendor autobiographical series. His other Vertigo editing credits include The Exterminators , Douglas Rushkoff 's Testament , novelist Denise Mina 's run on Hellblazer , Incognegro by Mat Johnson , and The Alcoholic by novelist and essayist Jonathan Ames . Alan Moore

1328-560: The " Season of Mists " storyline, and Gaiman's own return to the mythos with the hardcover Sandman: Endless Nights collection of short stories spotlighting the seven members of the Endless (an eight-page Endless Nights Preview issue was also released before the hardcover). Berger oversaw the entire Vertigo line, and was promoted to the position of "Senior Vice President—Executive Editor, Vertigo" in July 2006. Her promotion came as Vertigo

1411-450: The "Vertigo Voices" titles in 1995, as well as Shadows Fall , Ghostdancing , Egypt , Millennium Fever and both Tank Girl miniseries. Young's last editorial credit for Vertigo was Flex Mentallo #1 (June 1996). Shelly Bond was Vertigo's executive editor until 2016. Berger hired her as an assistant editor in the winter of 1992, making her the last of the original Vertigo team to join. Bond worked on many of Vertigo's top titles over

1494-540: The 1980s, which began after DC stopped submitting The Saga of the Swamp Thing for approval by the Comics Code Authority . Following the success of two adult-oriented 1986 limited series , Batman: The Dark Knight Returns and Watchmen , DC's output of mature readers titles, edited by Karen Berger , grew. By 1992, DC's mature readers' line was editorially separate from its main line and Berger

1577-531: The 2008 one-shot Moon Knight : Silent Knight , with artist Laurence Campbell . In 2010, Milligan was announced as the writer for Batman #703, a prelude to the " Bruce Wayne: The Road Home " crossover storyline, although he later clarified that he was not involved in the production of the issue. Following DC's 2011 relaunch , Milligan became the writer of Red Lanterns , an ongoing series which debuted in September 2011. He wrote Justice League Dark ,

1660-544: The British tabloid newspaper The Daily Mail , which strongly objected. Eventually the character was altered, as were the references to the British Royal Family . X-Statix was cancelled with issue No. 26 (Oct. 2004). Milligan wrote issues #166–187 of X-Men , teamed with artist Salvador Larroca , in 2005. He returned to The Human Target with the graphic novel Final Cut , followed by all 21 issues of

1743-539: The Changing Man (starting with #33), The Sandman (#47), Hellblazer (#63), Animal Man (#57), Swamp Thing (#129), and Doom Patrol (#64, with new writer Rachel Pollack ). The first comic book published under the "Vertigo" imprint was the first issue of Death: The High Cost of Living , a three-issue series by Neil Gaiman and Chris Bachalo . The second new title was the first issue of Enigma , an 8-issue limited series initially planned to launch Touchmark, written by Peter Milligan (also author of Shade,

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1826-461: The Changing Man for DC Comics . This proved his most successful American comic, and came at the end of the first wave of the " British Invasion ". With issue No. 33 (March 1993), it became part of the Vertigo imprint. It was cancelled with issue No. 70 (April 1996). A one-off story marking Vertigo's tenth anniversary was published in 2003. Milligan succeeded Grant Morrison on Animal Man for

1909-400: The Changing Man vol. 2, fantasy series The Sandman vol. 2, and horror titles Hellblazer and The Saga of the Swamp Thing . She also edited limited series such as Kid Eternity , Black Orchid (Gaiman's first work for DC) and The Books of Magic limited series. These six ongoing titles, all of which carried a "Suggested for Mature Readers" label on their covers, shared

1992-403: The Changing Man ) and drawn by Duncan Fegredo , the artist from Grant Morrison's earlier Kid Eternity limited series. The following month saw the debut of Sandman: Mystery Theatre by Matt Wagner and Steven T. Seagle , and illustrated primarily by Guy Davis , described as "playing the '30s with a '90s feel... haunting, film noir -ish...", and starring original Sandman Wesley Dodds in

2075-442: The Changing Man . He later edited Doom Patrol , Animal Man , Kid Eternity , and Black Orchid , as well as two "Vertigo Visions" one-shots. Peyer left editing behind in 1994, returning to DC as a writer. Stuart Moore edited a wide range of Vertigo titles between 1991 and 2000, including Swamp Thing , Books of Magic , Hellblazer , The Invisibles , Preacher and Transmetropolitan . One of his most important contributions to

2158-527: The Cutting Edge of Comics was a 2000 collection of artwork from various Vertigo titles, with commentary by Alisa Kwitney. The Vertigo Voices featured creator-owned "distinctive one-shot stories". The short-lived "Vérité" line, evoking the realism of Cinéma vérité , "was a 1996–98 attempt to promote new Vertigo projects devoid of the supernatural qualities that had gotten to define the publisher". The " fifth-week event " brand V2K (Vertigo 2000),

2241-468: The Marvel method "requires the writer to begin by writing out a plot and add[ing] words when the penciled artwork is finished. . . .[I]n the mid-sixties, plots were seldom more than a typewritten page, and sometimes less", while writers in later times "might produce as many as twenty-five pages of plot for a twenty-two page story, and even include in them snatches of dialog. So a Marvel Method plot can run from

2324-416: The Marvel method over the full script method that have been cited by creators and industry professionals include: Cited disadvantages include: In a variation of the plot script, attributed to Harvey Kurtzman , the writer breaks down the story into page roughs or thumbnail sketches, with captions and dialogue jotted down inside the roughs. The artist (who is often the comic's writer as well) then fleshes out

2407-559: The Steve Ditko-inspired " Bix Barton ". This was first run as a black and white strip for its first outing, "Barton's Beasts"; the second strip was called "Carry On Barton" (originally "Carry On Snuffing"). The strip was very popular and was a precursor of "Devlin Waugh" and others. In 1989 he had his first work published by DC Comics . Skreemer was a six-issue mini-series (May 1989 – October 1989) drawn by Brett Ewins that

2490-592: The Touchmark line was cancelled, the project moved to DC's newly launched Vertigo line in 1993. Milligan quickly followed this up with The Extremist with artist Ted McKeever . Both titles dealt with taboo subjects for a mainstream publisher, but were applauded for their handling of these subjects. Milligan and artist Mike Deodato launched the Elektra series for Marvel Comics in November 1996. Milligan spent

2573-542: The Vertigo imprint celebrated its 10th anniversary by branding its books cover-dated April 2003 to February 2004 (i.e. released between February and December 2003 ) with the label Vertigo X . This special subtitle was debuted on the Vertigo X Anniversary Preview (April 2003), a 48-page special previewing Vertigo's upcoming projects and featuring a short Shade, the Changing Man story by Peter Milligan and Mike Allred. Other projects highlighted included Death: At Death's Door , Jill Thompson 's first manga -ized version of

Peter Milligan - Misplaced Pages Continue

2656-408: The Vertigo launch. His Shade, the Changing Man was launched in 1991, pre-Vertigo, and ran 70 issues until 1996, by which time it was under the Vertigo imprint. He also wrote the creator-owned eight-issue miniseries Enigma (1993). Milligan and Brett Ewins 's 1989 mini-series Skreemer was subsequently collected by Vertigo. Milligan also wrote both a Human Target mini-series and ongoing series,

2739-428: The artist draws the story to fit all of this paste-up. This laborious and restrictive way of creating comics is no longer in general use; the last artist to use even a variation of EC style was Jim Aparo . Vertigo (DC Comics) Vertigo Comics (also known as DC Vertigo or simply Vertigo ) is an imprint of American comic book publisher DC Comics started by editor Karen Berger in 1993. Vertigo's purpose

2822-525: The book's Rob Liefeld -styled team with a more satirical one: the Orphan , the Anarchist , U-Go Girl , Phat , Vivisector , Venus Dee Milo , Dead Girl and Doop . X-Force was cancelled with issue No. 129 (August 2002), and replaced by a new title, X-Statix , with Milligan and Allred continuing as the creative force. Milligan proposed a character based on a resurrected Princess Diana . News spread to

2905-484: The books did not have a consistent " house style " of art, the cover designs of early Vertigo series featured a uniform trade dress with a vertical bar along the left side, which included the imprint logo, pricing, date, and issue numbers. The design layout continued with very little variation until issues cover-dated July 2002 (including Fables #1) which introduced an across-the-top layout ahead of 2003's "Vertigo X" 10th anniversary celebration. The "distinctive design"

2988-965: The characters from Neil Gaiman's series, written by other creators. Other long-running series have been The Invisibles by Grant Morrison and various artists (1994–2000); Preacher by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon (1995–2000); Transmetropolitan by Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson (1997–2002); 100 Bullets by Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso (1999–2009); Lucifer by Mike Carey , Peter Gross , and Ryan Kelly (2000–2006); Y: The Last Man by Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra (2002–2008); Daytripper by Fábio Moon and Gabriel Bá (2010); DMZ by Brian Wood and Riccardo Burchielli (2005–2012); and Fables by Bill Willingham , Mark Buckingham , and various other artists (2002–2015), which launched spin-offs including Jack of Fables by Willingham, Lilah Sturges (credited as "Matthew Sturges"), and various artists (2006–2011), and Fairest by Willingham and various artists (2012–2015). In 2003,

3071-545: The coming year, under Doyle's editorship. These included a new sub-imprint based on Neil Gaiman's Sandman with four new ongoing series, announced in March, and seven new series announced in June. The relaunch experienced a number of complications. Border Town by Eric M. Esquivel and Ramon Villalobos dealt with immigration and Latino identity, for which Esquivel received death threats in advance of its publication. The series

3154-405: The course of her tenure, including The Sandman , Shade, the Changing Man , Sandman Mystery Theatre , iZombie , Paul Pope 's Heavy Liquid , Fables , Ed Brubaker 's Deadenders , David Lapham 's Young Liars , Mike Carey 's Lucifer , and The Invisibles . She was promoted to executive editor and vice president of Vertigo Comics in 2013, taking the place of Berger. In April 2016, Bond

3237-628: The decade by writing a The Human Target four-issue miniseries (April 1999 – July 1999). Milligan's film work includes the screenplay for Pilgrim (2000, also known as Inferno ), starring Ray Liotta . He scripted the 2002 adaptation of the Melvin Burgess novel An Angel for May . In 2001, Marvel Comics' new editor-in-chief Joe Quesada began revamping the X-Men family of titles. Milligan and artist Mike Allred took over X-Force with issue No. 116 (July 2001), and immediately replaced

3320-461: The earlier Gaiman/McKean limited series), The Extremist by Peter Milligan and Ted McKeever , Scarab by John Smith with Scot Eaton and Mike Barreiro, and The Children's Crusade , a crossover involving several of the imprint's ongoing series. The Books of Magic limited series was relaunched as an ongoing series written by John Ney Rieber , and illustrated by Peter Gross (later also writer), Gary Amaro, and Peter Snejbjerg . Although

3403-536: The early 1980s. By 1986, Milligan had his first ongoing strip in 2000AD called " Bad Company ", with artists Brett Ewins and Jim McCarthy . "Bad Company" was a popular future war story and helped Milligan become better known. Concurrently, Milligan, Ewins and Brendan McCarthy had been working on the anthology title, Strange Days for Eclipse Comics . Strange Days featured three strips, " Paradax ", " Freakwave ", and " Johnny Nemo ". Milligan, McCarthy and Ewins produced three issues of this psychedelic comic, it

Peter Milligan - Misplaced Pages Continue

3486-512: The four-issue DC/ Helix miniseries Bloody Mary (1996–7) – have had collections released under the Vertigo label. Rachel Pollack , who was writing Doom Patrol when Vertigo launched, continued on that title until #87 (Feb. 1995), the final issue. She is known for creating the first openly trans superhero, Coagula . She also penned two "Vertigo Visions" specials — 1993's The Geek and 1998's Tomahawk . Nancy A. Collins , who wrote Swamp Thing #110–138 (Aug. 1991 – Dec. 1993), also wrote

3569-437: The full script method: "I break down each page on a panel by panel basis and label them as PANEL A, PANEL B, and so on. Then I describe what's in each panel, and then do the dialogue, numbering the balloons. I designate the panels with letters and the word balloons with numbers so as to minimize confusion for the letterer". In addition to writing the scripts, Jim Shooter drew layouts for the artist in his early work for DC. In

3652-433: The general character of Vertigo, have been reprinted under this imprint. This has included V for Vendetta , earlier issues of Vertigo's ongoing launch series, and books from discontinued imprints such as Transmetropolitan (initially under DC's short-lived sci-fi Helix imprint) and A History of Violence (originally part of the Paradox Press line ). Two of the new ongoing series did not last long; Kid Eternity

3735-414: The head of Vertigo was filled by Shelly Bond , who had begun editing for the imprint in 1993. However, in 2016, DC "restructured" Vertigo, eliminating Bond's position, and oversight of Vertigo was placed under Jamie S. Rich , until May 2017 when Mark Doyle became the new editor. In 2018, DC Comics announced a "line-wide relaunch and rebranding" as "DC Vertigo", including 11 new ongoing titles planned for

3818-494: The imprint's publishing plans with the limited series Enigma , Sebastian O , Mercy , and Shadows Fall . Vertigo was launched in January 1993 with a mixture of existing ongoing series continued under the new imprint, new ongoing and limited series, and single-volume collections or graphic novels. Their publishing plan for the first year involved two new titles – whether ongoing/limited series or one-shots – each month. The existing series (cover date March 1993) were Shade,

3901-566: The imprint: Art Young started out as Karen Berger's assistant and worked on pre-Vertigo issues of Animal Man , Hellblazer , Swamp Thing , The Sandman , Doom Patrol , Books of Magic , Skreemer , and Kid Eternity . He then left DC in 1991 to work for Disney in setting up Touchmark, before returning with those projects to Vertigo in early 1993, when he edited debut title Enigma , and later miniseries and one-shots such as Sebastian O , The Extremist , Mercy , Rogan Gosh , The Mystery Play , and Tank Girl: The Moovy . He edited all four of

3984-500: The individuals who would be instrumental in the creation and evolution of Vertigo seven years later, including Neil Gaiman , Jamie Delano , Peter Milligan , and Grant Morrison . She "found their sensibility and point of view to be refreshingly different, edgier and smarter" than those of most American comics writers. Berger edited several new or revived series with these writers, including superhero / science fiction series such as Animal Man , Doom Patrol vol. 2, and Shade,

4067-438: The launch of The Sandman for DC Comics, a title that became the backbone of the initial Vertigo line-up. His Death mini-series was part of the Vertigo launch, and his work on the first The Books of Magic miniseries (also released as a DC title, 1990–91) laid the groundwork for the long-running Vertigo Universe series of the same name, which featured young wizard Timothy Hunter . Peter Milligan contributed two titles to

4150-430: The launch of Vertigo), did not make the transition to the new imprint. Meanwhile, Disney Comics and former DC editor Art Young had been developing an imprint to be called Touchmark Comics, analogous to Disney's mature-audiences Touchstone Pictures studio. This project was abandoned following the so-called "Disney Implosion" of 1991 . Young and those works were brought into the Vertigo fold, allowing Berger to expand

4233-634: The launch of Vertigo, but their work on those titles was similarly retroactively branded as "Vertigo" when collected. They wrote three volumes of The Invisibles between 1994 and 2000 . In addition, they had produced a number of one-shots and miniseries including Sebastian O (1993), The Mystery Play (1994), Kill Your Boyfriend (1995), the Doom Patrol spin-off Flex Mentallo (1996), The Filth (2002–03), Seaguy (2004), Vimanarama (2005), We3 (2004–05) and Joe The Barbarian (2010). Neil Gaiman came to prominence four years pre-Vertigo with

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4316-663: The lead-in Batman Annual No. 26, as well as the parts of the storyline in the Robin monthly title. Milligan scripted for the BBC interactive animated series Meta4orce and the Sub-Mariner : The Depths limited series for Marvel's Marvel Knights imprint. In late 2008, Milligan was named writer for the long-running Vertigo series Hellblazer , and wrote that imprint's Greek Street , Additionally, for Marvel, he wrote

4399-478: The line was hiring Garth Ennis to write Hellblazer . He helped start the DC imprint Helix , and brought Transmetropolitan to Vertigo after Helix's demise. Axel Alonso began his editorial career at Vertigo editing titles like Hellblazer , Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso 's 100 Bullets , and Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon 's Preacher . He left Vertigo for Marvel Comics in 2000 and eventually ascended to

4482-460: The main DC Universe had a "crossover" in 1993-94: The Children's Crusade . The event "did not yield smashing results" or garnered many positive reviews, in large part due to its "gimmicky" nature, which ran counter to Vertigo's quirky, non-mainstream appeal and customer-base. The event was defended as "no marketing ploy" by one of the event's editors, Lou Stathis, who wrote of his dislike of

4565-569: The monthly comics in volumes, which were also sold in general-interest bookshops. Vertigo's success in popularizing this approach, beginning with Sandman , led to a wider take-up in the American comics industry of routinely reprinting monthly series in this format. Vertigo Visions was an irregular series of self-contained short stories featuring characters from the DC Universe, reinterpreted or recontextualized. Vertigo Visions: Artwork from

4648-454: The new plan, all of the company's comics were published under the "DC" brand, and categorized by intended reader age: DC Kids (8–12 years), DC (13+), and DC Black Label (17+). The Sandman -related titles retained their new branding as " The Sandman Universe ". In October 2024 at New York Comic Con , DC announced the Vertigo imprint would be returning after its discontinuation in 2020. Chris Conroy, editor of DC Black Label, confirmed not only

4731-413: The often "crass manipulation" of crossover events, defending The Children's Crusade as having come not from marketing, but the writers' minds, and therefore being "story-driven" rather than manipulative. The crossover did not become an annual event, however — indeed, "annuals" linked to Vertigo series rarely reappeared after this event. Works previously published by DC under other imprints, but which fit

4814-430: The one-shots The Eaters and Face for the "Vertigo Voices" sub-imprint, and a number of other miniseries, including The Extremist , Tank Girl: The Odyssey , Egypt , Girl , The Minx , and Vertigo Pop!: London . Jamie Delano was the original writer of Vertigo's flagship series Hellblazer , which spun-off from Moore's run on Swamp Thing . Moore himself recommended Jamie Delano for Hellblazer . Delano left

4897-433: The proto- and early Vertigo titles Sandman , Shade , Kid Eternity , Books of Magic , Death: The High Cost of Living and Sandman Mystery Theatre . As the imprint's initial ongoing series came to their ends, new series were launched to replace them, with varying degrees of success. The Sandman was replaced following its completion by The Dreaming (1996–2001) and The Sandman Presents , which featured stories about

4980-548: The publishing model in which monthly series sold through comic book shops are periodically collected into editions which are kept in print for bookstore sale. As DC's most popular and enduring imprint, several Vertigo series won the comics industry's Eisner Award , including for "best continuing series", and were adapted to film and television. The imprint began to decline in the 2010s, as certain properties like Hellblazer and Swamp Thing were re-integrated into DC's main comic books, while Berger departed in 2013. Berger's departure

5063-489: The relaunch of the imprint, but also that he would also be running Vertigo as well. In addition, James Tynion IV and Álvaro Martínez Bueno's series The Nice House by the Sea was announced to be switching from releasing under DC Black Label to releasing under Vertigo. Similarly, The Sandman Universe line of books will be folded back into the imprint as well. In addition to Berger, several other editors have become linked to

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5146-545: The remainder of the decade writing one-off specials such as Face and The Eaters , or miniseries like Egypt and Tank Girl The Odyssey (with its co-creator Jamie Hewlett providing art), as well as acting as advisory editor to Paul Honeyford 's Fighting Figurines . Milligan and Brendan McCarthy's psychedelic comic Rogan Gosh was reprinted in a collected edition by Vertigo in 1996, after being first serialised six years earlier in Revolver . Milligan rounded out

5229-538: The revamped DC properties Shade, the Changing Man and Human Target , a four-year run on the imprint's premier title Hellblazer , and original series Enigma , The Extremist , Egypt and Greek Street , as well as the Marvel series X-Statix , co-created by Milligan and artist Mike Allred . Milligan started his comic career with Sounds music paper's comic strip The Electric Hoax , with Brendan McCarthy , with whom he went to art school. Milligan later moved to write short stories for 2000 AD in

5312-413: The role of editor-in-chief, a title he held until 2017. Will Dennis attended film school with Bond, who later recruited him as an assistant editor. He was promoted to editor a few months after Alonso departured for Marvel. Dennis took over the editing of 100 Bullets and later edited Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra 's Y: The Last Man and Vaughan's Pride of Baghdad graphic novel. Dennis

5395-562: The roughs onto full-size art board. Writer/artists Frank Miller and Jeff Smith favor this style, as did Archie Goodwin . Attributed to William Gaines (Kurtzman's publisher at EC Comics ), the EC style is similar to the Kurtzman style, except the writer submits a tight plot to an artist, who breaks it down into panels that are laid out on the art board. The writer writes all captions and dialogue, which are pasted inside these panels, and then

5478-401: The series in 1991, before the launch of Vertigo, and was writing the imprint's Animal Man series at the time. His other Vertigo works included Outlaw Nation , Ghostdancing , and two Hellblazer miniseries, The Horrorist and Hellblazer Special: Bad Blood . Garth Ennis took over Hellblazer from Delano and wrote it at the time of Vertigo's launch. Ennis's best-known Vertigo work

5561-520: The subsequent series for Vertigo. In 2006, he wrote the X-Statix Presents: Dead Girl five-issue miniseries for Marvel collaborating with artist Nick Dragotta and co-creator Mike Allred. The following year he wrote an Infinity, Inc. limited series for DC and The Programme for Wildstorm , starring a Soviet Cold War superhero. Milligan was involved in 2007's Batman crossover, " The Resurrection of Ra's al Ghul ", by writing

5644-619: The world in general. The strip was due to feature in Crisis in 1990 but the publishers Fleetway were worried by the controversial subject matter, plus they were concerned with the use of explicit language in the story. The printers refused to print it, blaming the graphic language and controversial subject matter as a reason. The story remained in limbo until eventually being published as a graphic novel by Tundra Press to little controversy. Milligan and artist Duncan Fegredo created Enigma for Disney Comics ' planned Touchmark imprint. When

5727-458: Was a "much hyped concept" whose titles were designed to "usher...in the new millennium" and, as such, several of them were limited series rather than one-shots. The Vertigo Pop limited series were designed "to be about pop culture around the globe in some vaguely defined way". At the 2008 Comic-Con International Karen Berger outlined plans for a new "sub-imprint" called Vertigo Crime, a line of graphic novels, in black and white, hardcover. It

5810-492: Was cancelled after 16 issues, and Black Orchid continued for only 22. Sandman Mystery Theatre and most of the pre-existing series continued for several years, including Sandman which reached its planned conclusion with #75. Hellblazer was the last of the original ongoing series to be canceled, ceasing publication in February 2013 with #300. Berger won Eisner Awards for her editing in 1992, 1994 and 1995 for her work on

5893-459: Was fired by DC Comics after restructuring. "Shelly will never get full credit for all of the amazing things she did at Vertigo", Mike Allred wrote in 2016 in a tribute to Bond that featured many of the creators she worked with over the years. Tom Peyer was a founding editor of Vertigo. Tom was editor in 1990 with Karen Berger what would become the pillars of Vertigo: Hellblazer , Sandman (taking over from Art Young), Swamp Thing and Shade,

5976-430: Was followed by a series of editorial restructures, culminating in the imprint's relaunch as DC Vertigo in 2018, but the relaunch suffered a multitude of setbacks, including numerous cancellations. Vertigo imprint was discontinued in January 2020 by DC Comics as part of a plan to publish all the company's comics under a single banner, with DC Black Label taking its place as DC's mature readers' imprint. In 2024, DC announced

6059-615: Was give Steve a one-line description of the plot and he'd be off and running. He'd take those skeleton outlines I had given him and turn them into classic little works of art that ended up being far cooler than I had any right to expect. The October 2018 issue of DC Comics' in-house previews magazine, DC Nation , featured a look at the creative process that writer Brian Michael Bendis and artists Ryan Sook , Wade von Grawbadger and Brad Anderson employed on Action Comics #1004, which included pages of Bendis' script that were broken down panel by panel, albeit without dialogue. Advantages of

6142-721: Was given permission to start her own imprint. Vertigo was launched in January 1993, with a mix of existing DC ongoing series and new series. The first original Vertigo series was Death: The High Cost of Living , a Sandman spin-off featuring the character Death . Although its initial publications were primarily in the horror and fantasy genres, over time Vertigo published works dealing with crime, social commentary , speculative fiction , biography, and other genres. Vertigo also adopted works previously published by DC under other imprints, such as V for Vendetta and Transmetropolitan . The imprint pioneered in North America

6225-573: Was his and artist Steve Dillon 's creator-owned Preacher , which ran for 66 issues and six spin-off specials between 1995 and 2000. Ennis has also written several miniseries for Vertigo, including Goddess (1995–96), Pride & Joy (1997), Unknown Soldier (1997), and Adventures in the Rifle Brigade (2001–02), as well as eight one-shot War Stories between 2001 and 2003. Two of his pre-Vertigo works — True Faith (serialized in Crisis) and

6308-434: Was intended to be used on "all Vertigo books except the hardcovers, trade paperbacks, and graphic novels". Berger noted that DC was "very" committed to the line, having put a "lot of muscle behind" promoting it, including a promotional launch kit made available to "[r]etailers who order[ed] at least 25 copies of the February issue of Sandman [#47]", a "platinum edition" variant cover for Death: The High Cost of Living #1 and

6391-509: Was launched in 2009 with two titles: Brian Azzarello 's Filthy Rich and Ian Rankin 's Dark Entries , the latter featuring John Constantine . Each volume features a cover illustration by Lee Bermejo . Vertigo Crime ended as a sub-imprint in 2011. The following original graphic novels have been published under the Vertigo Crime imprint (in order of publication): Karen Berger left the company in March 2013. Berger's position at

6474-436: Was not a great seller but it picked up a small, loyal readership. The most conventional strip, "Johnny Nemo", had its own series, while the more quirky "Paradax" had a two-issue series published by Vortex Comics in 1987. By 1989 Milligan was swapping between strips such as "Bad Company", while still writing material in 2000AD , such as " Hewligan's Haircut " with artist Jamie Hewlett . Milligan and artist Jim McCarthy created

6557-427: Was responsible for bringing writers Brian Wood ( DMZ ) and Jason Aaron ( Scalped ) to Vertigo and teamed writer Andy Diggle and artist Jock on their breakout series The Losers . He was the editor who presided over the Vertigo Crime line of graphic novels. Jonathan Vankin was hired as an editor at Vertigo in 2004 after previously writing two of the line's Vertigo Pop miniseries and several entries in

6640-402: Was said to be equivalent to "the fourth largest American comic book publisher" in 2005, with Paul Levitz praising her personally as having "built Vertigo into an imprint which is simultaneously one of comics' leading creative and commercial successes". The financial success of many Vertigo titles relied not on monthly issue sales, but on the subsequent "trade paperback" editions that reprinted

6723-532: Was somewhat lost in the midst of the so-called "British Invasion" of American comics of the time. A dark post-apocalyptic gangster story, it did receive critical acclaim but did not sell well. Milligan was soon to become a regular writer for DC while still working on his more personal comics in the United Kingdom in comics such as 2000 AD , and its spin-off titles Crisis and Revolver . The 1990s saw Milligan revamp Steve Ditko 's character Shade,

6806-443: Was to publish comics with adult content , such as nudity, drug use, profanity, and graphic violence, that did not fit the restrictions of DC's main line, thus allowing more creative freedom. Its titles consisted of company-owned comics set in the DC Universe , such as The Sandman and Hellblazer , and creator-owned works, such as Preacher , Y: The Last Man and Fables . Vertigo grew out of DC's mature readers' line of

6889-492: Was well received by critics, but after four issues were published, Esquivel was accused of sexually and emotionally abusing a former partner. Villalobos and colorist Tamra Bonvillain withdrew from the project, and DC cancelled the series, including issues that were ready for publication. Meanwhile, Second Coming by Mark Russell and Richard Pace came under criticism from Christians and conservatives who considered its announced premise – in which Jesus Christ returns and lives as

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