370-] English Literature
The
Greatest Peter Milligan Stories Ever Told! Brian Cronin
Published May 24,
2010, 11:51 PM EDT
CBR senior staff
writer Brian Cronin has been writing professionally about comic books for
twenty years now at CBR (primarily with his “Comics Should Be Good” series of
columns, including Comic Book Legends Revealed). He has written two books about
comics for Penguin-Random House – Was Superman a Spy? And Other Comic Book
Legends Revealed and Why Does Batman Carry Shark Repellent? And Other Amazing
Comic Book Trivia! and one book, 100 Things X-Men Fans Should Know & Do Before
They Die, from Triumph Books. His writing has been featured at ESPN.com, the
Los Angeles Times, About.com, the Huffington Post, Vulture and Gizmodo. He
features legends about entertainment and sports and other pop culture features
at Pop Culture References. Follow him on Twitter at @Brian_Cronin and feel free
to e-mail him suggestions for stories about comic books that you'd like to see
featured at brianc@cbr.com!
Every day in May we
will reveal the greatest stories ever told starring a particular character or
written/drawn by a particular creator (and throughout the month, you'll get
daily chances to vote for NEXT week's lists). These lists are voted on by YOU,
the reader!
Here is the list of
characters/creators featured so far (along with the rules on how to vote).
Today's list is the
Greatest Peter Milligan Stories Ever Told!
15. Human Target #1-6
"Strike Zones"
In these issues, the
opening of the ongoing Human Target series by Milligan and Javier Pulido, we're
treated to a number of small stories starring Christopher Chance, a man who
impersonates people to protect them, but after how many impersonations can your
original personality remain intact? Milligan touches on this idea as Chance
impersonates a film producer, an accountant who faked his death on 9/11 and a
baseball superstar.
14. The Extremist
The Extremist (a name
that Brendan McCarthy came up with) shows a woman driven to insanity and murder
by the death of her husband. As she slowly descends into becoming the
Extremist, she discovers that all is not what it seems, but is it too late -
has solving her husband's murder turned her into exactly what the murderer
wants? Ted McKeever drew this dark mini-series.
13. Animal Man #27-32
Few situations are
more unsung that following up a legendary run on a comic book title, and that's
what Milligan had to deal with with his six-issue run on Animal Man following
up Grant Morrison. And yet, in his issues, Milligan managed to continue in the
same spirit of Morrison while providing unique offbeat stories himself. Chas
Truog drew the issues.
12. Batman #452-454
"Dark Knight, Dark City"
Speaking of Morrison,
the current "Return of Bruce Wayne" storyline in Batman involves the
demon Barbathos, who made his debut in this acclaimed three-part story by
Milligan and artist Kieron Dwyer that involves Batman versus a
possessed-by-a-demon Riddler.
11. Skin
This graphic novel,
done with artist Brendan McCarthy, was deemed too controversial to print by
Fleetway, so after it went unpublished for a bit, Tundra stepped up and
published it. It's an extremely raw and strangely compelling look at a young
deformed skinhead in England during the 1970s. The "lead" of the
book, Martin, is repulsive and not because of his deformity (he has seal-like
stubs with hands on them rather than arms and hands) but because of his twisted
ideology - and yet Milligan and McCarthy make it worth following his
misadventures.
10. Spider-Man's
Tangled Web #5-6 "Flowers for Rhino"
Milligan and Duncan
Fegredo combined for this two-part story where they basically just put Rhino
through a riff on "Flowers for Algernon." It works really quite well.
9. X-Force #121-129
"Final Chapter"
Working with a
variety of artists (although Mike Allred as the "main" artist),
Milligan further satirized the very fundamentals of superhero-dom with this
final series of stories featuring the members of X-Force before the book
relaunched as X-Statix. There's an especially compelling multi-part story where
the three "main" members of the team, the Orphan, the Anarchist and
U-Go-Girl, deal with the fact that one of them is "destined" to die.
This series of stories also features a brilliant spotlight issue on U-Go-Girl
drawn by Darwyn Cooke. Also, where else but in a Peter Milligan comic would the
stars of a comic book series get sued by the team that they replaced in the
title over the usage of the name "X-Force"? Classic.
8. 2000 AD #500-519
"Bad Company"
Bad Company debuted
in the 500th issue of 2000 AD, so it was given a nice spotlight and it worked
out nicely, as readers quickly took a liking to the series, which was written
by Milligan and drawn by Brett Ewins. It told the story of a company of
soldiers fighting a war with an alien race called the Krool on the faraway
alien planet, Ararat. We follow young soldier Danny Franks as his own platoon
is wiped out so he joins up with Bad Company, a bizarre group of soldiers led
by Kano, a Frankenstein's monster-esque fellow. As the series' popularity grew,
so too did Milligan's inventiveness with the stories. This is the series that really
put Milligan on the map.
7. Shade the Changing
Man #45-50 "A Season in Hell"
Chris Bachalo says
goodbye to Shade the Changing Man after a long run as artist (although not
every issue, of course, heck, he doesn't even draw every issue this arc) with this
sad, odd, tragic, bizarre and enthralling epic that revolves around Shade
getting Kathy pregnant, which is problematic for some folks who want the baby
dead before it is ever born. Meanwhile, Lenny does not react well to Kathy's
impending motherhood, and things get even ODDER when Lenny's DAUGHTER shows up!
The whole thing wraps up in a devastatingly sad and poignant finale. If Shade
had ended here, this would have been one hell of an ending. Milligan is
brilliant here.
6. Rogan Gosh
Milligan and Brendan
McCarthy spin a wild tale of twisted realities and identities in this one-shot
(that originally appeared in Revolver as a serial) that is named after an
Indian dish (Rogan Josh), which ties into the general plot of the series, which
DOES involve an Indian restaurant, but so much more - including Rudyard
Kipling, the Indian death goddess Kali, a futuristic India and lots of sex
magic! It's a wild ride that Milligan and McCarthy take us on, while making us
appreciate the very medium of comic books, as this story likely could not be
done in any other media.
5. X-Force #116-120
"New Beginnings"
This is the series of
stories that introduced the brand-new X-Force, who exist as a parody of both
superheroes and celebrity culture. This is your post-reality television
superhero team - a group of fame whores and misfits whose deaths are followed
the way you would follow a baseball team's wins and losses. The first issue
makes this very clear as the main hero does not exactly make his way through
the first story. Mike Allred is brilliant on the art and Milligan makes these
heroes compelling AND ridiculous at the same time, which is no easy feat!
4. Shade the Changing
Man #1-6 "American Scream"
Sent to Earth to deal
with a growing "madness" that threatens Earth and his own home, Rac
Shade shows up on Earth by possessing the body of a serial killer who is about
to be killed. Using his "Madness-Vest," which he can use to warp
reality, Shade goes on the road along with Kathy George, a young woman whose
parents were murdered by the man whose body Shade now resides in. As you can
quite imagine, the two are quite the odd couple, as Kathy is dark and death
obsessed while Shade is a bit of a naive poet at heart. Together they explore
the evil "American Scream" that is infecting the Earth with madness
based on American culture. An early example of this is when we learn the OTHER
history of the Kennedy assassination. Using the American Scream as a jumping on
point, Milligan used the series as an exploration of cultural themes in America
and artist Chris Bachalo (working off of designs by Brendan McCarthy) began to
show the skills that would eventually make him a comic art superstar.
3. Skreemer
Working with his Bad
Company collaborator, Brett Ewins, Milligan made his DC Comics debut with
Skreemer, a tale about the rise and fall of a violent giant of a man named Veto
Skreemer who we follow from his early days as an assassin until he is one of
the most powerful gangsters in the world, which is especially notable in this
post-apocalyptic world where gangsters basically rule the country like kings.
However, the days of lawlessness are not going to be here forever, and we see
the beginnings of a new society through the counter-story in the volume, the
Finnegan family (we follow them through many years). This series was noted for
its brutal violence during a time, the late 80s, when such things were not
quite as common.
2. Human Target
(mini-series)
Milligan almost
completely re-imagines the character of Christopher Chance in this mini-series
with artwork by the late, great Edvin Biukovic. Chance is doing his standard "impersonating
someone who is being threatened" deal, but HE is also threatened, so we
discover that his assistant, Tom McPherson, is filling in for Chance himself!!
As you might imagine, lines get blurry and things like "one's own identity"
don't seem as clear cut as they normally are. The artwork is simply amazing.
This eventually led to a great ongoing series by Milligan.
1. Enigma
Enigma is another
brilliant look at the shifting reality of identity, as a young man encounters a
fictional superhero in real life, and the encounter begins a change in the
man's life - but IS it a change or is it just awakening something that was
always there, hidden in the man's personality? That is the type of tricky
question Enigma deals with, and as the title of the book lets you know - the
answer is not a simple one. Duncan Fegredo does a wonderful job on the artwork.
Our own Greg Burgas wrote extensively about this series here - check it out!
That's the list! I'm
sure there is a lot of agreement and disagreement with the list out there! Feel
free to share your thoughts in the comments section!
