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Did nineties editorial really get it so wrong?

Started by Frank, 16 December, 2015, 05:40:54 PM

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Colin YNWA

Quote from: Skullmo on 19 December, 2015, 09:34:08 PM
The pat mills haters thread - I'm out.

Oh no this is turning into a reasonably reflecting (with our limited understanding) the role of an individual in a larger story of the history of something we love that took a dip and reflecting that onto a section of that individual's work in a balanced manner hating thread - I'm out....

... oh hold on that would be unreasonable wouldn't it...

Hawkmumbler

Yeah, just to be clear, i'm not a fan of Pat Mill's. I joke about how heavy handed his resent slew of title's has been and this current run of ABC's got off to a terrible start.

But damnit, he wrote Nemesis the Warlock. The Black Hole. Large parts of The Cursed Earth. I really like Defoe, and outside of the prog he wrote one of my all time favorite works of fiction, Charley's War.

Ol' Pat is fine by me.

ZenArcade

He did write some teethgrinding stuff in the 90's: Finn being a particular dislike. However the tktality of his work is awe inspiring. The 90's ennui was, I feel, resultant from many more factors than Pat Mills dip in form. Z
Ed is dead, baby Ed is...Ed is dead

NapalmKev

I think it's worth noting that although a lot of long-term reader's may have left during the Nineties(because of allegedly Bad stories) quite a few new readers joined at that time also. I'm guessing those that joined were enticed by the stories and artwork that other's (who left) didn't like*

Cheers

*Personal taste, and all that Jazz
"Where once you fought to stop the trap from closing...Now you lay the bait!"

NapalmKev

Quote from: ZenArcade on 20 December, 2015, 10:10:42 AMHe did write some teethgrinding stuff in the 90's: Finn being a particular dislike. However the tktality of his work is awe inspiring. The 90's ennui was, I feel, resultant from many more factors than Pat Mills dip in form. Z

Have to disagree. I personally like 'Finn' and could quite happily never see 'Slaine' in the Prog again.

Cheers
"Where once you fought to stop the trap from closing...Now you lay the bait!"

ZenArcade

I acknowledge your disagreement and accept it within the context of forum harmony. Z :D
Ed is dead, baby Ed is...Ed is dead

Jim_Campbell

Quote from: Tordelback on 20 December, 2015, 12:26:54 AM
Mills' intro to the Slaine:Lord of Beasts collection devotes half a page to specific editorial interference on Secret Commonwealth (the lowpoint for Slaine IMO, at a time when much of the rest of the comic was thriving under Diggle) in terms of content, structure, pacing, language and even enforced adherence to the 'rules of drama', so perhaps this is one where editorial input really was the issue...

This rather gets us to the nub of the problem. I picked Secret Commonwealth simply as the series most immediately available in my memory as a terrible Mills strip, but I think it's fair to say there was a sizeable section of the readership who felt Pat's heart wasn't in it for an extended period culminating (more or less) in the mess that was the Secret Commonwealth — there's a fairly notorious ABC Warriors script where they don't leave their hotel room for the first two episodes that certainly wasn't the fault of meddling editors.

So... I'm sure where Pat sees destructive interference in Secret Commonwealth, Andy and/or David might (perhaps justifiably) claim necessary remedial changes.

And here, really, is the chicken-and-eggy crux of it. Was Pat's heart not in it because of constant editorial intereference and a feeling that the editorial team was hostile towards him, or did the editorial team feel the need to make changes and reject proposals because Pat's heart clearly wasn't in it? It's obvious, when you think about it, that both of those assessments could be true, depending from which side of the fence you're viewing it.

It's worth nothing that the recipients of Pat's ire often remember the offending incidents very differently to Pat himself. By way of example: both Nemesis Book X and the follow-up Deadlock series were widely lauded as a return to form for Mills. Pat claims that despite the popularity of Deadlock, Andy 'refused' to commission any further series. Andy, by contrast, recalls rejecting Pat's first proposal for a Deadlock sequel and then simply never receiving a follow-up pitch.

Cheers

Jim

Stupidly Busy Letterer: Samples. | Blog
Less-Awesome-Artist: Scribbles.

Frank

Quote from: NapalmKev on 20 December, 2015, 10:15:21 AM
although a lot of long-term reader's may have left during the Nineties (because of allegedly Bad stories) quite a few new readers joined at that time also.

I take your point, but 2000ad has lost readers regardless of what kind of stories it was printing*.

Most people don't read comics as adults, and turning up at college in a Rogue Trooper t-shirt doesn't make you a hit with the ladies. That was always the case, but in the late eighties the supply of new kid readers dried up.

Not just for 2000ad, but for any comic - the kids who started reading comics opted for licensed properties like Transformers or TMNT, a trend which continues to this day. What happened to 2000ad happened to every original UK title (and US comics too).



*1987-1994: Burton/McKenzie (100k readers, down to 50k readers)
  1994-2001: Tomlinson/Bishop/Diggle  (50k readers, down to 25k readers)
  2001-2013: Matt Smith (25k readers, down to 15k readers)

Leigh S

As a reader, it immediately felt like Pat was targeting the wrong person/people when claiming Bishop and (particularly) Diggle were the nadir.  As a reader, you saw the comic improve, and both (again, particularly Diggle) were convinced that the key to recovery was to return to the comics roots - Pat's own belief.

However, it is fair to say that there appears to have been a more antagonistic "personal" relationship during those years on both sides which has coloured Pat's opinion.  So I can see why Pat feels (for example) that Andy had no right to reject, challenge or change things, or that at some point he was doing this only  to assert his authority as editor - hence what seemed a very paranoid Pat "banning" fanzines from using his characters for a while. Whether his beliefs had any basis in fact is hard to judge - I know that I witnessed editorial (and creative) droids throw subtle and sometimes less subtle digs at Pat at fan events like DreddCon... though again, chicken and egg - was it Mill's (well documented as fiery) behaviour that was the architect of such ill feeling, where other editorial had just kept their heads down? Pat is such a gent in interviews and signings, and very passionate about what he created - he is very protective and likely worn very thin by the crap the comic had to go through over the years - I can understand that he might have a short fuse about anything he detected as more interference? 

My take is that Bishop and Diggle cared enough to try and challenge what was going on, and this led to some misunderstandings and clashes that sadly became bitter and personal rather than professional and potentially constructive.  Matt clearly knows how to handle Pat - on the evidence of his recent material, I would say he is getting good results, though it's crying shame that at the heart of it,  Diggle and Mills seemed to be not far off the same page as to what needed to be done

Colin YNWA

Quote from: Tordelback on 20 December, 2015, 12:26:54 AM
Mills' intro to the Slaine:Lord of Beasts collection devotes half a page to specific editorial interference on Secret Commonwealth (the lowpoint for Slaine IMO, at a time when much of the rest of the comic was thriving under Diggle) in terms of content, structure, pacing, language and even enforced adherence to the 'rules of drama', so perhaps this is one where editorial input really was the issue...

So here's where I throw another spanner into the already spanner packed works that are the chances of the board ever getting to consensus on this. See while I know a lot of people think Andy Diggle is the bees knees, and while I defo see a lot of good he did I have some real issues with his time as editor (as I've whittered on about at length) and while it was in some ways a step in the right direction, it was only that, a step and the real change didn't come until Matt Smith was a couple of years into his rein and seemed to have developed his own 'style' (whether that's true of course I haven't a clue, just how it appears to me.)

My big issue with Mr Diggle is his mandate of short stories - or a shot glass of thrill power. He seemed to limit stories to 8 parts, maybe 10 at a push (by and large I'm sure some smarty pants will now pop to Barney and role out a load of exceptions!). Often I found this strangled potentially fantastic stories and compressed things too far.

The thing that bugged me about this in particular is his statement (no don't ask me to back this up but in my head I'm right DEFO) that this was taking things back to 2000ads origins. Yet if you think about this time many, many stories from Prog 1 onwards were allowed to run at great lenght and weren't shackled by an imposed edict.

Jim_Campbell

Quote from: Colin_YNWA on 20 December, 2015, 11:27:19 AM
My big issue with Mr Diggle is his mandate of short stories - or a shot glass of thrill power. He seemed to limit stories to 8 parts, maybe 10 at a push (by and large I'm sure some smarty pants will now pop to Barney and role out a load of exceptions!). Often I found this strangled potentially fantastic stories and compressed things too far.

Two things have become conflated here: Andy's "shot glass of rocket fuel" memo was a general statement of intent that has been assumed to be the reason that Storming Heaven and Love Like Blood, particularly, were held to shorter page counts when they would clearly have benefitted from a couple of extra episodes.

In fact, there was a plan in the works at senior management level to do a deal with a European book publisher which mandated a very specific page count. The deal, obviously, never panned out but there was a period where the editorial team were directed to hold series to a particular number of episodes/pages in order to make repackaging for this deal possible.

Cheers

Jim
Stupidly Busy Letterer: Samples. | Blog
Less-Awesome-Artist: Scribbles.

Leigh S

Quote from: Colin_YNWA on 20 December, 2015, 11:27:19 AM

My big issue with Mr Diggle is his mandate of short stories - or a shot glass of thrill power. He seemed to limit stories to 8 parts, maybe 10 at a push (by and large I'm sure some smarty pants will now pop to Barney and role out a load of exceptions!). Often I found this strangled potentially fantastic stories and compressed things too far.

The thing that bugged me about this in particular is his statement (no don't ask me to back this up but in my head I'm right DEFO) that this was taking things back to 2000ads origins. Yet if you think about this time many, many stories from Prog 1 onwards were allowed to run at great lenght and weren't shackled by an imposed edict.

I agree with this - a lot of stories with great potential appeared, then were cut short - wasnt this something to do with a plan to reprint stories in 44-48 page length reprints somewhere?  Wonky memory recalls something of that ilk.  As an example that springs to mind, Storming Heaven had a great premise (60s counterculture heroes and villains superpowered up) - but it was all done at such a pace as to waste/overlook a lot of potential. 

It's possible the comic had some terrible never ending stuff mucking up the early 90s (New Harlem Heroes etc), but teh problem was the quality - if the quality had been there, then the length wouldnt ahve been a problem!

Leigh S


Colin YNWA

Look Mr so called Campbell could you keep your pesky facts away from my gut reaction based on my limited knowledge of events. It doesn't half get in the way of my long held prejudices.

TordelBack

I didn't know that either, thanks Jim.

My very personal thoughts on the later Bishop/Diggle era. When I finally made it back to weekly purchase (about 1141, I think - driven by hunger for Cam art, anyway), I felt welcome - I felt like there was always going to be something for me in every issue, and there always was. Perversely though, two of the strips I enjoyed most were two I'd hated while I was driftng away: Dante and Sinister Dexter, so it's hard to say what had changed.