Kick Ass MARK MILLAR talks Marvel & DC Comics, Stan Lee, Wanted & more!
happy Sunday it is Sunday is it so it’s actually
Friday today we’re recording it and it’s worth the show it’s not lying it’s not live it’s as live
we’ve got the dogs with us to introduce you to Buddy and make they’re always kind of pattering
at our feet when we do the show because they love cuddles and we thought this time we maids will
bring them on board bringing get some value out of them they can start giving us some return on
investment it’s not biting me Oh blessing what do we have on the show today we’ve got loads of
interesting stuff as usual we don’t have Bob’s be cave this week because he’s very busily putting
together a very exciting edit that we’re gonna be announcing soon so watch this space but he will
be back soon and he’s coming back with something very exciting we have the comedy from Winner and
we have another competition everybody loves a competition and we’ve always got great prizes so
make sure you stay hang around and see who’s won and see what you can win we have a great interview
on the show today very excited that this fabulous person said yes Mark Miller very very cool we
were very lucky to meet him when we did Life After Flash to head up and film him up in Scotland
we also had a lovely breakfast with him and Sam and Melody and everybody it was nice to
get to know him incredibly talented person to lead into the interview I thought it’d be fun to
do five fun facts about Mark Miller yes I pulled them off the internet so no they might not all be
correct but Mark if you’re watching let me know if the internet is not telling the truth I will try
and resolve it some now so five fun facts about Mark Miller fact one the ultimate written and Marvel
was selected by Time magazine as a comic book of the decade many stories that he wrote have inspired
big screen blockbusters including Wolverine old man Logan which of course inspired Logan as
well as Civil War where the crossover storyline was the inspiration for Captain America Civil
War Although Mark has said he thought the film was ultimately bleak Civil War was published in
2007 and was the u.s.
Industry’s biggest-selling comic book of the decade he was awarded the MBE
which is a member of the Order of the British Empire in the 2013 Queen’s Birthday Honours
List for his services to literature and drama according to IMDB empress wanted an untitled
Kingsman project TV series has been announced and the Magic Order TV series is currently
in pre-production so Meg Buddy and I are very excited for Mark Millar the fabulous Mark
Millar thank you so much for joining me on the web show we met obviously during life after a flash
that of course was one of the films that you grew up with were there any other films that you
grew up with that has made such an impact in your life today I think I was so lucky that my
Mom got pregnant exactly when she did you know because it meant that I had such a brilliant run
of movies of my childhood like if I’d been born five years earlier done late and it made it
been definitely could be out there a different person you’re certain talkin see ya but I was so
lucky that I was seven when Star Wars came out I was eight when I saw some bad Night the Tiger
you know Superman came out it was just about to turn nine and Flash Gordon when I was ten you
know so it was just such a brilliant run just just maybe when I was about to grow up and not
the end to this stuff and getting sick well or something like that then another great movie
came along and just killed me back in and it was a great run I mean all the
way from about 77 so about 85 you don’t see Ghostbusters Back to the Future gremlins all that
stuff it was such a fantastic childhood I’ve read some articles about you that you from a really
early age loved comics and got into comics but do you remember ever wanting to do anything else
you know like kids grew up wanting to be firemen astronauts or presidents or did you ever
have any dreams even ridiculous or fantastical when you were growing up of anything else or has
it has always been comic books for you I was sort of nudged towards real life and occasionally you know
when I was at school and because of as reasonable as far as you like would be encouraged works
more academic subjects you know so I was doing sciences and you know I planned to go and become
a GP you know the cat possession in a small town kind of thing but I mean every time
I was certain when I should have been you know doing force equals mass times acceleration I was
drawing a picture of a green lantern cannot be on the side of the page so like everything I loved and
bleeds from I was like four or so you know it was comic books I remember gassing my alias for
me please I can’t quite remember which ones came first cuz I still have them you know but like
but I remember just being mesmerized instantly when there was a Superman cartoon on TV and
everything so I was either Zen there was no way I was going to do anything else and what
was hard because I lived in a small town and Scotland miles away from Holly with males
away from New York we’re publishing happens so I didn’t know how it was going to happen so I must
have seemed insane you know these people you see on the pop idol or something you know say no
yeah I’m gonna be Beyonce’s partner you know further her next song you know I must have seemed
like that cuz, I had went to Kitty Hawk so the skill and say I want it right now I know I wanted
an artist at the same time so what were I guess the opinions of other people in the town that you
grew up in when you would say things like when you made the decision that you wanted to be writing
comics was it a kind of welcoming idea or was it that kind of small town of oh you know that’s
just kind of in your head that doesn’t happen in this kind of town combination like my mom I
think was worried about was about 15 or something you know and like showing elderly and
she was almost stupidly encouraging and so were my dad my brothers my sister but I think by
the time other kids were starting to grow up and think about shaving and stuff like that I
think she was just a little bit why didn’t I keep center I’m good at working comic boots and she
I think she was scared that was gonna be like you know painless I think that was her fear that it’s
like saying I’m gonna be on name artist and she was always gently encouraging me toward something
about more conventional but I just I just had no interest in anything else and my hometown
and it was kind of eccentric in its way there are an awful lot of people that my old skill
went often to music careers and film careers which is greatly unusual for a small working-class town
in Scotland but we had an unusual head mass that our headmaster back in the nineteen
sixties had won the brain of Britain so he was like the smartest man in Britain you know and he
also was a former well-known goalkeeper and the television compensates for everything so we almost
had these kind of weirdly lofty ideas you know like I think my class was about 30 or 31
of us when I started Ace One in high school and all that almost definitely one has done something
quite interesting which is odd you know way more than a private school like just ended up with a
we’re just really interesting jobs at one point there were two guys from my school playing for
Scotland against Brazil and the 1990 World Club Cup and I saw them on screen at the same time two
guys in my stove you know so actually we were gonna do something something from know
as much as Stanley steals the most amazing one there’s the way DeWitt Clinton High School in
there in New York the most amazing skill that Calvin Klein Stanley Bob Kane who created Batman
you heard about Lancaster it’s insane that you look up for that skill that nets Cosby but these guys were
all there at the same time back in the nineteen twenties so what was the moment that you made
that transition from this is what I want to do to this is me doing it it was actually
poverty and quite often you talk to musicians about everything and having no money is sometimes the
the best catalyst you know from making what you want to do happen because there’s no Terrance’s
no, I dropped out of University when I was 19 with no cash at all and no plans like living in a tiny squalid
flat and I thought to make some money and I didn’t want to do a regular job or you know because most
writers are lazy and I tried to regular job but then unfortunately it was the same when there
was just no jobs and in the UK, especially in the north there was industrialization
good on so there were like 50 people applying for every job there’s just no chance so what
lots of money I had my my unemployment benefit for those few weeks I spent on stats and my sister
used this do me a for paper of her work and I went to the local library and started typing
submissions to comic companies and I was lucky quickly and the market was kind of
exploding in comics and they just needed people and any idea would do did you when you started
out have a goal of where you wanted to end up or did you just kind of take it one step
at a time with your career absolute goal yeah my goal was to work at DC Comics and it’s funny
because sometimes it’s like a parable or something you know you go off on your huge destination and
then you realize when you get that this isn’t really what you want to be and then want it to
be somewhere else but growing up all I ever wanted to do was work at DC Comics and Batman Justice
League all that stuff and then when I go ahead it was quite a corporate it was not where
I expected you to know there’s a certain illusion I guess old city does that this is tremendous fun
I mean you get so good had a hardcore Billy invite everything was unpleasant so I stayed on
the periphery of it and didn’t have much nobody played anything at the time it
was always just staying above cancellation I did a little run on a Superman boot for kids that
I enjoyed running for 19 hours but even that every month I usually called the editor and say
are we canceled yet I was always just floating at breakeven and every month it looked
like we could get canons and it would mean no cash so I’m just here to fight for like the whole
19 months but then I just lucked out and then making up took off when I stopped thinking
about plans and destinations and everything I just took each gay guy just something that looks
fun and nice people to work with everything so I’m an austere Wildstorm that have been called
the authority which was a whole book and I can I started my career really and there’s a huge
lesson that I think’s in not of a plan and just do you want to be doing is the particular
vanity endeavor was it quite an easy decision for you then to go off on your own and start
your own company there was a period in between but what happened was I had a hit first that came
when I was starting so I’ve been doing this since I was 19 then when I was 30 I had a head book
and that got me punched by Marvel and I’ve never really been that interested in Marvel and it’s
weird because I ended up becoming like you don’t have it all with my company for 10 years
I was there for a long time and I didn’t grow up a Marvel fan I liked Marvel you know I read the
stuff when I was really like so but I was always DC was always the kind of cooler company through
the eighties but what I am white and in Marvel wasn’t well distributed in Scotland either
so why did I end up at Marvel almost by default and in the first-week Dad was the number
one number one book and in the second book a dad was like the number one and over too big for the
next five years you know this is crazy you know and everything even though I wasn’t a massive
then tomorrow I somehow seem to be finding this audience that I enjoyed what I was doing
and I was what can be great people and but then I had to make conversation with Stan Lee and Stan
said to me a lesson you’ve you’ve got to strike on your own do you don’t think he said all these
boots are doing the marbles going great you know he said oh man I can feel as if these things to
be movies I feel you because you create your characters and he talks the answer he says to go off
and do your own thing I start to mellow what’ll next thing knowing Stanley like you do what is
one thing that people may not know about him oh wise standards I mean I was the one thing is you
have to remember he was an amazing operator you know like Stan’s Khadijah runs from the nineteen
the forties up until the day he died when Stan was active the whole time and most people are
Lucky if they have a five or ten-year career you know in the pop medium and because it’s
very fickle and people want to see something new and something about that trash and then Stan
Stan, there’s an amazing survival and the weird thing was as most people start to slow down
and the mid-40s East and we get just kicked into high gear and just go even beggars I mean it’s
always massively inspirational to middle-aged clears cool and I just loved him growing up
you know so like yeah I wasn’t disappointed when I finally got to speak to him and he was just
a nice age because it’s seen it all before and if you think about it you know there’s been a lot of
us doing this job over the last three generations comic books have been around for generations
almost and Stan is the one that almost everybody in the world knows like there’s a la modem Frank
Miller and Stan are so far about them in terms of public consciousness that people just now know
who stan is Stan would charge 150 thousand dollars just for appearing you know it’s like kitties
megastar in comics and he was very because he was a it was in charge of the business side of
things as well as the creative side of things he had an amazing roam did looked at the whole
industry and so he was very smart he said to me I finally had the opportunities you have which
is creating my stuff and owning my stuff that’s why I’d be doing no I wouldn’t be great and
Marvel stuff you know he said don’t do what I did 15 years ago is going to go into your own thing
now and there’s smart so when your projects you went off on your own and your project
started to become big screen adaptations your very first one how did that happen were you
seeking that when you sought after what was that process I what Stan said I would often a bought a
plant from W slits and a pen and I sat in a train station and I wanted I wrote the plan while I was
waiting on a train in Glasgow and I thought it’s very good for something here you know and I put
it together and I read in the shoot one and sent it off to the publisher who was quite keen to do
something because I’ve had a lot of Marblehead boots I was getting good offers from from other
publishers what I could do in the material and I thought well give this a try and see what happens I’ll
keep doing the Ultimate and the x-men and all that kind of stuff Wolverine and the meantime but then
weirdly before that bookkeeping came out it was just in the catalog and a company called Marc
Platt production so it made Legally Blonde right there most unlikely action movie producer but this
the guy you today I used to run Universal Studios you know it’s amazing and has second in command and
called me up and I thought it was a prank I didn’t believe it he came through an agent I
was using for that particular project and he called me up and he says would like to make
a movie and I was like yeah even you know and he said I saw it and previews which is the comic book
industry catalog or you can see what’s coming up the retailers can buy in a few months
time and they’re on the shelves and he said it just was really interesting I liked
so we did a deal and it was insane and I was just thinking Stan is so right he’s so
cleverly this was the absolute right thing and I was thinking well less ever happen again you know
it’s like I mean I find it Angelina Jolie is gonna be in a mask you know it wasn’t a big deal at the
time but it’s obviously since become enormous yeah Morgan Freeman’s gonna be on it everything and it
was gonna be directed by a guy had never heard of but he was the biggest director in the southern
hemisphere like it was crazy that Lee had Nate watch a movie I think it made more money than Lord of
the Rings and Russia and various countries in the southern hemisphere you know and so you
know he was such an amazing could you say have on this he took a comic be property
nobody ever heard of and spent seventy million dollars on it and made three hundred and forty-two
million back and then it did Gangbusters on DVD and Blu-ray as well so it was crazy you know that
what an introduction to Hollywood I mean one of my friends didn’t go or the guy who wrote the Batman
films everything he said to me on the set of Once It’s him shouldn’t Batman be around the same
time Dark Knight and he said so you’re supposed to do like five rubbish things for us to do you yet
I am DB page should be embarrassing for a little bit and then you get lucky with Angelina Jolie so
I was insanely lucky you know just coming in at the top like that and that just opens every door
So any projects I had coming out everybody made an offer for so I’d never done a pitch-in
my life I’ve never sat at a meeting and said hey what do you think of this people are always
hovering and saying okay what’s the next thing you’ve got coming out then I finish it and send
over the name that’ll oh I think every person’s dream I mean just so nobody hates me you know I’d
end I lived in tough years before but what do I mean I would say this to anyone who has
happen as it makes you appreciate it when things do work out because I do remember what
it was like for every three months my phone’s be cut off and then I’m getting money together to
get it back on again and ended three months later to be cut off again you know about four times a
year before we used the gate cut everything for the first ten years of my career but you don’t
realize at the time that that is just part of the process you know like you you’re not going
to be an instant and I remember when I was 19 thank you Mother I should be right in Batman X
and of course but then you realize now you have to start for the bottom and let every kid here you
have to start for the bottom and if you rise too soon you’ll rot too soon as well you
know you need to build your bags before you can have any kind of long I’m Korea so if there were
people out there who wanted to do what you have done what would your biggest piece of advice for
them be do something that interests you I mean that was the thing it took me ten years to learn I
used to almost rank these other people and it was the worst thing you could do was actually
it’s because you never well you know that if you don’t please yourself you’ll please no one so the
the most important thing is what would I spend $3 main today on you know what would make
I turn the page so never anticipate trends or anything like that just just think about what
am I interested in it right now and there’s a reasonable chance a large number of people will
also be into a fuel into it so I think that’s the wisest I’ve been in this game for several years
as the wisest piece of advice I’ve given off if you could be any character that you’ve creators
who would you be and why well that’s already Adam you know because I was a lot of the characters
that I did correctly cancer sorts biographical you know that there are a little bits and Kingsman
and everything that that’s me but if I think somebody had a really easy life like I wouldn’t
really like to be kick-ass you know in the comic books because he has been I mean he’s always
covered in everything you know what somebody attractive people and you know had
you know a nice lifestyle and things like that you don’t think I’d go for somebody who’s never
in fates you know but unfortunately, that doesn’t make good eat drama you know you can you
want your characters to be having a tough time you know doing all the years I’ve done this I’ve
never been asked to do I’d want to be that good cuz I was worried trying to
come up with questions for you because I thought the number of times you’ve been interviewed and
there are people out there who know your work inside out and I just thought there’s quite a
high bar to be thinking of questions that good ones didn’t most normal questions you asked are
what superpower would you like to have you know I almost try and think up ten brilliant stop
responses listen I don’t forget you know okay to the main point I mean Batman would be killing you
know nice house good car you know cool costume and everything you know it’s a good one oh my Ewan
don’t show me I maybe need to create some killer characters well, I have an important
the question actually that because I know that we’re coming to the end of our time my birthday is
tenth of December and I know that your birthday is very much more of a Christmas birthday do you
think it’s a positive or a negative having a Christmas birthday hundred percent positive 100
percent positive and I’ll tell you why because when you’re low you always think it’s all
about you like like my family used to present me when I was a kid this is you know I’m the
youngest of six I was overly indulged but when I was really little my family deceits me with
all these decorations they have up in the setting and I associate my baby Jesus personally
I think it gives you a certain level of confidence you think this is nice of the ones to
Getting in on this is good and then being the same do you realize the pretending then the damage is
done you’re already an artist so that’s good and the other thing that works well is that
you also always get presents like people assume after you get a Christmas specialty that somebody
will say oh I’ll just give you a Christmas present and that’ll be a birthday too never happened in
my whole life it’s never had once and people can never forget at Christmas because it’s so unusual
you know so everybody almost can remember your birthday and I had the opposite I was always
the one that’s a person and this is probably how shallow I was as a kid I was always the one
that got oh this is for your birthday and it’ll just be for Christmas and so I always
associated it with you know that kind of the combination prison and I you know with the little
kids that I liked you know I liked quantity rather than quality because I liked unwrapping things
but I love the idea that you would walk around the streets and think that all the decorations are
for you that’s sweet use me as a baby and I crept with three wise men coming to bring me
yes but like surely whenever they combine your present like that they double up like we’re gonna
spend hundreds of trillion dollars with the same two hundred Australian dollars no cuz I also had
a sibling too so then I mean I mean you had more than one but in my family, it was lucky though
because all my siblings were so much older I was one of those babies at the end you know and
so all my siblings were like 14 years old in May 16 years older so they competed like
my parents had already moved on from getting them really good presents and we’re just buying jumpers
and sharp some things you know we die with me I then suddenly had is almost like having loads
of parents everybody was working in the dog I’m cool stuff so even though we were poor
I always had quite good stuff I loved it well thank you so much I know that you’re gonna go
make dinner so I appreciate you spending the time talking to me and it’s so it’s been a
fabulous journey meeting you in all of this and I’m just so impressed with everything that you have
achieved and I think you’re incredibly talented so thank you very much thanks so you
for staying until the end of the episode that’s very kind of you you’re in luck because you’re just in
time for the competition Before we announce this week’s competition we have a winner from the last
week’s competition who won the competition was to win a link to In Search of Darkness we
interviewed director David Winner last week if you missed it there’s a card brilliant interview
great documentary series and the winner will be the competition the competition was what the most
underrated horror film in your opinion and what was the winner winner drumroll please Karloff
87 said street trash was released in 1987 it was about homeless people it feels like this is a
made-up one homeless people get their hands on ancient food rap out the ranks of the feud I’ve
never even heard of it well I think you need to put it on yeah well look at that one street
trash so well done if you email info at Life After Movies comm I will get that link to you
now this week’s competition oh well we’ve got a great one it is a copy of A Life After Flash
which is signed by none other than Sanjay Jones Flash Gordon himself and who else is that
it’s a DVD which is signed by both of these fabulous people one sat next to me and one in
America just thinks it’s ancient technology maybe homeless people can find an ancient DVD
if anybody’s got anything that can play this format then you’re welcome to this prize Alisa
tells me lots of people still use DVDs I haven’t seen a DVD player since circa 2005 I don’t think
but people still seem to love them the thing about this one that’s so special is it is signed
so how do you get your hands on this beauty I can hear you ask but before we do that the answer
the question though Mark Miller’s in this oh yes smart Miller we interviewed him for this DVD
hence the connection it’s not just a random entry because I had one sitting on my desk there was
a connection to some thought goes into this stuff people it’s not just made up on the
spot you know so how do we win it the question the next week’s show on how to win this beautiful
possibly sort of defunct piece of technology is I don’t have anything Blu-ray can you come up with
an original superhero name and what their unique superpower is we like funny ones we do like
funny let’s give it’s not gonna be a random winner it’s gonna be chosen by us, yeah so make it funny
make it a good comment down below also tell us what else you like did you enjoy the interview mark
who else do you want to speak to talk to people we want to hear from don’t forget to subscribe
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thanks for watching everyone and thanks if you watch to the end and you’re not one of
those people that watch the first 18 seconds yeah the first 18 seconds [ __ ] we call
The 18 seconds that your attention drop like 40 percent viewing up to the 82nd 18
seconds they’re sorry if we’re not as exciting at the beginning I’ll tell you what we’re gonna
focus on for next week is the most bloody exciting first 18 seconds you’ve ever seen I might dress
up with something or do something incredible so make sure you come back for that to me great
watching please enter the competition it’s free if you have a pet if you’ve got an old DVD
player somewhere next to your Betamax and your Super 8 and your 8 tracks this could be played
on it and body okay so I think see you next week
ᵃⁿⁱᵐᵃᵗⁱᵒⁿ ˢᵗᵘᵈⁱᵒ ᴏɴᴇ-ᴛɪᴍᴇ ꜱᴘᴇᴄɪᴀʟ ᴜᴘɢʀᴀᴅᴇ ᴅᴇᴀʟ – ᴍᴀʏ ᴇxᴘɪʀᴇ ᴏɴᴄᴇ ʏᴏᴜ ʟᴇᴀᴠᴇ ᴛʜɪꜱ ᴘᴀɢᴇ. ꜱᴋɪᴘ ᴛʜɪꜱ ᴅᴇᴀʟ ᴀᴛ ʏᴏᴜʀ ᴏᴡɴ ʀɪꜱᴋ ᴀꜱ ᴛʜᴇ ᴘʀɪᴄᴇ ᴍᴀʏ ᴅᴏᴜʙʟᴇ ᴡɪᴛʜᴏᴜᴛ ɴᴏᴛɪᴄᴇ! Animation Studio is a must-have for anyone serious about selling or promoting anything online with video! Damon Nelson. Wow, Paul & Todd, this is a competition killer. “Animation Studio The Animation Creator That You Have Been Waiting For Has Finally Arrived… …..”
