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Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Skrull Kill Krew by Grant Morrison Skrull Kill Krew by Grant Morrison. I found out today how the scripting for Morrison & Millar's VAMPIRELLA issues was broken down between the pair (care of an ancient Usenet post from Mark Millar himself), which makes SKRULL KILL KREW the last M&M collaboration (at least of their US stuff) where I don't know for sure who wrote what. Apparently all of their stuff was plotted together (in the pub. ) and then each issue was scripted solo by one of the two - they don't seem to have collaborated at all on the scripts themselves. Here's who wrote what in case you were ever curious - SWAMP THING Morrison scripts #140 and 142, Millar scripts #141 and #143. I've got the first few pages of the scripts for #140 and 141 which confirm those two, the other two are an educated guess based on one being a interesting Clive Barker-esque horror issue and the other being a nonsensical rip-off of Terminator 2. SKRULL KILL KREW I re-read this tonight (it's still rubbish) and I'd guess that Morrison scripted #4, possibly #5. I'd say definitely Miller scripts for #1, 2 and 3. AZTEK Morrison scripted #1, 5 and 6; Millar scripted #2-4 and 7-10. I'd be very surprised if Morrison didn't write the 'Citizen Vane' text piece in issue #3. Issue scripts confirmed by Mark Millar in a (long deleted) Millarworld post from 2004. VAMPIRELLA Millar scripted #1-3, Morrison scripted #4, Steven Grant scripted #5 and 6 from a Morrison 'plot' (which, for issue 6 at least was one sentence of solicit text according to SG). Nobody knows who scripted #7 (Millar and Grant both say it wasn't them, and it's very unlikely to have been Morrison). #8-9 were written by Steven Grant with no involvement from Grant or Mark beyond their original outline document (all confirmed by Steven Grant/Mark Millar on Usenet). THE FLASH Morrison wrote 'Emergency Stop' in #130-132, Millar wrote the three done-in-ones in #133-135, Morrison took over again to write 'The Human Race' in #136-138. Millar gets a solo credit for #139-141 even though it's likely the Black Flash was a co-creation (again, confirmed by Mark Millar on Usenet). So there you go, you need never accidentally read a Mark Millar comic ever again. You're welcome :) Aztek: remembering the DC "hero for the new millennium" It's time to go back-issue diving for Aztek: The Ultimate Man. Published for 10 issues by DC from 1996 to early 1997 as a series, Aztek contained much of the quirkiness and mad unpredictability that flavored Grant Morrison's Doom Patrol a few years before, while at the same time, carried a through-line of Silver Age-style heroics from Morrison, co- writer Mark Millar, and artist N. Steven Harris. Looking back on it now, the series and the character are as fresh as anything coming from DC, and a little more accessible than Morrison and Mark MIllar's Skrull Kill Krew at Marvel, which brought a true British punk feel to comics. No, Aztek was a series with a cool hero, a cool setting, with worlds of potential that felt somehow… different. Looking back at Aztek, you can see strains of themes and ideas that are often used and became well-accepted in in the early '00s titles – the beginnings of Morrison's 'widescreen' approach to heroes is here, as well as heroes taking a no-nonsense approach to villains. Heck, it feels just like a modern book. But it came out in 1996, so of course, it was canceled. Like DC's Captain Comet, Aztek: The Ultimate Man was ahead of its time, pushed out on a market that had just seen its sales sliced roughly by half during the previous year, sending many fans into the familiar and, well, predictable arms of the traditional, mainline superheroes, and away from titles like Aztek. While his series ended with issue #10, Aztek was moved into the JLA from issues #10 - #15 (he left after the 'Rock of Ages' storyline), and returned for Morrison's final arc, 'World War III.' The following quotes from Morrison and Millar come from an interview that, unfortunately, never saw the light of day, due to the title's cancelation back in 1997. It's a fascinating look at where both the creators were near the series' end, and their thoughts on how this series could help to lift comics up again. Making a New Hero. When Aztek debuted, the comic market was slowly coming out of its self-imposed grim and gritty era, with Mark Waid's run on Flash largely credited for promoting the idea of upbeat, shiny heroes. Aztek followed the lead. "The lighter touch came out of a dissatisfaction with grim and gritty, which is what everyone's been doing for the last few years," Morrison said in 1996. "When I did Animal Man way back, that was only two years after Dark Knight, and already I was sick of that stuff. It's just time to get back to the kind of superheroes we like, a guy who would lookout for people, who would take the time to rescue a kitten or a lost lizard. We just wanted to do a nice guy again, because we were so tired of doing these miserable guys in trench coats with five o'clock shadow and ponytails." "We also wanted a challenge of doing a new superhero who would work, and that remains to be seen, but we were looking around and thought that Green Lantern was the last superhero comic in the last 30 years that's worked at DC, and hasn't been canceled. We wanted to create a new superhero that was actually viable, and was interesting enough, and had a visual look that was distinctive enough that it might survive. That's why we created it at DC, cause we wanted to create a character that could be long-running." Dusting off the recipe for the classic Golden and Silver Age and pulp heroes, Morrison and Millar pulled out the traditional ingredients: a hero following in the steps of his father trained by a mysterious society (the Q Society) the last in a long line of heroes, pure motives square- jawed alter ego of a naive, awkward teenager brilliant in numerous fields from philosophy to medicine a connection to a threat that was supposed to one day destroy the entire world. Heck, Aztek was following formula so dead-on, his name 'Aztek' was given to him by a reporter in issue #2. Sound familiar? "He's kind of the Doogie Houser of the superhero community," Morrison said. "He's so painfully naive, he's almost impossible to talk to, but he's the ultimate man in terms of the mental and physical training he's gone through. He's the weird kid in the back of the class. The 'class nerd' of superheroes." Aztek is the kind of guy who would stay up all night looking for a lost pet (issue #4) just because it's the right thing to do. He's also the kind of hero who would give muggers some money so they would stay out of trouble (issue #3). But since he was raised by a secret brotherhood in the Andes as humanity's savior, his motives are beyond reproach, but his contact with society has been somewhat limited. To call him naive is an understatement. "He's this fantastic warrior who's read every book of philosophy that exists," Millar explained. "But he can't figure out how to order a pizza, or ask a girl out. So he's this great hero with a horrible social life. Sadly, Grant and I wanted to create a character we could empathize with." The quick background of the character included ties to Aztec mythology (since virtually every other mythology has been mined for heroes), was that Aztek was the latest in a line that stretches back 2000 years, of warriors trained since birth to battle Tezcatlipoca, the Aztec god of darkness that makes the Western view of Satan look like a pretty tolerable guy. According to Aztec mythology, Tezcatlipoca would return to battle the embodiment of light - the warriors of the Q Society. "The god of darkness was imprisoned 2000 years ago, but they knew they couldn't hold him, and he'd be back, and when he came back he was going to destroy the earth and create a new earth in his image, so this society was formed to prepare a champion, and every generation they have a new one since they don't know exactly when the guy's coming back," Morrison said. "It's now gotten to the point that the last champion who should've faced it was Aztek's dad, and some mysterious thing went wrong with him, which we'll find out in the series, and they killed him, which Aztek doesn't know about. He's only 19, and has been stuck with the task of dealing with the thing because they've realized that it's coming back within the year, and it's chosen this city called Vanity to make its return." The Touch of Vanity. Two of the pioneers of a technique that would be used later by the likes of James Robinson with Starman's Opal City among others, Morrison and Millar created a new and unique fictional city within the DCU, Vanity.