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BIOGRAPHY Early career .]] Milligan started his comic career with short stories for '' 2000 AD '' in the early 1980s . By 1986 , Milligan had his first ongoing strip in ''2000AD'' called '' Bad Company '', with artists Brett Ewins and Brendan McCarthy . ''Bad Company'' was a fairly formuliac Science Fiction war story in ''2000AD'', but it did prove popular and help Milligan become better known. Also at this time Milligan, Ewins and 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 Surreal Psychedelic comic, it 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 psychedelic ''Paradax'' had a two issue series published by Vortex Comics in 1987 . By 1989 Milligan was swapping between more conventional strips such as ''Bad Company'', while still writing his more surreal efforts in ''2000AD'', such as '' Hewligan's Haircut '' with artist Jamie Hewlett . In 1989 he had his first work published by DC Comics . '' Skreemer '' was a six issue mini series with art by Brett Ewins that was somewhat lost in the midst of the so-called "British Invasion" of American comics of the time. A dark Science Fiction themed Gangster story, it did receive critical acclaim but did not sell well. Milligan however was soon to become a regular writer for DC while still working on his more personal comics in the UK in comics such as ''2000AD'', and its spin off titles '' Crisis '' and '' Revolver ''. ''Skin'' '' 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 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 explicit use of 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 with little, or no controversy. It remains one of Milligan's most powerful and acclaimed works. The 1990s '' #4 by Brendan McCarthy .]] Milligan had started to revamp Steve Ditko 's character '' Shade, The Changing Man '' for DC Comics in 1990 . This proved to be his largest break into American comics and came at the end of the first wave of "The British Invasion" of comics. Milligan updated and adapted many of Ditko's concepts, while adding his own ideas to embark upon one of the most bizarre titles published by DC. In 1993 , it was one of the first wave of Vertigo titles with issue 33. It was a steady seller but it was cancelled with issue 70. A one-off story for Vertigo's tenth anniversary was published in 2003 . Milligan also replaced Grant Morrison on '' Animal Man '' for a six issue run in 1991 , plus he became the regular writer of Batman in '' Detective Comics '' in the same year. It was during one meeting of Batman writers that Milligan came up with the initial idea which led to the '' Knightfall '' storyline which was to cross over all the Batman family of titles. Milligan however had finished writing ''Detective Comics'' and was not involved with the crossover. Milligan also created the highly acclaimed '' Enigma '', with artist Duncan Fegredo for Vertigo in 1993 . In this, Milligan introduced a gay superhero and dealt with his subject manner in his usual surreal way. 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 by their handling of these subjects. Milligan spent the remainder of the decade writing one-off specials such as '' Face '' and '' The Eaters '', or mini series like '' Egypt '' and '' Tank Girl '' with its creator Jamie Hewlett providing art. Milligan and Brendan McCarthy's '' Rogan Gosh '' was reprinted in a collected edition by Vertigo in 1996 , after being first serialised six years earlier in '' Revolver ''. Milligan rounded out the decade by writing a four issue mini series featuring '' The Human Target ''. Proving to be Milligan's most conventional title for DC so far, it was also very popular and brought him to the attention of many who had been unaware of him and his works. ''X-Force'' / ''X-Statix'' .]] In 2001 Marvel Comics was undergoing a revamp by its new editor-in-chief Joe Quesada and one of his aims was to revamp the X-Men family of titles. Milligan was given '' X-Force '' to write with issue 116, and right away he removed the Rob Liefeld style superheroics and replaced it with a more Satirical tone. Milligan and artist Mike Allred also removed the traditional superhero names and replaced them with names which sounded more like product brand names. Characters such as The Orphan , The Anarchist , U-Go Girl , Phat , Vivisector , Venus Dee Milo , Dead Girl and Doop formed this new team. This was not well received by some fans of the title, and many wanted "their" X-Force back, a comment Milligan would later Parody in the pages of the title. These criticisms aside, the title sold well and even received mainstream media coverage both in America and Europe . Milligan's run was acclaimed for its different take on the super hero genre, however ''X-Force'' was cancelled with issue 129 so it could become '' X-Statix '', with Allred still as artist. It was on ''X-Statix'' that Milligan would once again become controversial when a proposed plotline was to feature a resurrected Princess Diana as a superhero and X-Statix team member. News of this spread to the press, including the British Tabloid Newspaper '' The Daily Mail '' who strongly objected to the idea. Eventually the character of Diana was altered, as were the references to the Royal Family but not before the story had been reported around the world. This aside, ''X-Statix'' was cancelled with issue 26, though several Trade Paperback s were released. Present day work Milligan's recent film work includes the screenplay for '' Pilgrim '' (a 2000 movie sometimes shown as ''Inferno''), which stars Ray Liotta . He also scripted the 2002 adaptation of the Melvin Burgess novel '' An Angel For May ''. He has become the regular writer on '' X-Men '' with artist Salvador Larroca in 2005 , as well as being the writer of an ongoing '' Human Target '' series for Vertigo . In '' with artist Mike Allred for Marvel Comics . BIBLIOGRAPHY ''#26.]] '' by Dean Ormston .]] Comics work includes:
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