Catching up with Tharg

As the 30th anniversary of 2000AD dawns, we thought it was time to catch up with 2000AD Editor Matt Smith to find out what's happening in the House of Tharg.

Before we get going, many are asking - when can we expect to see the conclusion to Origins?  

All being well, and barring acts of Grud, Origins will return in Prog 1529, on sale 21 March 07.

What's the feedback to the mega epic been so far - and will there be big repercussions following the event?  Also - is John Wagner going to remain on Dredd for the foreseeable future (there have been concerns in the past that he might leave after the origin tale was told)?  

The feedback has been very positive – a story like this, with two creators at the top of their game, you can’t help be gripped by it. There is a follow-up story, which Colin MacNeil is drawing at the moment, that has Dredd’s future with Justice Department hanging in the balance... Yes, John is carrying on writing Dredd – in fact, he’s scripting the return of one of Dredd’s villains for a Megazine story as we speak...

The mid-Origins Dredd stories have been of an admirably high quality - were these ready to publish after Origins or did any of them have to be specially commissioned? 

The three one-offs were all written by John when we realised Origins would have to take a hiatus (just before Christmas). Judgement has been in production since last year.

What other strips do you think have been particularly successful over the past year?  And what characters do you think have a good chance of longevity in the style of something like Dante or Slaine? 

I was pleased that Malone caught as many people out as it did. I thought some would recognise Dan’s writing, but it’s gratifying it throw some true surprises in there. Sinister Dexter seems to be going down well, with its building plotlines, and Dante’s back in people’s affections. It was nice too to see that readers enjoyed London Falling, which was a tight little story, and Kingdom has been very popular. As for returning characters, the likes of The 86ers and Harry Kipling have potential, and now we can add Stickleback to that.

The dollar-pound exchange rate must make working for the UK market more tempting to some artists/writers.  Have there been any efforts to get some classic 2000AD artists back to the fold? 

To a degree, though it’s often the case that’s it’s not so much the Americans that are keeping creators busy as other design fields, which are paying more for long-term projects – computer games, film production and book publishing. That said, Bryan Talbot has done a couple of covers for the Megazine, Mick McMahon is doing one, and John Higgins is returning to 2000 AD with Greysuit.

Going the other way, 2000AD has often been seen as a route for creators to break into the international comics scene.  Who do you see as making a big impression over the next year? 

Some talented artists are working on Future Shocks – Edmund Bagwell, Tiernen Trevallion, Edison George, Lee Carter... Lee Garbett is a great new artist, and has got a big series this year with Dead Eyes. In fact, he’s already got a gig with DC Wildstorm.

While we've seen some good breakthroughs from artists like Karl Richardson, Smudge and Lee Garbett in the past year, there seem to be less new writers emerging (with the exception of Al Ewing, of course).  Are there any plans to encourage new writing talent into the fold - and what do you look for in new writers.

No plans beyond the usual submissions policy – a writer’s ability is less easy to gauge at first glance than an artist’s, and requires some nurturing. I think Arthur Wyatt’s writing has come on a lot, and he’s got a couple of one-offs in the pipeline. What I’m looking for is imagination, humour, clever plotting, dialogue that doesn’t make you cringe, and hopefully a unique voice.

Although it has certainly seen an improvement in recent issues, the Megazine has been coming in for its share of criticism.  How do you view the criticism and see the Megazine's format evolving over the coming months? 

As far as I was concerned, when I took over the Megazine, I had to do something about the fact that it was shedding money (making it stitched self-cover instead of perfect bound was the obvious first move, which saved a fair bit in print costs in itself) and encouraging casual readers put off by the prohibitive cover price – I initially wanted to bring it down further to £2.50, but that would’ve left me with an unworkable editorial budget.

Unfortunately, much of the material commissioned by Alan Barnes had been commissioned in 12-page episodes (Black Siddha, Devlin, Anderson), which were too big and costly to run in their entirety, so I had to split them. That material is going to continue through much of 2007 too, so it’s only until the end of this year that I can think about revising the page count of the strips.

Are there any non-Dredd reprints you would consider for the Megazine along the lines of Charlie's War?

It’s likely that I’ll be reprinting a creator-owned US title by John, Alan and Carlos at some point.

DC have, with "52", finally made a success of the weekly format in the States. What do you think of the experiment?  And do you sympathise with the difficulties in producing a weekly?  If you were to give them one piece of advice from your experiences - what would it be? 

I know next to nothing about ‘52’, I’ve never read an issue, so I can’t really comment on whether I think their foray into weeklies has been successful. It’s certainly a challenge – you have to plan so much more in advance, and get the writers and artists working well ahead of time. My one piece of advice would be always have a back-up plan, cos something’s guaranteed to come along and throw a spanner in the works.

You've also got another novel out this year - this time in the Abaddon line. What can you tell us about this? Given you're covering so many titles, how do you find the time to write?

It’s called The Words of Their Roaring, and it’s a zombie novel in the Tomes of the Dead line, out in May. It’s a mix of London gangster and Romero, as ganglord Harry Flowers tries to use the zombie outbreak for his own ends. There’s also Cronenberg-style ideas thrown in there about the development of the virus that lead to the outbreak, and how it’s adapting the undead, changing them. It took me longer to write than the Dredd novel, about nine months all told, but I’m not a very fast writer and I was only doing a couple of hours each evening. You have to be quite strict with yourself, especially with a day job, otherwise it’ll never get done.

Can you tell us anything more about the upcoming Dredd figure from Toybiz? Are there any other 2000AD related figures in the pipeline?

Can’t really say much more than is already out there – further details will no doubt be released when they’re ready to roll. More figures are in the pipeline, and not just Dreddworld ones...

On that note, 2000AD merchandise has seen something of a resurgence over the past few months, with the successful T-Shirt line being a particularly good example.  Is there anything else like this that we can expect this year - and what merchandise would you like to see out there?

I’d like us to release some good quality 2000 AD binders, which would go down well I think, but sourcing them at a reasonable cost has proved tricky. We’ll probably do some more posters. And there’s some figurines coming from First4Figures too.

It's obviously a big year for 2000AD, what can we expect for 2000AD's 30th anniversary celebrations throughout the year?  Is this year a big opportunity to bring new and lapsed readers into the fold - and if so - how will you be capitalising on this? 

The bumper birthday prog comes out on 28 Feb. Still working on a venue for a party, though we’ll have a do at Bristol on the Friday evening. We’re getting a fair amount of coverage from the mainstream media – articles in the Independent on Sunday and on the BBC News website – and when David Bishop’s Thrill-Power Overload book comes out in the spring, I expect there’ll be more interest following from that.

And finally, what can we expect from 2000AD and the Megazine in 2007?

In the Meg – Anderson: Big Robots and Blood of Satanus III start in Meg 257; the Angel Gang return in Meg 258; couple of supporting characters are back in the frame in Dredd...

In 2000 AD – Savage, Sinister Dexter, Robo-Hunter, Nikolai Dante, Greysuit, ABC Warriors, Cab— But I think that’s enough to be going on with...

The 30th anniversary kicks off with prog 1526 in stores this week...