Embedded Files
PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT
Over the course of 2022/23, Google took the scythe to their previously free and quite versatile 'Sites' offering, requiring their existing customers (i.e. me) to either upgrade to a paid version or see their site moved to a new address with as good as all of the existing text formatting stripped out. As Real Life has conspired, over the last 2 or 3 years, to make it harder for me to update the site with any sort of regularity, I chose the latter option but have found I've neither the time nor the inclination to go through the new version and fix the huge morass of stuff that's broken, sorry!
You can still access everything that was here previously via the menu at top left, though be forewarned, a lot of it will be a hard read. For the time being, an (uneditable) old version of the site is still online here, and everything there should (probably) work and look as originally intended (deleted by Google, Halloween '23). One day I might try and take some of the more worthwhile stuff (the annotations, the interview archive etc) and move it somewhere else but for the time being we're stuck where we are.
The annotated comics bibliography below is realistically the only part of the site I'm going to be on top of going forward. Everything else will stay as was in the glory days (??) of 2019, but now all the links are broken and the pages look like shit, cheers Google...
NEAR MYTHS (Galaxy Media)
#2, Oct ’78 – ‘Time Is A Four Letter Word’ (art by GM)
#3–4, Dec ’78 – Sep ’79 – ‘Gideon Stargrave: The Vatican Conspiracy’ (art by GM)
#5, Apr ’80 – ‘The Checkmate Man: Part One’ (art by GM)
There was a black, white and red promotional poster printed for Near Myths in 1978, using a piece of Tony O'Donnell artwork that would later appear on the cover of issue five. O'Donnell sold a copy of the poster on eBay a few years back, which I didn't win :( It seems unlikely another copy will hit the market any time soon unfortunately.
As writer and artist I'd be surprised if Grant Morrison doesn't hold all of the rights to their Near Myths work, but its never been collected.
CAPTAIN CLYDE
3rd November 1979 – 5th November 1982 – The Govan Press (150 weekly strips, art by GM)
The strip also ran in sister papers The Renfrew Press and The Clydebank Press, but only The Govan Press ran all 150 installments.
The Clydebank Press (and possibly the other two, though examples of those have yet to surface) printed an A3 promo poster before the strip began, proclaiming "Captain Clyde Is Coming!". A signed copy was sold on eBay in 2016.
At least two runs of Captain Clyde have been preserved, primarily on badly photographed microfiche, in the Glasgow public library system from two of the papers above - I think both are incomplete but cover the whole run when combined together. The quality is not spectacularly great for either, but it's all there. I don't know for sure but I think Grant Morrison may still have some (or all?) of the original art for the strip, or at least copies of the papers it was printed in. In 20-plus years of looking for Morrison stuff on eBay etc, I think I've seen maybe 5 Captain Clyde strips come up for sale, total. The chances of putting together a privately held run of the strip are so remote it's as good as impossible, imo.
Morrison's Near Myths colleague Tony O'Donnell drew Captain Clyde on the cover of Fantasy Advertiser #75 in 1982, and on the cover of issue #7 of Hugh Campbell's Fusion fanzine in 1983 (which also featured an interview with Morrison about Captain Clyde). The good Captain also (maybe) briefly appeared in the 'In Xanaduum...' strip, serialised in Morrison's Substack newsletter in 2022/23.
A deal was struck to republish the Captain Clyde strips as a serial on a Scottish comics website named 'Scomics' in the 00's, but this never materialized. None of the strips have ever been officially republished or collected.
You can read all of Captain Clyde at the Global Variables site, starting here.
STARBLAZER (DC Thomson)
#15, Dec ’79 – ‘Algol The Terrible’ (art by GM)
#28, Jul ’80 – ‘Last Man On Earth’
#45, Mar ’81 – ‘Operation Overkill’
#86, Dec ’82 – ‘The Cosmic Outlaw’
#127, Aug ’84 – ‘The Death Reaper’
#142, ’85 – ‘Gateway To Terror’ (inks only by GM)
#152, ’85 – ‘Doomworld’ (inks only by GM)
#167, Apr ’86 – ‘Mind Bender’
#177, Sep ’86 – ‘The Midas Mystery’
#209, Jan ’88 – ‘The Ring Of Gofannon’
Starblazer - Operation Overkill / Jaws of Death (collects Starblazer #45, 71), Oversized SC, Nov '19
Starblazer - The Web of Arcon / The Death Reaper (collects Starblazer #12, 127), Oversized SC, Nov '23
The two oversized volumes that DC Thomson published in 2019 and 2023 are the only collections of Starblazer material there's ever been; the balance of Morrison's work on the title remains uncollected. At the rate they're currently going at, we might get them all by 2039.
'Algol the Terrible' was reprinted in French in 1981's Super Force #12, alongside the first half of the first multi-issue Judge Dredd story 'The Robot Wars' and parts of 'Death Game 1999' and 'Spinball' from Action. Almost certainly the first foreign translation of a Morrison story, the panels of the strip were reconfigured to fit into 38 pages rather than the 64 pages of the original.
As there are no writing or art credits in any issues of Starblazer, it's highly likely that hardly anyone had any idea Morrison had written these until the Morrison bibliography in Comics World #8 was published in October 1992.
WARRIOR (Quality Comics)
#26, Feb ’85 – ‘The Liberators: Night Moves’
Warrior 1996 Spring Special/Comics International #67, Apr ’96 – ‘The Liberators: Angels And Demons’
'Night Moves' was also reprinted alongside 'Angels And Demons' in the Warrior 1996 Spring Special (a flipbook with issue #67 of UK comic book news magazine Comics International), with a new splash page by artist John Ridgeway.
I'd assume like many of the other Skinn-originated Warrior strips, the rights for this rest with Dez Skinn himself, though he's been out of the comics publishing world for decades now. 'The Liberators' has never been collected.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT (Flying Pig Enterprises)
Apr ’85 – ‘Gideon Stargrave in... Famine’ (art by GM)
Publisher Gary Millidge promoted the one-shot with a 4-page flyer included in issue #22 of Phil Elliot's Fast Fiction news sheet. Millidge also offered a very limited edition (11 copies!) of the book signed by all of the creators involved (including Morrison and Alan Moore) except cover artist Alan Davis for some reason.
Due to a last-minute distribution snafu, many store orders for Food for Thought had to be hand-fulfilled by Millidge and consequently in recent years it's become extremely hard to find.
Similar to Morrison’s Near Myths work, this is creator-owned but has never been collected anywhere.
You can read 'Gideon Stargrave in... Famine' here.
BATMAN ANNUAL (DC Comics/London Editions)
1986, Aug ’85 – ‘The Stalking’ (text story with illustrations by Garry Leach)
Mass-market hardcover annual published for the UK Christmas gifting market. Though it was published in autumn 1985, the book is marked as the "Official 1986 Annual" on the cover. The book also features a cover by Bryan Talbot; another text story by Peter Milligan with illustrations by Brett Ewins; two Denny O'Neill/Neal Adams Batman tales (absolutely standard fare for all British Batman reprint books, well into the late 80's) and a Batman/Green Lantern team-up from The Brave and the Bold #155, one of Bob Haney's last issues as writer.
You can read 'The Stalking' here.
SUPERMAN ANNUAL (DC Comics/London Editions)
1986, Aug ’85 – ‘Osgood Peabody’s Big Green Dream Machine’ (text story with illustrations by Barry Kitson)
An early indicator of Morrison's penchant for reviving terminally forgotten bits of DC lore, this text story centres on Osgood Peabody, a forger who made his one and only prior appearance in 1972's Batman #245 - 'The Bruce Wayne Murder Case' - by Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams.
As with the Batman Annual from the same year, the book is marked as the "Official 1986 Annual" on the cover. Also features a Vartox tale from Superman #392 (exactly what every British kid wants at Christmas time); a Cary Bates/Mike Grell Legion of Super-Heroes tale centred on Tyroc; a Peter Milligan text story illustrated by Mike Collins, and a reprint of Action Comics #454 featuring the Super Friends version of Toyman.
I'm pretty sure both of these books were only available for sale in the UK, and the tiny bit of non-reprint content in them - including these two text stories - has never been collected elsewhere.
You can read 'Osgood Peabody's Big Green Dream Machine' here.
CAPTAIN BRITAIN (Marvel UK)
#13, Jan ’86 – ‘Captain Granbretan’ (text story with illustrations by John Stokes)
Intended as the first in a series of 'Tales of Alternate Captains', no further installments appeared as the comic was cancelled with issue #14 - apparently sales in the US Direct Market were very strong but the title failed to find a foothold in UK newsagents. 'Captain Granbretan' was reprinted in both the 2009 and 2021 editions of Marvel's Captain Britain Omnibus, and in the UK in Panini's Captain Britain: Endgame collection.
'Captain Albion', the second, previously unseen installment of 'Tales of Alternate Captains', appeared for the first time in a May 2024 post on Grant Morrison's Substack newsletter 'Xanaduum'.
THARG’S FUTURE SHOCKS (2000AD) (Fleetway)
Prog 463, 29/03/86 – ‘Hotel Harry Felix!’
Prog 466, 19/04/86 – ‘The Alteration’
Prog 469, 10/05/86 – ‘Alien Aid’
Prog 473, 07/06/86 – ‘2000BC!’
Prog 475, 21/06/86 – ‘Some People Never Listen!’
Prog 477, 05/07/86 – ‘The Shop That Sold Everything!’
Prog 479, 19/07/86 – ‘Danger! Genius At Work!’
Prog 481, 02/08/86 – ‘Wheels Of Fury!’
Prog 482, 09/08/86 – ‘Curse Your Lucky Star’
Annual 1987, Aug ’86 – ‘Return To Sender’
Prog 491, 11/10/86 – ‘Candy And The Catchman’
Prog 507, 31/01/87 – ‘Maniac For Hire’
Prog 508–509, 07/02/87 – 14/02/87 – ‘Ulysses Sweet In: Fruitcake And Veg!’
Prog 514, 21/03/87 – ‘Fair Exchange’
Prog 515, 28/03/87 – ‘The Invisible Etchings Of Salvador Dali’
Prog 516, 04/04/87 – ‘Big Trouble For Blast Barclay’
2000BC, Candy and the Catchman and the two Ulysses Sweet stories techincally weren't billed as Future Shocks, but I'm including them here anyway.
All of these stories have been reprinted a ton of times, variously in the 80's Quality/Fleetway comics, in the Best of 2000AD and the 2000AD Extreme Edition mags, and in various compilation books that Rebellion have put out. One day when I'm *really* bored I'll list them out here. Rebellion's now out of print All-Star Future Shocks book from 2014 reprinted them all, alongside other strips by Peter Milligan, Neil Gaiman and others. All-Star Future Shocks was repackaged in hardcover as issue #56 of Hachette's 2000AD: The Ultimate Collection partwork in 2020.
ZOIDS (SPIDERMAN AND ZOIDS) (Marvel UK)
#18, 05/07/86 – ‘Old Soldiers Never Die’
#19, 12/07/86 – ‘A Fine And Private Place’
#30-31, 27/09/86 – 04/10/86 – ‘Deserts’
#36-37, 08/11/86 – 15/11/86 – ‘Bits And Pieces’
#40–46, 06/12/86 – 17/01/87 – ‘The Black Zoid’
#47, 24/01/87 – ‘Orientation’
#48, 31/01/87 – ‘Out Of The Blue’
#49, 07/02/87 – ‘Blue Moon, Red Dawn’
#50, 14/02/87 – ‘Schumaker’s Story’
Many Morrison bibliographies (including the one on GM's own website) omit Spider-Man and Zoids #18 and 50, I think probably due to them being missed from the bibliography published in Comics World back in 1992. Even if there wasn't a writer credit in the comics themselves (which there is), they are both absolutely *unmistakably* Morrison's work.
Beginning with issue #36, Morrison took the previously heavily-derivative-of-Alien strip in an exciting new direction - making it heavily derivative of the then-newly released Aliens instead. James Cameron's sequel would've hit UK cinemas just a few short months previously, in August 1986.
Apropos of nothing especially Morrison-related, the setup for the Marvel UK Zoids strip is weirdly similar to David Twohy's Pitch Black movie from 2000 - a commercial freighter surreptitiously used as a prison transport crashes on an inhospitable desert nightmare world. There's even a striking similarity between the design of the main ship in the two stories, the Celeste and the Hunter Gratzner.
According to various bits and pieces I've read on Twitter over the years from some of the writers and editors involved, there are issues with the rights to the Zoids strip that immensely complicate any effort to reprint it. Apparently both Panini (who bought Marvel UK back in the 90's and presumably own the strip itself but not the overarching rights to the Zoids themselves) and American comic book publisher IDW have both attempted to bring Zoids reprints to the market in recent years, with no success thus far. As of this writing, no UK-originated Zoids material has ever been reprinted or collected.
You can read all of the Zoids strips, including Morrison's, here.
The final issue of Spider-Man and Zoids contained an announcement that Zoids would continue in a Marvel UK monthly book by Morrison and Steve Yeowell, starting in March '87. Similar to the contemporaneous Action Force Monthly/GI Joe European Missions mag, Zoids Monthly would've been published simultaneously in the US by Marvel - apparently in this case by their juvenile Star Comics line. Due to content concerns from US editorial the book was cancelled before release. A newly lettered version of the complete story intended for Zoids Monthly #1 was posted by Rich Starkings on Twitter in May 2020, and you can read it on Rich's Twitter timeline starting here.
DOCTOR WHO MAGAZINE (Marvel UK)
#118–119, Nov 86 – Dec ’86 – ‘Changes’
#127–129, Aug ’87 – Oct ’87 – ‘The World Shapers’
#139, Aug ’88 – ‘Culture Shock’
'Changes' and 'The World Shapers' feature Colin Baker's Sixth Doctor - the latter was the last Doctor Who Magazine strip the Sixth Doctor appeared in before his regeneration into the Seventh. 'Culture Shock' features Sylvester McCoy's Seventh Doctor.
Recalling Morrison's later treatment of Mike W. Barr and Jerry Bingham's Son of the Demon graphic novel in their Batman run, 'The World Shapers' is based on Morrison's slightly wonky memories of the 1964 Doctor Who TV serial 'The Keys of Marinus' (which was never repeated after it's initial airing on UK TV and not commercially released until 1999) and a text story, 'The Fishmen of Kandalinga' from World Distributors' 1967 Doctor Who Annual. Though Morrison's Cybermen origin tale is widely contradicted by other Doctor Who stories that followed it, it was briefly referenced in the TV episode 'The Doctor Falls' in 2017.
IDW have reprinted these stories a bunch of times over the last few years, most comprehensively in the two issue Grant Morrison's Doctor Who series from 2008.
ABRAXAS (Harrier Comics)
Sunrise #1–2, Feb ’87 – May ’87
Intended as "a 100-page sci-fi epic", only the first 16 pages ever saw print, though artist Tony O'Donnell did draw at least a few more pages of the story that were never published. In 1989, a young Warren Ellis asked if he could run 'Abraxas' in Steel Rain, an anthology comic he was putting together for Harrier Comics, but was told by Morrison and O'Donnell that no further chapters had been completed.
Years ago I bought some fanzines off of Tony O'Donnell and (obviously) asked after any unseen Morrison-related stuff he might have lying about. He very kindly sent me a hand-coloured postcard intended to advertise Abraxas to comic shops, but I have no idea whether this was ever properly printed up or distributed. A decade later, I happened to come across an ad for the Abraxas strip in an old issue of Speakeasy that used the same artwork.
Released right in the midst of comics' black and white boom of the 1980's, Sunrise is surprisingly easy (and cheap) to find today for such an ostensibly amateur publication, especially in the US.
ACTION FORCE (Marvel UK)
Weekly – #17, 27/06/87 – ‘Masters Of Kung Fu: Meditations In Red’
Monthly – #3, Aug ’88 – ‘Old Scores’
'Meditations in Red' is a 5-pager intended to introduce Shang-Chi and his supporting cast to UK youngsters, in advance of 11 weeks of Master of Kung-Fu reprints that appeared in Action Force Weekly #18-29. You can read it here.
Action Force Monthly #3 was published simultaneously in the US as GI Joe European Missions #3, and in France as GI Joe #3. The comics are identical besides the cover logo and price (and all the French dialogue in the French one...). You can read 'Old Scores' here.
As far as I know, neither strip has ever been collected. It feels unlikely that 'Meditations in Red' will ever be reprinted, given the headache of sorting licensing costs for two completely different properties Marvel doesn't own (G.I Joe and Fu Manchu), but 'Old Scores' could potentially slip out in a GI Joe collection somewhere one day I guess?
Marvel UK's primary distribution channel for their books was to UK newsagents rather than the Direct Market, though some of their books (licensing permitting) were available to the US via Direct Market distributors. Action Force #17 does have US and Canadian cover prices alongside the UK pence price, so I assume this was sold in US comic shops.
ZENITH (2000AD) (Fleetway)
Phase I: ‘Tygers’, Prog 535 – 550, 15/08/87 – 28/11/87
Interlude 1 – 2, Prog 558 – 559, 23/01/88 – 30/01/88
‘Zenith: A Midsummer Night’s Scene’, 2000AD Sci-Fi Special 1988, May ’88
Phase II: ‘The Hollow Land’, Prog 589 – 606, 27/08/88 – 24/12/88
Interlude 3, 2000AD Winter Special #1, Nov ’88
Phase III: ‘War In Heaven’, Prog 626 – 634, 13/05/89 – 08/07/89; Prog 650 – 662, 28/10/89 – 20/01/90; Prog 667 – 670, 24/02/90 – 17/03/90
Interlude 4, 2000AD Annual 1990, Aug ’89
Phase IV: ‘Jerusalem’, Prog 791 – 806, 11/06/92 – 24/10/92
‘Zzzzenith.com’, Prog 2001, 13/12/00
‘A Night 2 Remember’, Prog 1280, 27/02/02
Zenith Book One (collects Phase I), Titan Books, SC, '89
Zentih Book Two-Three (collects Interlude 1-2, Phase II), Titan Books, SC, '90
Zenith Book Four-Five (collects Interlude 3, Phase III), Titan Books, SC, '91
The Complete Zenith (collects Phase I-IV, Interlude 1-4, 'Zzzzenith.com', 'A Night 2 Remember'), Limited to 1000 copies, Rebellion, HC, '13
Zenith Vol. 1-4 (collects Phase I-IV, Interlude 1-4, 'Zzzzenith.com', 'A Night 2 Remember'), Rebellion, HC, '14-'15; SC, '15-'16
Not sure of the date but at some point Titan gave out a promotional bookmark to advertise the series. They also produced two badges/pins for retail sale - one with the Zenith logo in red on black and one proclaiming 'Never Trust A Hippy'. Alongside a yellow on black 'Z' logo t-shirt, they were sold through Forbidden Planet's merchandise catalogue in the early 90's. Rebellion released a reproduction of the t-shirt in 2015 to promote the new Zenith collections, along with a promotional poster for retailers advertising the hardcover collections.
Zenith, Peter St. John/Mandala, Zenith's manager Eddie McPhail, Robot Archie and Ruby Fox/Voltage all had cards in the 2000AD Data Chip set released in 1991. All five cards were part of the mail-away 'main set' rather than the ones given away with various issues of 2000AD at the time. All feature new art by Yeowell. Ruby Fox's datachip features Grant Morrison's costume design for the character, which only appears extremely fleetingly in one or two panels of the strip itself.
The 1994 'Zenith Phase II' reprint in Best of 2000AD #110 came with 3 free stickers, reproducing Steve Yeowell's pinup from the back cover of Prog 612 and the covers for 2000AD Prog 605 and The Best of 2000AD #100. The cover of Best of 2000AD #111 folds out into a large Zenith poster (sorry I don't remember what the picture is and my copy is sitting at the bottom of a box somewhere). Zenith also appeared as one of the characters on a (Rian Hughes-designed?) pencil given away with 2000AD Prog 830, and on one of the playing cards in a 2000AD deck given away with SFX magazine in 2008.
Beginning in September 1988, Zenith Phases I and II and the corresponding interludes were reprinted (poorly) in colour for the American market (though the books were also available in British newsagents) in Fleetway/Quality's 2000AD Showcase book, beginning in the double-numbered #29/30 and ending with December 1989's issue #45. Quality also reprinted Phases I and II as two separate 3-issue mini-series in 1993, with new painted covers by Dave DeVries.
Titan Books collected Phase I, Phase II (over two books) and Phase III (also over two books) in the early 1990's. There were two printings of Phase I - the only difference between the two is the cover price and in the indicia. There was no Titan reprint of Phase IV because they'd lost the Fleetway reprint licence by the time the series finished its run in 2000AD, not because of any legal issues surrounding the ownership of the series (those came later). Hamyln Books, who won the reprint licence from Titan, were reportedly planning to reprint all of Zenith in colour in the mid-90's, but poor sales on their line of colourised Dredd books soon put paid to that idea. After the reprint licence moved back to Titan. they tried again to reprint the series in 2001, with Phase I printed and ready to ship before being mysteriously withdrawn from sale. Allegedly none but a tiny handful of copies sent out for a Steve Yeowell signing escaped from the warehouse, though the rest of the print run obviously didn't get pulped/thrown in a skip as intended, as for many years you could pick up a copy of this 'unreleased' version on eBay pretty much any time you'd like. Though unconfirmed, the withdrawal of the 2001 book may well have been due to legal issues over the ownership of Zenith - prior to it's release Morrison was reportedly in talks to republish the series Stateside with Marie Javins, then-editor of a stillborn revival of Marvel's Epic imprint (and now Editor-in-Chief of DC Comics).
Announced with much fanfare, Rebellion's mail-order only The Complete Zenith hardcover - limited to 1,000 numbered copies and costing £100 - went on sale in 2013, much to Morrison's reported dismay. Mass market hardcovers of all four Phases (that had extras that weren't in the Complete book, sheesh...) appeared in 2015, and included a Zenith branded slipcase with initial printings of volume 4. They were followed by the over-sized Zenith: Phase I Apex Edition, featuring art scanned from Yeowell's original pages at actual size. The Apex Edition was initially only available via 2000AD's official web shop.
Issue #146 of Hachette's 2000AD: The Ultimate Collection partwork (released in April 2023) reprinted Phase One and Two and all of the accompanying interludes in one hardcover book. Issue #156 (released August 2023) did the same for Phases Three and Four. As a general rule, partworks are only distributed to the mass market (i.e. newsagents, supermarkets etc.) for the first handful of issues, then once a subscriber base has been built they move to a mail-order subscription only model. By the time they got around to Zenith, 2000AD: The Ultimate Collection was *well* into subscriber-only territory and consequently these two volumes are surprisingly hard to find/expensive on the second hand market.
VENUS BLUEGENES (2000AD) (Fleetway)
2000AD Sci-Fi Special 1988, May ’88 – ‘The Pleasures of the Flesh’
Not 100% sure but I *think* this 7-page Rogue Trooper spin-off and Big Dave are the only Morrison 2000AD strips that have never been reprinted in book form. No great loss here tbh.
You can read 'The Pleasures of the Flesh' here.
HEARTBREAK HOTEL (Willyprods)
#4, Jul/Aug ’88 – ‘Born Again Punk’ (art by GM)
UKCAC ’88 Programme – ‘Heartbreak Hotel’ jam session (second page, top left panel)
Morrison's website has, for twenty-plus years, listed Heartbreak Hotel #1 in the bibliography section, but I have a copy and can't see that Morrison actually has any work in it. I assume either someone was thinking of the UKCAC Programme piece, or it's some long forgotten ruse to root out bibliography plagiarists :) The art jam from that programme also features a panel by Alan Moore, the second and last time after the Food for Thought special that he and Morrison would have new work in the same book.
Neither of these pieces has been collected or reprinted.
You can read 'Born Again Punk' here, and see the art jam from the UKCAC '88 programme here.
ANIMAL MAN (DC Comics)
#1–26, Sep ’88 – Aug ’90
Secret Origins #39, Apr’89 – ‘The Myth Of Creation’ (precedes #10)
Animal Man Vol. 1 (collects Animal Man #1-9), SC, Jan '90 (reprinted with a new 'Animal Man' logo and Vertigo branding, May '01)
Animal Man Vol. 2: Origin of the Species (collects Animal Man #10-17, Secret Origins #39), SC, Jul '02
Animal Man Vol. 3: Deus Ex Machina (collects Animal Man #18-26), SC, Oct '03
Animal Man Omnibus (collects Animal Man #1-26, Secret Origins #39), Oversized HC, Jul '13
Animal Man by Grant Morrison: 30th Anniversary Deluxe Edition Book One (collects Animal Man #1-13, Secret Origins #39), Oversized HC, Dec '18; SC, Feb '20
Animal Man by Grant Morrison: 30th Anniversary Deluxe Edition Book Two (collects Animal Man #14-26), Oversized HC, Sep '20
DC sent an uncorrected black & white preview of issue #1 to stores before it hit the stands. Though it was a Direct Sales only book in the US, Animal Man was widely distributed in newsagents in the UK.
Unusually for a new title launch at the time, DC don't appear to have produced a promo poster to advertise the series in comic stores, despite seemingly producing one for all of the other new series they released that month - maybe Karen Berger just wasn't a fan of the poster as promotional tool? Promo posters definitely exist for V For Vendetta, Tailgunner Jo and even the toy tie-in C.O.P.S. - and there was a retail poster offered for Batman: The Cult - all of which saw a #1 issue hit the stands alongside Animal Man #1 in May '88.
Funnily enough the same seems to be true for Neil Gaiman's Sandman, which debuted later that same year, though Sandman did at least feature on a header card shared with The Greatest Joker Stories Ever Told, Mindy Newell's Catwoman mini-series, and the J.M. DeMatteis/Ian Gibson Mister Miracle book. If promo posters to mark the launch of either Sandman or Animal Man really do exist, then they don't appear to have ever resurfaced in the internet age.
A poster for Wes Craven's superlative Shocker was bound into Animal Man #17; and issue #21 came with a fold-out insert advertising Clive Barker's Nightbreed
A collection of Animal Man #1-5 with a new cover by Yanick Paquette was included in a Loot Crate subscription box in 2017.
DOOM PATROL (DC Comics)
#19–63, Feb ’89 – Jan ’93
Doom Patrol Vol. 1: Crawling From the Wreckage (collects Doom Patrol #19-25), SC, '92 (republished with Vertigo branding and 3 pages missing from initial printing, '00; republished with a new cover, Sep '04)
Doom Patrol Vol. 2: The Painting That Ate Paris (collects Doom Patrol #26-34), SC, Sep '04
Doom Patrol Vol. 3: Down Paradise Way (collects Doom Patrol #35-41), SC, Oct '05
Doom Patrol Vol. 4: Musclebound (collects Doom Patrol #42-50), SC, Aug '06
Doom Patrol Vol. 5: Magic Bus (collects Doom Patrol #51-57), SC, Jan '07
Doom Patrol Vol. 6: Planet Love (collects Doom Patrol #58-63, Doom Force Special #1), SC, Jan '08
Doom Patrol Omnibus (collects Doom Patrol #19-63, Doom Force Special #1), Oversized HC, Aug '14
Doom Patrol Book One (collects Doom Patrol #19-34), SC, Mar '16
Doom Patrol Book Two (collects Doom Patrol #35-50), SC, Aug '16
Doom Patrol Book Three (collects Doom Patrol #51-63, Doom Force Special #1), SC, Apr '17
Uncorrected b&w preview of issue #19 sent to retailers. Previously available on US newsstands, Doom Patrol went direct sales only with issue #19 at incoming editor Bob Greenberger's request, accompanied by a significant price hike and an upgrade in paper stock to DC's 'New Format'. Judging by the art in issue #19 (which keeps to the same sort of wide bleed required for newsprint printing rather than running all the way to the edge of the page as the offset printing for New Format books allowed) this decision probably came fairly late in the game.
Similar to Animal Man, while Morrison's entire Doom Patrol run was Direct Sales-only in the US, it was widely available in UK newsagents. I've seen one single issue of Doom Patrol (#41) come up for sale in the US with a distributor's barcode sticker on the cover, so it seems Doom Patrol may have been distributed to mall bookstores like Waldenbooks, though it seems not widely or likely for very long (see the entry below for Legends of the Dark Knight for more on this).
Doom Patrol #27 originally came with a bound-in poster advertising Wes Craven's cinematic magnum opus, Shocker. issue #30 came with a fold-out insert advertising Clive Barker's Nightbreed; and issue #39 came with an awesome bound-in poster for Predator 2 (I had this one on my wall when I was a teen).
A promotional poster ("Wanted: Grant Morrison for crimes against reason") was issued to comic book stores around the time that Art Young took over as the book's editor in mid-1990. A retail poster by Richard Case and Stan Woch was also released in January 1993, just as Morrison's run ended.
The first three trade paperbacks from the 2004-onward run (the '04 edition of Crawling From The Wreckage, The Painting That Ate Paris and Down Paradise Way) were also available in 'schools and library binding' editions (effectively the TPB contents bound to a hardcover with a case-wrap print of the original cover) from Paw Prints Books. It's unclear if there are library bound editions of the other three books in the series as well, but there may well be. As these were only produced in very low numbers and never meant for sale to the general public they're extremely hard to find.
The Doom Patrol TV show ran for four seasons between 2019 and 2023, initially on the DC Universe streaming service before moving to HBO Max with season 2. Featuring appearances by Crazy Jane, the Beard Hunter, Willoughby Kipling, Flex Mentallo, Dorothy Spinner, the Candlemaker and more, it was heavily, *heavily*, indebted to Morrison and Richard Case's run from the comics. Both received 'Special Thanks' credits, though if memory serves these only appeared in 'next episode' bumpers rather than in the episodes themselves. Shady.
DC reprinted Doom Patrol #19 as a promotional giveaway in 2019, with a new photo cover taken from the TV show. It was given away to subscribers of the DC Universe streaming service at DC's booth at the San Diego Comic-Con. They did the same (under a different cover) to promote the second season of Doom Patrol at NYCC in 2020.
THE ADVENTURES OF LUTHER ARKWRIGHT (Valkyrie Press)
#10, Apr ’89 – GM sketch
A sketch of the titular Arkwright by Grant Morrison. Reprinted in Heart of Empire #1, Apr ’99.
THE NEW ADVENTURES OF HITLER (Fleetway)
Cut, Jul ’89 – Sep ’89
Crisis #46–49, 09/06/90 – 21/07/90
'New Adventures' caused masses of controversy on its original publication, with both the editor and star columnist of Cut resigning as a result of the fallout. The strip was unfinished when Cut unexpectedly folded in September 1989. A coloured version appeared in Fleetway's Crisis the following year, seeing the series through to its conclusion
Though the series is seemingly unambiguously creator owned (the rights were initially held by a company called Snobbery With Violence Ltd, a joint publishing venture between Morrison and Forbidden Planet International's Jim Hamilton and Kenny Penman, but are most likely now back with Morrison), the series has never been reprinted.
ST. SWITHIN’S DAY (Trident Comics)
Trident #1–4, Aug ’89 – Feb ’90
St. Swithin’s Day (Trident), Mar ’90 - reprinted in colour
St. Swithin’s Day (Oni Press), Mar ’98
A short extract from the series appears in the first Trident Sampler. Trident also produced a huge poster ('St Swithin's Day: Available Here') to promote the series. Apparently a second printing of the March 1990 Trident version does exist, though it’s not clear what (if anything) distinguishes it from the first.
Trident also offered a St. Swithin’s Day t-shirt quoting the headline from a 1990 report on the book in British tabloid rag The Sun – ‘Death to Maggie Book Sparks Tory Uproar’. Due to ongoing financial woes (Trident's parent company Neptune Distribution would eventually go bankrupt in 1992), the t-shirt barely made it to general sale, though around 100 were sold at the inaugural GLASCAC convention at the end of March 1990 and a handful appear to have made their way across the pond to the US. The t-shirts were extremely cheaply made, and the majority of the GLASCAC stock was sold to random Poll Tax protesters demonstrating outside the convention venue. Against the odds, at least a couple of shirts still survive.
Trident solicited a redesigned 'second version' of the single issue collection in Diamond's Previews and Capital City's Advance Comics catalogues, though this never made it to a full print run. Office/editorial copies may exist, but if so there were probably only ever a handful in existence, and it’s not known if any are still around today.
Big thanks to (ex-Neptune employee!) Glenn Miller for the info!
ARKHAM ASYLUM: A SERIOUS HOUSE ON SERIOUS EARTH (DC Comics)
Oct ’89
15th Anniversary Edition, HC/SC, Dec ’04
25th Anniversary Deluxe Edition, HC/SC, '14
30th Anniversary Absolute Edition, HC, '19
New Edition (DC Black Label), SC, '20
Deluxe Edition, HC, '21
A silver ink retail poster with art by Dave McKean was released in September '89 - the poster artwork was later used as the cover art for the 15th Anniversary Edition. DC also supplied stores with a header card/standee, a book bin, a b&w ad slick and a promo sign - "Arkham Asylum: Enter At Your Own Risk" - for the book's release in October 1989.
There was only one printing of the original hardcover, so ignore any overpriced eBay listings that scream "FIRST PRINT! R@RE!" and the like. DC went through five softcover printings of the trade paperback version before the 15th Anniversary edition appeared in 2004. The first print softcover from 1990 has a blue-ish cover that's different to the other four, which have the same mostly black cover as the hardcover original.
Long before the days of widespread graphic novel distribution in mainstream bookstores, Warner Books - the traditional bookstore publishing arm of DC’s parent company - printed their own paperback version of Arkham Asylum in 1990. This one has a unique McKean cover showcasing a bat skeleton and carries Warner Books branding on the front and back covers.
The Quality Paperback Book Club (a mail-order company owned by Time Warner) published their own softcover version of Arkham Asylum in early 1990 that, due to a scheduling snafu, slightly pre-dated the Direct Market release of the standard DC softcover. The QPBC version features the cover art from the hardcover (the retail version only had this from the second printing onwards) and doesn't have a barcode, price or ISBN on the back cover, but is otherwise outwardly identical to the second through fifth printings of the standard DC trade paperback. The indicia in this version features a promotional blurb for the Book of the Month Club (a sister company of the QPBC).
Titan Books in the UK published versions of the original 1989 book in both hard and softcover (blue 1st print cover only), with their own branding replacing the DC bullet on the cover. They did the same for both the hard and softcover of the 15th Anniversary Editions, though for that one they only changed the branding on the back of the book. Second and later softcover printings of both the original and the 15th Anniversary version sold in the UK book trade were DC books with a Titan barcode sticker over the printed original.
2004's 15th Anniversary edition (and all subsequent editions) includes Morrison's script and original thumbnail art for the book. Dave McKean oversaw the remastering/rescanning of the original artwork for the book's 30th Anniversary edition in 2019, which also included a few stray Morrison odds and sods (sketches, plot breakdowns etc) not in the earlier books.
The 'Serious Edition' of the PS4/XBox One game Batman: Arkham Knight, sold via Amazon in June 2015, included an exclusive version of the 25th Anniversary Deluxe HC with a different cover (the blue cover of the 25th Anniversary softcover rather than the standard brown hardcover cover), marked 'Not for Resale' on the rear cover. Later printings of the 25th Anniversary SC from 2016-19 dropped the anniversary wording from the cover.
An over-sized, slipcased Absolute Batman: Arkham Asylum - The 30th Anniversary Edition was released in 2019, featuring Dave McKean's remastered art, also used in all versions of Arkham released since. I think a combination of COVID and DC changing their branding guidelines in January 2020 (ditching 'Suggested for Mature Readers' and moving all 'Ages 17+' books under the DC Black Label umbrella) might help explain why this original Absolute edition didn't even manage a year on sale before going out of print. As of this writing it's extremely expensive on the secondary market.
A new version of Absolute Arkham Asylum was released in August 2024. The new version loses the 30th Anniversary logo on the slipcase cover and spine, but otherwise appears to be functionally identical. Both Absolutes are listed as a First Printing in their respective indicias, which is kind of weird as the books inside the slipcases are, I think, exactly the same.
SECRET ORIGINS (DC Comics)
#39, Apr’89 – ‘The Myth Of Creation’
#46, Dec ’89 – ‘Justice League Of America: Ghosts Of Stone’
#50, Aug ’90 – ‘Flash Of Two Worlds’
As much of Morrison's 80's and 90's DC output was in Direct Sales-only titles like Animal Man, Doom Patrol and Legends of the Dark Knight, these issues of Secret Origins were probably the first Morrison comic available to the masses on (non-Waldenbooks) newsstands in the US. Indeed they're almost the only ones (bar a handful of issues of Spawn in 1993 and - inexplicably - the first four issues of The Invisibles) until JLA #1 hit the stands in 1996. Conversely, in the UK all of Morrison's early DC work was readily available in yr local newsagent, who would literally sell anything to anyone, 'Suggested for Mature Readers' be damned.
Though Secret Origins #50 didn't carry a printed UK cover price (unlike issues #39, 46 and all issues of Animal Man and Doom Patrol), I'm 99% sure given the prevalence of copies on eBay UK with cover damage from removal of a price sticker that it was distributed to UK newsagents.
'The Myth of Creation' has been reprinted a bunch of times in the various Animal Man collections. 'Flash of Two Worlds' made it into the first round of Morrison/Millar Flash trades (in the 2009 The Flash: The Human Race TPB), but not into the 2016 Morrison & Millar Collection book. As of this writing we don't know if it'll be included in the Deluxe Edition of Morrison and Millar's run due later in 2024 in 2025. 'Ghosts of Stone', I'm reliably informed, was reprinted in the Grant Morrison's JLA Omnibus in 2020, but hasn't as far as I'm aware appeared in any cheaper, less unwieldy books.
HELLBLAZER (DC Comics)
#25–26, Jan ’90 – Feb ’90
Hellblazer: Rare Cuts, SC, '05
John Constantine, Hellblazer Vol. 4: The Family Man (collects Hellblazer #23-33 and others), SC, Oct '08
Hellblazer was Direct Sales-only in the US, but widely available in newsagents in the UK.
A1 (Atomeka)
#3, Mar ’90 – ‘The House Of Heart’s Desire’
Reprinted with new colouring and lettering by original artist Dom Regan in Heavy Metal #287 (2017)
A promotional poster for A1 #3 featuring Brian Bolland's 'Actress and the Bishop' cover was sent to stores to help sell the book.
LEGENDS OF THE DARK KNIGHT (DC Comics)
#6–10, Apr ’90 – Aug ’90 – ‘Gothic: A Romance’
Batman: Gothic (stained-glass window cover, torn page logo), SC, '92; later printings have a different cover (Batman on a gargoyle)
Batman: Gothic (stained-glass window cover, block letter logo), SC, Sep '07
Batman: Gothic - The Deluxe Edition, Oversized HC, Jul '15; SC, Mar '18
A promotional poster was sent to stores to advertise the series before release. Though ostensibly a Direct Sales-only title, Legends of the Dark Knight was sold in chain bookstores like Waldenbooks with a barcode sticker applied to the cover. The title was sold in UK newsagents with a price sticker, as there was no printed UK cover price on the book until much later in LOTDK's run.
The 1991 UK Titan paperback of Gothic features a different cover to any of the US versions, showcasing a (Rian Hughes-designed?) cover based on Klaus Janson's cover art for Legends of the Dark Knight #9. Published in partnership with German publisher Carlsen Comics, I think it was released before the story was collected for the American market and does not include the F. Paul Wilson introduction.
Paw Prints Books published a 'schools and library binding' hardcover version of the 2007 TPB.
As they had with Arkham Asylum, the 'proper' book publishing arm of DC's parent company, Warner Books, released a version of Gothic to mass-market bookstores in 1992.
DARE (Fleetway)
Revolver #1–7, Jul ’90 – Jan ’91
Crisis #55–56, Feb ’91 – Mar ’91
Dare: The Controversial Memoir of Dan Dare, Britain's Most Famous Comic Hero, Xpresso Books, SC, Oct ’91
Dare 1 – 4, Monster Comics, Feb ‘92 – Jun ’92
Yesterday's Tomorrows: Rian Hughes Collected Comics (collects Dare, Really & Truly, others), Knockabout Comics, HC, '07
Revolver was cancelled before 'Dare' was complete. The strip that appears in Crisis #55 is a recap of the story so far (with no new art iirc), with the concluding chapter appearing in the next issue.
XPresso Books were a Fleetway sub-imprint who published an oversized softcover collection of the strip in 1991. Every copy I've ever seen of the XPresso book is battered to hell. Monster Comics (another sub-imprint, this time of Fantagraphics) published a US-comic sized mini-series reprint for the US Direct Market in 1992.
STEED AND MRS PEEL (Acme Press/Eclipse)
#1–3, Dec ’90 – Jun ’92
Steed and Mrs Peel #1-4 (Boom! Studios), Jan '12 - Apr '12
Steed and Mrs Peel: The Golden Game (collects Steed and Mrs. Peel #1-6), Boom! Studios, SC, Dec '12
A promotional poster was sent to (US?) stores to advertise the series. Eclipse took around 18 months to publish the three issues, and by the end of it were on the cusp of bankruptcy.
Apparently Grant Morrison only agreed to do this series as the publishers/licensors offered up a bunch of Avengers episodes on video to use as reference. Doesn't sound like much but these would've been as rare as rocking-horse shit circa 1990 - the first commercial UK release of episodes from the original series wasn't until 1993 as far as I can tell.
The Boom! reprints appear to be scans of the Acme/Eclipse books rather than shot from original art.
All four of the Boom! issues were also available with (terrible) 1:10 variant covers; there was also a harder to find Joseph Lisner variant for issue #1
LETTERBOX (Royal Mail)
’91 – ‘Juliet 4 Romeo’
Spiral bound. Given away to schoolchildren by Royal Mail as part of a letter-writing competition. Apparently the commissioning editors initially approached Will Eisner for a strip, but when he proved unavailable they ended up with this cute one-pager by Morrison and artist Paul Grist.
COMIC RELIEF COMIC (Fleetway/IPC)
Mar ’91 (script pps 4, 37, 38, 50, 51)
UK charity comic featuring characters from DC, Marvel, 2000AD, The Beano, The Dandy, the Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles (don't ask...) and Johnny Fartpants from Viz, all in one strip. Morrison writes from a plot by Neil Gaiman and filmmaker Richard Curtis. I've read that the licensing deal struck with the respective copyright holders to get this published was incredibly strict, and the chances of it ever being reprinted are essentially nil.
A tie-in to a hugely prominent annual TV fundraising exercise, this was primarily (possibly solely) distributed to mass market outlets like newsagents and supermarkets. I'm guessing due to the aforementioned strict licensing conditions that this was not available in the US at all.
BIBLE JOHN: A FORENSIC MEDITATION (Fleetway)
Crisis #56–61, Mar ’91 – Aug ’91
Like From Hell, this seems to be heavily inspired by Iain Sinclair's 1987 novel White Chappell, Scarlet Tracings. At least Morrison picked a different murderer. Presumably the rights to this unique strip are co-owned by Morrison and artist Dannie Vallely (GM's ex-band mate in The Mixers, amongst others). Never collected and no sign of a collection ever coming out.
KID ETERNITY (DC Comics)
#1 – 3, Apr ’91 – Nov ’91
Kid Eternity (collects #1-3), SC, Feb '06
Kid Eternity: The Deluxe Edition (collects #1-3), Oversized HC, Dec '15
DC provided stores with a header card and a two-sided flyer to promote the series. There probably isn't a poster but it's not impossible there might be (I've never seen one). The header card and flyer both use the same art used in the in-house advertisement for the series.
Kid Eternity was Direct Sales-only in the US, but was distributed with a price sticker to newsagents in the UK (at a hefty £2.80 an issue).
BORN TO BE WILD (Eclipse)
Dec ’91 – ‘Dominion’ (2 versions)
A benefit book for PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals). Two versions of the same Morrison script by two different art teams appear in the book. Copies of this used to be ten a penny but it seems to have become quite rare in recent years.
You can read both versions of 'Dominion' here.
DOOM FORCE (DC Comics)
#1, Jul ’92
An uncorrected b&w preview of #1 was sent to retailers before the issue hit the stands. Doom Force #1 has been reprinted many times as part of the various Doom Patrol collections.
Direct Sales-only in the US, but widely available in newsagents in the UK.
FAST FORWARD (DC Comics/Piranha Press)
#1, Oct ’92 – ‘A Glass Of Water’
Never reprinted or collected. You can read it in full on Twitter starting here.
Direct Sales-only in the US. I don't believe this (or any Piranha Press books) were distributed to the mass market in the UK (but would have been available in comics shops)
WHO’S WHO IN THE DC UNIVERSE (DC Comics)
1993 Update #2, Jan ’93 – Willoughby Kipling
Who's Who Omnibus Vol. 2, Oversized HC, May '22
Kipling's is the only Doom Patrol-related Who's Who entry credited to Morrison. All of the Doom Patrol entries from the Who's Who series proper (rather than the Update volumes) were written by then-editor Mark Waid.
I mean, you *could* buy a $125, 1184 page omnibus to get a reprint of this one page of Morrison text if you wanted to? It's not been reprinted elsewhere, so it’s that or the original issue, which is not easy to find. Your call.
Direct Sales-only in the US. Not distributed to UK newsagents, I'd guess due to the hefty $4.95 cover price and awkward size.
SEBASTIAN O (DC Comics/Vertigo)
#1 – 3, May ’93 – Jul ’93
Sebastian O (collects #1-3), SC, 2004
Sebastian O/The Mystery Play, HC, '17
Uncorrected b&w preview of #1, possibly distributed at the 1992(?) RRP retailer conference at the San Diego Comic Con. There was also a promotional poster for the series.
Prior to finding a home at Vertigo, Steve Yeowell art from Sebastian O also featured on a promotional poster/flyer for the aborted Touchmark Comics imprint from Disney. The poster and a Touchmark Comics badge were handed out at SDCC and UKCAC in Summer 1991.
Direct Sales-only in the US, but widely available in newsagents in the UK.
Republished in hardcover as a twofer alongside The Mystery Play in 2017. The book was solicited as being in DC's oversized 'Deluxe' trim but, annoyingly given DC have published a large amount of Morrison's work in this format, turned out to be just a regular sized hardcover when it eventually shipped to stores
REALLY & TRULY (2000AD) (Fleetway)
Prog 842 – 849, 03/07/93 – 21/08/93
Yesterday's Tomorrows: Rian Hughes Collected Comics (collects Dare, Really & Truly, others), Knockabout Comics, HC, '07
BIG DAVE (2000AD) (Fleetway)
Prog 842 – 845, 03/07/93 – 24/07/93 – ‘Target: Baghdad’ (with Mark Millar)
Prog 846 – 849, 31/07/93 – 21/08/93 – ‘Monarchy In The UK’ (with Mark Millar)
Yearbook 1994, Aug ’93 – ‘Young Dave’ (with Mark Millar)
Prog 869 – 872, 08/01/94 – 29/01/94 – ‘Costa Del Chaos’ (with Mark Millar)
Prog 904 – 907, 09/09/94 – 30/09/94 – ‘Wotta Lotta Balls’ (with Mark Millar)
A 'lost' Big Dave strip with art by Steve Parkhouse - 'Cheryl-Anne's Big Night Out' - was completed for the 1995 2000AD Yearbook, but reportedly strongly rejected by Fleetway head honcho Chris Powell. Big Dave never appeared in 2000AD again. At some point in the mid-90's, Mark Millar apparently threatened Fleetway with legal action over them continuing the Canon Fodder strip without him. At around the same time it seems the rights to Big Dave were returned to Morrison and Millar, possibly as part of some sort of settlement of the matter.
I think a page of completed art for 'Cheryl-Anne's Big Night Out' did appear alongside an interview with Morrison and Millar somewhere, but I'm not 100% sure where at the moment.
None of Big Dave has ever been reprinted and - given the co-rights holder's current relationship, not to mention that its extremely (satirically) racist, homophobic etc - I'd be surprised if it ever was to be honest.
JUDGE DREDD (2000AD) (Fleetway)
Prog 842–853, 03/07/93 – 18/09/93 – ‘Inferno’
Prog 859–866, 30/10/93 – 18/12/93 – ‘Book Of The Dead’ (with Mark Millar)
Prog 928–937, 24/02/95 – 28/04/95 – ‘Crusade’ (with Mark Millar)
Judge Dredd: Book of the Dead (collects 'Book of the Dead'), Hamlyn Books, SC, '95, 2 printings
Judge Dredd: Crusade and the Frankenstein Division (collects 'Crusade', 'Frankenstein DIvision' by Mark Millar, others), Rebellion, SC, May '12
Judge Dredd: Inferno (collects 'Purgatory' by Mark Millar, 'Inferno'), Rebellion, SC, Jul '12
Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files Vol. 19 (collects 'Inferno', others), SC, Rebellion, Jun '12
Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files Vol. 20 (collects 'Book of the Dead', others), SC, Rebellion, Jul '13
Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files Vol. 22 (collects 'Crusade', others), SC, Rebellion, Apr '14
In 2015, Hachette began Judge Dredd - The Mega Collection, a partwork series of mass-market hardcovers for sale in UK and European newsagents. Each book had an issue number (when in the series the book was released) and a volume number (when is the series the book chronologically takes place) 'Book of the Dead' was reprinted in issue 28 (volume 56 on the spine), titled Beyond Mega City One, and 'Inferno' was reprinted in issue 39 (volume 38), also titled Inferno.
JANUS: PSI DIVISION (2000AD) (Fleetway)
2000AD Winter Special #6, Nov ’93 – ‘Will O’ The Wisp’
Prog 953, 18/08/95 – ‘House Of Sighs’ (with Maggie Knight)
Prog 1024 – 1031, 07/01/97 – 25/02/97 – ‘Faustus’ (with Mark Millar)
It seems 'Faustus' was originally intended to run as a three parter in DC's Judge Dredd: Legends of the Law book (possibly as a Judge Anderson story), but Legends of the Law was cancelled before the story appeared. Original artist Chris Weston completed at least some of the first issue before the story was canned. Rather than getting Paul Johnson to redraw the first third of the story when the project moved back to 2000AD, it appears they just decided to excise it completely and start the story in media res.
I've no confirmation but would guess based on some of their other collaborations that the story was plotted by Millar and Morrison together, then what would have been three US-sized issues were scripted individually by the pair. I reckon the first half of what eventually appeared in 2000AD was written by Millar, and the last half (all of the Judge Angels stuff) is by Morrison
The series sat in a drawer at 2000AD for a long time before finally seeing publication in 1997 alongside a bunch of other inventory stories, not long before the Galaxy's Greatest Comic changed paper size (which would've made made anything completed before the change the wrong size for publication).
All of Morrison's Judge Janus stories were reprinted across two 'mini trades' polybagged with Judge Dredd Megazine #347 and 348, in May 2014
SPAWN (Image)
#16 – 18, Dec ’93 – Feb ’94 – ‘Reflections’
Spawn Book 4 (collects #16-20), SC, Jun '97 (available with two different covers)
Spawn Vol. 2 (collects #16-33), SC, Sep '06
Spawn Origins Collection Vol. 3 (collects #16-18), SC, '09
Spawn Compendium (collects #1-49 in b&w), SC, '12; republished in colour with a new cover, Feb '21
It's highly likely that these are the three best-selling individual comic books Morrison ever wrote. Available in Direct Sales and Newsstand (printed on newsprint rather than the standard glossy paper stock - TBC) editions. Reportedly Image had two newsstand distributors for some reason (US and Canada maybe?), so there are two different Newsstand barcodes available for each issue.
As far as I'm aware, Spawn was not distributed to newsagents in the UK. Titan published 5 issues of the oversized Spawn Magazine in 1997/98, but the title was cancelled before it reprinted the Morrison issues.
Titan Books also produced their own series of Spawn paperbacks for the UK market. Morrison's issues are reprinted in the 1997 Spawn: Escalation TPB
SWAMP THING (DC Comics/Vertigo)
#140 – 143, Mar ’94 – Jun ’94 – ‘Bad Gumbo’ (with Mark Millar)
Swamp Thing: The Root of All Evil (collects Swamp Thing #140-150), SC, Jul '15
A Platinum version of issue #140 was sent out to retailers, probably as an incentive for increased orders of the regular Swamp Thing book, similar to the platinum variant of Neil Gaiman and Chris Bachalo's Death: The High Cost of Living from the previous year. Given this was in 1994, just past the all-time peak in both comics' sales and in the number of stores that sold them, there are probably a fair amount of copies out there (I'm fairly sure I won mine on eBay for £1). A promotional poster was also sent out to stores, and another different poster was given away with Comic Values Monthly #92 in April 1994.
Though Morrison and Millar are co-credited as writers on all four issues, the actual scripts would suggest an 'exquisite corpse' approach that saw Morrison write #140 (and probably #142) solo, with Millar handling the writing chores for #141 and #143. Morrison takes credit in Supergods for the over-arching plot of Millar's subsequent run on the title (through issue #171, Oct '96) concerning Swamp Thing's quest to unite the four elements of Earth, Air, Fire and Water and ascend to Godhood. Morrison also provided dialogue and caption suggestions, at least some of which are likely in evidence in the concluding part of the Sargon storyline in issue #150 (Jan '95), which seems to be largely based on a page from Morrison's Kid Eternity #3.
Direct Sales-only in the US, but widely available in newsagents in the UK.
THE MYSTERY PLAY (DC Comics/Vertigo)
HC, Apr ’94; SC, '95
Sebastian O/The Mystery Play, HC, '17
A fully-painted hardcover graphic novel that failed to capture the critical or commercial success of Arkham Asylum, The Mystery Play effectively marks the end of Morrison's dalliance with 90's 'grown-up' comics (ie books that were targeted outside the Direct Market and didn't feature super-heroes) as they were perceived at the time. I'd still contend that if the same story was a BBC Play for Today broadcast once in 1974, people would be absolutely falling over themselves to rediscover it.
A promotional poster was provided to retailers prior to the series' release.
Republished in hardcover as a twofer alongside Sebastian O in 2017.
VERTIGO RAVE (DC Comics/Vertigo)
Sep ’94 – Kill Your Boyfriend, Invisibles previews
Previews of then-upcoming books. As far as I remember, there's no new art or anything in here.
Direct Sales-only in the US, but the printed UK price suggests this was widely available in newsagents in the UK.
THE INVISIBLES (DC Comics/Vertigo)
Vol. 1 Preview
Vol 1: #1 – 25, Sep ’94 – Oct ’96
Absolute Vertigo, Jan ’95 – ‘King Mob: Hexy’
Vertigo Gallery: Dreams & Nightmares, Oct ’95 – Chris Weston Invisibles pinup page
Vol 2: #1 – 22, Feb ’97 – Feb ’99
Vertigo Winter’s Edge #1, Jan ’98 – ‘And We’re All Policemen’
Vertigo Winter’s Edge #2, Jan ’99 – ‘The Invisibles: Paper Dolls’
Vol 3: #12 – 1, Apr ’99 – Jun ’00
The Invisibles: Say You Want A Revolution (collects Vol. 1 #1-8), SC, Jun '96 (reprinted in 1999 with a different cover)
The Invisibles: Apocalipstick (collects Vol. 1 #9-16), SC, Apr '01
The Invisibles: Entropy in the UK (collects Vol. 1 #17-25), SC, Aug '01
The Invisibles: Bloody Hell in America (collects Vol. 2 #1-4), SC, Feb '98
The Invisibles: Counting To None (collects Vol. 2 #5-13), SC, Mar '99
The Invisibles: Kissing Mister Quimper (collects Vol. 2 #14-22), SC, Feb '00
The Invisibles: Invisible Kingdom (collects Vol. 3 #12-1), SC, Dec '02
The Invisibles Omnibus (collects Vol. 1 #1-25, Vol. 2 #1-22, Vol. 3 #12-1, 'King Mob in Hexy', 'And We're All Policemen'), Oversized HC, Aug '12
The Invisibles Deluxe Edition, Book One (collects Vol. 1 #1-12, 'King Mob in Hexy'), Oversized HC, Feb '14; SC, Feb '17
The Invisibles Deluxe Edition, Book Two (collects Vol. 1 #13-25, 'And We're All Policemen'), Oversized HC, Aug '14; SC, Dec '17
The Invisibles Deluxe Edition, Book Three (collects Vol. 2 #1-13), Oversized HC, Feb '15; SC, Jul '18
The Invisibles Deluxe Edition, Book Four (collects Vol. 2 #14-22, Vol. 3 #12-1), Oversized HC, Jun '15; SC, Dec '18
Uncorrected b&w previews of v1 #1 and 5. A promotional pack was sent out to stores for the series launch, comprising 3 posters, a window cling, a bag of (almost) blank badges and a letter from DC's marketing department, all contained in an Invisibles-branded envelope. There was also a 4-page promotional preview intended to be given away in-store before the series was published.
All 3 posters from the promo pack can be seen in multiple episodes of the 90's sitcom Roseanne, where they were used as set dressing for Darlene's bedroom.
Some months after the series launched, DC produced another poster to advertise the Arcadia storyline beginning in v1 #5 - this is significantly harder to find than the various bits and bobs sent out for issue #1. Issue #5 was also offered with 4 different 'de-enhanced' covers, all in lovely shades of Vertigo brown.
For volume 2, uncorrected b&w previews of v2 #1 and 2 were sent to stores in advance of those issues' publication. The second series launch was also supported with a poster and a promotional flyer. A fold-out mini-poster with new art by Phil Jimenez was given away with September 1997 issue of Wizard magazine.
For volume 3 - despite the success JLA was continuing to enjoy at the time - the 'Superman 2000' debacle seems to have landed Morrison firmly in the DC editorial doghouse (culminating in their move to Marvel in summer 2000), with the result that there was seemingly no promotion at all undertaken for this final volume other than house ads - no posters, stickers, pogs, absolutely nowt.
The Invisibles v1 #4 originally came with a bound-in Books of Magic promotional trading card from Skybox, to promote their 1994 Vertigo trading card set (which included cards for The Invisibles, Sebastian O and The Mystery Play)
All copies (I think) of The Invisibles v1 #19 originally came polybagged with a promotional tie-in comic for the PlayStation game Loaded, written by Garth Ennis with art by Greg Staples and Les Spink. Some, but not all, copies of The Invisibles v2 #1 came polybagged with another promotional tie-in comic advertising the sequel, Re-Loaded, this time by Alan Grant, John Meuller and Marguerite Van Cook.
Titan Books in the UK printed a version of the 1996 edition of Say You Want a Revolution with their own branding replacing the DC/Vertigo logos on the cover.
The Omnibus and Deluxe Editions contain the series pitches for volumes 1,2 and 3, reproductions of promo material, and quite a bit of process art for the series, mostly from cover artist Brian Bolland. There’s marginally more stuff in the Omnibus, but the really meaty stuff is included in both.
Surprisingly, it seems that issues #1-4 of The Invisibles v1 were distributed to newsstands in the US (or more likely mall bookstores like Waldenbooks, B. Daltons and Borders). Almost no other Vertigo book was sold on the newsstand over the whole lifespan of the imprint. I've seen copies of issue #1 with both printed and stickered Newsstand barcodes. I assume issues #2-4 had printed Newsstand barcodes only, though I've never seen a copy of #3. From v1 #5 onwards, it appears the book was Direct Sales-only in the US.
The Invisibles v1 was widely available in newsagents in the UK, though issue #14 was the last to have a printed UK cover price as a knock-on consequence of DC's exclusivity agreement with Diamond, made earlier in the year. Reportedly, DC's mass market distributor in the UK, Portmans, were restricted to importing a flat 40 titles from DC's range, no matter how many different books were published in a given month, from books cover-dated December 1995 onwards. Previously there were no such restrictions, allowing the full gamut of US Direct Sales-only books to be made available to the UK newsagent network . Subsequent issues from The Invisibles v1 were available in newsagents with a price sticker applied by the distributor - though it's unclear at the moment if issue #19 was distributed, as all copies were polybagged.
Only issues #1-4 of The Invisibles v2 were distributed to newsagents in the UK. Due to the hard 40-title ceiling imposed on the distributor, they were keen to only select the best-selling books from DC's range - which could run to 70 or 80 titles a month - so at this point distribution of The Invisibles into UK newsagents ceased.
The Absolute Vertigo and Vertigo Gallery one-shots were Direct Sales-only in the US, but the printed UK cover price suggests they were widely available in newsagents in the UK. It's extremely unlikely that either of the Winter's Edge books made it to wide UK distribution outside of comics shops.
VEROTIKA (Verotika)
#1, Oct ’94 – ‘The Braille Encyclopaedia’
#2, Jan ’95 – ‘The Room Where Love Lives’
I think I remember reading on Barbelith that these adaptations by Ted Naifeh of Morrison's prose stories from the Hot Blood anthology series were unlicensed/unauthorised, but I have no idea how true that is.
Direct Sales only in the US. It's highly likely that Verotika was not distributed in the UK at all - direct market, mass market, or anywhere else - due to obscenity concerns.
VERTIGO VOICES: KILL YOUR BOYFRIEND (DC Comics/Vertigo)
Jun ’95; Second printing, Jul ’98
Kill Your Boyfriend / Vimanarama Deluxe Edition (collects Kill Your Boyfriend, Vimanarama #1-3), Oversized HC, Feb '16
The 'second printing' is actually a repackaged, squarebound version, with various bits of extra stuff in the back of it.
The original Vertigo Voices edition was Direct Sales-only in the US, but the printed UK price suggests this was widely available in newsagents in the UK.
SKRULL KILL KREW (Marvel)
#1 – 5, Sep ’95 – Jan ’96 (with Mark Millar)
Skrull Kill Krew (collects #1-5), SC, May '06
Skrulls Must Die! The Complete Skrull Kill Krew (collects #1-5, others), SC, Apr '15
Direct Sales only in the US and UK. Marvel's UK newsstand distribution had been a mess for some years at this point, and, in 1996, was only a year or two out from ending completely. Skrull Kill Krew was not distributed to UK newsagents.
FLEX MENTALLO, MAN OF MUSCLE MYSTERY (DC Comics/Vertigo)
#1 – 4, Jun ’96 – Sep ’96
Flex Mentallo, Man of Muscle Mystery: The Deluxe Edition, Oversized HC Mar ‘12; SC, Apr '14
Direct Sales-only in the US, but widely available in newsagents in the UK.
A collected edition of Flex was solicited in Diamond's December 1997 Previews catalogue, for release on April 1st 1998. DC notified retailers in February '98 that the book was cancelled and would not be re-solicited. Though not publicized at the time, the cancellation was due to legal action from the Charles Atlas Foundation over Flex's 'Hero of the Beach' origin and its similarity to the Charles Atlas ads from the 60's and 70's. The case was eventually dismissed. Prior to the 2012 release of the deluxe edition, lots of second hand book sites listed extortionately expensive copies of the cancelled 1998 TPB for sale, but none of the ones I contacted back in 2010 actually had it, and I'm 99% sure it was never printed.
DC's Italian licensee Magic Press did collect Flex in a softcover edition in 2002. An English-language deluxe hardcover edition, controversially recoloured by Pete Doherty in collaboration with series artist Frank Quitely, eventually saw the light of day a decade later in 2012.
OK Comics in the UK offered the deluxe hardcover with an exclusive bookplate signed by Grant Morrison, Frank Quitely and colorist Peter Doherty.
Unusually, there are three printings of the deluxe hardcover (DC usually only does one and then moves on to the softcover).
AZTEK THE ULTIMATE MAN (DC Comics)
#1 – 10, Aug ’96 – May ’97 (with Mark Millar)
JLA Presents: Aztek The Ultimate Man (collects #1-10), SC, May '08
Uncorrected b&w preview of #1. DC also produced a promo poster to advertise the series' launch in comic book stores.
Direct Sales-only in the US, but widely available in newsagents in the UK.
Mattel released an Aztek action figure in 2005, based on the character's design from the Justice League Unlimited cartoon.
Though it's widely believed that Morrison and Millar plotted the whole run together and scripted alternate issues, Mark Millar posted on the Millarworld forum back in 2004 that Morrison wrote issues 1, 5 and 7, and that he had scripted the rest. Interestingly, Morrison's name is listed first in the credits for issues 1, 2, 3, 5, 6 and 7, with Millar listed first for issues 4, 8 and 10. At the very least, the text piece from issue 3, 'A Monument to His Own Hubris', concerning the occult architecture of Vanity is most likely also Morrison's work.
The Six Flags theme parks in New England and Fiesta, Texas both have an (officially licensed by DC!) 'Aztek: The Ultimate Nachos' nacho stand that uses a lightly modified version of the comic book logo for its signage.
VAMPIRELLA (Harris Comics)
Vampirella 25th Anniversary Special, Oct ’96 – ‘The Blood Red Game’
Harris sent a promotional ashcan preview of the book to stores before release. The 25th Anniversary Special proper was also offered as a 'Virgin' (i.e. no logos or cover text) edition, a 'Platinum' edition (same as the virgin edition with a silver stamp, limited to 5,000 copies), and finally as a limited signed edition autographed by a bunch of creators (including Morrison) via Dynamic Forces.
#1 – 9, Nov ’97 – Aug ’98 (1-5 with Mark Millar, 6-9 with Mark Millar and Steven Grant)
Uncorrected b&w preview of #1. Harris produced a promo poster to advertise the 'Ascending Evil' storyline in stores, as well as an 'ashcan' issue, very practically named the 'Vampirella Monthly Series Preview Edition', consisting of preview art and interviews.
According to a contemporaneous Usenet post by Mark Millar, he scripted #1-3 solo from a Morrison/Millar plot. Morrison most likely scripted #4 before signing an exclusive contract with DC in January '98 that seems to have prematurely curtailed their involvement in the series (though not their co-writing credits it seems). Steven Grant finished scripting #5 and 6 from (very loose) Morrison plots - reportedly the plot for issue #6 was one line of solicit text. Nobody knows who scripted #7 (both Millar and Grant say it wasn't them, its incredibly unlikely it was Morrison), and Steven Grant scripted #8 and #9 with no input at all from Morrison or Millar. Neither Harris nor subsequent Vampirella licencees Dynamite have included issues #7-9 in their ' Vampirella by Morrison/Millar' collections, despite the credits on the issues themselves. Morrison's website bibliography lists only issues #1-4.
Issue #1 was available with 4 different covers, in *at least* 11 different variations -
Joe Quesada 'Vampirella against black background' cover (flat gold logo, standard edition - this is often erroneously listed on eBay etc as the limited 'Gold Edition' - the actual 'Gold Edition' has the Amanda Connor variant cover)
Joe Quesada cover (flat gold logo) (Dynamic Forces signed edition)
Joe Quesada cover (silver foil logo) ('Platinum Edition' available only to Scarlet Legion fan club members. Limited to 1,000 copies)
Joe Quesada cover ('Royal Blue Edition' with blue foil logo. Limited to 100 copies)
Joe Quesada cover (virgin cover - due to a printers error, no logo or credits appear on the cover - I've seen this listed on a Vampirella rarities website but have never actually seen a copy come up for sale)
Amanda Connor 'gory' cover
Amanda Connor 'gory' cover ('Gold Edition' with gold foil stamp. Limited to 500 copies)
Amanda Connor 'Vampirella reclining on skull' cover ('American Entertainment' mailaway variant)
Amanda Connor 'Vampirella reclining on skull' cover ('American Entertainment' mailaway variant, signed with silver foil square on cover. Available exclusively through an offer in Wizard Magazine)
Jae Lee cover
Jae Lee cover (Dynamic Forces signed edition. Limited to 250 copies)
Issue #2 had 2 covers - the regular Amanda Conner cover and a Jae Lee variant (with Lee's cover also available as a signed Dynamic Forces variant)
Issue #3 had 2 covers again, Conner and Jae Lee (no Dynamic Forces variant this time around, he must have been pig sick of signing Vampirella comics by this point tbf).
Issue #4 once again had 2 different covers, one by Louis Small Jr. - with two Dynamic Forces signed variants (sold individually as the 'Dynamic Forces Limited Signed Edition', limited to 250 copies, and as part of a signed collection of all of the Morrison/Millar credited issues - the 'Dynamic Forces Limited Signed Collection') - and one by Joseph Michael Lisner - the regular 'American Entertainment' variant; a 'Crimson' edition with a red foil stamp; a retailer incentive Gold edition with a gold foil stamp; and a Bill's Comics edition signed by both Lisner and Louis Small.
Surprisingly, there's only one (Louis Small Jr.) cover for issue #5 (though of course there was also a limited signed version available from Dynamic Forces) and - almost unbelievably - issue 6 seems to have only one cover and *NO SIGNED VARIANTS AT ALL*. Strike me down...
Back to business as usual and one million variants apiece for issues #7 and #8, but since by all accounts Morrison wasn't involved in the writing of either of those issues at all (despite what the credits say), I'll spare you the details here.
Direct Sales-only in the US and UK. Harris did not distribute their books to UK newsagents.
JLA (DC Comics)
#1 – 15, Jan ’97 – Feb ’98
JLA: Secret Files And Origins #1, Sep ’97 – ‘Star Seed’ (with Mark Millar)
JLA/WildC.A.T.S, Sep ’97
New Years Evil: Prometheus #1, Feb ’98
#16 – 17, Mar ’98 – Apr ’98
New Gods Secret Files And Origins #1, Sep ’98 – ‘Orion And Big Barda Join The JLA’
#22 – 23, Sep ’98 – Oct ’98
#1,000,000 – Nov ’98
#24 – 26, Dec ’98 – Feb ’99
#28 – 31, Apr ’99 – Jul ’99
#34, Oct ’99
#36 – 41, Dec ’99 – May ’00
JLA: Earth 2, Jan ’00
All of the standard issues of JLA, along with JLA Secret Files #1, New Years Evil: Prometheus #1 and JLA #1,000,000, were available in Direct Sales and Newsstand editions. The only difference between the two is a slight change to the barcode on the cover. I previously theorised that Newsstand versions of issues #2-4 didn't exist, as there are no pictures anywhere online (the GCD, Mile High etc) of Newsstand covers for any of those issues, and I've never seen any of them come up for sale. However, over the last few months I've managed to obtain Newsstand versions of issues #2 (overstickered but with a printed Newsstand barcode underneath the sticker) and #4, so it's a good as certain that #3 does exist as well. They just seem to be, for whatever reason, much more difficult to find than #1 or #5 upwards.
At least some issues of JLA were distributed to UK newsagents before distribution of DC comics to the UK mass market ended in 1999. As detailed in the entry for The Invisibles, DC's UK distributors were constrained to choosing 'best sellers' to import from late 1995 onwards - neither of JLA's predecessors, Justice League America and Justice League Task Force made the best seller list, and that decision stuck past JLA's launch in late 1996 (big shout out to a random issue of Comics International I picked up on a whim for confirming this). The earliest issue of JLA I've found with a UK distributor price sticker is #10, and the latest is #31. I think the last month of mass market UK distribution was the month #32 came out, so I'm pretty sure there aren't any beyond that. I'm not sure what issue distribution did start, but it seems #1-7 are definitely off the table. Some issues (#26 is a good example) I've seen loads of copies of, others none at all, so it's entirely possible that the run is not complete - i.e. that some issues between #10-32 were imported and others weren't. If you've any info on this please let me know!
I'm 99% sure that due to the increased cover price, JLA Secret Files & Origins #1, the New Gods Secret Files book and JLA/WildC.A.T.s were not sold to UK newsagents. New Years Evil: Prometheus #1, I haven't a clue but I'd guess it was not distributed.
A promotional poster ('The World's Greatest Heroes Together Again'), b&w ad slick and counter bin/header card were provided to retailers prior to the series hitting the shelves in November 1996. DC also sent out a flat-packed mobile which pops up on eBay now and again, and a frieze/roll of wallpaper border featuring the various logos of the 'Big 7', which hardly ever does.
Rich Johnston reported in 1997 that JLA #1 would receive a second printing from DC, but I've not been able to find any solicits or actual physical copies that would suggest this ever happened.
There were more promotional posters issued for issue #16 in January '98 ('What Does It Take To Join Their Ranks?'), JLA/WildCATS and the Earth 2 graphic novel. Earth 2 also got an 8 page preview giveaway and a promo bookmark. DC released a JLA retail poster featuring new art from Howard Porter not long after the series debuted, and a retail poster of Porter's cover to JLA #1 many years later.
Other retailer-only JLA promotional posters from this era exist but are either promoting other non-Morrison series (JLA: Year One, Paradise Lost etc.) or the JLA family of titles in general (e.g. this Tom Mandrake JLA poster, using art from Mandrake and John Ostrander's Martian Manhunter #1)
A JLA membership card and a poster (featuring new Porter/Dell art) were included with the 1997 Wizard JLA Special.
Uncorrected b&w previews exist of #1, 2, 3, 9, 10, 16, 22 (includes different dialogue to published issue), and New Year's Evil: Prometheus #1 (which also included 4 unlettered pages of JLA #16). Alongside the standard retailer preview, two different uncorrected b&w previews of JLA #1 were given out at the 1996 San Diego Comic-Con (one at the retailer-only San Diego Expo meeting, and one for attendees at DC's panel announcing the series - I've seen versions of this latter one with a white cover and with a red cover, possibly from two different conventions), along with a 1" button badge with the JLA logo (this was probably distributed at a number of different conventions around this time and is quite easy to find).
Second prints of issues #10 and 11 exist - they have a large Roman numeral 'II' to the right of the logo, along with a slightly different UPC box on the cover and a small 'Second Printing' beneath the indicia on page 1. I think these were included in the 'JLA Month' pack sent to retailers in July 1997, alongside another poster ('Strength In Numbers'), a black JLA t-shirt featuring Porter/Dell's cover art from JLA: Secret Files & Origins #1 (probably the only JLA t-shirt you'll ever see featuring Electric Superman) that was also offered for general sale around the same time, and a promotional giveaway envelope/file card.
Hasbro/Kenner produced a line of 5" JLA action figures in 1998, initially exclusively for the now-defunct KB Toys. Each figure including a JLA-branded base and a backdrop of a Morrison-era JLA comic cover that you could cut out of the packaging and insert into the base. The Batman, and Aquaman figures were straight re-releases of figures originally released in the 1996 Batman: Total Justice series by Kenner. The JLA Flash, Green Arrow, Green Lantern and Huntress figures were more comic accurate repaints of their respective Total Justice figures. New (Morrison/Porter JLA-relevant) figures for the JLA line were Electric Superman (Series 1); Martian Manhunter, Steel and Zauriel (Series 2); and Plastic Man (Series 3). Evil hard-light hologram versions of Batman, The Flash, Superman, Green Lantern, Martian Manhunter and Aquaman (as seen in the first chapter of 'Rock of Ages') were included in three Diamond Exclusive Collector Packs of the figures, all recolor/repaints of the existing figures in translucent plastic. Also only appearing in the Collector Packs were Injustice Gang versions of Lex Luthor and the Joker.
Hasbro/Kenner also produced a line of 12" JLA figures around the same time. Figures included in the line were Aquaman, The Flash, and Green Lantern. Finally, there were two 8" Mego-style dolls in fabric costumes of the Martian Manhunter and Electric Superman released in JLA branded packaging.
DC Direct released 'collectable action figures' (they don't call 'em toys anymore cos any kid can utterly destroy them in 10 minutes flat) of the android Hourman and Tomorrow Woman in 2000.
Other bits and bobs of relevant (lol) JLA merch from around this period were a deluxe pin collection, a pack of postcards featuring a bunch of Porter/Dell covers sans copy, a series of 4" pewter figures of the 'Big 7' (and Plastic Man), a pewter paperweight featuring the JLA logo, and a set of $200 bookends. Solicited (and advertised on the box) as 'limited to a maximum of 2,000 bookend sets', the actual product is numbered out of 1,150.
I've seen a solicit for a JLA mug from DC Direct, featuring Howard Porter's cover art to JLA #1, but I've never actually seen one.
Titan Books in the UK printed versions of the softcover trade paperbacks of New World Order, American Dreams, Rock of Ages, Strength in Numbers, One Million, and JLA: Earth 2 with their own branding replacing the DC logo on the cover. Titan seem not to have produced their own trades of Justice For All and World War III, but did import them for sale into UK bookstores, adding a sticker over the printed DC barcode.
JLA: Earth 2 was reprinted in the UK in issues #34-38 of Titan's DC Universe Presents series.
In February 2016, as part of their DC Comics Graphic Novel Collection partwork, UK publisher Eaglemoss published a hardcover of JLA: Earth 2. A hardcover of New World Order collecting JLA #1-4 and JLA Secret Files & Origins #1 followed in August 2017. Finally, a hardcover of JLA: World War III collecting issues #34-41 was published in 2020.
In 2021, Hachette published a JLA: New World Order hardcover collecting JLA #1-9 as part of their DC Comics Heroes & Villains Collection partwork. A hardcover of Rock of Ages reprinting JLA #10-17 and New Years Evil: Prometheus #1 followed in 2024.
Dino Verlag AG, DC's German licensee at the time, produced a promotional poster featuring the cover art to issue #1 when they launched the German-language reprints of the series in 1998. There was also a 3" circular sticker produced for the launch.
DC reprinted JLA #1 as part of their DC Essentials line in June 2016, and again in March 2020 as part of the Dollar Comics line.
WEIRD WAR TALES (DC Comics/Vertigo)
#3, Aug ’97 – ‘The New Toys’
Graphic Ink: The DC Comics Art of Frank Quietly (collects 'The New Toys' from Weird War Tales #3, others), HC, Jun '14
Promotional poster provided to retailers prior to the series' release. There's also a black and white proof copy of issue #1, though this doesn't feature Morrison's story which was in issue #3.
Direct Sales-only in the US, but widely available in newsagents in the UK.
'The New Toys' was reprinted in the 100-page Vertigo Resurrected special in 2010.
THE FLASH (DC Comics)
#130 – 138, Nov ’97 – Jun ’98 (with Mark Millar)
The Flash: Emergency Stop (collects #130-135), SC, Dec '08
The Flash: The Human Race (collects #136-141, Secret Origins #50), SC, Jun '09
The Flash by Grant Morrison and Mark Millar (collects #130-141, others), SC, Apr '16
Morrison and Millar's run was promoted (alongside a bunch of other stuff released in September 1997's "Flash Month") on a promotional poster headed "Born To Run!" and featuring the whole Flash family, sent to stores before publication. Though they're exactly the sort of book that DC might have included in their retailer preview program, as far as I can tell uncorrected b&w previews of #130 and #131 - both of which were released in the same month - don't exist.
Co-written with Mark Millar. Interview comments by the pair suggest that Morrison and Millar collaborated closely at the plotting stage, then took turns scripting alternate arcs - Morrison wrote the 3-part 'Emergency Stop' in #130-132 and 'The Human Race' in #136-138, with Millar handling the done-in-one tales in #133-136 and 'The Black Flash' in #139-141. Though Morrison talked extensively about the Black Flash storyline in interviews preceding the run (and featured the character in Final Crisis), he receives no credit in issues 139-141, with Millar credited as sole writer (likely due to Morrison's increased workload preparing the DC One Million crossover).
All of Morrison and Millar's Flash issues were available in both direct sales and newsstand versions, and were available, stickered, in UK newsagents, though by 1998 this distribution channel had been severely curtailed.
2016's The Flash by Grant Morrison and Mark Millar collection was originally solicited as a hardcover but was actually published as a softcover only. Morrison's ‘The Flash of Two Worlds’ from 1990’s Secret Origins #50 was included in The Human Race TPB but omitted from the 2016 collection.
In November 2021, as part of their DC Comics Graphic Novel Collection partwork UK publisher Eaglemoss published a hardcover of The Flash: Emergency Stop, collecting The Flash #130-135. A hardcover of The Human Race (collecting #136-141) followed in early 2022, just prior to Eaglemoss'bankruptcy.
A Deluxe hardcover of Morrison and Millar's Flash run was solicited for release in 2024 but orders were later cancelled. The book was subsequently resolicited and should hit the shelves in Spring 2025.
DC ONE MILLION (DC Comics)
#1 – 4, Nov ’98
DC One Million 80 Page Giant #1, Aug ’99 – ‘The Divided Self’, ‘Crisis One Million’
DC One Million (collects DC One Million #1-4, Green Lantern #1000000, Resurrection Man #1000000, Starman #1000000, JLA #1000000, Superman: The Man of Tomorrow #1000000, Detective Comics #1000000), SC, Jun '99; reprinted with a different cover and retitled JLA: One Million, Jun '04
DC One Million Omnibus (collects DC One Million #1-4, plus all of the original #1000000 issues (except Young Heroes in Love #1000000), DC One Million 80-Page Giant #1, Booster Gold #1000000, Superman/Batman #79-80), Overized HC, Oct '13; new edition May '22
Uncorrected b&w previews of #1, 2. DC pushed the series with a promo pack containing a letter from DC's marketing department, two posters ('The 853rd Century Is Here' and 'Comics You Thought You'd Never Live to See'), an ad slick, a 'Welcome to the 853rd Century' lanyard, a stack of leaflets and a t-shirt ("Ask Me About The 853rd Century"). DC also gave away a canvas tote bag with the 'Welcome to the 853rd Century' design on it at the Connexions retailer meeting at the 1998 San Diego Comic Con.
Two versions of the 'The 853rd Century Is Here' poster exist, one with "The Future Arrives In September" and a list of all of the tie-ins printed at the bottom, the other without.
Dino Verlag AG, DC's German licensee at the time, also produced a promotional poster for One Million when they reprinted it for the German market in 1999. It used the 'The 853rd Century Is Here' design, but all the text was in German (for hopefully obvious reasons). They also sent out 3" circular stickers to comic stores to promote the series.
As part of the 2007's 'Justice League' wave, Wizkids released Heroclix figures of the robot Hourman, Superman One Million, Batman One Million, The Flash One Million and Wonder Woman One Million. In 2015, they followed up with a giant-sized minature of Solaris the Tyrant Sun (!). At some point Wizkids also made a DC One Million Event Dial, though I don't really know what this is or does, sorry.
As well as writing the core mini-series and the JLA 1,000,000 tie-in issue for this fifth-week event, Morrison also plotted a 1,000,000 issue for all 34 titles in DC's core line at that time (apart from Hitman, where Morrison simply requested that Garth Ennis "take the piss"). The writers assigned to the individual issues varied widely in their engagement with Morrison's plot - Denny O'Neil's Azrael 1,000,000 and Peter David's Supergirl 1,000,000 being two examples where it was pretty much ignored completely. Superman writer Dan Jurgens was so incensed with the request to script from Morrison's outline that he refused to be involved in the project at all (as detailed in the Jurgens interview in Mark Salisbury's 1999 book Writers on Comic Book Scriptwriting). Figsarello from Captain Comics has an excellent write up looking at how much influence Morrison had (or didn't have) over the extended storyline with a comprehensive overview of all the individual issues here.
All four issues of the mini-series were available in both direct sales and newsstand versions, and may have been available in newsagents in the UK, though this is far from clear at the current time. If they were, they're likely the last Morrison-written floppies from any publisher that were distributed to the UK mass market, at least in their original form - reprints of New X-Men, All Star Superman, Morrison's entire Batman run and Final Crisis would later appear in UK mass market titles published by Panini and Titan Comics (see individual entries for each of those series).
Titan Books in the UK printed a version of the 1999 trade paperback of One Million, with their own branding replacing the DC logo on the cover.
As part of their DC Comics Graphic Novel Collection partwork, UK publisher Eaglemoss collected a big chunk of the One Million saga over two hardcover books in 2017. Volume one (published in March '17) collected DC One Million #1-3 and the #1000000 issues of Superman: The Man of Steel, Superman, Batman: Shadow of the Bat, Nightwing, Detective Comics, Starman, JLA, Batman and Catwoman. Volume two (published May '17) collected DC One Million #4, and the #1000000 issues of Robin, Wonder Woman, Shazam, Flash, Aquaman, Action Comics, Adventures of Superman, Superman: The Man of Tomorrow, and Resurrection Man. Some of Eaglemoss's omissions are perfectly understandable (Supergirl, Azrael, the Legion books), while others are real headscratchers (the Green Lantern and Martian Manhunter books are pretty integral to the whole thing). Ah well.
THE AUTHORITY (DC Comics/Wildstorm)
#28, Apr ’02 (Credited to Mark Millar; GM ghost-wrote first draft)
Morrison stepped in to ghost-write this issue while Millar was ill. Legend has it that Morrison's indiscretion in loudly taking credit for the comic led to the still-ongoing rift between the two, though the real story behind their fall out is undoubtedly much more complex.
MARVEL BOY (Marvel)
#1 – 6, Aug ’00 – Mar ’01
Marvel Boy (collects #1-6), SC, Jun '01
Marvel Boy (collects #1-6, Marvel Knights/Marvel Boy Genesis Edition), HC, Sep '08; SC, May '14
An uncorrected black and white preview of issue #1 – featuring unlettered art and the entire original script (including Morrison’s home address and phone number on the title page??) was sent to retailers in anticipation of the series’ release. A copy sold on eBay a couple of years back.
A Marvel Knights/Marvel Boy Genesis Edition preview comic was polybagged with The Punisher v3 #3 in June 2000
Issue #1 was also available in a limited edition of 4,000 through Dynamic Forces, featuring the other half of JG Jones' wraparound cover intended (but not used) for the regular issue #1
Brian Michael Bendis allegedly implied in a 2005 interview (anyone have a link?) that Marvel Boy was intended to be the mystery 'first Ultimate book' that Joe Quesada had been dropping hints about since the Ultimate line began in 2001. I’d guess the intention was to reveal that Noh-Varr’s ‘home reality’ was the Earth 1610 Ultimate universe? (Morrison has it that Noh-Varr hails from the 'DC Universe Hala' in the issue #1 script, lol). Apparently the original intention was to line up all of these ducks in a row in the never-published Marvel Boy 2.
Hasbro put out a Marvel Legends figure of Noh-Varr in 2023, though the figure's costume is based on his later appearances in non-Morrison comics.
NEW X-MEN (Marvel)
#114 – 154, Jul ’01 – May ’04
New X-Men Annual 2001, circa Aug ’01
New X-Men: E is for Extinction (collects #114-117), SC, Nov '01
New X-Men: Imperial (collects #118-126), SC, Jul '02
New X-Men: New Worlds (collects #127-133), SC, Dec '02
New X-Men: Riot At Xavier's (collects #134-138), SC, May '03
New X-Men: Assault on Weapon Plus (collects #139-145), SC, Oct '03
New X-Men: Planet X (collects #146-150), SC, Feb '04
New X-Men: Here Comes Tomorrow (collects #151-154), SC, May '04
New X-Men Vol. 1 (collects #114-126, Annual 2001), HC, '01
New X-Men Vol. 2 (collects #127-141), HC, '03
New X-Men Vol. 3 (collects #142-154), HC, '04
New X-Men Omnibus (collects #114-154, Annual 2001), HC, Nov '06; 2nd Edition with new cover, Aug '12; 3rd Edition, Sep '16
New X-Men by Grant Morrison: The Ultimate Collection Vol.1 (collects #114-126, Annual 2001), SC, May '08
New X-Men by Grant Morrison: The Ultimate Collection Vol.2 (collects #127-141), SC, Aug'08
New X-Men by Grant Morrison: The Ultimate Collection Vol.3 (collects #142-154), SC, Nov '08
New X-Men Vol. 1-8 (Digest-sized, collects #114-154, Annual 2001), SC, May '11-Dec '11
Issue #115 came with a 50/50 variant cover, by Barry Windsor Smith no less.
I'm not sure if Marvel (or specifically the immediate post-bankruptcy Marvel of 2001) did a lot less to promote their comics to stores than DC, or if it's just that less stuff makes it to the secondary market, but there's nowhere near the tide of promotional jetsam for New X-Men that you can find for Morrison's JLA run from just a few years prior. A large folded promotional poster with Frank Quitely art was sent to stores to promote the series before release, back when it was still going to be called X-Men 2001 (there was also a Spider-Man 2001 poster using the same branding, released to promote JMS and John Romita Jr's run on the title). That's pretty much it as far as promotional stuff for retailers goes.
Marvel reprinted New X-Men #114-116 in the 80-page Marvel Must Haves #12 in December 2001, and New X-Men #150 in 2018's True Believers: Death of Phoenix #1.
A number of issues of the series were offered in signed editions through Dynamic Forces, but I think the only one that was signed by Morrison was #114.
Every issue of Morrison's New X-Men run, including the 2001 Annual, were available in both Direct Sales and Newsstand versions. I'm not sure why but these seem to be much easier to find in the UK than any other newsstand books listed here. There's no sign that Marvel promoted the book to retailers with a black & white preview, though advance copies of #114 were sent to retailers a week early as part of Marvel's First Look Program. As far as I've been able to tell, these pre-release copies are identical to the standard book that went on sale the following week.
The entirety of Morrison's New X-Men run was reprinted in the UK in issues #112-119, 123, 124, 126-129 and 133-141 of Panini's Essential X-Men title.
Paw Prints Books published 'school and library binding' hardcover editions of the fifth, sixth and seventh digest-sized collections in 2011. There may be other volumes in the series that received the same treatment.
Merch-wise, Diamond Select offered a couple of retail posters (ie intended for shops to sell in a poster rack) featuring art from the series, one with the cover art from New X-Men #114, and one with the art used on the first printing of the E is For Extinction trade paperback (looking up at the team with Homo Sapiens' gravestone in the background). At some point Marvel also offered a retail poster of Frank Quitely’s Wolverine cover for New X-Men #115. There are also posters featuring the Quitely Emma Frost cover for New X-Men #116, Quitely’s Wolverine cover for Wizard the Comics Magazine #117 and various other bits of New X-Men pinup art in circulation that seem to all come from various issues of Wizard’s annual Postermania mag and the Marvel Poster Magazine.
Diamond Select also churned out a series of limited-run busts in 2003 - Jean Grey (standard Quitely costume and green/red Phoenix shirt variant), Wolverine (standard and a jacketless Tower Records exclusive variant) and Cyclops, all decked out in their New X-Men togs - and a deluxe ‘Here Comes Tomorrow’ Phoenix action figure (available in 2 different variants).
Other New X-Men toys... sorry, adult collectables, include two 2004 two-packs of Mini-Mates figures from Art Asylum - Cyclops/Emma Frost (also offered with a limited transparent Emma Frost variant), and Wolverine/Jean Grey - all featuring Quitely's New X-Men designs.
The Cyclops and Wolverine Mini-Mate figures were also included (with different face prints) in a 2006 X-Men: Dark Tide DVD box set that was only available in the US, though these variants seem to pop up in random selections of Marvel Mini Mates offered cheap by Chinese eBay sellers all the time, so aren’t too hard to get. The Wolverine and Jean Grey figures were also offered in a 4-pack with Professor X and Magneto - these are identical to the two-pack figures.
There were also two 6" Marvel Legends figures released featuring characters or costume designs from New X-Men - Sentinel Attack Wolverine, released by Toy Biz in 2004 under the X-Men Legends banner and featuring a small Wild Sentinel as an accessory; and Xorn (with removable helmet!), released by Hasbro in 2007. Hasbro also released a Fantomex figure in 2020, though this was based on the character's costume from the later Uncanny X-Force series, rather than the New X-Men version.
X-Men: Next Dimension was a beat 'em up video game released for the PS2 and original XBox in late 2002 that used the character designs and costumes from Morrison and Quitely's run.
Hachette's 2012 UK partwork The Marvel Graphic Novel Collection featured volumes reprinting E is For Extinction (issue 17, reprints New X-Men #114-117) and Imperial (issue 34, reprints New X-Men #118-126). The same two books with very subtly different cover dress and different numbering (iirc) were offered again in the 2016 version of the Marvel Graphic Novel Collection.
FANTASTIC FOUR: 1234 (Marvel)
#1 – 4, Oct ’01 – Jan ’02
Fantastic Four 1234 (collects #1-4), SC, Sep '02
Fantastic Four 1234 Premier Hardcover (collects #1-4, Marvel Knights Double Shot #2), HC, Oct '11
Marvel Knights Fantastic Four 1234 (collects #1-4, Marvel Knights Double Shot #2), SC, Sep '18
A newsstand version of #4 exists, so one would assume that all of the issues were distributed to newsstands. I've never seen a newsstand copy of #1, 2 or 3 though.
The ‘Premier Classic’ hardcover (number #77 in a monthly series) was available with two different covers. The ‘Direct Market’ variant was limited to 590 copies and numbered on the reverse of the dustjacket. Previously I wondered who outside the DM would ever have sold this, then I saw one on eBay with an Amazon warehouse stock sticker on the reverse so there you go.
Barring the original 2002 release (maybe), the covers for all of Marvel’s FF1234 collections have been uniformly awful.
COSI FAN TUTTE (Scottish Opera)
Scottish Opera Programme Insert, Oct ’01 – ‘I Like To Dress Up And Two-Time Myself!’
Art by Cameron Stewart. This strip hasn't been reprinted or collected, but was up on Cameron Stewart's website back in the day. I don't think I've ever seen a copy of this come up for sale.
You can read ‘I Like To Dress Up And Two-Time Myself!’ here.
NICK FURY (Marvel)
Marvel Knights Double Shot #2, Jul ’02 – ‘Nick’s World…’
Fantastic Four 1234 Premier Classic Hardcover (collects #1-4, Marvel Knights Double Shot #2), HC, Oct '11
Marvel Knights Fantastic Four 1234 (collects #1-4, Marvel Knights Double Shot #2), SC, Sep '18
This may have been available in a Newsstand version - plenty of other Marvel Knights books were - but if it was I've never seen one, and neither has the internet at large (the GCD, Mile High, etc).
The ‘Premier Classic’ hardcover (number #77 in a monthly series) was available with two different covers. The ‘Direct Market’ variant was limited to 590 copies and numbered on the reverse of the dustjacket.
THE FILTH (DC Comics/Vertigo)
#1 – 13, Aug ’02 – Oct ’03
The Filth (collects #1-13), SC, May '04
The Filth: The Deluxe Edition (collects #1-13), Oversized HC, Apr '15; SC, Apr '17
A promotional poster was sent to stores to advertise the series before release. The Filth was also featured on one of the covers for Diamond's Previews catalogue for April 2002, and reproduced on a retailer-only poster advertising the catalogue.
SEAGUY (DC Comics/Vertigo)
Seaguy #1-3, Jul ’04-Sep ’04
Seaguy: The Slaves Of Mickey Eye #1-3, Jun ’09-Aug ’09
Seaguy (collects Seaguy #1-3), SC, Jan '05
Blink and you'll miss it, but Seaguy #1 features on a muti-title Vertigo promotional poster sent to stores before the series's release.
Seaguy: The Slaves of Mickey Eye has never been reprinted or collected. It seems extremely unlikely that 'Seaguy Eternal', the third and final volume of the series, will ever appear.
Morrison shared script pages and some of their preliminary layout sketches for Seaguy Eternal - along with performances of the various songs featured in the preceding series’ – in their Substack newsletter ‘Xanaduum’ in April 2023.
DC COMICS PRESENTS: MYSTERY IN SPACE (DC Comics)
#1, Sep ’04 - 'Two Worlds'
Part of a series of eight one-shots released in tribute to long-serving DC editor Julius Schwartz, who died in early 2004. I don't think this or the other one-shots in this series have ever been reprinted or collected.
WE3 (DC Comics/Vertigo)
#1 – 3, Oct ’04 – Mar ’05
Originally intended to have featured art by Morrison's Kill Your Boyfriend and Invisibles collaborator Philip Bond. Bond eventually moved over to pencil Vinamarama, while Frank Quitely picked up art duties on WE3 .
Like Seaguy, WE3 was (barely) featured on a promotional poster advertising a bunch of new Vertigo issue #1's, sent to stores before the series began.
Titan Books in the UK printed a version of the 2005 TPB for the UK book market which removed the DC/Vertigo branding from the cover and featured Titan's own branding on the reverse.
JLA: CLASSIFIED (DC Comics)
#1 – 3, Jan ’05 – Mar ’05
There was a promotional poster to advertise the series, sent to stores before it was released.
Issue #1 came with a (50/50?) variant cover - one featuring the JLA, the other the Ultramarines/Global Guardians.
A retail poster was later released featuring Ed McGuiness' JLA cover art from issue #1.
DC Direct released a JLA Classified action figure line based on Ed McGuiness' character designs in 2005, with figures of Superman, Batman, Green Lantern (John Stewart) and Wonder Woman. The series was rereleased in slightly different 'JLA' packaging some time later with a number of new figures based on McGuiness' designs that didn't feature in Morrison's storyline.
Both covers for issue #1 were available as Newsstand versions. There were also Newsstand versions of issues #2 and #3.
VIMANARAMA (DC Comics/Vertigo)
#1 – 3, Apr ’05 – Jun ’05
Collected in an oversized Deluxe hardcover alongside Kill Your Boyfriend.
SEVEN SOLDIERS (DC Comics)
DC Horizon #21, Dec ’04 – GM Introduction, sketches
Seven Soliders #0, Apr ’05
Shining Knight #1 – 4, May ’05 – Oct ’05
Guardian #1 – 4, May ’05 – Nov ’05
Zatanna #1 – 4, Jun ’05 – Dec ’05
Klarion The Witch-Boy #1 – 4, Jun ’05 – Dec ’05
Mister Miracle #1 – 4, Nov ’05 – May ’06
Bulleteer #1 – 4, Jan ’06 – May ’06
Frankenstein #1 – 4, Jan ’06 – May ’06
Seven Soldiers #1, Jun ’06
Promotional poster provided to retailers prior to the series' release.
There was a second printing of Seven Soldiers #0 with a black & white/red cover.
Initial copies of Klarion The Witch Boy #4 were misprinted with a large white triangle appearing on the cover. DC shipped free replacement copies to stores later that same month and requested that the original misprints were returned or destroyed. The cover UPC box for both is identical, and both are identified as the first printing.
The initial four volume trade paperback reprints contained a Morrison introduction and some concept sketches by Morrison and the various series’ artists (Vol. 1), and a script extract from Seven Soldiers #1 (Vol. 4). All of this was also reprinted in the two volume hardcovers and the 2018 omnibus edition.
Volume 3 of the trade paperback reprints was, for some unknown reason, massively under-ordered on release compared to volumes 2 and 4. Subsequently it became (and still is to some extent) much harder to find - and much more expensive second-hand - than the other three volumes.
Morrison's take on Frankenstein appears as a playable character in TT Games' 2012 videogame LEGO Batman 2, and in 2014's LEGO Batman 3: Beyond Gotham.
McFarlane Toys released a 'Megafig' (oversized figures designed to scale with McFarlane's regular 7" line) of Frankenstein in his Seven Soldiers togs in 2022. They also released figure of Ystin as the Shining Knight in 2024, though this was more based on their look from the New 52 Demon Knights series.
ALL STAR SUPERMAN (DC Comics)
#1 – 12, Jan ’06 – Oct ’08
A promotional poster and a promo bookmark were provided to retailers prior to the series' release. Quitely's cover to issue #1 also featured on a poster promoting Free Comic Book Day in 2008.
All twelve issues were available in both direct sales and newsstand versions, though no-one seems to have ever seen a newsstand version of issue #12. (August 2024 UPDATE: I finally found an eBay listing for a newsstand copy of issue #12, so it does exist!)
All Star Superman #1-12 were reprinted in the UK in issues #1-9, 11, and 22-24 of Titan's Superman Legends series.
DC have reprinted All Star Superman #1 as a floppy a bunch of times - firstly for Free Comic Book Day in 2008, then as part of the 'After Watchmen... What's Next?' $1 reprint program in 2008. There was also the All Star Superman Special Edition, released to tie-in to the 2015 Man of Steel movie in three different flavours - one for the Direct Market, one for the Bookstore market and a polybagged 'Sears Edition' with a different cover that was (I think) sent out in the mail to Sears members or card holders or something. Finally, a version featuring the S-shield from James Gunn's 2025 Superman movie on the cover was given away at the 2024 San Diego Comic-Con.
In the UK, Eaglemoss reprinted All Star Superman - complete in one Deluxe-trim volume - as Special #24 of their DC Comics Graphic Novel Collection partwork in 2021.
DC Direct released an 'All Star' action figure line in 2009 featuring figures of All Star Superman and Lois as Superwoman. There was also a Bizarro and All Star Superman two-pack which included the first hardcover collection of the series, reprinting issues #1-6 - the Superman figure in the two pack has different paint deco to the single carded figure, and possibly a different head sculpt.
An All Star Superman DTV animated movie was released in the US in 2011 in three different editions - a Blu-Ray/DVD combo pack, a double disc Special Edition DVD, and a single disc DVD. A 4K Ultra-HD/Blu-Ray release followed in 2024. Grant Morrison features prominently in many of the special features, including a Blu-Ray only audio commentary by Morrison and Bruce Timm. Best Buy offered an exclusive boxset of the DVD/Blu-Ray Combo Pack that came with an figurine of Superman in his solar suit, based on the designs from the cartoon. Amazon also offered the DVD/Blu-Ray Combo Pack with an exclusive Litho Cell. In 2011, DC Direct offered an All Star Superman statue based on the design from the animated movie.
All Star Superman was not released in the UK until 2013, when it was included alongside some random episodes of Superman: The Animated Series in a cheapo Superman Animated Collection 3 DVD box set.
52 (DC Comics)
#1 – 52, Jul ’06 – Jul ’07 (with Geoff Johns, Greg Rucka, Mark Waid)
TP Vol 1 (script extract #5)
TP Vol 2 (script extracts #17, #19, #25)
TP Vol 3 (script extracts #28, #29, #31, #36)
TP Vol 4 (script extract #49)
A promotional poster was provided to retailers prior to the series' release.
Using the Giffen breakdowns that appeared weekly on DC's 52 micro-site (now long gone unfortunately), arch Batmannotater David Uzumeri identified who amongst 52's four credited scripters wrote *every single page* of the series by looking at the fonts the writers used for their panel descriptions - a breakdown appears here at Funnybook Babylon. The two 52 scripts I've seen correspond to David's deductions exactly - good work fella :) David's breakdown suggests that Morrison's contributions were primarily focused on the 'Mystery in Space' and Oolong Island story threads. None of the script extracts included in the trade paperbacks appear to be Morrison’s work, nor are they quoted in any of the various commentaries in those books.
All 52 issues of the series were available in newsstand and Direct Sales editions.
Morrison's take on Chang Tzu appears as a playable character in TT Games' 2018 LEGO DC Super-Villains videogame.
Ace Books published a novelization of 52 by Greg Cox in 2007, though if memory serves much of Morrison's material doesn't make the cut despite the extra breathing room a novel-length adaptation might afford. Graphic Audio put out an unabridged full-cast audio adaptation ("A Movie in Your Mind") in two multi-disc box sets released in 2007 and 2008.
BRAVE NEW WORLD (DC Comics)
1, Aug ’06 – The All-New Atom, Uncle Sam & The Freedom Fighters (‘Based on ideas and concepts developed by Grant Morrison’)
THE ALL-NEW ATOM (DC Comics)
1, Sep ’06 (‘Based on ideas and concepts developed by Grant Morrison’)
All New Atom writer Gail Simone told me that the only elements of Morrison's 'ideas and concepts' document that she used, beyond the character of the Ryan Choi Atom himself, were the plot for the 8-page Brave New World story and Dr. Panda Potter, Choi's sidekick. Many of the series' other elements - the oddly out-of-time Ivy Town, the cancer God M'Nagalah etc. were re-purposed from an unpublished Kid Flash pitch that Simone had submitted sometime earlier.
Morrison only gets an ‘ideas and concepts’ credit in the first issue.
UNCLE SAM AND THE FREEDOM FIGHTERS (DC Comics)
#1-8, Sep ‘06-Apr ’07 (‘Based on ideas and concepts developed by Grant Morrison’)
Jimmy Palmiotti told me he'd only read Morrison's outline once, so presumably the lion's share of the FF revival came from himself and co-writer Justin Gray. Their take on Black Condor for one is completely different to Morrison's. Gonzo the Mechanical Bastard - one of the villains from Palmiotti and Gray's first Freedom Fighters mini-series - was inspired in part by Morrison's use of long-forgotten Quality Comics hero Bozo the Iron Man in their ideas and concepts document.
Gray and Palmiotti's Freedom Fighters made their debut in the 2006 Infinite Crisis Aftermath: Battle for Bludhaven mini-series, which also featured a revival of the Atomic Knights and final page revelation of a secret 'Command D' bunker beneath the ruins of Bludhaven. Given the Knights' and the bunker's later appearance in Final Crisis, these may well be elements that originated in Morrison's ideas and concepts document.
Palmiotti and Gray would continue the Freedom Fighters’ story in a bunch of mini-series and a short-lived ongoing book – even the New 52 didn’t stop them churning out various Freedom Fighters-adjacent series. Morrison gets an ‘ideas and concepts’ credit in all 8 issues of the first mini-series but nothing beyond that.
Morrison's own version of the Freedom Fighters - back on their original home of Earth X (now Earth 10) - made a very brief appearance in 2015's The Multiversity: Mastermen in 2015. Robert Vendetti and Eddy Barrows 12-issue Freedom Fighters mini-series from 2019 served as a direct sequel to the Mastermen story.
BATMAN (DC Comics)
#655 – 658, Sep ’06 – Dec ’06
#663 – 683, Apr ’07 – Jan ’09
#700 – 702, Aug ’10 – Oct ’10
Batman And Robin #1 – 16, Aug ’09 – Jan ’11
Batman: The Return Of Bruce Wayne #1 – 6, Jul ’10 – Jan ’11
Batman: The Return, Jan ’11
Batman Incorporated Vol. 1 #1 – 8, Jan - Oct ’11
Batman Incorporated: Leviathan Strikes!, Feb ’12
Batman Incorporated Vol. 2 #1 – 11, 13, Jul ’12 – Aug ’13
Batman Incorporated Vol. 2 #0, Nov ’12 (with Chris Burnham)
Promotional posters were sent to retailers to promote Batman #655 (also a bookmark), the Resurrection of Ra's Al Ghul crossover, and Batman and Robin #1 (poster was also given out at SDCC). A slightly different (and much bigger) version of the Quitely Batman and Robin #1 poster was given away with SFX Special Edition #40 magazine in 2009. Finally, a large poster featuring Andy Clarke's art from the in-house ad for Batman and Robin #10-12 was given away with an issue of the UK's Comic Heroes magazine in 2010.
I'm sure I remember seeing a postcard listing all of the Batman RIP crossovers, but I've been looking for it for years and have only found one in German, so maybe I imagined it.
There was a 1:10 variant for Batman #655 and 1:25 variants for #676-683 and 700, all 16 issues of Batman and Robin, all 6 issues of Return of Bruce Wayne, Batman: The Return, and all 22 regular issues of Batman Incorporated (only the Leviathan Strikes! special wasn't offered with a variant cover). In addition, 'sketch' variants were offered for Batman #670 (1:10), Batman #700 (1:75), Batman and Robin #1 (1:250), The Return of Bruce Wayne #1, Batman: The Return #1 and both Batman Incorporated #1's (all 1:200), and Batman Incorporated v2 #2-13 and 0 (all 1:100).
Batman #670, 671, 677, 681 and 700, and The Return of Bruce Wayne #2 all have second prints with recoloured covers. There were three printings of Batman #676, Return of Bruce Wayne #1 and Batman Incorporated v2 #8, and *four* printings of Batman and Robin #1 and 2, again all with recoloured covers. Batman and Robin #1 was republished again in 2010 with an "After Watchmen: What's Next?" cover banner; and Batman #655 was reprinted in 2014 as DC Essentials: Batman and Son #1 - both were cover priced $1.00. To tie in with DC's publishing plans for the Joker's 80th anniversary, DC solicited a Dollar Comics reprint of Batman #663 for April 2020. After delays due to Covid and DC moving distribution from Diamond to Lunar/GCBS, it did eventually ship in September 2020, though I don't think stores ordered it in any great quantity and it seems quite hard to find.
Batman Incorporated v2 #1-13 (and #0) were all offered as polybagged 'combo-packs' that included a code for a digital copy of that issue. All of them have the same cover art as the regular issue but recoloured.
All issues of Morrison's regular Batman run were available in both Direct Sales and Newsstand editions. Theoretically every issue of Batman and Robin should have a Newsstand edition as well, though there are no listings online for #1 or 2 and I've never seen a copy of either. There are also confirmed Newsstand editions of Batman Incorporated v1 #6, 7 and 8 - it's currently not know whether Newsstand versions of issues #1-5 or the Leviathan Strikes! one-shot exist. There's no indication that any issues of The Return of Bruce Wayne or The Return were distributed to DC's (by then, extremely small) newsstand network. There's a picture online of a Newsstand version of Batman Incorporated v2 #1, but it's a digital render rather than a picture of an actual physical comic. It also has exactly the same barcode as the Newsstand edition of Teen Titans #9 from the same month, so I'm 99.9% sure a Newsstand version of Batman Incorporated v2 #1 doesn't actually exist.
Double-sided posters of a number of Batman and Robin covers b/w Return of Bruce Wayne covers were included in some issues of the UK Batman Legends reprint book, published by Titan. Morrison's Batman run was reprinted for the UK mass market in Batman Legends v2 #1-4, 7, 11-17, 19, 22-29. Final Crisis and all of the Morrison written spin-offs were reprinted in Batman Legends #30-32 and Superman Legends #25-28. Reprints of Batman and Robin, The Return of Bruce Wayne, The Return one-shot and Batman Incorporated v1 followed in Batman Legends #35-56. Finally, Titan finished the run by reprinting Batman Incorporated v2 in Batman (2012) #10, 11, 13, 15, 17 and 18.
The Absolute edition of Batman Incorporated released in 2016 had a number of pages redrawn by original series artist Chris Burnham, some that were orginally fill-in pages by other artists and some puttting Batman back in a blue and grey Neal Adams suit for a flashback sequence. These pages were also used for the subsequent Batman by Grant Morrison omnibus volumes, which also had two new summary pages covering the events of the Resurrection of Ra's al Ghul crossover (again by Burnham). The Final Crisis recap pages included in the first volume of the Omnibus re-use art from the original series.
DC Direct put out three 6-inch action figure lines that tied in to Morrison's Batman run - Batman & Son in 2007 (with Batman, Joker and Ninja Man-Bat figures, and a Tim Drake Robin/Damian Wayne two-pack); the Return of Bruce Wayne in 2011 (with caveman, witch hunter, pirate and cowboy Batman figures); and Batman Incorporated in 2012 (with Batman, Chief Man of Bats, The Knight and Damian Wayne Robin figures).
Mattel released a 6-inch figure of the Batman of Zur En Arrh (called the Batman of Planet X on the packaging) as part of their Batman Unlimited line in 2013. A small Bat-Mite figure was included as a pack-in. In 2022, McFarlane Toys released their version of the Batman of Zur En Arrh in the 7-inch scale in three variants - standard, unmasked and a 'black light' version that glows under ultra-violet light.
Other Batman of Zur En Arrh/Batman of Planet X toys or collectables released in the wake of Morrison's run include a limited edition Funko Pop and a 'Wobbler' bobblehead figure, both exclusive to Target stores in the US; a 'Funko Dorbz' figure, exclusive to Walmart; a 4" Ooshies vinyl figure; an Ooshies pencil topper; a Heroclix figurine; a 4cm unpainted thermoplastic miniature for Knight Models' Batman Miniatures Game; a Fisher Price Imaginext figure for toddlers (!) featuring the variant cover to Batman #679 on the cardback; and an official Lego minifigure, complete with baseball bat accessory, given away at the 2014 San Diego Comic Con. Limited to 1,000 pieces, it now fetches thousands of dollars on the secondary market.
DC Collectables released a 6-inch Professor Pyg action figure in 2016, based on his appearance in the Arkham Knight videogame. Knight Models released a pack of 4cm miniatures of Pyg and three Dollotrons for the Batman Miniatures Game in 2017, also based on their Arkham Knight look. Pyg also featured prominently, alongside Mr. Toad, in the 2013 Beware the Batman animated series.
In 2024, McFarlane Toys released 7-inch scale action figures of Dick Grayson Batman and Damian Wayne Robin, based on their appearance from the front cover of Batman and Robin #1. Damian came packaged with a new reprint of that same issue.
A die-cast model of Frank Quitely's flying Batmobile design from Batman And Robin #1 was released as part of the Batman Automobilia partwork in the UK. The same model was later sold in discount stores without the partwork magazine. Batman Automobilia also featured a model of David Finch's 6-wheeled Batmobile from Batman: The Return #1.
Released in 2016, Lego Super-Heroes set 76056, 'Batman: Rescue from Ra's al Ghul', features Ra's, Talia, and the first minifigure of Damian Wayne as Robin.
Damian Wayne appears as a playable character in TT Games' LEGO Batman 2 videogame. The Batman of Zur En Arrh appears in LEGO Batman 3: Beyond Gotham.
Rocksteady/WB Games' Batman: Arkham videogame series has offered a bunch of Morrison-related character skins for download over the years, including a Batman Incorporated skin for 2011's Arkham City; a Batman One Million skin for 2013's Arkham: Origins; and Zur-En-Arrh and another Batman Incorporated skins for Arkham Knight in 2016. Most of the suits can be found in the Batman: Arkham Collection compilation currently available on the PS4 and XBox One. As Batman: Arkham Origins was never remastered for more modern systems, and, more importantly, the mechanism for redeeming the suit (by following an in-game link to register a WBID account) no longer appears to work, the Batman One Million suit is not currently commercially available, even using a genuine used copy of the game. Some enterprising Steam users have, however, discovered how to unlock the skin by manipulating the game code.
Batman: The Brave and the Bold, an animated series that ran from 2008 to 2011, featured numerous hat-tips to Morrison's run, including an adaptation of the original 'Batman of Zur En Arrh' story; the-Return of Bruce Wayne inspired 2011 episode 'Time out for Vengeance!"; and appearance by El Gaucho, the Club of Villains and Batman 666 amongst others.
Professor Pyg and Flamingo both made appearances in the live-action Gotham TV show, which ran from 2014 to 2019. Pyg also cropped up in a 2023 episode of Harley Quinn, the 2018 DTV animated movie Suicide Squad: Hell to Pay, and as one of the main antagonists alongside Mister Toad and Phosphorous Rex in the 2013 Beware the Batman animated show.
The 2014 DTV animated movie Son of Batman is (very loosely) based on Morrison and Andy Kubert's 'Batman and Son'. The third entry in the same series of movies, 2016's Batman: Bad Blood, is (again, very loosely) based on Morrison's Batman Incorporated. The internet sez that Morrison gets a credit in the Son of Batman, but not in Bad Blood.
WILDCATS (DC Comics/Wildstorm)
#1, Oct ’06
Promotional poster provided to retailers prior to the series' release. The script for the unreleased issue #2 was included in the 2017 Wildstorm 25th Anniversary hardcover.
THE AUTHORITY (DC Comics/Wildstorm)
#1 – 2, Nov ’06 – May ’07
The Authority: The Lost Year Reader (collects 1-2, Jan ’10)
#3 – 12, Jan’10 – Oct ’10 (Titled ‘The Authority: The Lost Year’. Story by GM and Keith Giffen, written by Giffen (8-9 by Giffen/JM DeMatteis))
The Authority: The Lost Year Book One (collects The Authority (2006) #1-2, The Authority: The Lost Year #3-7), SC, Jun '10
DC advertised Keith Giffen's continuation by stating that The Lost Year was the story Morrison 'would have told' had he stayed on the title, though it's fairly transparently not that if you read it - pretty much everything Morrison sets up in the first two issues is swiftly wrapped up by the time issue #3 is halfway done. According to the press for the earlier Authority: Relentless, Morrison was originally only planning to do five issues before handing over to another writer.
Though solicited to come out in March 2011, the second trade collection of Giffen and pal's Lost Year issues was never published.
METAL MEN (DC Comics)
#1 – 8, Oct ’07 – Jul ’08 (‘Based on ideas and concepts created by Grant Morrison’)
Metal Men, HC, Aug '08; SC, Aug '09
Morrison gets an 'ideas and concepts' credit in all 8 issues. Written and drawn by Duncan Rouleau, Metal Men is a lot of fun and well worth a read.
DC UNIVERSE (DC Comics)
#0, Jul ’08 (with Geoff Johns)
Second printing features the same Superman figure as the original cover, but replaces the background with large figures of Green Lantern and Wonder Woman.
FINAL CRISIS (DC Comics)
Sketchbook, Jul ’08
#1 – 7, Jul ’08 – Mar’09
#1 Director’s Cut, Oct ’08
Superman Beyond 3D #1 – 2, Oct ’08 – Mar ’09
Submit, Dec ’08
Secret Files, Feb ’09
Stores were sent a 'Heroes Die, Legends Live Forever' promo poster before the series launched, and promotional door posters of JG Jones' Green Lantern cover art from issue #1 and The Flash from issue #2 with the shipment of issue #1 (I think). Later, a Supergirl door poster featuring the cover art from issue #3 was sent to stores as part of a bundle promoting the launch of the Comic Shop Locator service. Finally a Darkseid door poster showcasing the cover art from issue #4 was given out at the DC booth at SDCC 2008. The Darkseid poster can be pretty tough to track down.
All of the issues of Final Crisis (including the tie-ins) were offered with two covers. There was also a second print of issue #6. There seem to be Newsstand versions of both the sliver and pin-up covers for all seven issues, though DC's newsstand business was defintiely in it's twilight years by this point and they're very difficult to find.
Final Crisis and all of the Morrison written spin-offs were reprinted for the UK mass market in Batman Legends #30-32 and Superman Legends #25-28.
Absolute Final Crisis, released in November 2012, featured seven extra story pages by Morrison and Doug Mahnke - it appears these were the same seven bonus pages mentioned by various comics news sites as being earmarked for inclusion in Final Crisis #7 back in 2009, but for one reason or another they never made it into the original issue or the first raft of trade collections. They've been included in all of the editions of Final Crisis that have followed in the wake of the Absolute edition.
Turtleback Books published a hardcover 'schools and library binding' edition of the revised TPB (including the extra story pages) in 2014.
The Director's Cut version of issue #1, featuring JG Jones' pencil art and extracts from Morrison's script, wasn't collected in any of the various hardcover, softcover and Absolute editions until the Essential Edition trade paperback was published in 2019.
Ace Books published a novelization of Final Crisis by Greg Cox in 2010. Graphic Audio put out an unabridged full-cast audio adaptation ("A Movie in Your Mind") of Cox's novelization in a 7-disc box set released in 2011. Though it does include elements of Submit and the Morrison-written Batman tie-ins, both the novelization and the audio adaptation skip over Superman Beyond completely, unfortunately.
MBX/18 DAYS (Virgin Comics/Liquid Comics/Dynamite)
MBX Sketchbook, Jul ’08
Grant Morrison’s 18 Days, Aug ’10
The 16 page, ashcan-sized MBX Sketchbook was only available for sale (for $25!) at the 2008 San Diego Comiccon. I'm fairly sure all of it is reprinted in the 2010 large-format Dynamite book.
Virgin had an MBX poster displayed on their stand at SDCC 2008 but I'm don't think it was ever sold/given away or sent out to retailers.
Its questionable how much input Morrison had - beyond the three scripts for animated shorts included in the 2010 book - in the Grant Morrison's 18 Days webseries or the comic that Graphic India launched in 2015.
Graphic India's Grant Morrison's 18 Days comic ran for 26 issues and a handful of one-shots after the series proper had concluded. The series is notable for featuring a truly mind boggling array of variant covers.
JOE THE BARBARIAN (DC Comics/Vertigo)
#1 – 8, Mar ’10 – May ’11
ACTION COMICS (DC Comics)
#1 – 18, Nov ’11 – May ’13
(preview DC Comics: The New 52 #1)
#0, Nov ’12
Issue #1 went through five printings, all with different covers. Another very limited cover was given to retailers attending the 2012 ComicsPro RRP meeting.
All nineteen issues feature a 1 in 25 variant cover. Issues #1-8 were also available as a 1 in 200 'sketch' cover (actually a black and white version of the regular cover). Issues #9-18 and #0 were also available with sketch covers, but with a 1 in 100 order ratio.
Issue #18 was also offered with a blank cover featuring only the logo and cover dress with no art.
Titan Comics published a 6-issue Superman series in the UK in 2013 that reprinted a bunch of these stories and featured textless, double-sided centrefold posters of some of the covers.
In 2016 as part of their Multiverse line, Mattel released a 6-inch action figure of the Superman of Earth 23, based on his appearance in Action Comics #9. There was also a Calvin Ellis Imaginext figure released by Fisher Price/Mattel in the blindbox 'Slammers' range in 2021.
All the issues of Morrison's Action Comics run were available in both Direct Sales and Newsstand editions - almost certainly the last Morrison super-books to be available outside the direct market as individual issues to date. Following Marvel's 2011 lead, DC discontinued much of their newsstand distribution operations in late 2013, leaving US chains Borders and Books-A-Million as the only customers for newsstand comic books (which by that point generally had a cover price that was a dollar more than their direct sales counterpart). Marvel ceased distribution to the newsstand sector entirely in December 2013, with DC following suit in August 2017.
DINOSAURS VS ALIENS (Liquid Comics/Dynamite)
May ’12 – Free Comic Book Day Special Preview
HC Jun ’12
Dinosaurs Vs Aliens was originally intended to be told over two or three 48 page graphic novels, but only the first was ever released.
HAPPY! (Image Comics)
#1 – 4, Sep ’12 – Feb '13
All four issues were available with a variant cover, though issue #2's 1:20 cover by Cameron Stewart was only announced when the book was approaching its Final Order Cut-Off date and is consequently much more difficult to find. Issue one also had a Forbidden Planet store variant cover, and a special limited variant intended only for attendees of the 2012 Morrisoncon event (there was, at one point, a guy on eBay who had a bunch of these cheap, but they seem to be long gone now). Alongside the various variants, issue one went through three printings with slightly different covers, and issues two and three went through two apiece.
The Deluxe hardcover collection (and subsequent trade collections) included 10 extra story pages.
Morrison and Crank co-director Brian Taylor later collaborated on a Happy! TV show for the Syfy network. It ran for two seasons from 2017 to 2019.
ANNIHILATOR (Legendary Comics)
#1 - 6, Sep '14 - June '15
Second print of issue #1 with a recoloured cover.
THE MULTIVERSITY (DC Comics)
#1 - 2, Aug '14 - Apr '15
The Society of Superheroes #1, Sep '14
The Just #1, Oct '14
Pax Americana, Nov '14
Thunderworld #1, Dec '14
The Multiversity Guidebook, Jan '15
Mastermen, Feb '15
Ultra Comics, Mar '15
Pax Americana: Director's Cut #1, May '15
The Multiversity #1-2: Director's Cut, Dec '15
There are at least three versions of the Multiversity Map - a rolled version on high quality stock given away at SDCC in 2014; a larger, folded map sent to retailers (one per store?) when issue #1 was released; and another slightly smaller folded version polybagged with the 'Director's Cut' of Pax Americana. The Pax Americana map and the retailer promo version have different icons for Earth-14 (Pax's has a faint atomic orbit pattern around it, the retailer promo doesn't).
Every issue of The Multiversity was released with five covers - a regular cover, a 1:10 black and white variant, a 1:25 classic cover homage variant, a 1:50 'History of the Multiverse' variant, and a 1:100 Grant Morrison sketch variant. In addition, The Multiversity #1 was also released with a blank cover, and in two convention exclusive editions (a blue one for NYCC and a red one for FanExpo Toronto), for a total of eight different versions. A Michael Cho variant of Pax Americana was sent out to participating retailers as part of the CBLDF package for 2015. There was also a second printing of The Multiversity Guidebook, with a white rather than red cover background.
The 'Director's Cut' of issues #1 and 2 - cancelled and rescheduled a couple of times, and eventually released 8 months after the series had concluded - was chronically under-ordered, and appears not to have made Diamond's Top 300 comics for the month it was released, suggesting total sales of ~3,000 copies, or less. It features a bunch of material not reprinted in the deluxe hardcover, and will probably become very difficult to find in years to come. The contents of both Director's Cut issues were included in Absolute Multiversity in 2023.
Though DC still had a (vanishingly small) presence in the newsstand comics market in 2015, I’ve never seen anything that would suggest newsstand versions of any of the Multiversity issues exist.
Robert Vendetti and Eddy Barrows’ 12-issue Freedom Fighters mini-series from 2019 was a direct sequel to The Multiversity: Mastermen #1. Justice Incarnate would go on to appear in the six-issue Infinite Frontiers mini-series in 2021, and an eponymous five-issue mini-series in 2022.
ALL-NEW MIRACLEMAN ANNUAL (Marvel Comics)
#1 - 'The October Incident: 1966', Feb '15
For the first new Marvelman/Miracleman content printed in decades, Marvel managed to cajole Morrison into selling them a Young Marvelman story he submitted to Dez Skinn at Warrior waaay back in 1985, on the condition that Chief Creative Officer Joe Quesada drew it. Fine trolling work, imo.
This being a 2010's Marvel comic, there are of course a raft of variant covers for this issue. Maybe one day I will be arsed to actually list them out here, but not today.
CAPTAIN VICTORY AND THE GALACTIC RANGERS (Dynamite Entertainment)
#6, Mar '15
Captain Victory and the Galactic Rangers (collects #1-6); SC, Aug ‘16
Artist jam issue featuring four panels of Morrison art. This Joe Casey-penned series is pretty good (and has some amazing art from Nathan Fox), worth picking up imo.
NAMELESS (Image Comics)
#1 - 6, Feb '15 - Dec '15
Nameless (collects #1-6); HC, Mar ’16, SC Feb ‘17
Issue #1 had six variants. Three of them were store exclusives - Newbury Comics (by Nathan Fox), Dimension X (by Chris Burnham) and a 'Ghost' variant by Tony Moore. Jonathan Hickman's cover was part of the CBLDF retailer package for 2015 and was limited to 1,000 copies. A black and white 'sketch' variant was given out by Image at the 2015 ComicsPro retailer meeting. There was also an Image Comics 'floor display' variant with a subtly different trade dress to the regular cover - these copies were available to select retailers on a sale or return basis. Issue #2 just had one variant, another 'Ghost' variant by James Flames.
Both issue #1 and 2 had second printings with recoloured covers.
KLAUS (Boom! Studios)
#1 - 7, Nov '15 - Aug '16
Klaus and the Witch of Winter, Dec '16
Klaus and the Crisis in Christmasville, Dec '17
Klaus and the Crying Snowman, Dec '18
Klaus: The Life and Times of Joe Christmas, Dec '19
There were three printings of issue #1 - the second print is almost identical to the first, with Morrison and Mora's credits in red rather than black, the third printing has a totally different cover. Issue #2 also got a second print, again with a different cover. Besides the straight reprints, issue one had five variants - an unallocated Local Comic Shop Day edition, a 1:10 '10 Years of Boom!' variant with a cover by Felipe Smith, two 'Jackpot' variants by Chris Burnham and Frazer Irving (these were kind of 1:100 variants, in that Boom! reportedly printed one copy for every 100 copies of Klaus #1 that were ordered, but were sent out randomly to any store that ordered the book regardless of quanity, rather than requiring a 100 copy buy-in), and a Newbury Comics store exclusive variant by Vanessa R. Del Ray.
Klaus and the Witch of Winter was offered with a regular cover by series artist Dan Mora and two variants, one by Mora again (1:15) and one by Cameron Stewart. Klaus and the Crisis in Christmasville had three variants as well as the regular Mora cover, a 1:15 cover by John Cassady, a Frank Quitely cover, and a sketch version of the Quietly cover exclusive to Fried Pie Comics. Klaus and the Crying Snowman had a regular cover, a 1:10 Mora variant, a 1:15 black and white textless cover by Humberto Ramos, and a coloured version of the same (allocation unknown). Finally, The Life and Times of Joe Christmas had just one Bengal-drawn variant besides the regular cover by Mora.
PROMETHEUS ETERNAL (Philadelphia Museum of Art / Locust Moon Comics)
#1 - 'Prometheus is Here!', Dec '15
One-shot initially only available via the museum's website (with cripplingly expensive international postage, thanks) and later solicited through Diamond. Morrison has 3 pages in this, with art by Ulises Farinas.
WONDER WOMAN: EARTH ONE (DC Comics)
Volume 1, Apr '16, SC Apr '17
Volume 2, Oct '18
Volume 3, Mar '21
Wonder Woman Earth One: The Complete Collection, SC Nov ‘22
Individual softcovers of volumes 2 and 3 don’t appear to have ever been published.
HEAVY METAL MAGAZINE (Heavy Metal)
#280-292, May '16 - Dec '18
#294, Jun '19
#296, Dec '19
Morrison was editor-in-chief of Heavy Metal from issue #280 to 292 (per their own website), and is listed as 'creative consultant' for issues #293-295.
Issues #280-292 all have a Morrison editorial.
Short stories-wise, Morrison wrote a two-part strip, 'Beachhead', with Ben Marra on art duties in #280 (8pgs) and 281 (6pgs). #281 also featured the 17-page 'Option 3' with Simeon Aston. Issue #282 included 'Industria and the Toilet That Traveled Through Time' (10pgs) and 'The Key' (8 pgs), both with Rian Hughes ('The Key' had earlier appeared as a motion comic on the BBC website in 2014). #285 had the 18 page 'Mythopia' with Andy Belanger. #288 reprinted 'The House of Heart's Desire' from A1 #4, with new colours and lettering by original artist Dom Regan; and 'The New Madonna' (11pgs) with art by Menton. Issue #289 featured a team-up between David Bowie and William Burroughs in 'Ten Sounds That Represent A Kind of Person' (16pgs), again with Marra on art. Issue #291 had the 8-page 'Nihilophilia', with art by Tula Lotay. Finally, issue #292 had another collaboration with Rian Hughes, the 14-page (wordless) 'The Rise And Fall of Empires'.
Five of the six parts of Morrison and Gerhard's (kind of, sort of) Louis Wain bio-comic 'The Smile of the Absent Cat' - named for an (unfinished?) radio play Morrison wrote in the 1990's - appeared in issues #283, 286, 292, 294 and 296. Though it was completed, part six was never published.
Two prologues for 'The Savage Sword of Jesus Christ', originally intended as a 48-page graphic novel to be published outside of the main Heavy Metal mag, appeared in issues #284 and 290, with art by the Dabel Brothers. There were at least a couple more pages of this shown on Facebook by the Dabel's, but nothing else appeared before Morrison's tenure at Heavy Metal ended.
Issue #286 has an expanded version of Morrison's 'Pop Magic!' essay, entitled 'Beyond the Word and the Fool', and issue #289 has an interview with Morrison about the Happy! TV show.
Issue #287 has no Morrison strips. Issue #293 and #295 don't appear to have any contribution from Morrison at all, despite the 'Creative Consultant' credit.
AVATAREX (Graphic India)
FCBD #1, May '16
#1-4, Jul '16 - Sept '17
#1 Directors Cut, Oct '17
Like its stable-mate Grant Morrison's 18 Days, Avatarex had a metric shit-ton of variants over its 4 issue run. I've a list somewhere, maybe one day I will summon the energy to dig it out. The most interesting (to me anyway) was the Chris Burnham variant cover for the trade paperback collection, released in December '17 and limited to 500 copies.
Some of the first issue appeared digitally before publication of the mini-series proper as part of a Graphic India Humble Bundle deal in 2015. That same section was reprinted in a Free Comic Book Day issue released in May 2016.
Though the rest of the mini-series was released digitally on Comixology and other platforms as the issues were published, issue #4 didn’t see a digital release until years after the print issue dropped. The collected edition seems to have never been released digitally.
LOVE IS LOVE (IDW)
nn, Dec '16
One-shot benefit book for the survivors of the 2016 Orlando Pulse shooting. Morrison has two (wordless) pages in this, with art by Jesús Merino.
There are at least 5 printings of this book, possibly as many as 7.
DARK KNIGHTS RISING: THE WILD HUNT (DC Comics)
#1, Feb '18 (with Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, Joshua Williamson)
Features a holographic foil cover. A non-foil kind of pseudo-sketch cover was given away to retailers at the 2018 RRP meeting - numbers are probably in the very low thousands, though there are usually plenty of copies on eBay.
SIDEWAYS (DC Comics)
Annual #1, Nov '18 (with Dan Didio, Justin Jordan)
Coming hot on the heels of an absolutely dreadful arc featuring Morrison's Seven Soldiers in the regular monthly Sideways book, this curate's egg of an annual features (sort of) the return of the New 52 Superman from Morrison's Action Comics run. No variants or anything, just wanted to advise you to Avoid, imo
THE GREEN LANTERN (DC Comics)
#1-12, Nov '18 - Oct '19
Annual 1, Jul '19
With 13 (!) covers, 2018's The Green Lantern #1 beats out even the first issue of the Harris Vampirella book for Morrison comic with most variants I think (hello, Detective Comics #1027, just over the horizon). All twelve regular issues were available with a minimal trade dress variant cover - I think these were freely orderable by retailers rather than incentive based. In addition, issue one was also available as a black and white 'Midnight Release' variant, as a blank variant, with a foil version of Liam Sharp's regular cover for Local Comic Shop Day (limited to 500 copies), and in three store exclusive editions by Francesco Mattina for Frankies Comics, Jim Cheung for Epic Comics, and Rodolfo Migliari for BuyMeToys.com. The Epic Comics and BuyMeToys store exclusives were were available in three different versions - standard (limited to 3,000 copies), minimal trade dress (limited to 600 copies) and 'sketch' (unsure of exact amount, probably ~250). The Frankies Comics cover was only offered in standard and minimal trade dress versions, with no accompanying sketch cover . That's a total of 8 store exclusive covers, plus the 5 wide-release covers.
A promotional poster was sent to stores before the series was released. Newsarama reported that Green Lantern cake toppers would be available for retailers to order from DC for the planned midnight release parties, though I never saw a picture of one when the book came out, so either they weren't or nobody/hardly anybody ordered one. I'd guess this was the standard licensed Green Lantern cake topper from Comansi rather than something cooked up especially for the title launch.
GREEN LANTERN: BLACKSTARS (DC Comics)
#1-3, Nov '19 - Jan '20
All three issues were available with a minimal trade dress variant cover.
GREEN LANTERN SEASON TWO (DC Comics)
#1-12, Feb '20 - May '21
Two issues of The Green Lantern Season Two were released before the whole US comics industry shut down in response to the coronavirus outbreak in late March 2020, resulting in a near 3 month gap between issues #2 and 3 (released on May 6th 2020). At one point not long before the first issue was released, it was reported (and confirmed by series artist Liam Sharp) that the series had been curtailed to 8 issues from the originally planned 12, but less than a month later DC reversed that decision.
All 12 issues of the series were available with minimal trade dress variant covers. Issue #1 was also released with a blank cover.
DETECTIVE COMICS (DC Comics)
#1027, Sept '20 - 'Detective #26'
The 144-page Detective #1027, celebrating 1,000 appearances of Batman in the title, had 12 freely-orderable variant covers, plus a blank variant. Offered alongside these were *at least* another 28 retailer variants (9 different covers in 3 different flavours - regular, black & white and 'virgin', ie no cover dress; plus one 'secret' variant limited to 500 copies) making for a grand total of 41 covers, possibly more. RIP my Morrison completist urges, we had a good run...
DC sent a poster of the Andy Kubert wraparound cover to stores to promote the book before release.
DC also offered a version of Detective Comics #1027 as a deluxe-trim hardcover in April 2021. Alongside the contents of the original issue is a gallery of all of the variant covers.
PROCTOR VALLEY ROAD (Boom! Studios)
#1-5, Mar '21 - Jul '21, with Alex Child
More variant madness as issue #1 was offered with somewhere between 16-18 covers. By the time the series wrapped with issue #5 that was down to a much (?) more reasonable (??) 5 variants. It's a good job 'Tec #1027 had already shaken me out of this habit...
OK Comics in the UK offered the collected edition with an exclusive bookplate signed by Grant Morrison, co-writer Alex Child and artist Naomi Franquiz.
The series is ™ and © Universal Content Productions, Morrison's current partner for TV work. Extremely thin gruel imo, I'm sure it will do gangbusters on the old idiot box.
SUPERMAN AND THE AUTHORITY (DC Comics)
#1 -4, Jul '20 - Dec '21
Superman and The Authority, HC, Jan ‘22; SC, Jan '23
All 4 issues were offered with a minimal trade dress cardstock variant cover. In addition, a 1:25 variant was offered for issue #1.
DC PRIDE 2023 (DC Comics)
#1, May ‘23
Features a Multiversity story by Grant Morrison and Hayden Sherman. Offered with 3 open to order variants alongside the standard cover.
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