Status | defunct, c. 2008 |
---|---|
Founded | 1982 |
Founder | Dez Skinn |
Country of origin | United Kingdom |
Headquarters location | 3 Lewisham Way London |
Publication types | Comic magazines, Magazines |
Fiction genres | Superheroes, Science fiction, Horror |
Quality Communications was a British publishing company founded by Dez Skinn that operated from 1982 to c. 2008. The company's most notable publications were the monthly comics anthology Warrior , which featured early work by writer Alan Moore; and the comics trade magazine Comics International , which Skinn published and edited for 16 years. Quality was involved with comics in both the UK and the U.S., mainly with reprint material from Warrior and repackaging 2000 AD material for the U.S. market.
Quality was initially formed to publish Warrior , which featured the Alan Moore stories V for Vendetta and Marvelman . Warrior won 17 Eagle Awards during its short run (including nine Eagles in 1983 alone). [1] Quality was also involved in the U.S. completion of Marvelman and V for Vendetta.
Quality's main period as a comics publisher was from 1982 to 1988. 2000 AD content repackaged for the U.S. market included the titles 2000 A.D. Presents, Spellbinders, and Scavengers. During this period, Quality also published 7 issues of Halls of Horror , a title Skinn had originated earlier with Thorpe & Porter (the British publishing division of Warner Communications).
In 1990, Quality shifted focus to magazines, launched the comics trade journal Comics International , which Skinn published and edited for the following 16 years. His "Sez Dez" column was a regular feature in issues #100–#200. With issue #200, in 2006, Skinn sold the magazine to Cosmic Publications. [2] (Comics International struggled along for another couple of years before folding in 2010.) [3]
Quality published a few sporadic titles in the 2000s, including Toy Max (2003), a one-off magazine for toy collectors, [4] and Skinn's hardcover book Comix: The Underground Revolution (2004). In 2005, Quality published Ace Comics, an anthology of ten comic strips by City College Brighton & Hove students of Skinn's; it was distributed for free in East Sussex.
In 2008, Quality Communications published the 15th-anniversary issue (numbered #15) of Jack Kirby Quarterly. [5]
Miracleman, originally known as Marvelman, is a fictional superhero appearing in comic books first published by L. Miller & Son, Ltd. Created in 1954 by writer-artist Mick Anglo for publisher L. Miller & Son as a United Kingdom home-grown substitute for the American character Captain Marvel, the original series ran until 1963. It was revived in 1982 in a dark, post-modern reboot by writer Alan Moore, with later contributions by Neil Gaiman.
A British comic is a periodical published in the United Kingdom that contains comic strips. It is generally referred to as a comic or a comic magazine, and historically as a comic paper.
Warrior was a British comics anthology that ran for 26 issues between March 1982 and January 1985. It was edited by Dez Skinn and published by his company Quality Communications. It featured early work by comics writer Alan Moore, including V for Vendetta and Marvelman.
Marvel UK was an imprint of Marvel Comics formed in 1972 to reprint US-produced stories for the British weekly comic market. Marvel UK later produced original material by British creators such as Alan Moore, John Wagner, Dave Gibbons, Steve Dillon, and Grant Morrison.
Derek "Dez" Skinn is a British comic and magazine editor, and author of a number of books on comics. As head of Marvel Comics' operations in England in the late 1970s, Skinn reformatted existing titles, launched new ones, and acquired the BBC license for Doctor Who Weekly. After leaving Marvel UK, Skinn founded and edited Warrior, which featured key works by Alan Moore.
Garry Leach was a British comics artist and publisher.
Michael Anglo was a British comic book writer, editor and artist, as well as an author. He is best known for creating the superhero Marvelman, later known as Miracleman.
John Bolton is a British comic book artist and illustrator most known for his dense, painted style, which often verges on photorealism. He was one of the first British artists to come to work in the American comics industry, a phenomenon which took root in the late 1980s and has since become standard practice.
Starburst is a British science fiction magazine published by Starburst Magazine Limited. Starburst contains news, interviews, features, and reviews of genre material in various media, including TV, film, soundtracks, multimedia, books, and comics books. The magazine is published monthly, with additional news and reviews being published daily on the website.
Hulk Comic was a black-and-white Marvel UK comics anthology published under the editorship of Dez Skinn starting in 1979.
Comics International was a British news and reviews magazine about comic books. Founded in 1990, it was published monthly by Quality Communications until 2006, and then by Cosmic Publications Ltd. until 2010.
Neat Stuff is an American alternative comic book series created by Peter Bagge and published by Fantagraphics. It ran from 1985 to 1989 for fifteen issues. Most takes the form of a series of short stories featuring different sets of characters, although some issues feature full-length stories relating to just one set of characters. The series was Bagge's first one-man comics anthology. Described by Dez Skinn in Comix: The Underground Revolution as the work which "threw Peter Bagge into the limelight", Bagge soon retired the title in preference of continuing the Bradley characters' story in Hate.
Paul Neary is a British comic book artist, writer and editor.
The Liberators was a science fiction comic book series based on concepts created by Dez Skinn and Will Simpson for the British anthology title Warrior. The series was intended as a far-future continuation of Skinn's proposed shared continuity 'Warrior-verse', established in the Big Ben strip which also ran in Warrior. The Liberators was one of the first mainstream continuing strips scripted by Grant Morrison.
Richard Burton is a British comic publisher and editor who had a lengthy career at IPC Magazines. While an assistant editor at 2000 AD, he became known to readers as Tharg the Mighty's bumbling assistant Burt, who appeared in a number of strips with him. Earlier in his career, Burton published the popular fanzine Comic Media News, and was a co-founder of the Eagle Awards.
John Stokes is a British comics artist who has largely worked for IPC and Marvel UK and is best known for his work on Fishboy.
The Society of Strip Illustration (SSI), later known as the Comics Creators Guild, was a British network for all those involved in any stage of the creative process of comics production. The SSI, which was co-founded in 1977 by Denis Gifford, met monthly in London, published a newsletter, and distributed annual awards for achievement in the field. Despite the organization's name, most members were comic book creators, as opposed to those of comic strips like those found in The Beano and The Dandy.
The House of Hammer was a British black-and-white magazine featuring articles and comics related to the Hammer Film Productions series of horror and science fiction films. The brainchild of Dez Skinn, almost every issue of the magazine featured a comics adaptations of a Hammer film, as well as an original comics backup story, such as the long-running feature Van Helsing's Terror Tales.
Thorpe & Porter was a British publisher, importer, and distributor of magazines and comic books. At first, the company was known for repackaging American comics and pulp magazines for the UK market. Later on, it became a publisher of original material. The company released more than 160 comics titles in the UK, the most prominent being Classics Illustrated, MAD UK, Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan of the Apes, Larry Harmon's Laurel & Hardy, House of Hammer, and Forbidden Worlds. T & P's most prominent imprints were Top Sellers Ltd. and Brown Watson. Thorpe & Porter operated from 1946 to c. 1979.
Williams Publishing was the short-lived European comics and magazines publishing division of Warner Communications in the 1970s. Headquartered at the Columbia-Warner House in London, Williams had European-language divisions in Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and West Germany. Comics titles were for the most part translations of American publications — many of them Warner properties — as well as some U.K. and European titles. Initiated in 1971, most of the Williams publishing divisions were closed or sold off in the period 1974–1979.