Warren Ellis

Warren Ellis
Ellis at Comic Con in 2010
Born	16 February 1968 Essex, England
Nationality	English
Area(s)	Writer
Notable works	Transmetropolitan Planetary Hellblazer The Authority Red Nextwave Global Frequency Iron Man Extremis Ministry of Space Fell Gun Machine
Awards	Eagle Award
http://warrenellis.com

Warren Girard Ellis (born 16 February 1968) is an English author of comics, novels, and television, who is well known for sociocultural commentary, both through his online presence and through his writing, which covers transhumanist (most notably nanotechnology, cryonics, mind transfer, and human enhancement) and folkloric themes, often in combination with each other. He is a resident of Southend-on-Sea, England.

Early life

Ellis was born in Essex in February 1968. Ellis has stated that the televised broadcast of the moon landing is his earliest coherent memory.^[1] He was a student at the South East Essex Sixth Form College, commonly known as SEEVIC. He contributed comic work to the college magazine, Spike, along with Richard Easter, who also later followed a career in writing.

Before starting his career as a writer, he ran a bookstore, ran a pub, worked in bankruptcy, worked in a record shop, lifted compost bags for a living.^[2]

Career

Early career

Ellis's writing career started in the British independent magazine Deadline with a six-page short story published in 1990. Other early works include a Judge Dredd short and a Doctor Who one-pager. His first ongoing work, Lazarus Churchyard with D'Israeli, appeared in Blast!, a short-lived British magazine.

By 1994 Ellis had begun working for Marvel Comics, where he took over the series Hellstorm: Prince of Lies with issue number 12, which he wrote until its cancellation after issue number 21. He also did some work on the Marvel 2099 imprint, most notably in a storyline in which a futuristic Doctor Doom took over the United States. His most notable early Marvel work is a run on Excalibur, a superhero series set in Britain. He also wrote a four-issue arc of Thor called "Worldengine", in which he dramatically revamped both the character and book (though the changes lasted only as long as Ellis's run on the book), and tackled Wolverine with then-rising star Leinil Francis Yu.

The Authority, Transmetropolitan, and critical acclaim

Ellis then started working for DC Comics, Caliber Comics, and Image Comics' Wildstorm studio, where he wrote the Gen¹³ spin-off DV8 and took over Stormwatch, a previously action-oriented team book, to which he gave a more idea- and character-driven flavour. He wrote issues 37–50 with artist Tom Raney, and the 11 issues of vol. 2 with artists Oscar Jimenez and Bryan Hitch. He and Hitch followed that with the Stormwatch spin-off The Authority, a cinematic super-action series for which Ellis coined the term "widescreen comics".

In 1997 Ellis started Transmetropolitan, a creator-owned series about an acerbic "gonzo" journalist in a dystopian future America, co-created with artist Darick Robertson and published by DC's Helix imprint. When Helix was discontinued the following year, Transmetropolitan was shifted to the Vertigo imprint, and remained one of the most successful non-superhero comics DC was then publishing.^[3] Transmetropolitan ran for 60 issues (plus a few specials), ending in 2002, and the entire run was later collected in a series of trade paperbacks. It remains Ellis's largest work to date.

1999 saw the launch of Planetary, another Wildstorm series by Ellis and John Cassaday, and Ellis's short run on the DC/Vertigo series Hellblazer.^[4] He left that series when DC announced, following the Columbine High School massacre, that it would not publish "Shoot", a Hellblazer story about school shootings, although the story had been written and illustrated prior to the Columbine massacre.^[5][6] Planetary concluded in October 2009 with the release of issue 27.

Return to superhero titles

Ellis also returned to Marvel Comics as part of the company's "Revolution" event, to head the "Counter-X" line of titles. This project was intended to revitalise the X-Men spin-off books Generation X, X-Man, and X-Force, but it was not successful, and Ellis stayed away from mainstream superhero comics for a time.

In 2003 Ellis started Global Frequency, a 12-issue limited series for Wildstorm, and continued to produce work for various publishers, including DC, Avatar Comics, AiT/Planet Lar, Cliffhanger and Homage Comics.

In 2004 Ellis came back to mainstream superhero comics. He took over Ultimate Fantastic Four and Iron Man for Marvel under a temporary exclusive work for hire contract.

Toward the end of 2004 Ellis released the "Apparat Singles Group", which he described as "An imaginary line of comics singles. Four imaginary first issues of imaginary series from an imaginary line of comics, even". The Apparat titles were published by Avatar, but carried only the Apparat logo on their covers.

In 2006 Ellis worked for DC on Jack Cross, which was not well received and was subsequently cancelled. For Marvel he worked on Nextwave, a 12-issue limited series. He also worked on the Ultimate Galactus trilogy. Ellis also took over the Thunderbolts monthly title, which deals with the aftermath of the Marvel Civil War crossover.^[7]

In honour of the 20th anniversary of Marvel's New Universe in 2006, Ellis and illustrator Salvador Larroca created a new series that reimagines the New Universe under the title newuniversal. The first issue was released on 6 December 2006.^[8]

Ellis continued to work on several projects for different publishers, including Fell (for Image), Desolation Jones (for DC/Wildstorm) and Blackgas and Black Summer (for Avatar Comics).^[9] Ellis also wrote an episode of Justice League Unlimited entitled "Dark Heart".

2007–present

Ellis has managed a series of online forums and media to promote his written works and his creative ideals. They include the Bad Signal mailing list, warrenellis.com, and Whitechapel. Ellis is frequently referred to as "The Boss", "Stalin", "The Love Swami" or "Internet Jesus" on these forums.^[10]

Ellis's first prose novel, Crooked Little Vein, was published in mid-2007 by William Morrow (an imprint of HarperCollins). A second novel, Listener, was planned, but was apparently lost and then cancelled.^[11] He was also asked to develop a television series for AMC called Dead Channel, but the project is currently on hiatus.^[12]

It has recently been announced^[13] that Ellis is writing the screenplay for an animated feature film, Castlevania: Dracula's Curse, produced by Frederator Studios of Hollywood and New York. It will be based on the similarly titled video game Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse.^[14][15]

Ellis has described himself as "a notorious pain in the arse for getting involved in book design".^[16] According to a comment made in the first issue of Fell, he has more trade paperbacks in print than anyone else in the American comic industry.

Ellis wrote a column for the Suicide Girls website, entitled "The Sunday Hangover", which appeared every Sunday from July to December 2007.^[17] He also wrote a Second Life column for Reuters, entitled Second Life Sketches.^[18] In Second Life he was known under the name Integral Danton.

On 29 July 2007 Ellis announced two new projects for Avatar Press: FreakAngels, a free long-form webcomic illustrated by Paul Duffield; and Ignition City, a five-issue miniseries.^[19] He also has five other current series with Avatar: Anna Mercury,^[20][21] No Hero,^[22] along with two long series Doktor Sleepless and Gravel.

On 12 June 2008, the front page of The Hollywood Reporter announced that Summit Entertainment had optioned Red (2003), Ellis's thriller with artist Cully Hamner, as a feature film. Whiteout screenwriters Eric and Jon Hoeber wrote the adaptation, directed by Robert Schwentke of The Time Traveler's Wife and produced by Lorenzo di Bonaventura and Mark Vahradian of Transformers.^[23] Principal photography began in January 2010 in Toronto and Louisiana with stars Bruce Willis and Morgan Freeman.^[24]

The first quarter of 2009 saw the release of G.I. Joe: Resolute, a series of webisodes written by Warren Ellis and later released on DVD in December.

He worked with D'Israeli again in 2010–2011 for a one-off comic, SVK, to be published by BERG, a London consultancy firm. It uses a UV torch to reveal the thoughts of the characters in the story.^[25][26]

In 2010, a documentary film on Ellis, Warren Ellis: Captured Ghosts, was announced for 2011 completion. Its co-producer Sequart Organization also plans on publishing, in 2011, three books studying Ellis's work: on Planetary, on Transmetropolitan, and on Ellis's overall career. Sequart has dubbed this push "The Year of Ellis."^[27]

Gun Machine, the second prose novel by Ellis, was released on 3 January 2013.^[28] The novel follows the story of detective John Tallow. Even before its scheduled release date, the novel began receiving critical acclaim, including two favourable reviews in the New York Times and a signature review in Publisher's Weekly. On 9 January, only five days after its official release, Ellis announced on warrenellis.com that Gun Machine had attained New York Times best-seller status. On 6 June however, just before the publication of his third novel "Dead Pig Collector", Ellis announced on warrenellis.com that "Due to continuing issues, I have terminated my relationship with Mulholland Books."^[29] The novel was subsequently published electronically by FSG Originals.^[30]

In 2012, Ellis announced via his website and Twitter that, after leaving his deal with Mulholland Books, he would publish a non-fiction book, tentatively entitled Spirit Tracks, with Farrar, Straus & Giroux. The book is "about the future of the city, the ghosts that haunt it and the science-fiction condition we live in." It is based on a talk Ellis gave in Berlin at a conference entitled "Cognitive Cities;" the talk was itself based on a series of posts on his website.^[31]

In 2013, Ellis spoke at the HowTheLightGetsIn festival in Hay. In his first talk, titled Our Hopeless Future & Other Comedy, he discussed the power of Twitter and how it can 'break' other people's websites. In the second, Thinking Differently, he debated how the internet revolution is changing people's lives and asks whether it is changing how people think.

Ellis was the writer for a relaunch of Marvel's Moon Knight comic book in 2014, and also worked on a comic book series for Image called Trees. 2015 also saw varied work, including an acclaimed initial run of a comic book series called Injection, also for Image.

Online presence

Ellis has an online presence. He started an email list called From the Desk of in 1998; when technical issues forced that list to shut down in 2001 he started a new email list called "Bad Signal". He started and maintained a number of message boards, and has maintained a personal web site since the late 1990s.

Awards

• 2001 Eagle Award – Favourite Comics Story (for The Authority: The Nativity)
• 2003 Wizard Magazine Best One-Shot (for Planetary/Batman: Night on Earth)^[32]
• 2004 Sidewise Award for Alternate History (for Ministry of Space)
• 2007 Eagle Award – Favourite Comics Writer
• 2007 Eagle Award – Favourite New Comicbook (for Nextwave)
• 2007 Eagle Award – Favourite Comics Story (for Nextwave #1–6)
• 2007 Eagle Award Roll of Honour^[33]
• 2010 Eagle Award – Favourite Comics Writer
• 2010 Eagle Award – Favourite Web-Based Comic (for FreakAngels)

Bibliography

References

1. http://www.scifidimensions.com/3 May/orbiter.htm Orbiter
2. www.reallyscary.com – 10 Questions w/Warren Ellis Archived 6 March 2007 at the Wayback Machine.
3. "Top 300 Comics For September". Comicbookresources.com. 30 August 2002. Retrieved 31 December 2010.
4. Irvine, Alex (2008). "John Constantine Hellblazer". In Dougall, Alastair. The Vertigo Encyclopedia. New York: Dorling Kindersley. pp. 102–111. ISBN 0-7566-4122-5. OCLC 213309015.
5. Holmes, Thomas Alan (2005) "Warren Ellis’ 'Shoot' and Media Passivity." International Journal of Comic Art. 7 (2). 370–374
6. ""Shoot" online". Compsoc.man.ac.uk. Retrieved 31 December 2010.
7. CONFIRMED: ELLIS & DEODATO ON THUNDERBOLTS, Newsarama
8. "CCI, DAY 4: ELLIS TALKS "NEWUNIVERSAL"". Comic Book Resources. 23 July 2006. Retrieved 31 December 2010.
9. Avatar #01
10. Simmons, Tony (12 August 2007). "Comic book writer's debut novel opens a new vein in U.S. culture.". The News Herald (Panama City).
11. "Who I Am And Where I Am (Oct 2011)". Warrenellis.com. 2 October 2011. Retrieved 3 October 2011.
12. "10 Minutes with Warren Ellis". TimeOut Singapore. 7 August 2009. Retrieved 31 December 2010.
13. Frederator Studios
14. "Castlevania". Warrenellis.com. 14 October 2006. Retrieved 31 December 2010.
15. "Castlevania: Dracula's Curse production blog". Castlevaniadraculascurse.com. Retrieved 12 January 2012.
16. Introduction to 'Strange Kiss Cover Notes', Strange Kiss Scriptbook (Avatar Press, May 2000)
17. "Warren Ellis To Join Suicide Girls As A Columnist" (news article). Suicide Girls. Retrieved 8 July 2007.
18. "Second Life Sketches: Ellis Second Life Column For Reuters". Secondlife.reuters.com. Retrieved 31 December 2010.
19. Warren Ellis Addresses His "Children" at Comic-Con, 29 July 2007
20. Who is "Anna Mercury?" Warren Ellis Gives Hints, Comic Book Resources, 14 February 2008
21. Warren Ellis on Anna Mercury, Newsarama,he also wrote thematic trilogy about the dark side of superheros Black Summer 18 February 2008
22. Supergod Leveling the Playing Field: Ellis talks "No Hero", Comic Book Resources, 23 May 2008
23. "RED Aims For Green Light, Hollywood Reporter, 12 June 2008
24. 'Red' To Begin Shooting In January, MTV
25. Burton, Charlie (3 March 2011). "How Warren Ellis is using torchlight for his latest comic, SVK". Wired.
26. Prigg, Mark (28 March 2011). "The comeback of the comic book". London Evening Standard. Retrieved 28 March 2011.
27. "2011: The Year of Ellis". Sequart Research & Literacy Organization. 30 December 2010. Retrieved 27 January 2011.
28. Upcoming4.me. "Warren Ellis's Gun Machine cover art and summary reveal". Upcoming4.me. Retrieved 14 May 2012.
29. "Cancellation Of DEAD PIG COLLECTOR, Publishing Future". warrenellis.com. June 6, 2013. Retrieved Sep 30, 2013.
30. "Warren Ellis's Dead Pig Collector: An American Experiment". Retrieved Jul 8, 2015.
31. "A Non-Fiction Book". warrenellis.com. Sep 20, 2012. Retrieved Sep 30, 2013.
32. "11th Annual Wizard Fan Awards". Hahnlibrary.net. Retrieved 12 January 2012.
33. The Eagle Awards – Results Archived 29 May 2007 at the Wayback Machine.

Further reading

• Warren Ellis at the Grand Comics Database

• Warren Ellis at the Comic Book DB
• Warren Ellis at the Internet Book List
• Works by or about Warren Ellis in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• The Complete Warren Ellis bibliography
• Warren Ellis on Marvel.com
• Warren Ellis at 2000 AD online
• Writers on Comic Scriptwriting, (Salisbury, 2002, Titan Books)

External links

• Official website
• Warren Ellis at the Internet Movie Database
• Warren Ellis at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Warren Ellis at Library of Congress Authorities, with 67 catalogue records