A circle around Pat Mills' characters

[House of Usher]

For what it's worth, to an extent Pat Mills only has himself to blame. As was quoted on a different thread ("The Knucker"), Pat could have written the Slaine novelisation if he'd wanted to, but he didn't want to do the story Games Workshop wanted him to write:

"Subsequently Slaine didn't work out for two reasons... Because I wanted to start it at the beginning with "Young Slaine" and small stories, closely following the original comic strip , and GW wanted epic stories including time travel from the beginning which I told them many times I thought was a grave mistake."

What Games Workshop are talking about here is a commercial product. Pat appears to be talking about art. If Games Workshop are paying, for what is essentially a cash-in on a licensed property, then they're entitled to ask the writer to deliver something close to what they themselves had in mind, even if that happens to be a straightforward retelling of Slaine's previously published comic book adventures. If Pat turned it down, knowing that another writer would be asked to do the job, then he can't really complain about the outcome; only about the 'work-for-hire' arrangement that made it possible in the first place.

Pat could have been the author of the Slaine novel if he'd wanted it badly enough to write what Games Workshop wanted him to. He didn't want it badly enough. As it happens, it turns out that Pat was right about the sort of story Games Workshop should have wanted in the first place. That's irony for you.

[Floyd-the-k]

when licenses are sold and the company selling them signs off on the product it must be reaching the required standard, surely?

Why surely? What's the required standard?

[House of Usher]

I would have thought when you own the rights to something and you licence them to someone else, the standard of the product is entirely a matter for the licencee - if the product is rubbish they just won't win the licence again. The only thing in favour of the licenced property being done justice is the financial risk that falls on the licencee. If I pay for the rights to make a product, then churn out a poor product, I lose money. The owner of the property still gets paid.

[GordonR]

Alan Barnes usd to be responsible for this, before working with one of the editors at Black Flame slowly drained him of all will to live.  As I understand it, various awful-sounding story outines for 2000AD novels had been vetoed by him/Rebellion.

No idea who's doing the job now that Alan's left.  And he'd managed to get out of doing it, a while before he left.


btw, if I was Pat (and there's a thought that would thrill both of us...) I would be raging.  Not only are they doing the Slaine novels in a way very similar to how he wanted to do them (so what happened to the time travel and leyser stuff?), but it turns out they're a "re-imagining" of some of his early comic strips.

None of the other flagship character 2000AD novels so far have been re-imagined adaptions of previously published stories, so why does Slaine get this treatment?

Beware the word "re-imagining".  Beware people who uses this word, for bullshit doth spout from them like water from a mountain stream.

[Funt Solo]

::"Beware the word "re-imagining". Beware people who uses this word, for bullshit doth spout from them like water from a mountain stream."

And lo, Fate did laugh his ass off.

[PiggyMitchell]

With the licenced product I had to get everything signed off from the owners, so they had it in their hands and were powered to make any changes etc so it strikes me they still have some influence in things.
You said yourself, anything Rebellion didn't approve of they could veto and had exercised that right in the past. They didn't.

As to the re-imaging that's precisely what your editor intstucted Gordon, to the word. 'A re-imagining'. I repeat the instruction I was giving. As you know I don't have the power to create or alter beyond the remit laid down by the licensee.

Why is it given that treatment? I don't know - in this instance mine is not to spit the dummy out, mine is to act like a professional, conduct myself in a professional manner and deliver the highest quality product to the best of my ability.

[Art]

including the movie adaptation of Return of the Jedi when they rereleased the tampered with movies at the cinema.

Eh? hadn't Alan Dean Fister already done a perfectly good job of adapting that? Unless they wanted extra cgi robots...

[Wils]

In a way, isn't this a showing of double standards by Rebellion? I'm guessing the fan-fic/fanzine ban is still in place, so it looks like it's a case of:

"Pat Mills has requested that none of the characters he created (including Slaine, Nemesis the Warlock and the A.B.C. Warriors) should
be used as the subject of fan fiction. As a courtesy to Pat, www.2000adonline.com will not publish any fan fiction or fan-created
strips based on his characters, so please do not submit any to the webmaster. WE, on the other hand, can do what we want with his characters, messing about with and 're-imagining' to our hearts content (we've already commissioned 'Deadlock does Dallas' and a ten book series of Slaine/Ukko slash fic). Pat's character's are fucked now! That'll learn him for that Dark Matter bollocks. Hahahahahaha! Remember the ban on fan work, though, or there'll be trouble. Oh, yes."

[Art]

That of course is Alan Dean Foster.

What a horribly wrong typo...

[Matt Timson]

Fister...  Wils will be all over that any second now...

;)

[PiggyMitchell]

Art - it was for a younger audience - they wen't through a spate of novelising junior versions of popular movies. Not so sure if they still do it.

[W. R. Logan]

>Eh? hadn't Alan Dean Fister already done a perfectly good job of adapting that?

Didn't he write 'Splinter In The Japs Eye'?

[ukdane]

Eh? hadn't Alan Dean Fister already done a perfectly good job of adapting that?

I just spat tea across my laptop!

I needed a laugh like that to brighten my day. (Although the missus thinks I'm a loon). Thanks Art.

[I, Cosh]

Didn't he write 'Splinter In The Japs Eye'?

And the sequel, A Hand Solo at Star's End.

[GordonR]

According to Amazon, they're "FunFax Star Wars File Books", published by mega-corp kids book publishers DK.

Link: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1862083584/qid=1141329966/sr=1-6/ref=sr_1_6/103-8251747-4778244?s=books&v=glance&n=283155" target="_blank">not really 'movie adaptions' as it's normally mean