|
|
|
|
|
Milestone MediaMilestone Media is a company best known for creating the Milestone comics imprint (that was published through DC Comics) and the Static Shock cartoon series. It was founded in 1993 by a coalition of African-American artists and writers (namely Dwayne McDuffie, Denys Cowan, Michael Davis, Derek T. Dingle, and Christopher Priest) who believed that minorities were severely underrepresented in American comics. Milestone Media was their attempt to correct this imbalance. Although Milestone comics were published through DC Comics, they did not take place in the DC Universe. Under an arrangement similar to the one DC and Wildstorm established later, all Milestone characters existed in a separate continuity that did not fall under DC Comics' editiorial mandate. All Milestone characters belonged to their respective creators. All Milestone Media titles were set in a continuity dubbed the "Dakotaverse", referring to the fictional midwestern city of Dakota, in which most of the early Milestone stories were set. Before any titles were published, Christopher Priest created a 400-page story bible, which provided back-story and information on all of the original Dakotaverse characters, as well as detailed background information on the history and geography of Dakota. Denys Cowan came up with the original character sketches that served as a guide for all artists who worked for Milestone. The guide was subsequently edited by Dwayne McDuffie. In 1993, Milestone Media launched its first batch of titles: Hardware, Icon, Blood Syndicate, and Static. A year later, the company's staff expanded. It was no longer considered an exclusively African-American operation. At the same time, Milestone Media published its first company crossover, Shadow War, which spawned two more titles: Shadow Cabinet and Xombi. In the summer of 1994, DC Comics and Milestone Media published an inter-company crossover called Worlds Collide. It featured a meeting between Metropolis-based superheroes from the DC Universe and Dakota-based superheroes from the Dakotaverse. Unlike many inter-company crossovers, it was intended to be part of the regular continuity. The situation was somewhat complicated by the fact that in the Dakotaverse, DC superheroes were known as fictional characters. Although the crossover had no lasting consequences in DC continuity, it was remembered by Milestone's superheroes. Milestone Media was forced to shut down its comic book division in 1997. This was due to the combination of fallout from the collapse of the speculator bubble, the "distributor wars", and the general decline the industry experienced at the time. Today, it is primarily a licensing company, focusing on its television property, the Emmy award and Humanitas prize winning animated series Static Shock. Comic titles published by Milestone include: Regular Series - Hardware - 50 issues
- Blood Syndicate - 35 issues
- Icon - 42 issues. The first eight issues were collected in a graphic novel: Icon: A Hero's Welcome
- Static - 45 issues. Also made into an animated series Static Shock. The first four issues were collected in a graphic novel:Static Shock: Trial by Fire in 2000; and a new mini series was published in 2001 called "Static Shock: The Rebirth of the Cool", it ran for 4 issues.
- Shadow Cabinet - 17 issues
- Xombi - 21 issues
- Kobalt - 16 issues
- Heroes - 6 issues
Limited Spin-Off Series - Deathwish - 4 issues (Hardware Spin-off)
- My Name is Holocaust - 5 issues (Blood Syndicate Spin-off)
- - 4 issues
- - 4 issues (Blood Syndicate Spin-off)
Crossovers - Shadow War- Company-wide crossover. Involved all comics, including the newly premiered Xombi and Shadow Cabinet.
- Long Hot Summer - Company-wide crossover. Three issues of the comic by the same title along with tie-ins in every Milestone title. - July-September 95
- Worlds Collide - 1 issue (crossover with Blood Syndicate, Hardware, Icon, Static, and DC's Steel, , and Superboy)
External links
|
 |
|
| Copyright 2005-2009 OnPedia.com. All Rights Reserved |
|
|