If you’re at all concerned about the impact AI is having on comic creators and the comic industry, you may want to check out Drawn to Extinction: Comics, Craft, and the Battle for Creativity in the Age of Ai, a new self–published book by Pete Trainor.
Comics built a culture that outlasted every attempt to dismiss it. The moral panic of the 1950s. The direct market collapse of the 1990s. The death of the newsagent spinner rack. The slow consolidation of the superhero industry into a near-monopoly on imagination. It survived all of that, but what it is facing now is different in kind, not just degree.
Drawn to Extinction featuring a foreword by Pat Mills, creator of 2000AD, is part cultural autopsy, part rallying cry, grounded in the medium itself, its history, its economics, its creators, and the community that has kept it alive through every contraction the market could throw at it. Through first-hand conversations with Ram V, John Wagner, Hannah Berry, Frazer Irving, Torunn Grønbekk, Patrick Goddard, and others including academics, lawyers, and industry figures who’d rather not be named, it documents the moment when the tools of automation arrived dressed in the language of democratisation, and the people who built the medium started disappearing from the credits.
“This is not a book about how Ai works,” says Pete. “It’s a book about what it costs, about who pays, and about why the struggle, the paper cuts and the deadlines and the decades of patience, is not a problem to be solved but the very thing that makes the work matter. The machine doesn’t dream. It replicates. And when replication starts to replace creation, it’s not just jobs at risk; it’s the human fingerprints that make stories feel like they belong to us.”
“Judge Dredd creator John Wagner compares Ai creativity to a jukebox, capable of replaying songs but never feeling the room. Illustrator Patrick Goddard imagines a world where our first instinct is to assume everything is a simulation. Creative force Dan Cornwell warns that when you remove the work, you remove the reason to improve, while master storyteller and world-builder Ram V speaks candidly about ambition flattened into adequacy. Legendary artist Frazer Irving takes a more philosophical stance celebrating human mistakes as a form of learning. Writer and artist Torunn Grønbekk reminds us that every line carries responsibility, and comic book royalty Steve McNiven helps to strip it back to a truth most artists already know – that speed has never made a drawing better, and that struggle is not waste, it is the work.
“Around them, the wider picture sharpens. Professor of comics and storytelling Dr Julia Round exposes how bias hides inside systems that claim neutrality, while plagiarism expert Jonathan Bailey lays bare the contracts and clauses quietly transferring power away from creators.
“Lesley Gannon, a leading voice for the writers’ guild, speaks about class, access, and who is always first to be pushed out when industries decide efficiency matters more than people.
“Running through all of it is the voice of a comic book nerd who found confidence, courage, and identity in ink and panels, and now uses those same pages to give rhythm and purpose to a personal exposé on how Ai is reshaping the world that made him.
“Drawn to Extinction is the result of god knows how many months of work by Pete Trainor, of interviews with and portraits of comic creators, and especially of the place (or not) of Ai in the process,” notes John Wagner MBE. “It’s a celebration of comics and a warning, written with intelligence and a deep, deep love of the medium.
“If you like comics and have any interest in their creators – and of course you do or you wouldn’t be on this page – you’ll find it thoroughly fascinating.”
Pete Trainor is an award-winning, best-selling author, technologist, and accidental polymath from London. He has spent nearly three decades working at the intersection of design, technology, and human behaviour. He talks all over the world as an analyst on artificial intelligence, emergent technology trends, human behaviour, data, and the macro effects all of these have on audiences, industries, and creative craft. With more than two decades spent shaping digital products and leading large-scale transformation programmes, he has built a reputation for translating complex technology into practical, human-centred outcomes.
His career spans senior roles across enterprise organisations, including leadership positions in AI, product, and service design. He has worked within highly regulated industries such as banking and healthcare, navigating the realities of deploying emerging technologies at scale while maintaining a strong focus on ethics, governance, and real-world impact. Known for his ability to connect strategy with delivery, Pete has led initiatives that blend innovation with operational rigour, particularly in the field of enterprise AI.
Alongside his professional work, Pete is a long-time advocate for creative industries and the people behind them. His writing explores the tension between technological progress and human craft, often focusing on how tools like generative AI reshape culture, labour, and value. Drawn to Extinction reflects this perspective, combining industry insight with a deeply personal connection to comics and the communities that sustain them. Whether designing systems, advising organisations, or writing about the future, Pete’s work is driven by a simple belief: technology should amplify human creativity, not replace it.
• Drawn to Extinction: Comics, Craft, and the Battle for Creativity in the Age of Ai is also available widely via AmazonUK (Affiliate Link) | ISBN: 978-1067648206
- About the Author
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John is the founder of downthetubes, launched in 1998. He is a comics and magazine editor, writer, and Press Officer for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He also runs Crucible Comic Press.
Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine and Overkill for Marvel UK, Babylon 5 Magazine, Star Trek Magazine, and its successor, Star Trek Explorer, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics; and has edited several comic collections and graphic novels, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”, and Hancock: The Lad Himself, by Stephen Walsh and Keith Page.
He’s the writer of comics such as Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs”, with Dave Hailwood.
Categories: British Comics, Comic Art, Comics, Comics Studies, Creating Comics, downthetubes Comics News, downthetubes News
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