This week’s Panel Borders: “The Umbral Fuse” featuring writer Antony Johnston

By John Freeman on May 13, 2015

Umbral Trade Paperback Volume 2: The Dark Path

Continuing a month of shows about creators whose work sits in the middle ground between ‘mainstream’ and independent comics, Alex Fitch talks to writer Antony Johnston about his career so far. Fitch and Johnston discuss the latter’s comics published by Image: fantasy saga Umbral and SF detective drama The Fuse, the author’s parallel career as a video game scripter and his experiences writing Daredevil titles for Marvel.

Antony Johnston is an award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of graphic novels, video games, and books, with titles that also include Wasteland, Shadow of Mordor, The Coldest City, Dead Space, ZombiU and more.

He has also adapted books by bestselling novelist Anthony Horowitz, collaborated with comics legend Alan Moore, and reinvented Marvel’s flagship character Wolverine for manga. (For a full list, check out his Work index page).

Antony’s work has been translated throughout the world, and optioned for film and television and recently launched SILENCAEON, a new dark ambient music project. The first release, Thorn, is now available at Bandcamp.

“Most people know I’m a big old metalhead in my spare time, he says of the project on his blog, “but less well known is my love for experimental, ambient, and drone (Not least because it’s great writing music!).

The interview was recorded at Cartoon County, Brighton, April 2015.

• Panel Borders: The Umbral Fuse airs at 11.00am Thursday 14th May, repeated 7am Saturday 26th May 2015, Resonance 104.4 FM (London) / streamed at www.resonancefm.com / podcast after broadcast at www.panelborders.wordpress.com

• Atony Johnston is online at: http://antonyjohnston.com | Follow Atony on Twitter @antonyjohnston | Tumblr

About the Author
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John Freeman

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.