Frank Miller


Born: January 27, 1957 in Olney, Maryland

 

 

Frank Miller is an American comic book artist who is known for his film noir-style comics books. He is known for his violence, not over-the-top but still disturbing (sometimes because of what is not seen), and his unique narration style.

 

 

Biography

 

He was born in Olney Maryland, but his family moved to Montpelier Vermont in his early life. He was the fifth of seven children and was raised in an Irish Catholic household. In the 1980s he moved to Hell's Kitchen (now known as Clinton) in Manhattan. He moved to LA in the 90s, and then back to Hell's Kitchen in 2001, where he was present for 9/11.

 

Career

 

Miller started on becoming an artist. He first worked on Twilight Zone comics, until he was contracted by DC. His first stuff was Weird War Stories. After several issues and other works, he moved to Marvel, where he worked on John Carter for an issue and working as an artist on other comics. He then took over Daredevil at issue 158. He revamped Daredevil in a more dangerous New York in typical film noir style. He also took over main writing and drawing tasks for the comic. His final work for Marvel was a small Wolverine spinoff.

 

In 1982, he started work for DC with the series Ronin, which featured a lot of manga influence. In 1986, DC released Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. The series completely changed Batman comics, as it showed Batman as an old man in his 50s. After this, he returned to writing Daredevil. He also released Batman:Year One, a re imagining of Batman's origins. After a fight over a ratings system, he quit DC and vowed never to work for them again. He then moved to work for Dark Horse comics. His final project before the move was an Elektra comic released in Marvel's adult label.

 

His first works for Dark Horse were small, such as Give Me Liberty. He worked on writing two of the Robo-Cop movies, but neither did very well. In 1991, he started work on Sin City, one of his most popular works ever. In 1993, he released a new Daredevil origins story for Marvel. In 1998, Miller released 300 as a miniseries, retelling the Spartan Battle of Thermopylae. The movie The 300 Spartans was a big inspiration behind the series. Breaking his vow, he returned to DC to write a sequel to Dark Knight Returns, The Dark Knight Strikes Again. Later, he returned to write for Batman. He also worked on producing and consulting on the movie adaptations of Sin City, The Spirit, and 300

 

Work 

 

Miller's work takes much of its influence from film-noir. He typically places less than perfect heroes (he hated tights in his early works) in a very dark and dangerous city. He primarily uses black and white in his comics, not using a lot of shading, trying to create a very stark contrast in his settings. While not as graphic as many of his counterparts and contemporaries, he does have some disturbing violence in his comics, some psychological.

 

Bibliography

 

 

 

References 

 

  1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Miller_(comics)
  2. http://frankmillerink.com/
  3. http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0588340/bio 

 

Further Reading