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Five Things We Learnt About David M Barnett And Martin Simmonds’ Punks Not Dead

Published

9 years ago

December 22, 2017

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Last Of The Mohicans?

♦ Over at Previewsworld, they just spoke to David M Barnett, the writer and co-creator of Black Crown’s Punks Not Dead series and here’s five things we learnt about it…

1. The lead character is a kid from the North of England: “Fergie is 15, from the north of England, and alive. He spends his time avoiding bullies at school and being dragged around the country by his mum who peddles outrageous lies for money on daytime TV shows and in trashy magazines. Until Fergie sees Sid in the toilets at Heathrow Airport. Sid’s been stuck there for 40 years, and now he’s stuck to Fergie… well, they can go about 30 feet apart, but that’s it.”

2. Punks Not Dead does explore some of writer Barnett’s obsessions:”I did sell a lot of my vinyl, and I never saw the Sex Pistols live. I’d kind of put all that behind me, but now you’ve re-opened old wounds. Want to rub salt in? Ask me about having to sell my copies of Watchmen signed by Moore and Gibbons, or that extremely limited edition signed and numbered Gaiman book I had to get rid of. Ask me about the day I let some older kids ride on the Raleigh Grifter bike I’d got for my birthday and they knackered the gears. All of that’s the impetus for Punks Not Dead, in that I’m hoping the book’s going to sell a truckload and make me enough filthy lucre to buy all that stuff, or things just like them, back.”

3. Barnett is very proud of his artistic collaborator Simmonds’ work:”Pretty much everything in the first issue is going to make you want to read on, and that’s mainly down to Martin Simmonds’ artwork, which is as moreish as heroin, basically. You get a lot of story in the first issue, a lot of bang for your buck. Martin and I don’t believe in turning out a comic that you’re going to have read while queuing up to pay for it in the shop.”

4. Punks Not Dead has a fairly extensive cast of characters, Barnett explains: “So we’ve got Fergie and Sid, of course, who are a bit of an odd couple act. Then we’ve got Julie, Fergie’s mum. Until Sid rocked up it was just the two of them.…Fergie doesn’t have a great many friends, but he’s got his eye on Natalie, a girl at his school who is so too cool for him they might as well be in different hemispheres. However, all that’s about to change as Fergie discovers some changes are afoot in him…And all this is bringing Fergie to the attention of the Department for Extra-Usual Affairs, an ultra-secret and rather obscure division of the British security services, which most people don’t know about and those that did would rather they didn’t. It’s been run alone for many years by Dorothy Culpepper, who will become your new favorite senior citizen in comics, but when we drop into the story she’s just been given a new partner in the shape of Asif Baig, straight out of spy school.”

5. The writer is very chuffed he has got to work with former Vertigo senior editor Shelly Bond:”working with the legendary Shelly Bond has been a dream. She’s a tough taskmaster, and won’t settle for “good enough”. She’s constantly driving both of us on to get this book as near to perfect as we can. I’m hoping people will find something fresh and entertaining and maybe even thought-provoking in Punks Not Dead, while having more fun than a barrel of mongooses.”