‘No Cricket Strips Here!’ An Interview with Dez Skinn

Dez Skinn is a highly experienced and outspoken editor, publisher and writer, whose career spans five decades. Skinn is a key figure in the development of the British comics industry in the 1970s and 1980s. He started his career at IPC Magazines, starting as a sub-editor, and working mainly on IPC’s humour titles such as Cor!!, Whizzer & Chips and Buster. After Dez left IPC, he went onto work exclusively for Marvel UK, where amongst other things, he created Doctor Who Weekly. After his stint at Marvel, Dez set up Quality Communications, who went onto publish the seminal British anthology comic, Warrior (Quality Communications 1982). This black and white monthly featured early work from future superstar creators such as Alan Moore, Alan Davis, Steve Dillon, David Lloyd and Steve Parkhouse. The comic is probably best known as the original home of V for Vendetta (in its original black and white version) and Alan Moore’s update and meta-reinvention of Marvelman. In this interview conducted in the summer of 2017, Dez reflects on his early career, giving us an insight into the development of Warrior and the other publications he was involved in over his career.