Editors 2007.|alt=In addition to Berger, several other editors have become linked to the imprint:
Art Young started out as
Karen Berger's assistant and worked on pre-Vertigo issues of
Animal Man,
Hellblazer,
Swamp Thing,
The Sandman,
Doom Patrol,
The Books of Magic,
Skreemer, and
Kid Eternity. He then left DC in 1991 to work for Disney in setting up Touchmark, before returning with those projects to Vertigo in early 1993, when he edited debut title
Enigma,
Mercy,
Rogan Gosh,
The Mystery Play, and
Tank Girl: The Moovy. He edited all four of the "Vertigo Voices" titles in 1995, as well as
Shadows Fall,
Ghostdancing,
Egypt,
Millennium Fever and both
Tank Girl miniseries. Young's last editorial credit for Vertigo was
Flex Mentallo #1 (June 1996).
Shelly Bond was Vertigo's executive editor until 2016. Berger hired her as an assistant editor in the winter of 1992, making her the last of the original Vertigo team to join. Bond worked on many of Vertigo's top titles over the course of her tenure, including
The Sandman,
Shade, the Changing Man,
Sandman Mystery Theatre,
iZombie,
Paul Pope's
Heavy Liquid,
Fables,
Ed Brubaker's
Deadenders,
David Lapham's
Young Liars,
Mike Carey's
Lucifer, and
The Invisibles. She was promoted to executive editor and vice president of Vertigo Comics in 2013, taking the place of Berger. In April 2016, Bond was fired by DC Comics after restructuring. "Shelly will never get full credit for all of the amazing things she did at Vertigo",
Mike Allred wrote in 2016 in a tribute to Bond that featured many of the creators she worked with over the years.
Tom Peyer was a founding editor of Vertigo. Tom was editor in 1990 with Karen Berger what would become the pillars of Vertigo:
Hellblazer,
Sandman (taking over from Art Young),
Swamp Thing and
Shade, the Changing Man. He later edited
Doom Patrol,
Animal Man,
Kid Eternity, and
Black Orchid, as well as two "Vertigo Visions" one-shots. Peyer left editing behind in 1994, returning to DC as a writer.
Stuart Moore edited a wide range of Vertigo titles between 1991 and 2000, including
Swamp Thing,
Books of Magic,
Hellblazer,
The Invisibles,
Preacher and
Transmetropolitan. One of his most important contributions to the line was hiring Garth Ennis to write
Hellblazer. He helped start the DC imprint
Helix, and brought
Transmetropolitan to Vertigo after Helix's demise.
Axel Alonso began his editorial career at Vertigo editing titles like
Hellblazer,
Brian Azzarello and
Eduardo Risso's
100 Bullets, and
Garth Ennis and
Steve Dillon's
Preacher. He left Vertigo for
Marvel Comics in 2000 and eventually ascended to the role of editor-in-chief, a title he held until 2017.
Will Dennis attended film school with Bond, who later recruited him as an assistant editor. He was promoted to editor a few months after Alonso departured for Marvel. Dennis took over the editing of
100 Bullets and later edited
Brian K. Vaughan and
Pia Guerra's
Y: The Last Man and Vaughan's
Pride of Baghdad graphic novel. Dennis was responsible for bringing writers
Brian Wood (
DMZ) and
Jason Aaron (
Scalped) to Vertigo and teamed writer
Andy Diggle and artist
Jock on their breakout series
The Losers. He was the editor who presided over the Vertigo Crime line of graphic novels.
Jonathan Vankin was hired as an editor at Vertigo in 2004 after previously writing two of the line's Vertigo Pop miniseries and several entries in the
Paradox Press "Big Book" series as well as several other non-comics works. He edited
Harvey Pekar's Vertigo work:
The Quitter hardcover and eight issues of Pekar's
American Splendor autobiographical series. His other Vertigo editing credits include
The Exterminators,
Douglas Rushkoff's
Testament, novelist
Denise Mina's run on
Hellblazer,
Incognegro by
Mat Johnson, and
The Alcoholic by novelist and essayist
Jonathan Ames.
Chris Conroy was hired as an editor at the newly revived Vertigo in 2024 after previously being an editor on
DC Black Label. but he never produced work for the Vertigo imprint, having refused to work for parent company DC in the late 1980s. His
Swamp Thing work and the
V for Vendetta reprint-maxiseries were retroactively collected as Vertigo-issued TPBs.
Grant Morrison left
Animal Man and
Doom Patrol before the launch of Vertigo, but their work on those titles was similarly retroactively branded as "Vertigo" when collected. They wrote three volumes of
The Invisibles between
1994 and
2000. In addition, they had produced a number of one-shots and miniseries including
Sebastian O (1993),
The Mystery Play (1994),
Kill Your Boyfriend (1995), the Doom Patrol spin-off
Flex Mentallo (1996),
The Filth (2002–2003),
Seaguy (2004),
Vimanarama (2005),
We3 (2004–2005) and
Joe the Barbarian (2010).
Neil Gaiman came to prominence four years pre-Vertigo with the launch of
The Sandman for DC Comics, a title that became the backbone of the initial Vertigo line-up. His
Death mini-series was part of the Vertigo launch, and his work on the first
The Books of Magic miniseries (also released as a DC title, 1990–1991) laid the groundwork for the long-running Vertigo Universe series of the same name, which featured young wizard
Timothy Hunter.
Peter Milligan contributed two titles to the Vertigo launch. His
Shade, the Changing Man was launched in 1991, pre-Vertigo, and ran 70 issues until 1996, by which time it was under the Vertigo imprint. He also wrote the creator-owned eight-issue miniseries
Enigma (1993). Milligan and
Brett Ewins's 1989 mini-series
Skreemer was subsequently collected by Vertigo. Milligan also wrote both a
Human Target mini-series and ongoing series, the one-shots
The Eaters and
Face for the "Vertigo Voices" sub-imprint, and a number of other miniseries, including
The Extremist,
Tank Girl: The Odyssey,
Egypt,
Girl,
The Minx, and
Vertigo Pop!: London. Moore himself recommended Jamie Delano for
Hellblazer. Delano left the series in 1991, before the launch of Vertigo, and was writing the imprint's
Animal Man series at the time. His other Vertigo works included
Outlaw Nation,
Ghostdancing, and two
Hellblazer miniseries,
The Horrorist and
Hellblazer Special: Bad Blood.
Garth Ennis took over
Hellblazer from Delano and wrote it at the time of Vertigo's launch. Ennis's best-known Vertigo work was his and artist Steve Dillon's creator-owned
Preacher, which ran for 66 issues and six spin-off specials between 1995 and 2000. Ennis has also written several miniseries for Vertigo, including
Goddess (1995–96),
Pride & Joy (1997),
Unknown Soldier (1997), and
Adventures in the Rifle Brigade (2001–2002), as well as eight one-shot
War Stories between 2001 and 2003. Two of his pre-Vertigo works —
True Faith (serialized in
Crisis) and the four-issue DC/Helix miniseries
Bloody Mary (1996–1997) – have had collections released under the Vertigo label.
Rachel Pollack, who was writing
Doom Patrol when Vertigo launched, continued on that title until #87 (Feb. 1995), the final issue. She is known for creating the first openly trans superhero,
Coagula. She also penned two "Vertigo Visions" specials — 1993's
The Geek and 1998's
Tomahawk.
Nancy A. Collins, who wrote
Swamp Thing #110–138 (Aug. 1991 – Dec. 1993), also wrote the 1996 one-shot
Dhampire: Stillborn.
Matt Wagner wrote the early Vertigo series
Sandman Mystery Theatre and co-wrote the
Sandman Midnight Theatre special with Neil Gaiman. Wagner later wrote the 29-issue
Madame Xanadu series.
Later writers John Ney Rieber has produced most of his output for Vertigo, working exclusively for the company between
1994 and 2000. Reiber wrote the first 50 issues of the first ongoing
The Books of Magic series (May 1994 – July 1998), as well as a number of miniseries, mostly set in the wider Vertigo universe (and particularly the Sandman/Books of Magic sections) –
Mythos: The Final Tour (1996–1997),
Hellblazer/The Books of Magic (1997–1998),
The Trenchcoat Brigade (1999), ''
The Books of Faerie: Molly's Story'' (1999). Reiber's
Shadows Fall (with artist John Van Fleet) was a self-created horror story grounded in a reality which made the tale "all the more creepy than if the story was played out in the realm and scope of superheroes". Reiber's
Tell Me Dark, produced for DC, was collected in softcover by Vertigo, and he also contributed to various anthologies.
J. M. DeMatteis began his comics career on DC's
House of Mystery title over a decade before the formation of Vertigo, and later became one of the earliest Vertigo creators thanks in large part to his proposed Touchmark projects. DeMatteis'
Mercy one-shot and miniseries
The Last One both debuted in 1993, with reprints of two creator-owned
Epic Comics projects following in subsequent years: his 1985-87 creator-owned maxiseries
Moonshadow was reprinted between 1994 and 1995, with the miniseries
Blood: A Tale seeing print again in 1996–7. DeMatteis also wrote fifteen issues of
Seekers into the Mystery (1996–7) for Vertigo.
Mike Carey, having started his American comics career with
Caliber Comics in the mid-1990s catapulted to prominence in March
1999 with the first issue of his
Sandman spin-off miniseries
Sandman Presents: Lucifer, which would lead to an ongoing series a year later and considerable praise and projects for Carey. A second
Sandman miniseries,
Sandman Presents: Petrefax (2000), soon followed, before the June 2000 debut of
Lucifer. Neil Gaiman's preferred
Sandman spin-off had not had an easy time being published, due to its title and main character, but Carey was able to helm it for a
Sandman - equalling 75 issues (and a 2002 one-shot:
Nirvana) for 6 years. During this time, Carey also wrote the hardcover OGN
Sandman Presents: The Furies (2002), over 40 issues of
Hellblazer between 2002 and 2006 and a 2005 Hellblazer original graphic novel,
All His Engines. He also wrote a non-
Sandman miniseries,
My Faith in Frankie (2004), the comic book adaptation of ''
Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere (2005–6) and the OGN God Save the Queen (2007). In 2007 he launched the ongoing series Crossing Midnight (2007–2008) and the miniseries Faker'' (2007–8).
Brian K. Vaughans first Vertigo work was a short story in 2000's ''Winter's Edge
#3 anthology, which led to him relaunching Swamp Thing'' (vol. 3) (2000–2001), which lasted for 20 issues. In September
2002, his (and Pia Guerra's)
Y: The Last Man launched. It would ultimately run for 60 issues until March 2008. Vaughan also wrote the 2006 OGN
Pride of Baghdad for Vertigo.
Ed Brubakers first Vertigo work was on the "Vertigo Visions"
Prez one-shot (1995), and intermittent contributions to a couple of anthology titles preceded his
Scene of the Crime (1999), effectively laying the groundwork for his later crime comics. His next Vertigo project, the post-apocalyptic series
Deadenders (2000–2001), ran for 16 issues while Brubaker wrote for both
Batman and
Detective Comics for parent-company DC. His 2001 miniseries
Sandman Presents: The Dead Boy Detectives told the story of some incidental Sandman characters, and was later retold by
Jill Thompson in
manga form (2005). Brubaker subsequently took his Vertigo/crime sensibility to work from
WildStorm,
Icon and the mainstream DC and Marvel universes.
Bill Willingham came to Vertigo after a plethora of small press work in 1999 to launch his poker miniseries
Proposition Player (1999–2000), and contribute to the
Sandman universe with a one-shot spy-spoof,
Sandman Presents: Merv Pumpkinhead, Agent of D.R.E.A.M. (2000), and a single issue contribution to
The Dreaming ongoing series. A second
Sandman one-shot,
The Sandman Presents: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Dreams... (2001), also led to a 4-issue miniseries,
Sandman Presents: The Thessaliad (2002). Willingham's best-known work soon followed, with the July
2001 debut of
Fables (with artist
Lan Medina). In 2004, he returned to the world of the Sandman with
Sandman Presents: Thessaly: Witch for Hire, and 2006 saw the debut of the Vertigo-esque magical—but mainstream DCU title—
Shadowpact and
Fables companion series
Jack of Fables. In July 2008, with
Fables nearing a major turning point in its run, Willingham relaunched
House of Mystery as a Vertigo title with
Lilah Sturges (then known as Matthew Sturges). Other notable people who have written for Vertigo include
Kyle Baker,
Warren Ellis,
David Lapham,
Mark Millar, Brian Azzarello, Paul Pope,
James Robinson, and Brian Wood.
Artists Several artists have also produced a large amount of notable work for Vertigo, several (Steve Dillon, Pia Guerra, Eduardo Risso and
Darick Robertson) mainly producing lengthy runs on individual creator-owned titles (in Guerra's case,
Y: The Last Man makes up around 80% of her output to date), but others on a number of titles. Vertigo's main Universe titles,
The Sandman,
Hellblazer and
Swamp Thing, have been particularly artistically diverse, and home to many talents, while the large number of creator-owned miniseries has seen large numbers of individuals producing work for Vertigo.
Peter Gross worked on a pre-Vertigo issue of
Swamp Thing and an early Vertigo issue of
Shade the Changing Man (#36, June 1993) before penciling & inking a story featuring Timothy Hunter in the "Children's Crusade" crossover
Arcana Annual (Jan. 1994). This led to a regular inking role on the newly launched
Books of Magic series, taking over as regular penciler and inker with #6; he would stay with the title for most of its run, writing as well as drawing its final 25 issues (1998–2000). Gross also inked Reiber's
Mythos one-shot, and provided full artwork on the first
Books of Faerie miniseries (1997) and pencils on the following year's ''The Books of Faerie: Auberon's Tale
(1998). After Books of Magic
, Gross moved to Lucifer'' (beginning with #5, Oct. 2000) and penciled 56 of the remaining issues, as well as inking a handful. He also co-penciled 2005's
Constantine: The Official Movie Adaptation and several issues of
Douglas Rushkoff's
Testament from 2006 to 2007.
Dean Ormston has similarly produced a disproportionate amount of his artwork for Vertigo titles, including the lion's share of the alternate reality
Books of Magick: Life During Wartime series (2004–5). His first Vertigo work was as one of several pencilers in the pages of
Sandman #62 (Aug 1994), and in 1995 he penciled and inked Peter Milligan's
The Eaters one-shot. His artwork appears in most (14) of the non-Peter Gross issues of Mike Carey's
Lucifer, and he also handled art duties for
Caitlin R. Kiernan's 4-issue
The Girl Who Would be Death (1998–1999). In addition, he has worked on a number of single (and jam) issues of other Vertigo titles, including
Crusades,
House of Mystery,
The Invisibles,
Mythos,
Sandman Mystery Theatre,
Swamp Thing and
Testament between 1994 and 2007.
Duncan Fegredos first major American work was on the 1991
Kid Eternity miniseries with Grant Morrison. A 1992 cover for
Doom Patrol similarly fell in Vertigo territory
pre-Vertigo, while Fegredo's first "true" Vertigo work was also on the joint-first new series released by the imprint: Peter Milligan's
Enigma. Immediately after the end of the eight-issue series, Fegredo took over as cover artist on Milligan's long-running
Shade, the Changing Man (issues #42–50), collaborated with Milligan on 1995's one-shot
Face (Jan) and then returned to cover duties on
Shade, producing all but one of the remaining pieces of art. He produced pencils and inks for the miniseries
Millennium Fever (1995) and (with Milligan) for
Girl (1996). Between 1997 and 2002, he contributed artwork on fill-in issues (or to jam issues) of
Crusades,
The Dreaming,
Flinch,
House of Secrets,
The Sandman Presents: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Dreams...,
Totems,
Weird War Tales and
Weird Western Tales. In addition, his cover work graced the 1999 miniseries
Sandman Presents: Love Street, six issues of
The Books of Magick: Life During Wartime and the first fifteen issues of Mike Carey's
Lucifer.
Jill Thompson, although primarily known as an artist, has also produced scripts for Vertigo, producing as writer-artist three Sandman tie-ins:
The Little Endless Storybook (2001) and two manga retellings of storylines: ''
Death: At Death's Door (2003) and The Dead Boy Detectives
(2005). Between 1993 and 1994, she penciled the first six issues of the ongoing Black Orchid
series and the 4-issue miniseries Finals (1999). She has contributed ten issues each to the high-profile Vertigo series Sandman
(penciling the complete "Brief Lives" storyline, part 7 of which was the first Vertigo issue) and The Invisibles
, and penciled four of the last five issues of Seekers into the Mystery
. She has produced fill-in issues of Books of Magic
, The Dreaming
and Swamp Thing
and contributed artwork to the anthology comics Fables
#59 (in addition to a story in the hardcover OGN 1001 Nights of Snowfall) and Transmetropolitan: Filth of the City''.
Jon J Muth, a painter, has produced several lavish volumes for Vertigo, including writing, penciling, inking and coloring the 1998 one-shot
Swamp Thing: Roots. Primarily, his Vertigo output has been in collaboration with J. M. DeMatteis, an issue of
Blood: A Tale, the maxiseries
Moonshadow (and its coda,
Farewell, Moonshadow (1997)) and three issues of
Seekers into the Mystery. Muth painted Grant Morrison's
The Mystery Play (1994) and the 2002
Lucifer: Nirvana special for Mike Carey. His work also effectively ended Neil Gaiman's
Sandman series, Muth painting issue #74, the final issue of
The Wake storyline, and second-to-last main issue. The artwork of
Charles Vess has infrequently but notably accompanied the words of Neil Gaiman on Vertigo projects, including the 4-issue
Stardust (1997–8) miniseries, later reprinted as an illustrated hardcover book. Vess' work can also be seen in the two
Shakespeare adaptations in the pages of
The Sandman, the first of which (pre-Vertigo) won the comic and duo the
World Fantasy Award for Best Short Story, and the last of which was also the final (75th) issue of the series. Vess also contributed a story to the
Fables OGN
1001 Nights of Snowfall, illustrated a
Books of Magic cover and produced an issue of
The Dreaming (2000).
Sean Phillips earliest American comics work was in the pages of pre-Vertigo
Hellblazer, and in May 1993 he became one of the early Vertigo artists by illustrating (with assists from
Paul Peart and Sean Harrison Scoffield) the entire 16-issue run of
Kid Eternity (1993–4). He drew the covers for twenty-three of the twenty-five issues of the first
The Invisibles series and also returned to
Hellblazer (switching from artwork and covers to just covers after around 20 issues) between 1995 and 1998. He drew three issues of
Shade, the Changing Man (1994), the one-shot
Hell Eternal (1995) and the miniseries
The Minx as well as inking most of
Michael Lark's work on
Scene of the Crime. He penciled four issues of the final
Invisibles series between 1999 and 2000, produced covers for the
Hellblazer Special: Bad Blood miniseries, and shared art chores with John Bolton on the 2001 miniseries
User.
John Bolton, another frequent Gaiman collaborator has rarely worked with that author directly for Vertigo, but has utilised his characters, including in the OGN
Sandman Presents: The Furies and the
Books of Magic lead-in
Arcana Annual. He also contributed to the
Sandman Mystery Theatre annual, and the
Fables OGN
1001 Nights of Snowfall. With Sean Phillips, he produced the artwork for
Devin Grayson's 2001 miniseries
User, and individually fully illustrated the OGN's
Menz Insana (1997) and
God Save the Queen (2007). Other artists include
Chris Bachalo,
Mark Buckingham,
Guy Davis,
Phil Jimenez, Jock,
Warren Pleece and
Liam Sharp.
Cover artists Dave McKean is the artist who provided all of the covers to the Vertigo's highest profile series
The Sandman (1989–96). The first 46 of these covers were created for the DC imprint, but McKean's work also includes a number of
Sandman spin-off issues, miniseries and galleries. These include the two
Death miniseries and all 60 issues of
The Dreaming (1996–2001). He provided the first 24 DC published covers to
Hellblazer, and all 22 covers to the 1993-1995
Black Orchid Vertigo series (which spun off from his (and Gaiman's) 1988 DC miniseries). He produced the first cover for
Sandman Mystery Theatre and his work was featured in a 1997 artbook incorporating his
Sandman covers, "Dust Covers: The Collected Sandman Covers, 1989–1997". In addition, McKean's artwork also graced the inside pages of the public service comic
Death Talks about Life (1994), an issue of
The Dreaming (#8), two issues of the DC-published
Hellblazer (#27 with Gaiman and #40 with Delano) and his and Neil Gaiman's OGN
Mr. Punch (1994). The duo's
Black Orchid was similarly produced for DC, but was retroactively deemed a Vertigo title.
Brian Bolland and
Glenn Fabry have also produced a large number of iconic covers for the Vertigo line, Fabry probably being best known for his work on one title: Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon's
Preacher (and the spin-off miniseries). Bolland, one of the earliest British creators whose work was brought to America, drew the first 63 covers for
Animal Man, mostly for DC, but also the first six Vertigo issues before handing over to a succession of other artists. Bolland also drew the cover for Vertigo's first
Doom Patrol issue and for the entire second and third volumes of Morrison's
Invisibles (1997–2000) (and in addition provided artwork for the TPB collections of Morrison's
Doom Patrol run, and all volumes of
The Invisibles). Bolland provided covers for three issues of Mark Millar's
Swamp Thing run (1995), and miniseries including
Vamps (1994–5), both Vertigo
Tank Girl (1995–1996) miniseries and
Blood & Water (2003) as well as the one-shot
Zatanna: Everyday Magic (2003). Bolland also wrote and illustrated stories for the anthology titles
Heartthrobs and
Strange Adventures (1999) and OGN
1001 Nights of Snowfall, as well as providing a cover each for the
Gangland and ''Winter's Edge
anthologies. With issue #12, Bolland took over cover duties (from Fables
cover artist James Jean) on Fables
spin-off Jack of Fables
, which he continues to produce as of June 2008. Fabry, in addition to his Preacher'' covers, provided covers for Ennis' miniseries
Adventures in the Rifle Brigade: Operation Bollock (2001–2002) and most of that authors first run on
Hellblazer (1992–94) - which included the first Vertigo issue - as well as his return to the title in 1998–1999. In addition, Fabry has also penciled a couple of short
Hellblazer stories for various specials, and drew the covers for the
Hellblazer: The Trenchcoat Brigade miniseries. He contributed to the multi-artist
Transmetropolitan special "I Hate It Here" and provided three covers each to the ongoing
Transmetropolitan (2002) and
Swamp Thing (Vol. 3) (2001); covered the complete
Scarab (1993–1994) miniseries, all 19 issues of
Outlaw Nation and one issue each of the anthology titles
Gangland,
Heartthrobs and
Weird War Tales. Between 2005 and 2006, Fabry fully illustrated Mike Carey's adaptation of ''Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere
, having previously collaborated with the man himself on a story in the 2003 OGN The Sandman: Endless Nights. At the start of 2008, he provided a cover for an issue of Exterminators
, before taking over from Lee Bermejo as on-going cover artist on, again, Hellblazer''. Other notable cover artists include
Dan Brereton,
Tim Bradstreet, Duncan Fegredo, James Jean,
Dave Johnson and
J. G. Jones. ==Publications==