When I moved down to London in the early 70s and was given the job of editor of Sandie, one of my subs was Rhoda Miller, also an ex-DC Thomson employee. It must have been galling having some talentless newbie parachuted in on top of you, but she kindly never bore a grudge. Indeed, nearly 40 years later Rhoda, back at DC Thomson, asked me to do an interview for the staff magazine. As it's unlikely to see the light of day anywhere else, I thought you might be interested to read it.

Thanks for coming to the chat night on Wednesday John, it was a bit chaotic but I think we got some gossip out of you! I do hope you'll come back again.

During the session I asked if Mayor Ambrose was inspired by Boris Johnson. You said he wasn't and that his current position was just a natural progression for him (or rather, PJ.) That got me wondering, when you originally created young Mr Maybe, did you intend for him to be around this long and come this far or has the murderous little tyke just kind of found his way here on his own?

Hi John, it was good to see you (type) in the chatroom last week, as you made a few fans happy.
I have a question for you, if you don't mind!
This week I received my Dredd Restricted Files Vol 1 and inside some of the stories have unknown next to the writers credit. I wondered if you wrote any of them or if not, if you k...now who did. Here they are:-

The Judge's Graveyard - Summer Special '77
Dr Panic - 2000AD Annual '79
Ryan's Revenge - Dan Dare Annual '79
Mega-Miami - 2000AD Annual '80
Christmas Party - Dan Dare Annual '80

Thanks for any help in advance.

...JW said...

"PJ was always there to be used again, Pete, but the fact that he's still around and risen to such an elevated position is purely down to PJ himself. He's one of those characters who takes over a story...."

I hated Maybe when he first appeared. I thought he was a crap, boring character. I only changed my mind when he hit the Megazine. Since then he's become one of the most worthwhile and interesting characters the series has ever had. However, I still don't really understand what changed my attitude.

his journals are still misspelled and rather childlike