Panel Borders Pins down Chris Claremont on creating Captain Britain

Comic book creator Chris Claremont
at the November 2008 Big Apple
Convention in Manhattan.
Photo: Luigi Novi

Starting a new series of the UK's only weekly radio show about comics, now under a new (old) name, Panel Borders has a month of shows looking at the 'British Invasion' of UK creators who have worked on American and American-style superhero titles.

In this week's show, Alex Fitch talks to Chris Claremont, a veteran comics writer born in London who became one of the most prolific and popular American comic book writers of the 20th century, most famous for a 16 year sojourn writing the Uncanny X-Men from 1975 - 1991, with his last few issues selling in the region of eight million copies each.

In the interview, the team focus on a superhero Chris created for the UK market - Captain Britain - in 1976, his relocation to America via the monthly comic Excalibur in 1988 and his more experimental X-Men spin off - New Mutants - which he created in 1982 and returned to writing last month.

Also, in a 60 second (!) interview recorded at the premiere of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World in London, Alex talks to British director Edgar Wright about bringing a different kind of superhero to the screen.

• Panel Borders - eXpat Heroes broadcasts at 5.00pm, Resonance 104.4 FM (London) / www.resonancefm.com, Thursday 2nd September 2010. More info at http://panelborders.wordpress.com/