Nick Landau

Nick Landau
Born	United Kingdom
Nationality	British
Area(s)	Editor, writer, publisher, retailer

Nick Landau is a British media figure, co-owner of the Titan Entertainment Group, which publishes Titan Magazines and Titan Books and owns the London Forbidden Planet store.

Landau was significantly involved in comics fandom from at least 1968. He was co-editor of the fanzine Comic Media, ran comic marts and imported American comics into the UK. In the mid-70s, he ran a shop selling imported US comics in London's Notting Hill.

In the mid-1970s, after finishing a post-graduate course at film school, Landau got his break when he went to the offices of science-fiction comic 2000 AD to interview then-editor Pat Mills for Comic Media News (a spin off from Comic Media). Mills was planning on resigning once the comic had become established, and following the interview, had decided that Landau would make a suitable chief sub-editor, saying:

Nick was clearly an exceptional person and I knew he would be of great value, but [IPC publisher John] Sanders rightly regarded most comic fans with deep suspicion, irrelevant to a mainstream undertaking. I agreed with feeling and still do. Nick was the exception to an otherwise golden rule.

Landau didn't get that job due to his lack of experience, but he was soon given the same position at IPC Magazines' Action. When Mills stepped down after sixteen issues, replaced by Kelvin Gosnell, Landau was brought in as Gosnell's chief sub-editor. Gosnell was overwhelmed by the amount of work needed to launch Starlord, and Landau took up the slack. As Gosnell describes it, "As soon as Starlord came on the scene, I lost it. I had to have someone running 2000 AD and that was Nick Landau. He was halfway between editor and chief sub" and Roy Preston was made a sub-editor to take up the slack and help Landau. With the focus on the launch of Starlord (issue No. 1 was cover dated 13 May 1978), Landau, Preston and art editor Kevin O'Neill had more creative freedom. As Mills says, "Some of the best decisions on 2000 AD's future were made while they were running the show. They were responsible for "The Cursed Earth", credit cards and encouraged talented artists like Garry Leach and Brian Bolland." Gosnell disagrees, stating that "[t]his wonderful gush of creative freedom they felt when I started on Starlord nearly got 2000 AD taken off the market."

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