Toxic (comics)

Toxic!
Toxic #1 (March 1991), artwork by Kevin O'Neill.
Publication information
Publisher	Apocalypse Ltd
Schedule	Weekly
Publication date	March 28 - October 24, 1991
No. of issues	31
Creative team
Written by	Alan Grant Pat Mills John Wagner
Artist(s)	Mike McMahon Kevin O'Neill

Toxic! was a British weekly comic book published by Apocalypse Ltd. A total of 31 issues were published from March 28 to October 24, 1991.

Toxic! was the idea of Pat Mills, Kevin O'Neill, Mike McMahon, John Wagner and Alan Grant. The aim was to provide creators an outlet for their work to be published with them retaining the rights and control of their work. This was in contrast to 2000 AD, which Mills had also launched in 1977. Toxic! was to be the main rival of 2000 AD, and Toxic! would be in full colour throughout as opposed to 2000AD, which was still mainly published in black and white.

Toxic! was published by Apocalypse Ltd, an offshoot of Neptune Distribution based in South Wigston, Leicester. Neptune also owned Trident Comics which printed black and white comics by mainly new, unpublished creators.

The first title released by Apocalypse was a Marshal Law special titled Kingdom of the blind published in October 1990. This was followed by the first issue of Toxic! in March 1991. Toxic! was initially dominated by Mills (Mills had rejected John Wagner's proposal for Button Man based on its supposed similarity to Accident Man. It later appeared in 2000 AD). His Marshal Law strip was seen as the flagship title and a character to perhaps rival Judge Dredd. Mills also wrote Accident Man (with Tony Skinner) and Muto-Maniac in the first issue, which was rounded out by a short strip by Alan Grant and Simon Bisley.