BUTTON MAN

'''Button Man''' is a comic strip created for leading British comic ''2000 AD'', written by John Wagner and illustrated by Arthur Ranson.

Contents

Plot

Publication

Film adaptation

External links

Plot

Harry Exton, ex-mercenary, is a "Button Man", a hired killer pitted against other killers in an underground sport. Each works for a mysterious "Voice", a rich man of unknown identity. The object of the game is to kill your opponent, or capture him and take his marker - the first two joints of a finger. Button Men who lose three fingers are shot anyway. The "voices" profit from the game by gambling on the outcome, and a ruthless killer like Harry Exton can make a modestly wealthy man extremely rich. Exton decides to quit, only to discover that leaving the Button Man game isn't so easy.

Publication

''Button Man'' ran for three series (with a new one just starting), and remains one of the best-selling collections of ''2000 AD'' strips (other than ''Judge Dredd'') ever published.
The series three outings, all written by John Wagner, are:

★ ''Button Man'':

★
★ "Book I: The Killing Game" (with Arthur Ranson, in ''2000 AD'' #780-791, 1992)

★
★ "Book II: Confession" (with Arthur Ranson, in ''2000 AD'' #904-919, 1994)

★
★ "Book 3" (with Arthur Ranson, in ''2000 AD'' prog 2001 & #1223-1233, 2001)

★
★ "Book IV: The Hitman's Daughter" (with Frazer Irving, in ''2000 AD'' #1551-ongoing, 2007)
There have been a couple of collections of Book I:

★ Kitchen Sink Press (1995, ISBN 0-87816-276-3)

★ Rebellion (2003, ISBN 1-904265-05-7)

Film adaptation

Movie rights are owned by Dreamworks, which has co-opted the producers of Wagner's ''A History Of Violence''. The film is due for release in 2008. [1]

External links

★ 2000 AD profile

★

★ Review of ''The Killing Game''