Kick-Ass writer Mark Millar makes £1.8m from films

Kick-Ass and Wanted writer Marc Millar. Picture: Ian Rutherford

The Scot has had a string of box office successes including Wanted and the Kick-Ass series after his creations were picked up by movie bosses.

His career has taken off since he started writing as a penniless student living in a flat near his home town of Coatbridge, Lanarkshire.

Accounts recently published by his firm Millarworld Limited show it has total assets of £1,815,000.

Millar, 45, set up the Glasgow-based company to have control over his own comic book characters.

The accounts show that company made profits of £364,387 over the last year and owes £1,592,629 to unnamed creditors.

In recent years, Millar has become the undisputed king of the graphic novel on both sides of the Atlantic, working for DC Comics and Marvel, writing the adventures superheroes including Superman, Batman, The Flash, Spider-Man and Wolverine.

In 1994, the multi-award winning writer started working on his first American comic, Swamp Thing.

By 2001, he launched Ultimate X-Men for Marvel. Three years later, he was brought on board by Fox to oversee The Fantastic Four and X-Men film franchises.

Major Hollywood stars including Angelina Jolie, Samuel L Jackson and Nicolas Cage have starred in adaptation of his own books.

However, he has previously told how he struggled to make a living after his parents died when he was still a teenager.

He said: “After my parents died, I had no cash.

“I was living in a flat on the outskirts of Coatbridge - I couldn’t afford to live in Coatbridge - and there wasn’t even a proper lock for the door.

“You used to have stick your finger in and open it from the inside.

“I did my second year at university living there. I thought this was horrible, so every day I would go to the library and borrow or steal paper, and I would literally batter out scripts.”

Millar recently bought his first mobile phone, which cost £18, and said he was not comfortable splashing the cash.

He said: “I’ve been lucky and I never forget this is a transient business.

“Everyone I know in Hollywood grew up rich. I didn’t. The trappings of wealth don’t sit easily with me.

“I never want to be one of those guys that splashes cash on an Aston Martin.

“I want my kids to have a normal life and play with the neighbours’ kids and go to a local school. Otherwise, you end up like Paris Hilton.”

The latest film based on Millar’s work, Kingsman: The Secret Service tells the story of Colin Firth’s veteran secret agent Harry Hart who leads young protégé Gary ‘Eggsy’ Unwin into the world of spies, gadgets and guns.

Directed by Matthew Vaughan, it also stars Michael Caine and Mark Strong and became the biggest ever 15 certified January box office opening in British history when it was released earlier this year.