Ed Brubaker

In 1991, he started to contribute crime stories to the Dark Horse Comics anthology series Dark Horse Presents, a comic he would continue to contribute to intermittently throughout the decade. Among those contributions was the three part serial "An Accidental Death" (Dark Horse Presents #65–67), a collaboration with artist Eric Shanower, which garnered the two a 1993 Eisner Award nomination.

In 1997, he began to publish his cartoonist work through the small press publisher Alternative Comics. In the one-off At the Seams, a romantic triangle is explored through three stories which each depict a different participant's point-of-view. The comic was a 1997 Ignatz Award nominee for Outstanding Graphic Novel or Collection. His other work for Alternative Comics, the humorous and experimental Detour No. 1, was to be the first issue of a series, though only one issue was published. Detour was nominated for the "Best New Series" Harvey Award in 1998.

Brubaker's next major work for Vertigo was the Scene of the Crime four issue limited series in 1999, which marked his first collaboration with both Michael Lark and Sean Phillips, two artists who would frequently work with the writer in later years. A slacker detective story set in San Francisco, the series was critically acclaimed and the first to gain Brubaker attention from Hollywood producers.

In late 2000, Brubaker signed an exclusive contract with DC Comics. That same year, he began to do his first mainstream super-hero work, on the series Batman starting with issue #582 (Oct. 2000). He would continue to work on various series starring the Batman character until late 2003 including such story arcs as "Bruce Wayne: Murderer?" and "Bruce Wayne: Fugitive".

Returning to Vertigo in 2000, Brubaker and artist Warren Pleece produced the science fiction series Deadenders. The series lasted 16 issues before being canceled in 2001. Staying with Vertigo in 2001, Brubaker wrote the four issue Sandman Presents: Dead Boy Detectives, which was drawn by artist Bryan Talbot.

The Fall, a graphic novel that was written by Brubaker and illustrated by Berlin creator Jason Lutes was published by Drawn and Quarterly in 2001. This work had previously been anthologized in five parts in Dark Horse Presents in 1998. The story involved a convenience store clerk who gets involved in a ten-year-old murder mystery after he uses a stolen credit card. In 2004 IDW Publishing announced that Brubaker and artist Sean Phillips would collaborate on a creator owned pirate series titled Black Sails for them. That series has not yet been published and The Fall remained the last independent comic book work by Brubaker until his work for Image Comics, which began in 2012.

Also in 2001, Brubaker and artist Darwyn Cooke teamed up to revamp the Catwoman character. They started with the four issue serial "Trail of the Catwoman" which ran in Detective Comics #759–762. In the serial, private detective Slam Bradley attempts to investigate the death of Selina Kyle (aka Catwoman). The story led into a new Catwoman title in late 2001 by Brubaker and Cooke in which the character's costume, supporting cast and modus operandi were all redesigned and redeveloped. Brubaker stayed on the series until No. 37 (January 2004).

In 2002 Brubaker did his first work for Wildstorm, another DC imprint, with the series Point Blank which featured the artwork of New Zealand artist Colin Wilson. The series took existing concepts from the Wildstorm universe, such as Grifter (the star of the series), John Lynch and Tao and used them to set up his Sleeper series which debuted later that year.

In early 2003, Brubaker and writer Greg Rucka created and co-wrote the Gotham Central series. Focusing on the activities of the Gotham City Police Department, the two writers either co-wrote storylines or wrote alternate arcs separately throughout the series, which featured artwork from Brubaker's Scene of the Crime collaborator Michael Lark. The title was cancelled in 2006, shortly after Brubaker's last issue.

In December 2003, in a unique publicity stunt conceived to help promote the first trade paperback collection of Sleeper, Brubaker organized an "arm-wrestling competition" at San Francisco's "Isotope – the comic book lounge" comic book shop. If participants were able to beat Brubaker at arm wrestling they were awarded free signed comic books. According to Brubaker, the writer wrestled 40–50 people and won most of the time, losing only eight or nine times.

Although Sleeper was a success with critics and fans on the Internet, the series underperformed commercially, and so it was canceled after its twelfth issue. It was relaunched in 2004 with the same creators as Sleeper: Season Two but also ended with its twelfth issue.

In late 2004 Brubaker, no longer exclusive to DC, began to work for their main competitor Marvel Comics. His first major work for the publisher was volume five of the Captain America series. Paired with artist Steve Epting, Brubaker's Captain America introduced new villains and resurrected the long dead character Bucky Barnes as "The Winter Soldier". The series was a sales and critical success from its first issue. Brubaker continued on this series for eight full years, from November 2004 to October 2012, alongside sister titles and limited series based around the character.

In February 2005 Brubaker signed his first exclusive contract with Marvel, the deal allowing the writer to finish out his prior commitments for DC on Gotham Central and Sleeper.

In early 2006 Brubaker wrote two limited series for Marvel; with artist Pablo Raimondi, he wrote Books of Doom, which retold and expanded on the origin of Doctor Doom; and with artist Trevor Hairsine, he wrote X-Men: Deadly Genesis, ret-conning information about the origins of the "All New, All-Different X-Men" who debuted in 1975.

He became the regular writer of Uncanny X-Men, working with artist Billy Tan and Clayton Henry, in July 2006. Brubaker, together with Matt Fraction, co-wrote a new Iron Fist ongoing series, The Immortal Iron Fist, which started in November 2006.

A creator-owned crime comic with Sean Phillips, Criminal, was published by Marvel's Icon Comics imprint. It has generally received positive reviews. In 2007, Criminal won the Eisner Award for Best New Series for its first arc, "Coward."

In 2008, he and Phillips began a new Icon series titled Incognito, which Brubaker says is "about a completely amoral guy with super-powers forced to pretend he's a normal law-abiding citizen, because he's in Witness Protection, and how that shapes what he becomes. It's also a brutal noir twist on the super-hero/super-villain genre that delves more into their roots in the pulps, and it's going to be pretty over-the-top and action-packed."

In March 2009 Brubaker premiered his web series Angel of Death on Crackle.

In February 2010, a controversy arose with Captain America No. 602, which depicted a group of anti-tax protesters, understood by some readers to be a Tea Party, which was characterized by the Falcon as exclusively white and racist group. Brubaker and Marvel editor-in-chief Joe Quesada apologized for the matter, explaining that although the group was not intended by Brubaker to represent any particular real-life group, one of the signs depicted in the scene read, "Tea Bag The Libs Before They Tea Bag YOU!", which was not written by Brubaker, but was added by letterer Joe Caramagna, who, under deadline pressures, added messages on signs that were found to still be blank, based on signs he saw on the Internet. Quesada further assured that the error would not appear in future reprints of the issue. In an interview following the controversy Brubaker stated that "I had to shut down my public email because I started getting death threats from, y'know, peaceful protesters."

Brubaker and Sean Phillips launched their Fatale series at Image Comics in January 2012. The series was initially announced as a twelve-issue maxi-series but was upgraded to an ongoing title in November 2012. Jesse Schedeen of IGN stated that "You can't go wrong with a Brubaker/Phillips collaboration. Even so, Fatale is making a strong case for being the best of their projects."

Brubaker and Steve Epting debuted Velvet, an espionage series, in October 2013.

In October 2013, Brubaker signed a five-year contract to produce comics exclusively for Image. Under the terms of the deal, Image will publish any comic Brubaker brings to them without having to pitch it to them first. Brubaker said this arrangement is something he has always wanted. The first series released under this contract was The Fade Out, a Hollywood period piece made with Sean Phillips.

Brubaker made a cameo appearance in the 2014 film Captain America: The Winter Soldier, as the Winter Soldier's handler.

In 2016, Brubaker joined the writing staff for HBO's Westworld. He co-wrote the episode "Dissonance Theory" with Jonathan Nolan.

In 2019, Brubaker partnered with Nicolas Winding Refn to release Too Old to Die Young, a 10-part noir miniseries for Amazon.