189-732: Alan Moore (born 18 November 1953) is an English author known primarily for his work in comic books including Watchmen , V for Vendetta , The Ballad of Halo Jones , Swamp Thing , Batman: The Killing Joke , and From Hell . He is widely recognised among his peers and critics as one of the best comic book writers in the English language. Moore has occasionally used such pseudonyms as Curt Vile , Jill de Ray , Brilburn Logue , and Translucia Baboon ; also, reprints of some of his work have been credited to The Original Writer when Moore requested that his name be removed. Moore started writing for British underground and alternative fanzines in
378-401: A kenosis towards comic book history [...] [which] does not ennoble and empower his characters [...] Rather, it sends a wave of disruption back through superhero history [...] devalue[ing] one of the basic superhero conventions by placing his masked crime fighters in a realistic world". First and foremost, "Moore's exploration of the [often compromised] motives for costumed crimefighting sheds
567-524: A 12-inch single featuring a recording of "This Vicious Cabaret", a song featured in V for Vendetta , which was released on the Glass Records label. Moore wrote the song "Leopardman at C&A" for David J, and it was set to music by Mick Collins for the album We Have You Surrounded by Collins' group The Dirtbombs . Moore's work in 2000 AD brought him to the attention of DC Comics editor Len Wein , who hired him in 1983 to write The Saga of
756-601: A story within a story in the form of Tales of the Black Freighter , a fictional comic book from which scenes appear in issues three, five, eight, ten, and eleven. The fictional comic's story, "Marooned", is read by a youth in New York City. Moore and Gibbons conceived a pirate comic because they reasoned that since the characters of Watchmen experience superheroes in real life, "they probably wouldn't be at all interested in superhero comics." Gibbons suggested
945-415: A "Marvel"-brand douche caused DC executive Paul Levitz to order the entire print run destroyed and reprinted with the advertisement amended to "Amaze", to avoid friction with DC's competitor Marvel Comics . A Cobweb story Moore wrote for Tomorrow Stories No. 8 featuring references to L. Ron Hubbard , American occultist Jack Parsons , and the " Babalon Working ", was blocked by DC Comics due to
1134-457: A 1986 interview, Moore said, "What I'd like to explore is the areas that comics succeed in where no other media is capable of operating", and emphasized this by stressing the differences between comics and film. Moore said that Watchmen was designed to be read "four or five times", with some links and allusions only becoming apparent to the reader after several readings. Dave Gibbons notes that, "[a]s it progressed, Watchmen became much more about
1323-400: A British music magazine. (Steve Moore wrote the strip under the name "Pedro Henry", while Alan Moore drew them using the pseudonym of Curt Vile , a pun on the name of composer Kurt Weill .) Not long afterward, Alan Moore succeeded in getting an underground comix -type series about a private detective known as Roscoe Moscow (who is investigating the "death of Rock N' Roll") published (under
1512-625: A basis for the Awesome Universe. Moore was not satisfied with Liefeld, saying "I just got fed up with the unreliability of information that I get from him, that I didn't trust him. I didn't think that he was respecting the work and I found it hard to respect him. And also by then I was probably feeling that with the exception of Jim Lee, Jim Valentino – people like that – that a couple of the Image partners were seeming, to my eyes, to be less than gentlemen. They were seeming to be not necessarily
1701-462: A beneficial impact on society. He expanded on this for a 2009 book-length essay entitled 25,000 years of Erotic Freedom , which was described by a reviewer as "a tremendously witty history lecture – a sort of Horrible Histories for grownups." In 2007, Moore appeared in animated form in an episode of The Simpsons – a show of which he is a fan – entitled " Husbands and Knives ", which aired on his fifty-fourth birthday. Since 2009, Moore has been
1890-431: A concerted effort to draw the characters in a manner different from that commonly seen in comics. The artist tried to draw the series with "a particular weight of line, using a hard, stiff pen that didn't have much modulation in terms of thick and thin" which he hoped "would differentiate it from the usual lush, fluid kind of comic book line". In a 2009 interview, Moore recalled that he took advantage of Gibbons' training as
2079-521: A couple of years, I realised that I would never be able to draw well enough and/or quickly enough to actually make any kind of decent living as an artist." To learn more about how to write a successful comic-book script, he asked for advice from his friend Steve Moore. Interested in writing for 2000 AD , one of Britain's most prominent comic magazines, Alan Moore then submitted a script for their long-running and successful series Judge Dredd . While having no need for another writer on Judge Dredd , which
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#17327914493172268-649: A cult following throughout subsequent decades. Marvelman (later retitled Miracleman for legal reasons) was a series that originally had been published in Britain from 1954 through to 1963, based largely upon the American comic Captain Marvel . Upon resurrecting Marvelman , Moore "took a kitsch children's character and placed him within the real world of 1982". The work was drawn primarily by Garry Leach and Alan Davis. The third series that Moore produced for Warrior
2457-446: A day at the latter's house creating characters, crafting details for the story's milieu and discussing influences. The pair were particularly influenced by a Mad parody of Superman named " Superduperman "; Moore said: "We wanted to take Superduperman 180 degrees—dramatic, instead of comedic". Moore and Gibbons conceived of a story that would take "familiar old-fashioned superheroes into a completely new realm"; Moore said his intention
2646-420: A different age and class – all meet in a European hotel and regale each other with tales of their sexual encounters. With the work, Moore wanted to attempt something innovative in comics, and believed that creating comics pornography was a way of achieving this. He remarked that "I had a lot of different ideas as to how it might be possible to do an up-front sexual comic strip and to do it in a way that would remove
2835-403: A disturbing light on past superhero stories, and forces the reader to reevaluate—to revision—every superhero in terms of Moore's kenosis —his emptying out of the tradition". Klock relates the title to the quote by Juvenal to highlight the problem of controlling those who hold power and quoted repeatedly within the work itself. The deconstructive nature of Watchmen is, Klock notes, played out on
3024-544: A dysutopian [ sic ] mystery story". In 1988, Watchmen received a Hugo Award in the Other Forms category. According to Gibbons, Moore had his award placed upside down in his garden and used it as a bird table. Dave Langford reviewed Watchmen for White Dwarf #96, and stated that "The modern myth of the Superhero is curiously powerful despite its usual silliness; Watchmen lovingly disassembles
3213-441: A few of his one-off stories for Doctor Who Weekly and Star Wars Weekly . Aiming to get an older audience than 2000 AD , their main rival, they employed Moore to write for the regular strip Captain Britain , "halfway through a storyline that he's neither inaugurated nor completely understood." He replaced the former writer Dave Thorpe but maintained the original artist, Alan Davis, whom Moore described as "an artist whose love for
3402-422: A former surveyor for "including incredible amounts of detail in every tiny panel, so we could choreograph every little thing". Gibbons described the series as "a comic about comics". Gibbons felt that "Alan is more concerned with the social implications of [the presence of super-heroes] and I've gotten involved in the technical implications." The story's alternate world setting allowed Gibbons to change details of
3591-563: A further £10 a week from this, he decided to sign off of social security and to continue writing and drawing Maxwell the Magic Cat until 1986. Moore has stated that he would have been happy to continue Maxwell's adventures almost indefinitely but ended the strip after the newspaper ran a negative editorial on the place of homosexuals in the community. Meanwhile, Moore decided to focus more fully on writing comics rather than both writing and drawing them, stating that "After I'd been doing [it] for
3780-562: A future 1997 where a fascist government controlled Britain, opposed only by a lone anarchist dressed in a Guy Fawkes costume who turns to terrorism to topple the government. Illustrated by David Lloyd , Moore was influenced by his pessimistic feelings about the Thatcherite Conservative government, which he projected forward as a fascist state in which all ethnic and sexual minorities had been eliminated. It has been regarded as "among Moore's best work" and has maintained
3969-470: A gigantic squid -like creature , created by Veidt's laboratories, dead in the middle of the city. Manhattan notices his prescient abilities are limited by tachyons emanating from the Antarctic and the pair teleport there. They discover Veidt's involvement and confront him. Veidt shows everyone news broadcasts confirming that the emergence of a new threat has indeed prompted peaceful co-operation between
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#17327914493174158-490: A great deal of autonomy in developing the visual look of Watchmen and frequently inserted background details that Moore admitted he did not notice until later. Moore occasionally contacted fellow comics writer Neil Gaiman for answers to research questions and for quotes to include in issues. Despite his intentions, Moore admitted in November 1986 that there were likely to be delays, stating that he was, with issue five on
4347-515: A group known as the Northampton Arts Lab . The Arts Lab subsequently made significant contributions to the magazine. He began dealing the hallucinogenic LSD at school, being expelled for doing so in 1970 – he later described himself as "one of the world's most inept LSD dealers". The headmaster of the school subsequently "got in touch with various other academic establishments that I'd applied to and told them not to accept me because I
4536-455: A killing spree, and Batman's effort to stop him. Despite being a key work in helping to redefine Batman as a character, along with Frank Miller 's The Dark Knight Returns and Batman: Year One , Lance Parkin believed that "the theme isn't developed enough" and "it's a rare example of a Moore story where the art is better than the writing," something Moore himself acknowledges. Moore's relationship with DC Comics had gradually deteriorated over
4725-645: A local right-wing newspaper. When Rorschach and Dreiberg travel to Antarctica to confront Veidt at his private retreat, Veidt explains that he plans to save humanity from an impending nuclear war by staging a fake alien invasion and killing half the population of New York, forcing the United States and the Soviet Union to unite against a common enemy. He reveals that he murdered Blake after he discovered his plan, arranged for Doctor Manhattan's past associates to contract cancer to force him to leave Earth, staged
4914-429: A longer letters column to fill the space, but editor Len Wein felt this would be unfair to anyone who wrote in during the last four issues of the series. He decided to use the extra pages to fill in the series' backstory. Moore said, "By the time we got around to issue #3, #4, and so on, we thought that the book looked nice without a letters page. It looks less like a comic book, so we stuck with it." Watchmen features
5103-442: A lot of these things started to generate themselves as if by magic", in particular citing an occasion where they decided to name a lock company the " Gordian Knot Lock Company". The initial premise of the series was to examine what superheroes would be like "in a credible, real world". As the story became more complex, Moore said Watchmen became about "power and about the idea of the superman manifest within society." The title of
5292-416: A lot of what I saw were the problems with pornography in general. That it's mostly ugly, it's mostly boring, it's not inventive – it has no standards." Like From Hell , Lost Girls outlasted Taboo , and a few subsequent instalments were published erratically until the work was finished and a complete edition published in 2006. Meanwhile, Moore set about writing a prose novel, eventually producing Voice of
5481-436: A lot to recommend them". Gibbons said that while readers "were left with the idea that it was a grim and gritty kind of thing", he said in his view the series was "a wonderful celebration of superheroes as much as anything else". Watchmen was first mentioned publicly in the 1985 Amazing Heroes Preview . When Moore and Gibbons turned in the first issue of their series to DC, Gibbons recalled, "What really clinched it [...]
5670-507: A major contributor to the series. Moore chose Orlando because he felt that if pirate stories were popular in the Watchmen universe that DC editor Julius Schwartz might have tried to lure the artist over to the company to draw a pirate comic book. Orlando contributed a drawing designed as if it were a page from the fake title to the supplemental piece. In "Marooned", a young mariner (called "The Sea Captain") journeys to warn his hometown of
5859-571: A media celebrity, and the resulting attention led to him withdrawing from fandom and no longer attending comics conventions (at one UKCAC in London he is said to have been followed into the toilet by eager autograph hunters). He and Gibbons had earlier created the character Mogo as part of DC's Green Lantern Corps and a short story by Moore and artist Kevin O'Neill published in Green Lantern Corps Annual No. 2 (1986)
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6048-406: A new universe for the characters he had brought with him from Image. Moore's "solution was breathtaking and cocky – he created a long and distinguished history for these new characters, retro-fitting a fake silver and gold age for them." Moore began writing comics for many of these characters, such as Glory and Youngblood , as well as a three-part mini-series known as Judgment Day to provide
6237-490: A number of other publishers over the course of his career. Meanwhile, during this same period, he – using the pseudonym of Translucia Baboon – became involved in the music scene, founding his own band, The Sinister Ducks, with David J (of goth band Bauhaus ) and Alex Green, and in 1983 released a single, March of the Sinister Ducks , with sleeve art by illustrator Kevin O'Neill . In 1984, Moore and David J released
6426-655: A number of writers (including Moore) that challenged the Thatcher government's recently introduced Clause 28 , a law designed to prevent councils and schools "promoting homosexuality". Sales from the book went towards the Organisation of Lesbian and Gay Action, and Moore was "very pleased with" it, stating that "we hadn't prevented this bill from becoming law, but we had joined in the general uproar against it, which prevented it from ever becoming as viciously effective as its designers might have hoped." Moore followed this with
6615-618: A panellist on the BBC Radio 4 programme The Infinite Monkey Cage , which is hosted by physicist Brian Cox and comedian Robin Ince . Watchmen Watchmen is a comic book limited series by the British creative team of writer Alan Moore , artist Dave Gibbons and colorist John Higgins . It was published monthly by DC Comics in 1986 and 1987 before being collected in a single-volume edition in 1987. Watchmen originated from
6804-638: A personal cosmology". ABC Comics was also used to publish an anthology series, Tomorrow Stories , which featured a regular cast of characters such as Cobweb , First American, Greyshirt , Jack B. Quick , and Splash Brannigan. Tomorrow Stories was notable for being an anthology series, a medium that had largely died out in American comics at the time. Despite the assurances that DC Comics would not interfere with Moore and his work, they subsequently did so, angering him. Specifically, in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen No. 5, an authentic vintage advertisement for
6993-560: A pirate theme, and Moore agreed in part because he is "a big Bertolt Brecht fan": the Black Freighter alludes to the song " Seeräuberjenny " (" Pirate Jenny ") from Brecht's Threepenny Opera . Moore theorized that since superheroes existed, and existed as "objects of fear, loathing, and scorn, the main superheroes quickly fell out of popularity in comic books, as we suggest. Mainly, genres like horror, science fiction, and piracy, particularly piracy, became prominent—with EC riding
7182-530: A profound effect on me. While continuing to live in his parents' home for a few more years, he moved through various jobs, including cleaning toilets and working in a tannery . In late 1973, he met and began a relationship with Northampton-born Phyllis Dixon, with whom he moved into "a little one-room flat in the Barrack Road area in Northampton". Soon marrying, they moved into a new council estate in
7371-413: A proposed age-rating system similar to those used for films. After completing V for Vendetta , which DC had already begun publishing, thus enabling him to finish the final few episodes, in 1989, Moore stopped working for DC. Moore later claimed that fine print in the contracts regarding Watchmen and V for Vendetta , which stipulated that the ownership rights would revert to Moore and the artists after
7560-405: A regular strip. I didn't want to do short stories ... But that wasn't what was being offered. I was being offered short four or five-page stories where everything had to be done in those five pages. And, looking back, it was the best possible education that I could have had in how to construct a story." From 1980 through to 1986, Moore maintained his status as a freelance writer and was offered
7749-546: A second political work, Shadowplay: The Secret Team , a comic illustrated by Bill Sienkiewicz for Eclipse Comics and commissioned by the Christic Institute , which was included as a part of the anthology Brought to Light , a description of the CIA 's covert drug smuggling and arms dealing. In 1998 Brought to Light was adapted by Moore in collaboration with composer Gary Lloyd as a narrative and music work which
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7938-477: A spate of work by a variety of comic book companies in Britain, mainly Marvel UK , and the publishers of 2000 AD and Warrior . He later remarked that "I remember that what was generally happening was that everybody wanted to give me work, for fear that I would just be given other work by their rivals. So everybody was offering me things." It was an era when comic books were increasing in popularity in Britain, and according to Lance Parkin , "the British comics scene
8127-408: A story proposal Moore submitted to DC featuring superhero characters that the company had acquired from Charlton Comics . As Moore's proposed story would have left many of the characters unusable for future stories, managing editor Dick Giordano convinced Moore to create original characters instead. Moore used the story as a means of reflecting contemporary anxieties, deconstructing and satirizing
8316-455: A super-dog Radar, and a Kryptonite -like material known as Supremium, in doing so harking back to the original "mythic" figure of the American superhero. Under Moore, Supreme proved a critical and commercial success, announcing that he was back in the mainstream after several years of self-imposed exile. When Rob Liefeld, one of Image's co-founders, split from the publisher and formed his own company Awesome Entertainment, he hired Moore to create
8505-522: A template that was "moodier" and favored secondary colors. Moore stated that he had also "always loved John's coloring, but always associated him with being an airbrush colorist", which Moore was not fond of; Higgins subsequently decided to color Watchmen in European-style flat color. Moore noted that the artist paid particular attention to lighting and subtle color changes; in issue six, Higgins began with "warm and cheerful" colors and throughout
8694-579: A trade paperback by Eddie Campbell Comics. It was widely praised, with comics author Warren Ellis citing it as his "all-time favourite graphic novel". The other series that Moore began for Taboo was Lost Girls , which he described as a work of intelligent "pornography". Illustrated by Melinda Gebbie , with whom Moore subsequently entered into a relationship, it was set in 1913, where Alice from Alice in Wonderland , Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz and Wendy from Peter Pan – who are each of
8883-503: A two-part story for Vigilante which dealt with domestic abuse. He was eventually given the chance to write a story for one of DC's best-known superheroes, Superman , entitled " For the Man Who Has Everything ", which was illustrated by Dave Gibbons and published in 1985. In this story, Wonder Woman , Batman , and Robin visit Superman on his birthday, only to find that he has been overcome by an alien organism and
9072-458: A variety of literary and television figures including Neil Gaiman and Damon Lindelof . He has lived a significant portion of his life in Northampton, England, and he has said in various interviews that his stories draw heavily from his experiences living there. Moore was born on 18 November 1953, at St Edmund's Hospital in Northampton to a working-class family who he believed had lived in
9261-405: Is "quite possibly Moore's most underrated work". Soon after this, Mad Love itself was disbanded as Phyllis and Deborah ended their relationship with Moore, taking with them much of the money that he had earned from his work in the 1980s. Meanwhile, Moore began producing work for Taboo , a small independent comic anthology edited by his former collaborator Stephen R. Bissette . The first of these
9450-402: Is a recurring image in the story, appearing in many forms. In The System of Comics , Thierry Groensteen described the symbol as a recurring motif that produces "rhyme and remarkable configurations" by appearing in key segments of Watchmen , notably the first and last pages of the series—spattered with blood on the first, and sauce from a hamburger on the last. Groensteen cites it as one form of
9639-643: Is an occultist , ceremonial magician , and anarchist , and has featured such themes in works including Promethea , From Hell , and V for Vendetta , as well as performing avant-garde spoken word occult "workings" with The Moon and Serpent Grand Egyptian Theatre of Marvels , some of which have been released on CD. Despite his objections, Moore's works have provided the basis for several Hollywood films, including From Hell (2001), The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003), V for Vendetta (2005), and Watchmen (2009). Moore has also been referenced in popular culture and has been recognised as an influence on
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#17327914493179828-477: Is hallucinating about his heart's desire. He followed this with another Superman story, " Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? ", which was published in 1986. Illustrated by Curt Swan , it was designed as the last Superman story in the pre- Crisis on Infinite Earths DC Universe . The limited series Watchmen , begun in 1986 and collected as a trade paperback in 1987, cemented Moore's reputation. Imagining what
10017-656: Is possessed by an ancient pagan goddess, the titular Promethea, explored many occult themes, particularly the Qabalah and the concept of magic , with Moore stating that "I wanted to be able to do an occult comic that didn't portray the occult as a dark, scary place, because that's not my experience of it ... [ Promethea was] more psychedelic ... more sophisticated, more experimental, more ecstatic and exuberant." Drawn by J. H. Williams III , it has been described as "a personal statement" from Moore, being one of his most personal works, and that it encompasses "a belief system,
10206-558: Is still president as of October 1985 upon the repeal of term limits and the Watergate scandal not coming to pass. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan occurs approximately six years later than in real life. When the story begins, the existence of Doctor Manhattan has given the U.S. a strategic advantage over the Soviet Union , which has dramatically increased Cold War tensions. Eventually, by 1977, superheroes grow unpopular among
10395-488: Is that DC owns it for the time they're publishing it, and then it reverts to Dave and me, so we can make all the money from the Slurpee cups." For Watchmen , Moore and Gibbons received eight percent of the series' earnings. Moore explained in 1986 that his understanding was that when "DC have not used the characters for a year, they're ours." Both Moore and Gibbons said DC paid them "a substantial amount of money" to retain
10584-513: The 1963 stuff I'd become aware of how much the comic audience had changed while I'd been away [since 1988]. That all of a sudden it seemed that the bulk of the audience really wanted things that had almost no story, just lots of big, full-page pin-up sort of pieces of artwork. And I was genuinely interested to see if I could write a decent story for that market." He subsequently set about writing what he saw as "better than average stories for 13- to 15-year olds", including three mini-series based upon
10773-471: The Doomsday Clock ticking up to midnight. Moore drew inspiration from psychological tests of behaviorism , explaining that the tests had presented the face as "a symbol of complete innocence". With the addition of a blood splash over the eye, the face's meaning was altered to become simultaneously radical and simple enough for the first issue's cover to avoid human detail. Although most evocations of
10962-478: The Spawn series: Violator , Violator/ Badrock , and Spawn: Blood Feud . In 1995, he was also given control of a regular monthly comic, Jim Lee 's WildC.A.T.S. , starting with issue No. 21, which he continued to write for fourteen issues. The series followed two groups of superheroes, one of which is on a spaceship headed back to its home planet, and one of which remains on Earth. Moore's biographer Lance Parkin
11151-632: The Spectre , the Demon , the Phantom Stranger , Deadman , and others, and introduced John Constantine , an English working-class magician based visually on the British musician Sting ; Constantine later became the protagonist of the series Hellblazer , which became Vertigo's longest-running series at 300 issues. Moore wrote Swamp Thing for almost four years, from issue No. 20 (January 1984) through to issue No. 64 (September 1987) with
11340-546: The Topper with another of D. C. Thomson's long-running comics, The Beezer and the two comics combined as Beezer and Topper . This continued in publication until 1993; it subsequently closed, with a small amount of content from the combined comic subsequently relocating into other D. C. Thomson publications The Beano and The Dandy . Despite the closure of the Topper as a standalone title, The Topper Book continued as an annual, separate from The Beezer Book , until
11529-665: The Twilight proposal before starting work on their series, but that any similarities are both minor and unintended. DC Comics confirmed that the full text of the story would be released in December 2020. Moore wrote the lead story in Batman Annual No. 11 (1987) drawn by George Freeman . The following year saw the publication of The Killing Joke , written by Moore and illustrated by Brian Bolland . It revolved around The Joker , who had escaped Arkham Asylum and gone on
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#173279144931711718-487: The "worrying" times he lived in, he stated the reason that the story was set in an alternate reality was because he was worried that readers would "switch off" if he attacked a leader they admired. Moore stated in 1986 that he "was consciously trying to do something that would make people feel uneasy." Citing Watchmen as the point where the comic book medium "came of age", Iain Thomson wrote in his essay "Deconstructing
11907-648: The 1994 annual (published 1993, the year new issues of Beezer and Topper ceased). Vintage stories from the Topper appeared alongside stories from other D. C. Thomson publications in Classics from the Comics , a compilation magazine series which ran from 1996 to 2010. In March 2012, the Royal Mail launched a special stamp collection to celebrate Britain's rich comic book history. The collection featured The Beano , The Dandy , Eagle , The Topper , Roy of
12096-407: The 2017 four-part DC miniseries The Button serving as a direct sequel to both DC Universe Rebirth and the 2011 storyline " Flashpoint ". Manhattan reappears in the 2017–19 twelve-part sequel series Doomsday Clock . "I suppose I was just thinking, 'That'd be a good way to start a comic book: have a famous super-hero found dead.' As the mystery unraveled, we would be led deeper and deeper into
12285-405: The American landscape, such as adding electric cars , slightly different buildings, and spark hydrants instead of fire hydrants , which Moore said, "perhaps gives the American readership a chance in some ways to see their own culture as an outsider would". Gibbons noted that the setting was liberating for him because he did not have to rely primarily on reference books. Colorist John Higgins used
12474-589: The Charlton heroes. Moore had initially believed that original characters would not provide emotional resonance for readers but later changed his mind. He said, "Eventually, I realized that if I wrote the substitute characters well enough, so that they seemed familiar in certain ways, certain aspects of them brought back a kind of generic super-hero resonance or familiarity to the reader, then it might work." Artist Dave Gibbons , who had collaborated with Moore on previous projects, recalled that he "must have heard on
12663-518: The Curt Vile name) in the weekly music magazine Sounds , earning £35 a week. Alongside this, he and Phyllis, with their newborn daughter Leah , began claiming unemployment benefit to supplement this income. After the conclusion of Roscoe Moscow , Moore started a new strip for Sounds – the serialized comic "The Stars My Degradation" (a reference to Alfred Bester 's The Stars My Destination ), featuring Axel Pressbutton. Alan Moore wrote most of
12852-593: The Fire , which was published in 1996. Unconventional in tone, the novel was a set of short stories about linked events in his hometown of Northampton through the centuries, from the Bronze Age to the present day, which combined to tell a larger story. In 1993 Moore declared himself to be a ceremonial magician . The same year marked a move by Moore back to the mainstream comics industry and back to writing superhero comics. He did so through Image Comics , widely known at
13041-483: The Hero" that the story accomplished this by "developing its heroes precisely in order to deconstruct the very idea of the hero and so encouraging us to reflect upon its significance from the many different angles of the shards left lying on the ground". Thomson stated that the heroes in Watchmen almost all share a nihilistic outlook, and that Moore presents this outlook "as the simple, unvarnished truth" to "deconstruct
13230-656: The House of Thunder (led by the Captain Marvel family). These two houses are about to unite through a dynastic marriage, their combined power potentially threatening freedom, and several characters, including John Constantine, attempt to stop it and free humanity from the power of superheroes. The series would also have restored the DC Universe's multiple earths, which had been eliminated in the continuity-revising 1985 limited series Crisis on Infinite Earths . The series
13419-561: The Swamp Thing , then a formulaic and poor-selling monster comic. Moore, with artists Stephen R. Bissette , Rick Veitch , and John Totleben , deconstructed and reimagined the character, writing a series of formally experimental stories that addressed environmental and social issues alongside the horror and fantasy, bolstered by research into the culture of Louisiana , where the series was set. For Swamp Thing he revived many of DC's neglected magical and supernatural characters, including
13608-468: The United States depends on Manhattan as a strategic military asset, his departure throws humanity into political turmoil, with the Soviets invading Afghanistan to capitalize on the United States' perceived weakness. Rorschach's concerns appear validated when Veidt narrowly survives an assassination attempt. Rorschach himself is framed for murdering a former supervillain named Moloch. While attempting to flee
13797-546: The age of five, getting books out of the local library, and subsequently attended Spring Lane Primary School. At the same time, he began reading comic strips, initially in British comics, such as Topper and The Beezer , but eventually also American imports such as The Flash , Detective Comics , Fantastic Four , and Blackhawk . He later passed his 11-plus exam and was, therefore, eligible to go to Northampton Grammar School , where he first came into contact with people who were middle class and better educated, and he
13986-470: The attempt on his own life to place himself above suspicion, and framed Rorschach for Moloch's murder to prevent him from discovering the truth. Horrified by Veidt's callous logic, Dreiberg and Rorschach vow to stop him, but Veidt reveals that he already enacted his plan before they arrived. When Manhattan and Juspeczyk arrive back on Earth, they are confronted by mass destruction and death in New York, with
14175-405: The base and finds Veidt, who asks him if he did the right thing in the end. Manhattan cryptically responds that "nothing ever ends" before leaving Earth. Dreiberg and Juspeczyk go into hiding under new identities and continue their romance. Back in New York, the editor at New Frontiersman asks his assistant to find some filler material from the "crank file", a collection of rejected submissions to
14364-472: The basis of reprinting them in a collected form for these markets. Watchmen received critical praise, both inside and outside of the comics industry. Time magazine, which noted that the series was "by common assent the best of breed" of the new wave of comics published at the time, praised Watchmen as "a superlative feat of imagination, combining sci-fi, political satire, knowing evocations of comics past and bold reworkings of current graphic formats into
14553-483: The blood-splattered smiley face, and the dialogue between Doctor Manhattan and Ozymandias in the last issue of Watchmen , are shown. Further Watchmen imagery was added in the DC Universe: Rebirth Special #1 second printing, which featured an update to Gary Frank's cover, better revealing the outstretched hand of Doctor Manhattan in the top right corner. Doctor Manhattan later appeared in
14742-450: The central image were created on purpose, others were coincidental. Moore mentioned in particular that on "the little plugs on the spark hydrants if you turn them upside down, you discover a little smiley face". Other symbols, images, and allusions that appeared throughout the series often emerged unexpectedly. Moore mentioned that "[t]he whole thing with Watchmen has just been loads of these little bits of synchronicity popping up all over
14931-465: The change to the A4 format. The Topper also produced an annual collection, The Topper Book . In the late 1980s and 1990s, with the expansion of children's television and video games taking a greater share of children's time, sales of comics began to fall. So D. C. Thomson decided to modernise the Topper , relaunching it as Topper '89 from February 1989. In September 1990, it was decided to merge
15120-400: The character Swamp Thing , and penned original titles such as Watchmen . During that decade, Moore helped to bring about greater social respectability for comics in the United States and United Kingdom. He prefers the term "comic" to " graphic novel ". In the late 1980s and early 1990s he left the comic industry mainstream and went independent for a while, working on experimental work such as
15309-561: The characters of Watchmen were Moore's "admonition to those who trusted in 'heroes' and leaders to guard the world's fate". He added that to place faith in such icons was to give up personal responsibility to "the Reagans , Thatchers , and other 'Watchmen' of the world who supposed to 'rescue' us and perhaps lay waste to the planet in the process". Moore specifically stated in 1986 that he was writing Watchmen to be "not anti-Americanism, [but] anti- Reaganism ", specifically believing that "at
15498-440: The circle shape that appears throughout the story, as a "recurrent geometric motif" and due to its symbolic connotations. Gibbons created a smiley face badge as an element of The Comedian's costume in order to "lighten" the overall design, later adding a splash of blood to the badge to imply his murder. Gibbons said the creators came to regard the blood-stained smiley face as "a symbol for the whole series", noting its resemblance to
15687-535: The comics and mainstream press. Watchmen was recognized in Time ' s List of the 100 Best Novels as one of the best English language novels published since 1923. In a retrospective review, the BBC 's Nicholas Barber described it as "the moment comic books grew up". Moore opposed this idea, stating, "I tend to think that, no, comics hadn't grown up. There were a few titles that were more adult than people were used to. But
15876-461: The comics mainstream. In 2005, he remarked that "I love the comics medium. I pretty much detest the comics industry. Give it another 15 months, I'll probably be pulling out of mainstream, commercial comics." The only ABC title continued by Moore was The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen ; after cutting ties with DC he launched the new League saga, Volume III: Century , in a co-publishing partnership of Top Shelf Productions and Knockabout Comics ,
16065-415: The coming of The Black Freighter , after he survives the destruction of his own ship. He uses the bodies of his dead shipmates as a makeshift raft and sails home, gradually descending into insanity. When he finally returns to his hometown, believing it to be already under the occupation of The Black Freighter ' s crew, he makes his way to his house and slays everyone he finds there, only to discover that
16254-558: The conception of Watchmen . He admired Burroughs' use of "repeated symbols that would become laden with meaning" in Burroughs' only comic strip, " The Unspeakable Mr. Hart ", which appeared in the British underground magazine Cyclops . Not every intertextual link in the series was planned by Moore, who remarked that "there's stuff in there Dave had put in that even I only noticed on the sixth or seventh read", while other "things [...] turned up in there by accident." A stained smiley face
16443-726: The contemporary world of the 1980s. The primary difference is the presence of superheroes. The point of divergence occurs in the year 1938. Their existence in this version of the United States is shown to have dramatically affected and altered the outcomes of real-world events such as the Vietnam War and the presidency of Richard Nixon . In keeping with the realism of the series, although the costumed crimefighters of Watchmen are commonly called "superheroes", only one, named Doctor Manhattan, possesses any superhuman abilities. The war in Vietnam ends with an American victory in 1971 and Nixon
16632-442: The creators began to hit deadlines, Moore would hire a taxi driver to drive 50 miles and deliver scripts to Gibbons. On later issues the artist even had his wife and son draw panel grids on pages to help save time. Near the end of the project, Moore realized that the story bore some similarity to " The Architects of Fear ", an episode of The Outer Limits television series. The writer and Wein (an editor) argued over changing
16821-440: The crest of the wave." Moore felt "the imagery of the whole pirate genre is so rich and dark that it provided a perfect counterpoint to the contemporary world of Watchmen ". The writer expanded upon the premise so that its presence in the story would add subtext and allegory. The supplemental article detailing the fictional history of Tales of the Black Freighter at the end of issue five credits real-life artist Joe Orlando as
17010-405: The dead bodies of his former comrades as a means of reaching his goal". Moore stated that the story of The Black Freighter ends up specifically describing "the story of Adrian Veidt" and that it can also be used as a counterpoint to other parts of the story, such as Rorschach's capture and Dr. Manhattan's self-exile on Mars. Moore named William S. Burroughs as one of his main influences during
17199-440: The deconstructions of the hero in the existentialism movement. Richard Reynolds states that without any supervillains in the story, the superheroes of Watchmen are forced to confront "more intangible social and moral concerns", adding that this removes the superhero concept from the normal narrative expectations of the genre. Reynolds concludes that the series' ironic self-awareness of the genre "all mark out Watchmen either as
17388-452: The early 1980s. Moore reasoned that MLJ Comics ' Mighty Crusaders might be available for such a project, so he devised a murder mystery plot which would begin with the discovery of the body of the Shield in a harbor. The writer felt it did not matter which set of characters he ultimately used, as long as readers recognized them "so it would have the shock and surprise value when you saw what
17577-502: The echoing of the EC-style layouts "was a very deliberate thing", although his inspiration was rather Harvey Kurtzman , but it was altered enough to give the series a unique look. The artist also cited Steve Ditko's work on early issues of The Amazing Spider-Man as an influence, as well as Doctor Strange , where "even at his most psychedelic [he] would still keep a pretty straight page layout". The cover of each issue serves as
17766-484: The ending and when Moore refused to give in, Wein quit the book. Wein explained, "I kept telling him, 'Be more original, Alan, you've got the capability, do something different, not something that's already been done!' And he didn't seem to care enough to do that." Moore acknowledged the Outer Limits episode by referencing it in the series' last issue. Watchmen is set in an alternate reality that closely mirrors
17955-444: The epic From Hell and the prose novel Voice of the Fire . He subsequently returned to the mainstream later in the 1990s, working for Image Comics , before developing America's Best Comics , an imprint through which he published works such as The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and the occult-based Promethea . In 2016, he published Jerusalem : a 1,266-page experimental novel set in his hometown of Northampton, UK. Moore
18144-640: The episodes of "The Stars My Degradation" and drew all of them, which appeared in Sounds from 12 July 1980, to 19 March 1983. Beginning in 1979 Moore created a new comic strip known as Maxwell the Magic Cat in the Northants Post (based in Moore's hometown), under the pseudonym of Jill de Ray (a pun on the Medieval child murderer Gilles de Rais , something he found to be a "sardonic joke"). Earning
18333-521: The exception of issues No. 59 and 62. Moore's run on Swamp Thing was successful both critically and commercially, and it inspired DC to recruit British writers such as Grant Morrison , Jamie Delano , Peter Milligan , and Neil Gaiman to write comics in a similar vein, often involving radical revamps of obscure characters. These titles laid the foundation of what became the Vertigo line. Moore began producing further stories for DC Comics, including
18522-479: The fans wanted rather than being innovative. Next he took over Rob Liefeld 's Supreme , about a character with many similarities with DC Comics' Superman . Instead of emphasising increased realism as he had done with earlier superhero comics he had taken over, Moore did the opposite and began basing the series on the Silver Age Superman comics of the 1960s, introducing a female superhero Suprema,
18711-585: The film's release. DC Comics published Before Watchmen , a series of nine prequel miniseries, in 2012, and Doomsday Clock , a 12-issue limited series and sequel to the original Watchmen series, from 2017 to 2019 – both without Moore's or Gibbons' involvement. The second series integrated the Watchmen characters within the DC Universe . A standalone sequel, Rorschach by Tom King , began publication in October 2020. A television continuation to
18900-550: The first page mirrors the last (in terms of frame disposition), with the following pages mirroring each other before the center-spread is (broadly) symmetrical in layout. The end of each issue, with the exception of issue twelve, contains supplemental prose pieces written by Moore. Among the contents are fictional book chapters, letters, reports, and articles written by various Watchmen characters. DC had trouble selling ad space in issues of Watchmen , which left an extra eight to nine pages per issue. DC planned to insert house ads and
19089-428: The first panel to the story. Gibbons said, "The cover of the Watchmen is in the real world and looks quite real, but it's starting to turn into a comic book, a portal to another dimension." The covers were designed as close-ups that focused on a single detail with no human elements present. The creators on occasion experimented with the layout of the issue contents. Gibbons drew issue five, titled "Fearful Symmetry", so
19278-397: The first part, titled "1910" released in 2009, the second, titled "1969", released in 2011, and the third, titled "2009", released in 2012. He continues to work with Kevin O'Neill on their League of Extraordinary Gentlemen spin-off, Nemo , with three graphic novels published, "Heart of Ice", "The Roses of Berlin", and "River of Ghosts". In 2006, the complete edition of Lost Girls
19467-778: The first volume of the series pitted the League against Professor Moriarty from the Sherlock Holmes books; the second, against the Martians from The War of the Worlds . A third volume entitled The Black Dossier was set in the 1950s. The series was well received, and Moore was pleased that an American audience was enjoying something he considered "perversely English", and that it was inspiring some readers to get interested in Victorian literature. Another of Moore's ABC works
19656-403: The government. The story focuses on the protagonists' personal development and moral struggles as an investigation into the murder of a government-sponsored superhero pulls them out of retirement. Gibbons uses a nine-panel grid layout throughout the series and adds recurring symbols such as a blood-stained smiley face . All but the last issue feature supplemental fictional documents that add to
19845-403: The grapevine that he was doing a treatment for a new miniseries. I rang Alan up, saying I'd like to be involved with what he was doing", and Moore sent him the story outline. Gibbons told Giordano he wanted to draw the series Moore proposed and Moore approved. Gibbons brought colorist John Higgins onto the project because he liked his "unusual" style; Higgins lived near the artist, which allowed
20034-426: The greatest comic book ever written. Alongside roughly contemporary works such as Frank Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight Returns , Art Spiegelman 's Maus , and Jaime and Gilbert Hernandez 's Love and Rockets , Watchmen was part of a late 1980s trend in American comics towards more adult sensibilities. Comics historian Les Daniels noted that Watchmen "called into question the basic assumptions on which
20223-413: The hero fights a fascist dictatorship based in London, in the other an Aryan superman imposes one." Although Moore's work numbered amongst the most popular strips to appear in 2000 AD , Moore himself became increasingly concerned at the lack of creator's rights in British comics. In 1985, he talked to fanzine Arkensword , noting that he had stopped working for all British publishers bar IPC, "purely for
20412-467: The introduction to the Graffiti hardcover of Watchmen that while writing the series he was able to purge himself of his nostalgia for superheroes, and instead he found an interest in real human beings. Bradford Wright described Watchmen as "Moore's obituary for the concept of heroes in general and superheroes in particular." Putting the story in a contemporary sociological context, Wright wrote that
20601-399: The issue gradually made it darker to give the story a dark and bleak feeling. Structurally, certain aspects of Watchmen deviated from the norm in comic books at the time, particularly the panel layout and the coloring. Instead of panels of various sizes, the creators divided each page into a nine-panel grid. Gibbons favored the nine-panel grid system due to its "authority". Moore accepted
20790-406: The issues of creator's rights and merchandising. Moore and Gibbons were not paid any royalties for a Watchmen spin-off badge set, as DC defined them as a "promotional item", and according to certain reports, he and Gibbons gained only 2% of the profits earned by DC for Watchmen . Meanwhile, a group of creators including Moore, Frank Miller, Marv Wolfman , and Howard Chaykin , fell out with DC over
20979-506: The last key superhero text, or the first in a new maturity of the genre". Geoff Klock eschewed the term "deconstruction" in favor of describing Watchmen as a "revisionary superhero narrative". He considers Watchmen and Frank Miller 's Batman: The Dark Knight Returns to be "the first instances [...] of [a] new kind of comic book [...] a first phase of development, the transition of the superhero from fantasy to literature." He elaborates by noting that "Alan Moore's realism [...] performs
21168-468: The late 1970s before achieving success publishing comic strips in such magazines as 2000 AD and Warrior . He was subsequently picked up by DC Comics as "the first comics writer living in Britain to do prominent work in America", where he worked on major characters such as Batman ( Batman: The Killing Joke ) and Superman (" Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? "), substantially developed
21357-593: The local paper Anon , and St. Pancras Panda , a parody of Paddington Bear , for the Oxford-based Back Street Bugle . His first paid work was for a few drawings that were printed in NME . In late 1979/early 1980, he and his friend, comic-book writer Steve Moore (whom he had known since he was fourteen) co-created the violent cyborg character Axel Pressbutton for some comics in Dark Star ,
21546-565: The magazine were impressed by Moore's work and decided to offer him a more permanent strip, starting with a story that they wanted to be vaguely based upon the hit film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial . The result, Skizz , which was illustrated by Jim Baikie , told the story of the titular alien who crashes to Earth and is cared for by a teenager named Roxy, and Moore later noted that in his opinion, this work "owes far too much to Alan Bleasdale ." Another series he produced for 2000 AD
21735-474: The mainstream, Moore, with his wife Phyllis and their mutual lover Deborah Delano, set up their own comics publishing company, which they named Mad Love. The works they published in Mad Love turned away from the science fiction and superhero genres that Moore was used to writing, instead focusing on realism, ordinary people, and political causes. Mad Love's first publication, AARGH , was an anthology of work by
21924-409: The majority of comics titles were pretty much the same as they'd ever been. It wasn't comics growing up. I think it was more comics meeting the emotional age of the audience coming the other way." After several attempts to adapt the series into a feature film, director Zack Snyder 's Watchmen was released in 2009. An episodic video game, Watchmen: The End Is Nigh , was released to coincide with
22113-428: The medium and whose sheer exultation upon finding himself gainfully employed within it shine from every line, every new costume design, each nuance of expression." The third comic company that Moore worked for in this period was Quality Communications , publishers of a new monthly magazine called Warrior . The magazine was founded by Dez Skinn , a former editor of both IPC (publishers of 2000 AD ) and Marvel UK, and
22302-472: The merger with The Beezer . Unlike most other comics at the time, which were half tabloid size, the Topper was for many years full tabloid. It changed to A4 in 1980, one year before The Beezer . Two comics were merged into The Topper during its run: these were Buzz in 1975 and Sparky in issue 1276 (16 July 1977). In issue 1260 on 26 March 1977, "Big News" was announced on the front cover redirecting
22491-403: The moment a certain part of Reagan's America isn't scared. They think they're invulnerable." Before the series premiered, Gibbons stated: "There's no overt political message at all. It's a fantasy extrapolation of what might happen and if people can see things in it that apply to the real America, then they're reading it into the comic [...]." While Moore wanted to write about "power politics" and
22680-452: The mythology into bloodstained cogs and ratchets, concluding with the famous quotation Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? " Disagreements about the ownership of the story ultimately led Moore to sever ties with DC Comics. Not wanting to work under a work for hire arrangement, Moore and Gibbons had a reversion clause in their contract for Watchmen . Speaking at the 1985 San Diego Comic-Con , Moore said: "The way it works, if I understand it,
22869-403: The note "If that doesn't work for you, do what works best"; Gibbons nevertheless worked to Moore's instructions. In fact, Gibbons only suggested one single change to the script - a compression of Ozymandias' narration while he was preventing a sneak attack by Rorschach - as he felt that the dialogue was too long to fit with the length of the action; Moore agreed and re-wrote the scene. Gibbons had
23058-457: The notion of "[cramming] regurgitated morals" down the readers' throats and instead sought to show heroes in an ambivalent light. Moore said, "What we wanted to do was show all of these people, warts and all. Show that even the worst of them had something going for them, and even the best of them had their flaws." Moore and Gibbons designed Watchmen to showcase the unique qualities of the comics medium and to highlight its particular strengths. In
23247-400: The original 1986 cover price of $ 1.50 as part of its "Millennium Edition" line. In 2012, DC published Before Watchmen , a series of nine prequel miniseries, with various creative teams producing the characters' early adventures set before the events of the original series. In the 2016 one-shot DC Universe: Rebirth Special , numerous symbols and visual references to Watchmen , such as
23436-418: The original comic, set 34 years after the comic's timeline, was broadcast on HBO from October to December 2019 with Gibbons' involvement. Moore has expressed his displeasure with adaptations and sequels of Watchmen and asked it not be used for future works. Watchmen , created by writer Alan Moore and artist Dave Gibbons , first appeared in the 1985 issue of DC Spotlight, the 50th anniversary special. It
23625-504: The original proposal and concept art. In 2005, DC released Absolute Watchmen , an oversized slipcased hardcover edition of the series in DC's Absolute Edition format. Assembled under the supervision of Dave Gibbons, Absolute Watchmen included the Graphitti materials, as well as restored and recolored art by John Higgins. That December DC published a new printing of Watchmen issue #1 at
23814-584: The page also as, "[l]ike Alan Moore's kenosis , [Veidt] must destroy, then reconstruct, in order to build 'a unity which would survive him. ' " Moore has expressed dismay that "[t]he gritty, deconstructivist postmodern superhero comic, as exemplified by Watchmen [...] became a genre". He said in 2003 that "to some degree there has been, in the 15 years since Watchmen , an awful lot of the comics field devoted to these grim, pessimistic, nasty, violent stories which kind of use Watchmen to validate what are, in effect, often just some very nasty stories that don't have
24003-484: The pair take it upon themselves to break him out of prison. After looking back on his own personal history, Manhattan places the fate of his involvement with human affairs in Juspeczyk's hands. He teleports her to Mars to make the case for emotional investment. During the course of the argument, Juspeczyk is forced to come to terms with the fact that Blake, who once attempted to rape her mother (the original Silk Spectre),
24192-431: The paper, many of which have not yet been reviewed. The series ends with the young man reaching toward the pile of discarded submissions, near the top of which is Rorschach's journal. With Watchmen , Alan Moore's intention was to create four or five "radically opposing ways" to perceive the world and to give readers of the story the privilege of determining which one was most morally comprehensible. Moore did not believe in
24381-554: The people I wanted to deal with." Image partner Jim Lee offered to provide Moore with his own imprint, which would be under Lee's company WildStorm Productions . Moore named this imprint America's Best Comics , lining up a series of artists and writers to assist him in this venture. Lee soon sold WildStorm – including America's Best Comics – to DC Comics, and "Moore found himself back with a company he'd vowed to never work with again". Lee and editor Scott Dunbier flew to England personally to reassure Moore that he would not be affected by
24570-452: The period is connected with the events in some way, including "Elephant Man" Joseph Merrick , Oscar Wilde , Native American writer Black Elk , William Morris , artist Walter Sickert , and Aleister Crowley , who makes a brief appearance as a young boy. Illustrated in a sooty pen-and-ink style by Eddie Campbell , From Hell took nearly ten years to complete, outlasting Taboo and going through two more publishers before being collected as
24759-422: The person he mistook for a pirate was in fact his wife. He returns to the seashore, where he realizes that The Black Freighter has not come to claim the town, but rather to claim him; he swims out to sea and climbs aboard the ship. According to Richard Reynolds, the mariner is "forced by the urgency of his mission to shed one inhibition after another." Just like Adrian Veidt, he "hopes to stave off disaster by using
24948-460: The place". Gibbons noted an unintended theme was contrasting the mundane and the romantic, citing the separate sex scenes between Nite Owl and Silk Spectre on his couch and then high in the sky on Nite Owl's airship. In a book of the craters and boulders of Mars, Gibbons discovered a photograph of the Galle crater , which resembles a happy face, which they worked into an issue. Moore said, "We found
25137-556: The police and the public, leading them to be outlawed with the passage of the Keene Act. While many of the heroes retired, Doctor Manhattan and another superhero, known as The Comedian, operate as government-sanctioned agents. Another named Rorschach continues to operate outside the law. In October 1985, New York City detectives investigate the murder of Edward Blake. With the police having no leads, costumed vigilante Rorschach decides to probe further. Rorschach deduces Blake to have been
25326-452: The reader to page 7 of the comic. The announcement was that starting from issue number 1261 the comic would include a "Special Pull-out section" that brought back classic Topper Characters such as Splodge and Big Uggy . These lasted until issue 1276, when the pull out section was used for the Sparky comic, creating the "Special Sparky Pull-Out". The Sparky Pull out section was continued until
25515-438: The real heart of this super-hero's world, and show a reality that was very different to the general public image of the super-hero." —Alan Moore on the basis for Watchmen In 1983, DC Comics acquired a line of characters from Charlton Comics . During that period, writer Alan Moore contemplated writing a story that featured an unused line of superheroes that he could revamp, as he had done in his Miracleman series in
25704-781: The reality of these characters was". Moore used this premise and crafted a proposal featuring the Charlton characters titled Who Killed the Peacemaker , and submitted the unsolicited proposal to DC managing editor Dick Giordano . Giordano was receptive to the proposal, but opposed the idea of using the Charlton characters for the story. After the acquisition of Charlton's Action Hero line, DC intended to use their upcoming Crisis on Infinite Earths event to fold them into their mainstream superhero universe. Moore said, "DC realized their expensive characters would end up either dead or dysfunctional." Instead, Giordano persuaded Moore to continue his project but with new characters that simply resembled
25893-489: The reason that IPC so far have avoided lying to me, cheating me or generally treating me like shit." He did join other creators in decrying the wholesale relinquishing of all rights, and in 1986 stopped writing for 2000 AD , leaving mooted future volumes of the Halo Jones story unstarted. Moore's outspoken opinions and principles, particularly on the subject of creator's rights and ownership, would see him burn bridges with
26082-412: The rights. Moore added, "So basically they're not ours, but if DC is working with the characters in our interests then they might as well be. On the other hand, if the characters have outlived their natural life span and DC doesn't want to do anything with them, then after a year we've got them and we can do what we want with them, which I'm perfectly happy with." The Topper (comics) The Topper
26271-641: The sale, and would not have to deal with DC directly. Moore decided that there were too many people involved to back out from the project, and so ABC was launched in early 1999. The first series published by ABC was The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen , which featured a variety of characters from Victorian adventure novels, such as H. Rider Haggard 's Allan Quatermain , H. G. Wells ' Invisible Man , Jules Verne 's Captain Nemo , Robert Louis Stevenson 's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde , and Wilhelmina Murray from Bram Stoker 's Dracula . Illustrated by Kevin O'Neill ,
26460-495: The scene of Moloch's murder, Rorschach is captured by police and unmasked as Walter Kovacs. Neglected in her relationship with the once-human Manhattan, whose godlike powers have left him emotionally detached from ordinary people, and no longer kept on retainer by the government, Juspeczyk stays with Dreiberg. They begin a romance, don their costumes, and resume vigilante work as they grow closer together. With Dreiberg starting to believe some aspects of Rorschach's conspiracy theory ,
26649-399: The scripts, the artist had to number each page "in case I drop them on the floor, because it would take me two days to put them back in the right order", and used a highlighter pen to single out lettering and shot descriptions; he remarked, "It takes quite a bit of organizing before you can actually put pen to paper." Despite Moore's detailed scripts, his panel descriptions would often end with
26838-441: The second Silk Spectre; and Adrian Veidt, once the hero " Ozymandias ", and now a successful businessman. Dreiberg, Veidt, and Manhattan attend Blake's funeral, where Dreiberg tosses Blake's pin badge in his coffin before he is buried. Manhattan is later accused on national television of being the cause of cancer in friends and former colleagues. When the government takes the accusations seriously, Manhattan exiles himself to Mars. As
27027-436: The series after only two issues in 1990, and despite plans that his assistant, Al Columbia , would replace him, it never occurred and the series remained unfinished . Following this, in 1991 the company Victor Gollancz Ltd published Moore's A Small Killing , a full-length story illustrated by Oscar Zárate , about a once idealistic advertising executive haunted by his boyhood self. According to Lance Parkin, A Small Killing
27216-472: The series refers to the question "Who will watch the watchmen themselves?", famously posed by the Roman satirist Juvenal (as " Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? "), although Moore was not aware of the phrase's classical origins until Harlan Ellison informed him. Moore commented in 1987, "In the context of Watchmen , that fits. 'They're watching out for us, who's watching out for them? ' " The writer stated in
27405-485: The series' backstory and the narrative is intertwined with that of another story, an in-story pirate comic titled Tales of the Black Freighter , which one of the characters reads. Structured at times as a nonlinear narrative , the story skips through space, time and plot. In the same manner, entire scenes and dialogues have parallels with others through synchronicity , coincidence , and repeated imagery. A commercial success, Watchmen has received critical acclaim both in
27594-420: The series' backstory by portraying events that occurred in 1966. Watchmen was published in single-issue form over the course of 1986 and 1987. The limited series was a commercial success, and its sales helped DC Comics briefly overtake its competitor Marvel Comics in the comic book direct market. The series' publishing schedule ran into delays because it was scheduled with three issues completed instead of
27783-464: The series. Ten thousand sets of the four badges, including a replica of the blood-stained smiley face badge worn by the Comedian in the story, were released and sold. Mayfair Games introduced a Watchmen module for its DC Heroes Role-playing Game series that was released before the series concluded. The module, which was endorsed by Moore (who also provided story assistance), adds details to
27972-546: The six editor Len Wein believed were necessary. Further delays were caused when later issues each took more than a month to complete. One contemporaneous report noted that although DC solicited issue #12 for publication in April 1987, it became apparent "it [wouldn't] debut until July or August". After the series concluded, the individual issues were collected and sold in trade paperback form. Along with Frank Miller 's 1986 Batman: The Dark Knight Returns miniseries, Watchmen
28161-495: The stands, still writing issue nine. Gibbons mentioned that a major factor in the delays was the "piecemeal way" in which he received Moore's scripts. Gibbons said the team's pace slowed around the fourth issue; from that point onward the two undertook their work "just several pages at a time. I'll get three pages of script from Alan and draw it and then toward the end, call him up and say, 'Feed me!' And he'll send another two or three pages or maybe one page or sometimes six pages." As
28350-470: The stories had gone out of publication, had tricked him into believing he would eventually retain ownership, only to discover that DC had no intention of ceasing publication of the stories, effectively preventing the ownership from ever returning to Moore. In a 2006 interview with The New York Times , Moore recalled telling DC, "I said, 'Fair enough. You have managed to successfully swindle me, and so I will never work for you again'". Abandoning DC Comics and
28539-491: The subject matter. DC had already published a version of the same event in their Paradox Press volume The Big Book of Conspiracies . In 2003, a documentary about him was made by Shadowsnake Films, titled The Mindscape of Alan Moore , which was later released on DVD. With many of the stories he had planned for America's Best Comics brought to an end, and with his increasing dissatisfaction with how DC Comics were interfering with his work, he decided to once more pull out of
28728-467: The superhero concept and making political commentary. Watchmen depicts an alternate history in which superheroes emerged in the 1940s and 1960s and their presence changed history so that the United States won the Vietnam War and the Watergate scandal was never exposed. In 1985, the country is edging toward World War III with the Soviet Union , freelance costumed vigilantes have been outlawed and most former superheroes are in retirement or working for
28917-443: The superhero genre is formulated". DC Comics writer and executive Paul Levitz observed in 2010 that "As with The Dark Knight Returns , Watchmen set off a chain reaction of rethinking the nature of superheroes and heroism itself, and pushed the genre darker for more than a decade. The series won acclaim ... and would continue to be regarded as one of the most important literary works the field ever produced." Moore briefly became
29106-460: The superpowers; this leads almost all present to agree that concealing the truth is in the best interests of world peace. Rorschach refuses to compromise and leaves, intent on revealing the truth. As he is making his way back, he is confronted by Manhattan who argues that at this point, the truth can only hurt. Rorschach declares that Manhattan will have to kill him to stop him from exposing Veidt, which Manhattan duly does. Manhattan then wanders through
29295-504: The symmetrical design of issue 5, "Fearful Symmetry", where the last page is a near mirror-image of the first, the second-last of the second, and so on, and in this manner is an early example of Moore's interest in the human perception of time and its implications for free will. It is the only comic to win the Hugo Award , in a one-time category ("Best Other Form"). It is widely seen as Moore's best work, and has been regularly described as
29484-524: The telling than the tale itself. The main thrust of the story essentially hinges on what is called a macguffin , a gimmick ... So really the plot itself is of no great consequence ... it just really isn't the most interesting thing about Watchmen . As we actually came to tell the tale, that's where the real creativity came in." Gibbons said he deliberately constructed the visual look of Watchmen so that each page would be identifiable as part of that particular series and "not some other comic book". He made
29673-469: The time for its flashy artistic style, graphic violence, and scantily clad large-breasted women, something that horrified many of his fans. His first work published by Image, an issue of the series Spawn , was soon followed by the creation of his own mini-series, 1963 , which was "a pastiche of Jack Kirby stories drawn for Marvel in the sixties, with their rather overblown style, colourful characters and cosmic style". According to Moore, "after I'd done
29862-490: The town for several generations. He grew up in a part of Northampton known as The Boroughs, a poverty-stricken area with a lack of facilities and high levels of illiteracy, but he nonetheless "loved it. I loved the people. I loved the community and ... I didn't know that there was anything else." He lived in a house with his parents, brewery worker Ernest Moore and printer Sylvia Doreen, with his younger brother Mike, and with his maternal grandmother. He "read omnivorously" from
30051-451: The town's eastern district while he worked in an office for a sub-contractor of the local gas board. Moore felt that he was not being fulfilled by this job, and so decided to try to earn a living doing something more artistic. Abandoning his office job, he decided to instead take up both writing and illustrating his own comics. He had already produced a couple of strips for several alternative fanzines and magazines, such as Anon E. Mouse for
30240-488: The true identity of "The Comedian", a costumed hero employed by the U.S. government, after finding his costume and signature smiley-face pin badge. Believing that Blake's murder could be part of a larger plot against costumed adventurers, Rorschach seeks out and warns four of his retired comrades: shy inventor Daniel Dreiberg, formerly the second Nite Owl; the superpowered and emotionally detached Jon Osterman, codenamed "Doctor Manhattan"; Doctor Manhattan's lover Laurie Juspeczyk,
30429-413: The two to "discuss [the art] and have some kind of human contact rather than just sending it across the ocean". Len Wein joined the project as its editor, while Giordano stayed on to oversee it. Both Wein and Giordano stood back and "got out of their way", as Giordano remarked later. "Who copy-edits Alan Moore, for God's sake?" After receiving the go-ahead to work on the project, Moore and Gibbons spent
30618-495: The use of the nine-panel grid format, which "gave him a level of control over the storytelling he hadn't had previously", according to Gibbons. "There was this element of the pacing and visual impact that he could now predict and use to dramatic effect." Bhob Stewart of The Comics Journal mentioned to Gibbons in 1987, that the page layouts recalled those of EC Comics , in addition to the art itself, which Stewart felt particularly echoed that of John Severin . Gibbons agreed that
30807-576: The world would be like if costumed heroes had really existed since the 1940s, Moore and artist Dave Gibbons created a Cold War mystery in which the shadow of nuclear war threatens the world. The heroes who are caught up in this escalating crisis either work for the US government or are outlawed, and are motivated to heroism by their various psychological hang-ups. Watchmen is non-linear and told from multiple points of view, and includes highly sophisticated self-references, ironies, and formal experiments such as
30996-426: The would-be hero's ultimate motivation, namely, to provide a secular salvation and so attain a mortal immortality". He wrote that the story "develops its heroes precisely in order to ask us if we would not in fact be better off without heroes". Thomson added that the story's deconstruction of the hero concept "suggests that perhaps the time for heroes has passed", which he feels distinguishes "this postmodern work" from
31185-510: Was D.R. and Quinch , which was illustrated by Alan Davis . The story, which Moore described as "continuing the tradition of Dennis the Menace , but giving him a thermonuclear capacity", revolved around two delinquent aliens, and was a science-fiction take on National Lampoon ' s characters O.C. and Stiggs . The work widely considered to be the highlight of his 2000 AD career, and that which he described as "the one that worked best for me",
31374-503: Was From Hell , a fictionalised account of the Jack the Ripper murders of the 1880s. Inspired by Douglas Adams ' novel Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency , Moore reasoned that to solve a crime holistically , one would need to solve the entire society it occurred in, and depicts the murders as a consequence of the politics and economics of the time. Just about every notable figure of
31563-415: Was The Ballad of Halo Jones . Co-created with artist Ian Gibson , the series was about a young woman in the 50th century. The series was discontinued after three books due to a dispute between Moore and Fleetway, the magazine's publishers, over the intellectual property rights of the characters Moore and Gibson had co-created. Another comic company to employ Moore was Marvel UK, who had formerly purchased
31752-433: Was The Bojeffries Saga , a comedy about a working-class English family of vampires and werewolves , drawn by Steve Parkhouse . Warrior closed before these stories were completed, but under new publishers both Miracleman and V for Vendetta were resumed by Moore, who finished both stories by 1989. Moore's biographer Lance Parkin remarked that "reading them through together throws up some interesting contrasts – in one
31941-512: Was Tom Strong , a post-modern superhero series, featured a hero inspired by characters pre-dating Superman, such as Doc Savage and Tarzan . The character's drug-induced longevity allowed Moore to include flashbacks to Strong's adventures throughout the 20th century, written and drawn in period styles, as a comment on the history of comics and pulp fiction . The primary artist was Chris Sprouse . Tom Strong bore many similarities to Moore's earlier work on Supreme , but according to Lance Parkin,
32130-401: Was "more subtle", and was "ABC's most accessible comic". Moore's Top 10 , a deadpan police procedural drama set in a city called Neopolis where everyone, including the police, criminals, and civilians has super-powers, costumes, and secret identities, was drawn by Gene Ha and Zander Cannon . The series ended after twelve issues but has spawned four spin-offs: a miniseries Smax , which
32319-417: Was [writer/artist] Howard Chaykin , who doesn't give praise lightly, and who came up and said, 'Dave what you've done on Watchmen is freaking A.'" Speaking in 1986, Moore said, "DC backed us all the way [...] and have been really supportive about even the most graphic excesses". To promote the series, DC Comics released a limited-edition badge ("button") display card set, featuring characters and images from
32508-562: Was a UK comic published by D. C. Thomson & Co. Ltd that ran from 7 February 1953 to 15 September 1990, when it merged with The Beezer . A strip named " Mickey the Monkey " originally appeared on the front cover. In 1973, it was replaced by " Send for Kelly ", by " Danny's Tranny " in 1975, briefly by "The Whizzers from Oz" in 1979, and again in 1979 by " Tricky Dicky ". " Beryl the Peril " took over on 24 May 1986, and remained there until
32697-467: Was a danger to the moral well-being of the rest of the students there, which was possibly true." LSD was an incredible experience. Not that I'm recommending it for anybody else; but for me it kind of – it hammered home to me that reality was not a fixed thing. That the reality that we saw about us every day was one reality, and a valid one – but that there were others, different perspectives where different things have meaning that were just as valid. That had
32886-456: Was actually her biological father, having fathered her in a second, consensual relationship. This discovery, reflecting the complexity of human emotions and relationships, reignites Manhattan's interest in humanity. On Earth, Dreiberg and Rorschach find evidence that Veidt may be behind the conspiracy. Rorschach writes his suspicions about Veidt in his journal, which includes the full details of his investigation, and mails it to New Frontiersman ,
33075-508: Was already being written by John Wagner , fellow writer Alan Grant saw promise in Moore's work – later remarking that "this guy's a really fucking good writer" – and instead asked him to write some short stories for the publication's Future Shocks series. While the first few were rejected, Grant advised Moore on improvements, and eventually accepted the first of many. Meanwhile, Moore had also begun writing minor stories for Doctor Who Weekly and later commented that "I really, really wanted
33264-412: Was cohering as never before, and it was clear that the audience was sticking with the title as they grew up. Comics were no longer just for very small boys: teenagers – even A-level and university students – were reading them now." During this period, 2000 AD accepted and published over fifty of Moore's one-off stories for their Future Shocks and Time Twisters science fiction series. The editors at
33453-410: Was critical of the run, feeling that it was one of Moore's worst, and that "you feel Moore should be better than this. It's not special." Moore himself, who remarked that he took on the series – his only regular monthly comic series since Swamp Thing – largely because he liked Jim Lee, admitted that he was not entirely happy with the work, believing that he had catered too much to his conceptions of what
33642-512: Was designed to offer writers a greater degree of freedom over their artistic creations than was allowed by pre-existing companies. It was at Warrior that Moore "would start to reach his potential". Moore was given two ongoing strips in Warrior : Marvelman and V for Vendetta , both of which debuted in Warrior ' s first issue in March 1982. V for Vendetta was a dystopian thriller set in
33831-492: Was eventually published as a 12-issue maxiseries from DC Comics , cover-dated September 1986 to October 1987. It was subsequently collected in 1987 as a DC Comics trade paperback that has had at least 24 printings as of March 2017; another trade paperback was published by Warner Books , a DC sister company, in 1987. In February 1988, DC published a limited-edition, slipcased hardcover volume, produced by Graphitti Design, that contained 48 pages of bonus material, including
34020-502: Was his favorite to draw because "you just have to draw a hat. If you can draw a hat, then you've drawn Rorschach, you just draw kind of a shape for his face and put some black blobs on it and you're done." Moore began writing the series very early on, hoping to avoid publication delays such as those faced by the DC limited series Camelot 3000 . When writing the script for the first issue Moore said he realized "I only had enough plot for six issues. We were contracted for 12!" His solution
34209-405: Was marketed as a " graphic novel ", a term that allowed DC and other publishers to sell similar comic book collections in a way that associated them with novels and dissociated them from comics. As a result of the publicity given to the books like the Watchmen trade in 1987, bookstores and public libraries began to devote special shelves to them. Subsequently, new comics series were commissioned on
34398-505: Was never commissioned, but copies of Moore's detailed notes have appeared on the Internet and in print despite the efforts of DC, who consider the proposal their property. Similar elements, such as the concept of hypertime , have since appeared in DC comics. The 1996 miniseries Kingdom Come by Mark Waid and Alex Ross , was also set amid a superheroic conflict in the future of the DC Universe. Waid and Ross have stated that they had read
34587-566: Was one of the inspirations for the " Blackest Night " storyline in 2009–2010. In 1987, Moore submitted a proposal for a miniseries called Twilight of the Superheroes , the title a twist on Richard Wagner 's opera Götterdämmerung (meaning "Twilight of the Gods"). The series was set in the future of the DC Universe, where the world is ruled by superheroic dynasties, including the House of Steel (presided over by Superman and Wonder Woman) and
34776-465: Was published, as a slipcased set of three hardcover volumes. The same year Moore published an eight-page article tracing out the history of pornography in which he argued that a society's vibrancy and success are related to its permissiveness in sexual matters. Decrying that the consumption of contemporary ubiquitous pornography was still widely considered shameful, he called for a new and more artistic pornography that could be openly discussed and would have
34965-436: Was released on CD. After prompting by cartoonist and self-publishing advocate Dave Sim , Moore then used Mad Love to publish his next project, Big Numbers , a proposed 12-issue series set in "a hardly-disguised version of Moore's native Northampton" known as Hampton, and deals with the effects of big business on ordinary people and with ideas of chaos theory . Illustration of the comic was begun by Bill Sienkiewicz, who left
35154-539: Was set in a fantasy realm and drawn by Cannon; Top 10: The Forty-Niners , a prequel to the main Top Ten series drawn by Ha; and two sequel miniseries, Top 10: Beyond the Farthest Precinct , which was written by Paul Di Filippo and drawn by Jerry Ordway , and Top 10: Season Two , written by Cannon and drawn by Ha. Moore's series Promethea , which told the story of a teenage girl, Sophie Bangs, who
35343-540: Was shocked at how he went from being one of the top pupils at his primary school to one of the lowest in the class at secondary. Subsequently, disliking school and having "no interest in academic study", he believed that there was a "covert curriculum" being taught that was designed to indoctrinate children with "punctuality, obedience and the acceptance of monotony". In the late 1960s, Moore began publishing his poetry and essays in fanzines , eventually setting up his fanzine, Embryo . Through Embryo , Moore became involved in
35532-399: Was to alternate issues that dealt with the overall plot of the series with origin issues for the characters. Moore wrote very detailed scripts for Gibbons to work from. Gibbons recalled that "[t]he script for the first issue of Watchmen was, I think, 101 pages of typescript—single-spaced—with no gaps between the individual panel descriptions or, indeed, even between the pages." Upon receiving
35721-447: Was to create "a superhero Moby Dick ; something that had that sort of weight, that sort of density". Moore came up with the character names and descriptions but left the specifics of how they looked to Gibbons. Gibbons did not sit down and design the characters deliberately, but rather "did it at odd times [...] spend[ing] maybe two or three weeks just doing sketches." Gibbons designed his characters to make them easy to draw; Rorschach
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