What we might expect from DC's upcoming 'Before Watchmen' series
Will new stories about Nite Owl, Dr. Manhattan and Rorschach live up to the legacy?
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DC Comics' upcoming 'Before Watchmen' series
With this week's news that DC is going ahead with a series of long-rumored prequels to Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' seminal 1986 comic miniseries "Watchmen," we offer a peek at the covers of the books and try to predict what kind of stories they'll focus on. The original series was incredibly dense and covered (or at least hinted at) a number of story strands and character arcs, but there's always room for DC to get some more mileage out of the characters, although, even with some A-list talent involved, many fans would say they should just leave "Watchmen" alone. Vote for which issues you are most looking forward to.
Photo Credit: DC Comics
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Login or create a HitFix account Login SignupDave I
February 1, 2012 at 4:44PM EST Reply to CommentWhy not just use the characters Watchmen were based on? What made Watchmen special was that DC let Moore create original characters based on B-list characters since the Watchmen would end up being pretty much unusable. Moore made a complete story, beginning, middle, and end. This is almost like saying, "Hey, let's write a Tom Joad prequel to Grapes of Wrath!" There is so much wrong with this story.
There is a reason DC did not want Moore to use pre-established characters. The Watchmen was all-encompassing. An origins or prequel story would be unnecessary. Plus, I think the rights should be Moore's & Gibbons' alone and should have reverted to them as the creators long ago. This puts a very sour taste in my mouth and I can not stomach the idea of putting one red cent toward this absolute money grab on the part of DC Comics.
-Cheers
Shitegeist I agree with you in principle, but I love these characters so much that I'm definitely going to be buying the books.
February 1, 2012 at 5:37PM ESTDave I I will agree most of my gripes are based on either:
February 1, 2012 at 6:26PM EST1) Principles or;
2) My Hate of Prequels/Sequels.
I can get around #2, as there are exceptions to the rule there, although I hate how Hollywood & comics just squeeze every last bleeding drop out of anything even remotely successful. Still, when done right I guess my gripes sort of evaporate. The first is more problematic because I feel bad supporting them in their handling of the comic creators. Not only am I morally against the way they dealt with the contract, I also disagree with them being able to override the will of the people who created the story. I understand legally DC is within their rights. However, for the same reason I would detest Calvin & Hobbes by anybody other than Bill Watterson or Sandman by anybody other than Neil Gaiman or a Great Gabsby prequel, I cannot really see myself ever buying these books.
Note, I don't hold it against anybody else that buys it, and hope these end up being good books. For some reason though I'm just really anal about this stuff and it bothers me quite a bit.
-Cheers
Prettok Do you read 'League of Extraordinary Gentlemen'? Do you object to Alan Moore playing with characters created by Jules Verne, HG Welles, Bram Stoker, etc?
February 1, 2012 at 7:44PM ESTEventually everything is fair game.
Dave I Those characters are all public domain. If Jules Verne, H.G. Welles, and Bram Stoker were alive, actively disagreed with LoEG's portrayal of their characters, and said authors were kept from the rights of characters THEY invented due to what one might view as the abuse of the intent of the contract said authors had to use to create said characters in the first place? Yeah, I would object.
February 1, 2012 at 9:56PM ESTWould you object if the publishers used a contract clause to let somebody other than J.K. Rowling publish a new Harry Potter novel or write a new Harry Potter movie against her expressed wishes? Maybe down the road it will happen (much like I suspect will be the case with Star Wars for that matter). However, it still does not sit well with me at all.
-Cheers
Dustin
February 1, 2012 at 4:52PM EST Reply to CommentA "borderline psychopath"?