It's official: Before Watchmen comics this summer
By
Agonus,
Posted on: 2012-02-01 04:42 in Comic and Hero-Villain Culture
I'm willing to admit that the following opinion may somehow be naive, because I can't see why I'm the first to share it.
Watchmen was a self-contained story arc, yes. A masterful one at that. I can see how this much is true. But that there shouldn't be any more stories featuring any of those characters, I can't see how that's true. It just looks like an arbitrary sacrifice to me, made on the altar of Alan Moore's colossal ego, carried on ever since by geek culture. Some people have repeated Moore's sentiment without ever reading a comic book. Any comic book. Ever. I'm referring to people I know. People like to say this at parties.
Comic book characters are serial fiction. An arc may have a beginning, middle, and end. But by their nature, comic book characters transcend those boundaries. An end arrives. You see the heroes ride into the sunset, toward some new adventure. Next month, you see where they went. That's life, when you're a comic book character. And there's nothing intellectually banal about this. For those like myself who also read novels, it's almost a kind of wish fulfillment, never having to wave goodbye to favored characters.
This is why I'm excited to hear about these comics. I don't care at all whether they're able eclipse the original title. In fact, for those who will inevitably compare and contrast these titles with the original, I think they will be misguided to do so. I'll gladly flip through my new rag, while the geek culture eloquently formulates a few cheap shots, as if they were deconstructing Steinbeck or Hemingway. 
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I suspect it will be awful. I certainly won't buy them.
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So the deal was they'd get the characters back once it went out of print and never did?|
Originally Posted by TrueGentleman
Eric Stephenson, publisher of Image Comics, takes this argument on (at length):
The more the news of this project sinks in, the more scandalous it feels. |
If DC keeps publishing the work because it's making money that's one thing. If they keep publishing it just to spite Moore that's another.
I don't think any of the books will be very good and I can't see that anything interesting can be done with the characters that hasn't already been done.
I could be wrong, though.
And since Moore has made a career out of deconstructing other people's creations, I have a real problem seeing him as the poster boy for creator's rights.
(Note I have read and enjoyed a lot of what he's written but that doesn't change the fact he has done things that I think the people whose toys he's playing with would not have approved of.)
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This news confirms two things for me.
1) The current management team at DC is living in the past, and pining for the "better days" (??) of the late 70s - early 80s, hence the return of titles like "Resurrection Man", "Firestorm", "I Vampire", "Justice League International", "Captain Atom", "Hawk and Dove", "All-Star Western", "Swamp Thing", "Animal Man", "Blackhawks", and "(Army) Men (at) of War"
2) The current management team at DC is only in it for the money, damn be everything else...
I'm not saying Marvel is better, but at least they flaunt it less...
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Yes, but the deal was further complicated by the absence of the graphic novel genre and the reprint market. Even the term "graphic novel" was fairly new and applied to only a few works.|
Originally Posted by BlueBattler
So the deal was they'd get the characters back once it went out of print and never did?
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Watchmen was intended to be a 12-issue mini-series (a new-ish innovation at the time, too), not to be published as a single volume. Moore and Gibbons expected that DC would publish the series, reprinting some of the individual issues to fulfill backorders, and then revert the rights afterward. Reversion of publishing rights (and subsidiary rights, if any) to out-of-print books is a common practice in regular publishing and a standard part of boilerplate contracts. The copyright, however, remains the author's. In the comics industry, at the time, there was virtually no precedent for a self-contained mini-series being published as a single collection and then selling for decades.
Without realizing how Watchmen would change comics publishing, Moore and Gibbons negotiated a compromise deal with DC, giving the copyright to the corporation on what they though was a limited basis. In a work-for-hire industry, this was initially regarded as a victory for creator's rights. Instead, it turned into another sucker punch. Moore, stubborn S.O.B. that he is, refused to suck it up and broke off ties with DC as he had with Marvel, taking his work elsewhere and going independent. For a time, it looked as though the big two comics publishers had learned their lesson from this burned bridge and were much more receptive to new talents' copyrights. Neil Gaiman, Grant Morrison, Brian Michael Bendis, etc., etc., have all benefited from Moore's principled obduracy.
DC is with its legal rights, barely, to publish this series, but ethically, they've always been on shaky ground.
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The difference, to me, is that Marvel seems to be having fun in their quest for money.|
Originally Posted by Archiviste
2) The current management team at DC is only in it for the money, damn be everything else...
I'm not saying Marvel is better, but at least they flaunt it less... |
"Let's turn everyone into spiders! Hell yeah! Give a bunch of heroes giant friggin' hammers! Push out even more films! Make Spider-man, I dunno, hispanic! Have the X-men fight the Avengers! Bring some more tequila in here, let's see what other freaky crap we can think up!"
In contrast, DC just seems to be cynical and joyless right now. I hope they break out of their funk.
...
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Now see. They thought they'd make a comic get the rights back after a year, and then what?
Yup, that's right, they would of printed new Watchmen stories. DC is doing what Alan Moore would of done if he got the rights back like he expected.
So Alan Moore and die hard fans of Watchmen, who say "Perfectly self-contained story that doesn't need more" are being silly. More stories would of been created. This was Alan Moore trying to get one for creator rights, likely get DC comics to get their creation out there, so they could then use that fanbase to keep making money on new Watchmen comics.
DC kept printing it, thusly keeping the rights to the Watchmen. Alan Moore urshed in a new day for artists. DC comics urshered in a new day for comics with graphic novels.
DC is now doing what they likely wanted to do from the start but worried about some sort of fan backlash.
Funny thing is, someone has to be buying those graphic novels to make it worthwhile to keep printing it.
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Now that is the way to write comics.|
Originally Posted by RemusShepherd
The difference, to me, is that Marvel seems to be having fun in their quest for money.
"Let's turn everyone into spiders! Hell yeah! Give a bunch of heroes giant friggin' hammers! Push out even more films! Make Spider-man, I dunno, hispanic! Have the X-men fight the Avengers! Bring some more tequila in here, let's see what other freaky crap we can think up!" In contrast, DC just seems to be cynical and joyless right now. I hope they break out of their funk. |
Comics today have lost that sense of fun and LOL. It's all brooding, ultra-massive-gonna-change-everything!-but-not-really, total crossover to sell underperforming books even if the story doesn't actually call for it, cancel and relaunch 3 months later, and "superstar" writer/artist fanwanks.
Comics are supposed to be an escape from the **** we call reality. If I want a story "ripped from the headlines", I'll watch any of the interminable cop dramas on tv.
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Yes and no. Leaving aside the obvious point that the original creators should be the first candidates to tell any such stories, there was disagreement from the start about when Moore and DC discussed even the possibility of more. DC wanted more of the same, featuring the main characters from the series, such as "Rorschach's Journal" and "The Comedian's Vietnam War Diary". Although those subplots figured prominently in Watchmen's main narrative, DC obviously felt that if the readers loved it once they'll like it again. Moore and Gibbons rejected them, especially under other writers and artists. The only derivative projects they considered as potentially interesting were a "Tales of the Black Freighter" series and a Golden Age-style Minutemen project. Whether or not they would be - and Gibbons says that on reflection, neither of them would have been good ideas - is apparently now going to be tested without Moore's consent, in addition to other plot ideas he rejected at the time.| So Alan Moore and die hard fans of Watchmen, who say "Perfectly self-contained story that doesn't need more" are being silly. More stories would of been created. |
For a long time, Moore's refusal was acceptable to DC, at least under ex-publisher Paul Levitz, who personally blocked Watchmen spinoffs because he didn't want to dilute the original or incur the backlash from the creative community. His replacement, Dan DiDio, has no such scruples, however, and DC tried to leverage their control over the copyright to convince Moore to acquiesce. Moore relates, "They offered me the rights to Watchmen back, if I would agree to some dopey prequels and sequels. So I just told them that if they said that 10 years ago, when I asked them for that, then yeah it might have worked, but these days I dont want Watchmen back. Certainly, I dont want it back under those kinds of terms.
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DC kept printing it, thusly keeping the rights to the Watchmen. Alan Moore urshed in a new day for artists. DC comics urshered in a new day for comics with graphic novels. DC is now doing what they likely wanted to do from the start but worried about some sort of fan backlash. |
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Marvel is struggling currently to sell anything that is not an event. And even those event books are limping along. Their resources seem directed more towards film than towards print. Exception to me is Hickman's work - which reminds me of the creativity of Stan Lee in the 60s and John Byrne in the 80s.|
Originally Posted by Dark One
Now that is the way to write comics.
Comics today have lost that sense of fun and LOL. It's all brooding, ultra-massive-gonna-change-everything!-but-not-really, total crossover to sell underperforming books even if the story doesn't actually call for it, cancel and relaunch 3 months later, and "superstar" writer/artist fanwanks. Comics are supposed to be an escape from the **** we call reality. If I want a story "ripped from the headlines", I'll watch any of the interminable cop dramas on tv. |
DC is again bringing lots of attention to the comic medium with this move, which hopefully will infuse the business with long-term readers and attract new creative talent (writers) to the business.
Go Team Venture!
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For me I think these companies have lost their way since the late 80s, with so many re-boots (even movies re-boots now), retcons and stuff like the Ultimate universe etc. it makes me wonder if they understand their fan-base at all or whether any large fanbase could realistically keep up with or accept all the changes. These days popular characters appear in almost every title...sometimes more is less. Most titles are now delivering what amounts to the same old slugfest over and over again, whatever happened to original storytelling and real character devolopment?
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Originally Posted by BlackSun17
Marvel is struggling currently to sell anything that is not an event. And even those event books are limping along. Their resources seem directed more towards film than towards print. Exception to me is Hickman's work - which reminds me of the creativity of Stan Lee in the 60s and John Byrne in the 80s.
DC is again bringing lots of attention to the comic medium with this move, which hopefully will infuse the business with long-term readers and attract new creative talent (writers) to the business. |
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I'd say the problem is their fanbase grew up and started saying "Yeah, I used to read comics. When I was a kid."
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Originally Posted by Night_Hornet
For me I think these companies have lost their way since the late 80s, with so many re-boots (even movies re-boots now), retcons and stuff like the Ultimate universe etc. it makes me wonder if they understand their fan-base at all or whether any large fanbase could realistically keep up with or accept all the changes. These days popular characters appear in almost every title...sometimes more is less. Most titles are now delivering what amounts to the same old slugfest over and over again, whatever happened to original storytelling and real character devolopment?
|
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Or more like, "I need to buy how many comics to read one story?". At $3+ a pop, needing to buy 15 different comics to read one arc gets old...fast.
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Originally Posted by BrandX
I'd say the problem is their fanbase grew up and started saying "Yeah, I used to read comics. When I was a kid."
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Originally Posted by RemusShepherd
The difference, to me, is that Marvel seems to be having fun in their quest for money.
"Let's turn everyone into spiders! Hell yeah! Give a bunch of heroes giant friggin' hammers! Push out even more films! Make Spider-man, I dunno, hispanic! Have the X-men fight the Avengers! Bring some more tequila in here, let's see what other freaky crap we can think up!" In contrast, DC just seems to be cynical and joyless right now. I hope they break out of their funk. |
I'm looking forward to Ultron vs Kang fighting across all of time. That's going to be epic.
"And for us this is the end of all stories, and we can mostly say they lived happily ever after. But for them it was the beginning of the real story. All there life in this world and all there adventures in Narnia had only be the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of The Great Story which no one on earth has ever read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before" - C.S Lewis, The Last Battle.
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No story is a bad story until it premiers and sucks.|
Originally Posted by Night_Hornet
For me I think these companies have lost their way since the late 80s, with so many re-boots (even movies re-boots now), retcons and stuff like the Ultimate universe etc. it makes me wonder if they understand their fan-base at all or whether any large fanbase could realistically keep up with or accept all the changes. These days popular characters appear in almost every title...sometimes more is less. Most titles are now delivering what amounts to the same old slugfest over and over again, whatever happened to original storytelling and real character devolopment?
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Ultimate u was good. At least Spidy done by Bendis.
I think there is a lot of good and interesting stories that can exist with these characters. Whether they use those stories is yet to be seen.
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Introductions, Obey,
And if this prequel series is financially successful, the DC editors will start thinking about which other Watchmen characters they can prequelize...
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LOL - I like that!|
Originally Posted by TrueGentleman
And if this prequel series is financially successful, the DC editors will start thinking about which other Watchmen characters they can prequelize...
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From what I can tell, pressure to produce the Before Watchmen books is coming from waaaay above the DC editors. WB execs are looking to maximize revenue from their existing stable of properties, and the removal of Levitz as DC President & Publisher was partially based on his reluctance to visit the Watchmen universe again.
Say what you want as a fan, but the WB execs are doing their job pushing for these books. One casualty of being owned by a public corporation (DC and Marvel) is losing the ability to ultimately pick and choose what you want to publish.
Regarding the books, I am coming around to wanting to see what they are like. Probably sampling some of the books and waiting on word-of-mouth for others. Comic store owners seem to fall into the camp that their order numbers will be based mostly on what type of discount / returnability DC offers. They are not sure how to order the book as it is a prequel to a 25+ year old comic and 2+ year old movie. The discount / returnability program that DC is using for the new 52 lanuch (relaunch / reboot / etc.) has been very successful for everyone, and I would be shocked if DC did not employ a similar plan for retailers to use in ordering these books.
And I am sure that the long-term thinkers at WB are thrilled to have a new stable of DC books (HC and TPB) for sale in the future.
Go Team Venture!
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The editorial job of DC's execs is to find, nurture, and retain creative talent. Recycling old material after burning bridges with its creators is the opposite of that.|
Originally Posted by BlackSun17
Say what you want as a fan, but the WB execs are doing their job pushing for these books.
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After The Dark Knight Strikes Again, The Kingdom, DC's new The Spirit, the Star Wars prequel trilogy, Star Trek: Enterprise, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, The Godfather Part III, etc., etc., etc., any corporate decision to push prequels or sequels ought to be greeted with intense scepticism.
Even if Alan Moore had taken DC's earlier offer to write more Watchmen-related stories in exchange for getting his creator's rights back, the odds are that the results would be inferior to the original. Lightning rarely strikes twice in the same place, and when it does, it's even harder to bottle the second time around.
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I hear what you are saying, but DC editorial reports to the DC publisher, who reports to WB. And despite skeptisism, prequels / sequels make TONS of cash for studios, as do 'event' comics.|
Originally Posted by TrueGentleman
The editorial job of DC's execs is to find, nurture, and retain creative talent. Recycling old material after burning bridges with its creators is the opposite of that.
After The Dark Knight Strikes Again, The Kingdom, DC's new The Spirit, the Star Wars prequel trilogy, Star Trek: Enterprise, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, The Godfather Part III, etc., etc., etc., any corporate decision to push prequels or sequels ought to be greeted with intense scepticism. Even if Alan Moore had taken DC's earlier offer to write more Watchmen-related stories in exchange for getting his creator's rights back, the odds are that the results would be inferior to the original. Lightning rarely strikes twice in the same place, and when it does, it's even harder to bottle the second time around. |
So in the case of Before Watchmen you have a 'perfect storm' of a prequel event.
Go Team Venture!
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Fixed.
| The editorial job of DC's execs is to increase the corporation's stock value. |
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Historically, the comics community has been on the side of the creator in most creator vs. corporation battles. Much has been written and said about Jack Kirby's battles with Marvel Comics, for instance, and most of us tend to agree that Kirby was not treated as he should have been, when the big picture is considered.
But something else most of us can agree on when discussing Kirby vs. Marvel, is that Jack knew he was creating characters that would be owned by Marvel Comics. Did he want more credit and compensation for his part in those characters' creation than he ultimately received? Yes. Did he deserve it? A thousand times, yes: characters Fantastic Four, Thor, the Hulk, Iron Man, the X-Men, S.H.I.E.L.D., the Silver Surfer, Captain America, and the Avengers would not exist without Jack Kirby. But did he know he was creating characters that Marvel would ultimately own? Again, the answer is yes.
Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, meanwhile, created Watchmen under the impression that the rights would be returned them eventually. Within a year after it was concluded, in fact. That's not my opinion. That's a fact. It's public knowledge. Due to the nature of the deal that had been agreed upon by Moore, Gibbons and DC Comics, it was widely discussed. It was a genuine victory for creators' rights. {emphasis added}
But then the book was kept in print forever, and the rights to Watchmen never reverted back to Moore and Gibbons.
And people wonder why Alan Moore felt betrayed.
It was a dirty deal, and the fact that there are people who want to rationalize it by saying, "Well, Alan Moore wrote League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Lost Girls, and those books used other writers's characters, so how is this any different?" just shows that truth is a sadly devalued currency. It's different because Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons negotiated, in good faith, a deal that would have allowed them to retain the rights to Watchmen. {emphasis added}
And yes, the characters in Watchmen were inspired by characters like Peacemaker, Thunderbolt and The Question. We know that, because Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons told us as much. Had they kept that inspiration quiet would anyone anywhere have mistaken Watchmen for something published by Charlton Comics? Dr. Manhattan is no more the same character as Captain Atom as Captain Marvel is Superman or Blue Beetle is Spider-Man.
All in all, it's a strange double standard, arbitrarily applied to an amazing writer who has done more than almost anyone else to draw serious attention to this medium. And it's one that anyone who supports creator's rights should find fairly troubling, if not outright maddening.