DC Comics General

Eh. He HAS been treated unfairly but saying superhero stuff is bad WHEN HE HASN'T EVEN SEEN IT and has avoided keeping track of the comics for 30 years is just asinine. He's rendering judgement when he himself admits he doesn't pay much attention. As much as I disagree with Jonathan Rosenbaum and Anthony Lane when they slag Star Wars at least they WATCHED the movies. Moore doesn't even do that and yet he passes judgement?

The issue with lost girls is that at the time a children's hospital DID own the copyright and they made it VERY clear that they didn't want the book published because they didn't approve. Moore basically said "fuck you I don't care." His publishers had more sense and waited until the copyright lapsed. Again, Moore himself was willing to ignore their wishes but his publishers had cooler heads. That just seemed hypocritical to me especially since he also talks about creator sanctity. Maybe the hospital owning it was silly but they WERE the owners so Moore should have been willing to just shut the hell up and respect their wishes

So no. I don't particularly feel a lot of sympathy for the guy. He squandered a lot of it by being a hypocritical jackass. Maybe he should have the rights but his assholish demeanor isn't helping matters and it also feels like people are using the bad treatment he endured to excuse his jackassery

Edited by LordYAM on Nov 18th 2019 at 9:56:50 AM

AMA with Goodreads

Edited by alliterator on Nov 18th 2019 at 10:13:55 AM

Because he's admitted that he hasn't seen superhero movies (he infamously once said he never watched Iron Man but heard and predicted that it was a pro-US military industrial complex film and thus was terrible, at the same time as talking about how "friendly fire" should be named "American Fire") and that he doesn't follow Marvel or DC. Even your own quote shows that he only kept up with a handful of indie writers who worked at the same company as him. However he had no problem declaring that there was no top tier talent at DC whilst slagging off Dave Gibbons for being willing to work with them.

Or in short; he doesn't read superhero comics anymore but still passes judgement on them.

Considering that Moore lives in the UK that is quite relevant. But it's a perfect example of Moore's hypocrisy. Moore objects to other writers using character's he created because they don't follow his intentions whilst having made several works and series using almost exclusively characters in ways the creators would not have agreed with, and grinds his axe over DC keeping the rights for Watchmen away from him through a loophole but then turned around and started arguing a legal loophole against the claim that held up Lost Girls.

I'm not going to take away from the man's achievements, but I've also grown past the cult of reverence of the man himself who hold him up as doing no wrong and ignoring his less savoury parts like the hypocrisy, pettiness and casual racism (granted the only instance I can think of comes from three years ago with him using an anti-Roma slur and stereotypes when describing what DC did with Watchmen, but still not cool).

I believe one of the posters mentioned that Moore’s purposefully been avoiding the Big 2 for years. That’s his choice but for him to say their comics are a certain way when he hasn’t read them in years is silly

The children’s hospital didn’t want them to publish in the U.K. and given that they were the legal owners they had a case (Moore’s publishes seemed to think so). Moore didn’t have a case and yet he tried to use weasel words to get around it and basically insulted the owners. I found that hypocritical.

At least when Geoff Johns did Doomsday Clock he did the characters in character and honored the themes. Far more than Moore did in his works for the most part

exactly. He also had casual anti Arab bigotry in the first league of extraordinary gentleman

Edited by LordYAM on Nov 19th 2019 at 1:38:38 AM

I haven't read the comics but aren't the LXG books supposed to be a case of Deliberate Values Dissonance?

I presume so, Moore's work has never shyed away from the ugly side of people.

The interview also never went into any of his feelings about individual movies, just their impact on audiences, so I'm not even sure why you are bringing this up, other than to shit on Alan Moore. "Oh, he can't talk about the impact of movies on people, he's never even seen some movies!"

Also, you keep failing to mention how Moore never published Lost Girls in the UK until the copyright went out. You keep saying it was the publisher who did it, but it was also Moore's decision. Moore basically is the publisher of his own comics these days.

Edited by alliterator on Nov 19th 2019 at 7:34:00 AM

I don't think there's a contradiction in believing that Moore was screwed over and also that he's kind of a crazy old talking beard.

Yeah, I know. I'm not saying he isn't a cranky old man. I'm saying that there's a pretty good reason for him being a cranky old man. And that he isn't automatically wrong just because he's a cranky old man.

Also, I see this argument all the time, but it still doesn't make any sense: Moore using public domain characters for League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Lost Girls is in no way similar to DC Comics using characters other people created. The reason Moore dislikes both DC and Marvel is because they had a long history of, basically, stealing the IP of their creators — in the early days, when contracts were much looser and didn't include things like "work-for-hire" rules and then when creators sued for the rights, getting them into long legal battles that would last decades — and so ended up screwing over creators like Jack Kirby, Seigel and Shuster, and, especially, Bill Finger. Bill Finger didn't even start getting credit for basically creating Batman's entire universe until 2015. And DC had to be threatened with a lawsuit to do it.

Moore's LOEG and LG comics all use characters that anyone can use, as opposed to DC and Marvel, where those characters are strictly kept within DC and Marvel. Hell, Disney basically extended the copyright of the US on their own to keep the copyright on some of their characters.

Edited by alliterator on Nov 19th 2019 at 8:20:46 AM

Finally someone who gets it.

Also I know people are going to bring up his use of James Bond and Harry Potter I’m LXG but that was for the purpose of satire and criticism, whether or not you agree with the criticism is your own business. But, the point still stands that everyone has the right to criticize other works in a sense it’s not that different from the MAD parodies by Harvey Kurtzman (Who Moore is a big fan of.)

Top shelf published lost girls and from what ive seen moore doesn’t own them. They were the ones who made the decision to wait, not Moore. The point of him being a hypocrite still stands.

And he made a decision on Iron Man based on what he’s heard rather than watching it. If he’d actually watched it he might have a different opinion. Even more galling is that they do t have anything to do with the rise of trump. It’s like people blaming Star Wars for the rise of Reagan. When the outside world is crummy people turn to escapism. They also tend to embrace bad populist movements. Correlation does not mean causation.

Again. It was idiotic to blame Star Wars for the rise of Reagan and it was stupid to blame superheroes for the rise of Trump.

And no he doesn’t just have casual bigotry as deliberate values dissonance. The first issue has arabs try to rape Mina and portrays Arabs as filthy and dirty.

Edited by LordYAM on Nov 19th 2019 at 10:30:49 AM

So I finally finished reading Tom King's Mister Miracle.

Man, that was weird AF.

Apparently, Metron gave Scott the chance to escape from the Omega Sanction, but Scott was like "Hard pass!" because he's totally fine where he is, but then Oberon's ghost sort of suggests that someone will come along to save Scott eventually? Erm. I mean on one hand, Scott's world has him married with Barda, having a son with a daughter on the way, him being Highfather, and Darkseid being deader than a doornail, so all that is the best life. On the other hand, it's all in the mind. Just a (dying?) dream. Why not go out and make the dream a reality?

INB4: A story that welds the events of Tom King's MM and has Scott waking up will be titled "For the God Who Had Everything."

Also, where are you getting this whole "Moore hated the children's hospital that owned the copyright" from? Where's the interview?

Fair enough, but in the interview posted last page (the newer one) he says that they kept us adolescent and compared them to Birth of a Nation in that they "inspired white supremacy". That's just idiotic and it was part of what I was referencing. I probably should have been clearer.

He also admits he hasn't been following the Big Two at all, so for him to comment on certain things he hasn't read just smacks of arrogance. Going back to Star Wars. I disagree with a lot of the people who blame Star Wars for "ruining cinema" but at least those idiots watch the movies even if their conclusions are utterly idiotic. Moore doesn't even do that.

Edited by LordYAM on Nov 19th 2019 at 11:19:36 AM

He stated nothing of the sort.

1. He stated that Birth of the Nation was the first superhero film, which is something I disagreed with. It's the first action-adventure film.
2. He stated that, aside from a few non-white creators and non-white characters, superheroes were still overwhelmingly white and a white supremacist's wet dream. Which is absolutely correct. Look at the backlash against Black Panther and Captain Marvel. Look at ComicsGate and their backlash against any comic creator who is a woman or POC. Superheroes might not have been created for that reason, but they have definitely been co-opted by white supremacists.

Note, also, the interview was in 2016, pre-Black Panther and pre-Into the Spider-Verse.

By the way, he didn't say that superheroes were keeping us in adolescents — it's more like he said that we're choosing to go with what we're comfortable and familiar with, even if it doesn't challenge us to move from our positions. This is his quote:

Edited by alliterator on Nov 19th 2019 at 11:21:53 AM

Coopted yes but the mere fact those morons are throwing a fit shows that (as rough as it is) that change is happening. Most people loved Captain Marvel and Black Panther (though hilariously I've seen some academics say with a straight face that it's "promoting colonialism" by having Killmonger as the bad guy). Change is happening in the industry and even then the original core of superhero stories (knight errant/modern mythology) isn't necessarily racist or sexist

From the first line of your own quote:

Right there, he states that he mainly only reads comics by his co-workers. Which is the point that I made, not that he only read comics from his publisher. Please at least read what I'm writing before telling me I'm wrong.

I'm talking about a different interview, where he stated that he had never seen Iron Man but heard that it was military industrial complex propaganda and then went on to talk about that being fact (as a refresher; this is a film where the US Military's involvement in the plot is being wiped out to a man in the opening sequence and getting in Iron Man's way, the villain is an arms dealer and Tony Stark's first acts after getting home is to stop making weapons and say the system is broken). Which is my gripe with the man; he admits to not seeing/reading things but passes judgement on their merits despite his ignorance. That would be like me offering a criticism of the writing of League when I've never read any issues.

Here's the interview with the top tier jab

And back in 2012 after Before Watchmen was announced:

Putting aside where BW should have been done or not, it had Darwyn Cooke, J. Michael Straczynski, Brian Azzarello, and Len Wein as writers. All of them have impressive writing credits to their name and JMS has many projects outside of comics, but Moore dismisses them as either never making anything original themselves, if they have not being good enough for DC, and that working on BW is the only thing anyone outside of comics will hear of their work. To highlight out stupid that is, Len Wein co-created Wolverine and Swamp Thing and was the editor on Watchmen, JMS created Babylon 5, Sense 8, and wrote the World War Z film, Darwyn Cooke contributed to the early DCAU and created the opening to Batman Beyond, and Azzarello...well people keep trying to turn 100 Bullets into a TV Series or movie so he'll a property noticed outside of comic books one day.

And did, but the dispute related to the UK release, thus it's relevant to the discussion. Trademarks don't stop being relevant just because they inconvenience people.

First off; DC never took the rights for Watchmen away from Moore and Gibbons as the rights started with DC and only when the book has not been republished for a year do they get transfered to Moore and Gibbons. Yes still dodgey, but different from what you said (and it must also be noted that the only reason the Watchmen characters exist is because DC told Alan it'd be better if he created original characters, which Alan had to be convinced to do).

Second, here is his comments on what he's doing:

The issue I have is that he's basically arguing that because he can legally use public domain characters it's okay for him to do what he wants with them without caring for the author's original intent (I don't think anyone is going to argue that any of the original authors would approve of Lost Girls), but when DC legally uses characters they have the rights to use those writers are terrible and morally bankrupt and unoriginal hacks. He criticises DC and it's writers for using someone else's characters and not creating new ones at the same time as half of his works rely on characters created by other writers and in his most famous work he had to be convinced, by DC, that it would work if he used original characters. If his arguments were only "DC has the rights to my characters through shifty means and that is why I don't like the idea of people using them" then that would be fine, but when his argument is "using my characters proves these writers can't come up with something original" that makes him a hypocrite (and before you start, it is possible for him to hold both views at once).

I never mentioned it because it's not relevant to the point I was making; while the copyright was in place Moore argued that he didn't need permission as the hospital only held the rights to performances of the original play and not the characters. Or in short, after almost two decades of complaining how DC screwed him out of the rights to Watchmen through technicalities, attempted to screw another rights holder by arguing technicalities.

Edited by alliterator on Nov 19th 2019 at 1:35:57 AM

He said “I don’t think the industry has top flight talent middle flight talent or bottom flight talent.” That’s basically saying they’re hacks. Given that many of the writers (Darwyn Cooke, Len Wein) we’re legends in the field that just makes him even more disingenuous. He also says “I said words that I still stand behind.” That sounds like slagging Gibbons off.

And he waited begrudgingly. That he even made the argument at all shows as much. All things said you are making excuses for him and being dishonest while doing it. There’s a reason I refer to his die hard supporters as “drooling idiot fanboys”. They ignore Moore’s hypocrisy because they think his talent as a writer and the fact dc did him dirty justifies him being a asshole

Edited by LordYAM on Nov 19th 2019 at 1:52:59 AM

1. I'm not a die hard supporter (I've already stated where I disagree with him and I don't like his more current works), but I think you two are definitely die-hard Moore haters. You are ignoring the legitimate things he stated in the previous interview because of other interviews where he said things you don't like. That's a fallacy if I ever saw one.
2. You are becoming dangerously close to literally insulting me.

In any case, once again, we're talking about this interview which had this quote in it:

Edited by alliterator on Nov 19th 2019 at 1:58:33 AM

Ok, go to your corners, this is getting too much.

I said "he mainly only reads comics by his co-workers." That he listed books from other companies does not change the fact that he bases those books were written by his coworkers. You are arguing against a point I did not make. By his own admission he mainly reads works by his co-workers, at no point did I say he only reads works by his publisher.

He says "Now, I don’t think that the contemporary industry actually has a ‘top-flight’ of talent. I don’t think it’s even got a middle-flight or a bottom-flight of talent." His description of Gibbons as "frantic sounding" came off to me as mean spirited, as was him saying he got angry and said things he still stands behind and ending his friendship over it.

True, yet irrelevant. He stated point blank he thought that the copyright shouldn't have applied and argued legal technicalities.

And I believe that as the rights have never been Moore's and Gibbon's it's incorrect to say that DC took the rights away since those two didn't have them to start with. Semantically I'd say DC is keeping the rights away, but this is just an argument over semantics right now.

And if Moore's argument was solely about how DC kept the rights then he would have a point. But his argument is that the writers are bad because they aren't making original characters, which is utterly hypocritical for Moore to make.

Given that Moore wasn't the publisher of the book, and he would have had a lawsuit on his hands had he done so, he doesn't get props for that. The point remains that when confronted his first response was to start using the same kind of legal technicalities he's chided DC for using is hypocritical. He didn't go "okay, I'll do the right thing and wait for the copyright to expire," he went "this copyright is bullshit and I should be allowed to ignore someone's else legal right to characters I'm using, their claim is wrong and I won't ask their permission to publish. Also I won't publish now so I won't get sued."

Also I disagree with your opinion that I am a Moore hater. He has written some great things in his time. I am just sick of him being put up on the "says no wrong" pedestal.

Pretty much. I’ve seen Moore’s fans literally said that because the copyright was unfairly extended moore wasn’t being a hypocrite even though they were the owners and so what they said went

You know I started this conversation because I wanted to gain a better understanding on what Moore’s statement on Birth of the Nation meant to me as someone who loves the super hero genera not to dunk on Alan Moore on whether or not he’s an asshole. If its Moore’s fandumb that you really have an issue with then that’s fine I don’t think anyone on this forum is like that. I’m sorry I ever brought up the topic now we’re just spinning around in circles going over the same points over and over again. Can we either resolve the issue or just move on?

Whether or not DC violated the letter of any law they still betrayed Moore's trust that Watchmen would return to him in due time.