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Alan Moore will contribute a prose essay to the Occupy Comics project currently running on Kickstarter. He joins David Lloyd on the roster of the project which will record the Occupy Movement in comics — their V FOR VENDETTA comic has been an inspiration for the protesters with the Guy Fawkes mask from the comics showing up around the globe.

Moore’s contribution will be a longform prose piece (possibly with spot illustrations) the content of which is still to be determined, but Moore has indicated he intends to touch on the principles of the Occupy movement and how those principles compare and contrast with the comics business in terms of corporate control of creative arts and also in terms of the superhero paradigm itself.

The project now reunites Moore with his V FOR VENDETTA collaborator David Lloyd, who joined the roster last week.

“Alan Moore and David Lloyd joining the project is really incredible not just because their creation from 30 years ago continues to inspire activists today, but because they themselves are inspired by the activists they helped influence,” said Matt Pizzolo, who spearheaded the organization of Occupy Comics. “It’s also impressive how careful they both are to join the coalition as part of the team, they want to support the movement and the project without being treated as de facto leaders.”

Uniquely, Occupy Comics is more than just a show of solidarity with the protesters: the collaborators are creating new art & stories inspired by the protesters and are actively fundraising for them – having already raised nearly $15,000 on Kickstarter with just days left to go.

This is the first project of its kind to bring together artists and writers inspired to create change by making art together and utilizing that art to financially support a social protest movement in an organized, sustainable way.

Updated Complete Roster
(in alphabetical order)
Charlie Adlard (The Walking Dead)
Mike Allred (Madman)
Marc Andreyko (Manhunter)
Susie Cagle (Notes on Conflict, arrested at Occupy Oakland)
Mike Cavallaro (Parade (with fireworks), Life & Times of Savior 28)
Kevin Colden (I Rule the Night, Grimm’s Fairy Tales)
Molly Crabapple (Dr. Sketchy’s)
Tyler Crook (Petrograd, B.P.R.D.)
Vito Delsante (Superman, FCHS)
J.M. DeMatteis (Justice League, Spider-Man, Imaginalis)
Guy Denning (painter)
Eric Drooker (Flood!)
Troy Dye (Shrek, Puss in Boots, The Goblin Chronicles)
Joshua Dysart (Swamp Thing, The Unknown Soldier)
Zoetica Ebb (Biorequiem.com)
Joshua Hale Fialkov (I Vampire, Tumor)
Dan Goldman (Shooting War, 08: A Graphic Diary of the Campaign Trail)
Jenny “Devildoll” Gonzalez-Blitz (Coffin Factory art collective)
Brea Grant (We Will Bury You, Suicide Girls)
Zane Grant (We Will Bury You, Suicide Girls)
Joe Harris (Ghost Projekt, Spontaneous)
Dean Haspiel (American Splendor)
Joe Keatinge (Hell Yeah, Glory, Brutal)
Tom Kelesides (Shrek, Puss in Boots, The Goblin Chronicles)
Ales Kot (upcoming projects w/ Image Comics & DC Ent)
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4 Comments on Alan Moore joins David Lloyd on Occupy Comics project, last added: 12/7/2011

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James W said, on 12/6/2011 8:01:00 AM

This headline is technically true! (Despite the typo.)

Briareos said, on 12/6/2011 12:15:00 PM

I wonder if they’ll have a part on the cover up of rapes that happened in the camps. Or the fact that the movement was started by an anti-smite magazine?

JMD said, on 12/6/2011 12:20:00 PM

I gave $50 to the Kickstarter even before Moore got involved, and I didn’t take the offer of the book. I just wanted to stick it to Frank Miller.

adfa said, on 12/6/2011 3:54:00 PM

Moore and Miller are both political idiots who paint everything with absurdly broad brushes.

OWS has some good points, but for Moore to label them “intellectual” is ridiculous. Some of them are smart, yes. But there are so many incoherent statements coming out of OWS that the effectiveness of the movement is obviously compromised.

On the other hand, if there was one slightly misspelled word on one Tea Party sign, Alan Moore would point to that and say “Well, everyone in the Tea Party is a moron.”

So, it’s hypocrisy. Miller is no better, because he spent his entire op-ed attacking OWS without once acknowledging the very real banking abuses that were the catalyst for the movement.

Bottom line: we need a lot fewer “thinkers” who automatically label diverse political movements entirely good or entirely bad.

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There have been frequent sightings of the fabled “WATCHMEN sequel” over the years, but no photographic evidence, if you will. Now, Bleeding Cool claims to have a solid source that a series of four prequels are under way, and Andy Kubert is slated to draw at least one of them. Also believed to be involved: J. Michael Straczynski, JG Jones, and original WATCHMEN collaborators John Higgins and Dave Gibbons. Darwyn Cooke is said to be masterminding the whole thing.

Although unverified, Cooke and Kubert have been hinting at working on Top Secret projects for a while. WATCHMEN II supposedly got the nod after Paul Levitz left DC — he had personally blocked it for nearly 20 years, kind of like that dude guarding the one true Chalice in INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE. But like that dude, Levitz couldn’t hold on forever. With him gone, the story goes, Dan DiDio hopped all over it. But a lot of people at DC also thought the idea was blasphemy, and it kind of petered out — or at least leaks about it to Bleeding Cool did.

Alan Moore confirmed the story in an interview with Wired:
“They offered me the rights to Watchmen back, if I would agree to some dopey prequels and sequels,” the influential comics legend told Wired.com. …“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,” he said. “But these days I don’t want Watchmen back. Certainly, I don’t want it back under those kinds of terms.”

Yeah, sometime in June. I received a phone call from Dave Gibbons in which I probably did sound a little bit unfriendly on the phone, because it was very clear that he wasn’t phoning up to thank me for the WATCHMEN film money and I figured that he was probably phoning up to talk to me about something else to do with WATCHMEN. I was busy at the time, I told him to call me back on the Monday. Sure enough, he said, “Alan, got a few minutes? I just want to talk to you about WATCHMEN.” So I said, “As long as it was a few minutes only, Dave, and if that is the end to it.” He then went forward — I didn’t let him get very far — but he said, and I knew, that he had always been opposed to the prequels and sequels of WATCHMEN and had always had the assurances of people like Paul Levitz at DC that that would never be done. But of course, those people aren’t there anymore and it was a different regime, and I had heard that the new Head of DC had announced that she really wan

16 Comments on What’s up with Andy Kubert on WATCHMEN 2?, last added: 12/1/2011

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Chris Hero said, on 12/1/2011 1:43:00 PM

This is the absolute worst idea I’ve ever heard of in comics. I only went to law school, I never became a practicing lawyer and have no plans to, but everything I’ve ever read about the contract for Watchmen leads me to believe if Moore ever got over his distaste for lawyers, he could sue WB for a *lot* of money.

As far as comparable literay sequels go, this would be more like following up Gravity’s Rainbow or Infinite Jest…possible, but the original work is from such a unique voice a sequel by anyone else would just be a waste of time.

blacaucasian said, on 12/1/2011 2:10:00 PM

It’s not the absolute word idea ever in comics. There have been much worse ideas with far less talented people attempting it.

I’m not so sure you’re correct about that contract.

I don’t see the big deal about a prequel/sequel/whatever. It’ll come out, it will either be good or bad, and we’ll move on. They are world building their own property. They have the right to do that.

How is Watchmen any more sacred then the characters Moore uses in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Making judgements on the quality of what this will be like when it hasn’t even been confirmed as being in progress is ludicrous.

Darren J Hudak said, on 12/1/2011 2:57:00 PM

Alan Moore lost the moral high ground on this when he turned James Bond, a character he did not create, does not own and is not in the public domain, into a rapist and a traitor. If you want people to respect your creations then you need to be respectful of the creations of others. If you don’t show that respect you look like a hypocrite complaining when others don’t show respect to your creations.

This is especially true when the creations are thinly disguised versions of company owned characters that started out as the company owned characters and were only changed into new characters when the company requested it. Had Moore’s original proposal gone though to publication he’d have as much claim to them as he has to Swamp Thing, which is to say no claim at all.

(BTW, Am I the only one who remembers that Moore and Gibbon were at one time announced as working on a prequel but it was scrapped when Moore and DC had their falling out.)

Synsidar said, on 12/1/2011 3:10:00 PM

One practical problem to doing add-ons to WATCHMEN might be that the status of the GN will be diminished. People who haven’t read it will see the books as a group and some of the opinions, pro or con, and decide not to read that. It’s unlikely that the prequels and the GN will be hailed as a group of classics.

SRS

jimmy palmiotti said, on 12/1/2011 4:03:00 PM

The right people doing these books will be awesome. The wrong ones, not so much.

Honest, the WATCHMEN graphic novel will always be available…sales will dictate if they have an audience.

Correct me here if I am wrong, arent all these characters owned by D.C. comics? Seriously…Anyone know?

Dara said, on 12/1/2011 4:34:00 PM

@Jimmy: I believe DC owns the rights, but only so long as they keep the book in print. If it goes out of print (don’t know if there’s a specified length of time) the rights revert back to Moore and Gibbons. That’s actually one of Moore’s (many) beefs with DC.

@Heidi, re: And who wouldn’t want to read “The Early Rapes of the Comedian”?

You just uttered the mating call of the ubiquitous Scottish Mark Millar.

blacaucasian said, on 12/1/2011 4:48:00 PM

“One practical problem to doing add-ons to WATCHMEN might be that the status of the GN will be diminished.”

As arguably the “most critically acclaimed graphic novel of all time” do you realistically see this as an honest issue? Because I don’t. Not with the press that is put out about it over and over and over again.

“The right people doing these books will be awesome. The wrong ones, not so much.” – Thank you once again, Jimmy. My point exactly.

Phil said, on 12/1/2011 4:49:00 PM

I say do it. There are no sacred cows with fiction anymore. Especially one that is a deconstruction. I think it could work if they treat it as well as the other deconstructed superhero book that Alan Moore left, Miracleman.

Chris Hero said, on 12/1/2011 5:46:00 PM

I stand by this being the absolute worst idea on comics. I mean, George RR Martin is a good writer, but would a Martin written sequel to Infinite Jest be a good idea? No, of course not.

As I understand it, at the time of the contract signing, the longest any trade had been in print was 18 months. Therefore, Moore, Gibbons, and DC couldn’t have reasonably expected the book to stay in print for 20+ years. Further, it could be argued as a legal issue the contract only covered the rights to the graphic novel itself, not for the ideas inside to be used in other works.

I know it’s hard to accept WB and DC are acting in bad faith. But they are.

Saber Tooth Tiger Mike said, on 12/1/2011 5:50:00 PM

Except for Cooke, and Kubert, the other two contemporary creators rumored to be involved in this sequel I feel will deliver material that is extremely boring based on past output.

Chris Hero said, on 12/1/2011 5:56:00 PM

“How is Watchmen any more sacred then the characters Moore uses in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.”

Those characters were in the public domain.

“Alan Moore lost the moral high ground on this when he turned James Bond, a character he did not create, does not own and is not in the public domain, into a rapist and a traitor.”

You’re comparing apples and oranges. Moore used a Bond knockoff in a new story that in no way connected to or played off events of any of the Bond stories. An analog to what you’re saying would be if Moore had the rights to Watchmen and DC used a Dr. Manhattan knock-off named “Doc” or something in a Superman story. And that’s kinda the point…it’s not about owning the characters, it’s about trying to make a story piggybacking off another story and exploiting a contract to do so.

Wesley Smith said, on 12/1/2011 5:56:00 PM

blacaucasian & Synsidar:

Two words: Phantom Menace. Most people (kids) who are introduced to Star Wars today are introduced via either The Phantom Menace or The Clone Wars cartoon. My kids don’t see Star Wars as three movies about Luke Skywalker with three more about his father; they see it as one single story about the rise and fall of the Empire and Darth Vader. And because the original Star Wars IS episode IV of VI, to them it feels like they’re starting in the middle. It’d be like reading Return of the King before Fellowship of the Ring. So, yeah, I think this move by DC to turn Watchmen into a franchise will eventually devalue the importance of the original story.

But on the other hand, there have been tons of unnecessary sequels/prequels to literary classics over the past few decades: Gone With the Wind, Peter Pan, Casablanca… I’m sure there are others. Most of those sequels have quietly disappeared while their inspirations have continued to be iconic.

So what do I know? It seems like an awfully big gamble by DC for what appears to be a naked cash grab. But all this is moot until we see an official announcement, probably in January.

I think the most interesting thing Moore could do at this point is cut the legs out from underneath the project now and voice his disapproval before it’s announced. And I could actually see him doing that.

Saber Tooth Tiger Mike said, on 12/1/2011 6:06:00 PM

“I know it’s hard to accept WB and DC are acting in bad faith. But they are.” It’s not just them. The arts and entertainment fields are persuing the trend of recycling material from the past. Remakes, covers, prequels, and sequels. We’re in a period of intellectual stagnation. I wish I could say nostalgia is driving this, but the attempts have been so cynical and half-hearted that I wonder.

Travis M. said, on 12/1/2011 6:10:00 PM

The Star Wars comparison is interesting. Anectdotally, I can tell you my friends, a group of 35-year-old dudes who grew up with Star Wars no longer talk about it with the same reverence we did before the prequels. And it seems like kids are less into then they were before them (though that could just be the passing of time).

On the other hand, did Dark Knight Strikes Back really have much effect on the prestige of DKR? Does the difference between a sequel and a prequel have some impact here?

Of course, both of the above are by the same author. That’s another factor.

Matt M. said, on 12/1/2011 6:18:00 PM

There were sequels to both CATCH-22 and GONE WITH THE WIND and the world went right on spinning (and largely ignored them.)

Kurt Busiek said, on 12/1/2011 6:59:00 PM

>> As I understand it, at the time of the contract signing, the longest any trade had been in print was 18 months. Therefore, Moore, Gibbons, and DC couldn’t have reasonably expected the book to stay in print for 20+ years.>>

On the other hand, lots and lots of novels had stayed in print that long, and in-print-based reversion clauses were and are common in publishing, including at DC’s then-sister company, Warner Books.

As for whether trades had stayed in print that long, maybe not at DC’s then-young trade program, but comics in book form include TINTIN and ASTERIX album, which had been in print for far longer. I’d also wonder about the longevity of ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS and various comic-strip collections.

And then there’s the WONDER WOMAN contract, which had a similar clause in it, and had prevented reversion of WW rights for decades.

DC isn’t keeping WATCHMEN in print through chicanery; they’re keeping it in print because it’s selling. That it’s been selling solidly for a long time doesn’t mean the deal as made in bad faith, it means the book did surprisingly well. I don’t think that’s a winner of an argument — a court would look to publishing law, not to how long one publisher’s books had stayed in print prior to that time. Certainly, when Simon & Schuster were a young company, their books hadn’t stayed in print long, but their reversion clauses weren’t affected by that.

>> Further, it could be argued as a legal issue the contract only covered the rights to the graphic novel itself, not for the ideas inside to be used in other works. >>

Could it? It would depend on what the contract says, and from my experience with DC boilerplate, I doubt very much that the grant of rights was limited to the story itself and did not specifically include control of the characters and concepts beyond the story itself.

I haven’t seen the WATCHMEN contract, but I wouldn’t simply assume that such an argument could be made with any foundation at all.

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