@johnny spam: I'm familiar with Super-Folks, and Moore most likely was inspired by it, but as I said before it's impossible to know for sure unless it comes from Moore's lips. As for Morrison being a better writer than the Heroes writers; going off his older stuff I would agree, but based off his recent work with DC I'm not so sure. But now were heading back into the land of pure speculation and opinions and starting to go in circles with this debate. I think were just going to have to agree to disagree. =)
@johnny spam: I understand the argument that there is no truly unique story, and I understand that there were similar concepts of what Moore did before he did it, but it's impossible to speculate on where Moore drew his inspirations from unless it actually comes from his lips. I also understand other stories have already taken ideas from Watchmen, but that doesn't make it okay. Heroes is probably one of the most recent examples of it, and believe me I, and a lot of other people were not thrilled about it. Their lack of ability to come up with decent original stuff is why the show is being canceled and as far as I can tell Morrison is heading right down the same path, but only time will tell.
"...And you can paint the characters any way you want to, but it is blatantly clear that what Morrison and DC are doing is suppose to be a version of the Watchmen, and if Moore had sold out we wouldn't be looking at the Charlton characters, we'd be looking at the Watchmen. So in the end it still feels like a cheap knock off of the Watchmen. Which goes right back to being insulting to the Watchmen story "
The originals can't be knockoffs of their imitators. No matter how good the story was, the Watchmen are knockoffs of the Charlton characters. If DC wants to apply that kind of story atmosphere to the original characters, then so what? Outside of comics, people aren't going to recognize the Charlton characters as the Watchmen. Good or bad, Multiversity will not have an effect on Watchmen. "
::Sigh:: I never said the Charlton characters are knockoffs of Moore's characters. I said "what Morrison and DC are doing" is a knock off of what Moore did. When you take the original characters and place them in a situation/world DC never intended them to be in in the first place, one originally created by Moore, then guess what your doing. Your knocking off Moore's work. And I'm not sure I understand what you mean by "Outside of comics." This whole thing is about the comics, so of course it's not going to be an issue for people that don't read comics...
@johnny spam said:
" @Marius138:
I never said that there isn't other writers or stories equal to or greater than Moore and Watchman. I said Morrison's works as of late comes no where near Moore's Watchman. The only thing that was an opinion about my statement was that Morrison's work has been sub-par. And the way inferior work takes away from a great piece of work is like this. Say you have a truly great movie. Then a sequel comes out and it's okay at best. Then another sequel comes out and another and so on and so forth, and they're all okay at best. Soon people stop remembering how great the first one was and only really remember the series of movies as a whole, which was okay. Now I know the circumstances around this are different, but this can very easily start the ball rolling on what I was describing above. Soon we'll have people saying "Oh the Watchmen are just like Morrison's Pax Whateverica." Just like when the Fantastic Four movie came out they were saying it was just like The Incredibles, even though the Fantastic Four have been around decades longer. "
No one ever forgets the original nor will anyone take it away just because a comic will be published in the spirit of Watchmen does not mean it will replace anyone's memories of it. "
When you duplicate a story enough times it takes away from the uniqueness of the original story. People forget the original stories of things all the time. It happens in history, religion, literature, music, movies, TV, and yes comic books. I'm not trying to be offensive or insult you personally but your statement is a bit naive.
Being an opinion I can argue I think there are many writers equal or better then Alan Moore and Watchmen. I still do not understand how telling a story with different characters in the story telling styles of Watchmen is an insult to Watchmen I am not seeing how it takes away from Watchmen at all. "
I never said that there isn't other writers or stories equal to or greater than Moore and Watchman. I said Morrison's works as of late comes no where near Moore's Watchman. The only thing that was an opinion about my statement was that Morrison's work has been sub-par.
And the way inferior work takes away from a great piece of work is like this. Say you have a truly great movie. Then a sequel comes out and it's okay at best. Then another sequel comes out and another and so on and so forth, and they're all okay at best. Soon people stop remembering how great the first one was and only really remember the series of movies as a whole, which was okay.
Now I know the circumstances around this are different, but this can very easily start the ball rolling on what I was describing above. Soon we'll have people saying "Oh the Watchmen are just like Morrison's Pax Whateverica." Just like when the Fantastic Four movie came out they were saying it was just like The Incredibles, even though the Fantastic Four have been around decades longer.
Calling his work sub par is always a opinion and many have been satisfied lately. But the thing is it seems like anti-Watchmen we saw Captain Atom already and Superman called him out on being cold and distant and at the end Captain Atom started to see the beauty of the Multiverse. With Question he will have the belief of Spiral Dynamics that people can change and adapt while Rorschach was unwilling to change these characters seem different then the ways they were handled in Watchmen. "
Your right, my opinion that his work has been sub-par is just that, an opinion, but none the less, you can't argue that his works have come anywhere near Moore's Watchmen, and that's the point I was trying to make. Anything less than epic or legendary story telling does nothing but take away from what Moore did with the Watchmen.
And you can paint the characters any way you want to, but it is blatantly clear that what Morrison and DC are doing is suppose to be a version of the Watchmen, and if Moore had sold out we wouldn't be looking at the Charlton characters, we'd be looking at the Watchmen. So in the end it still feels like a cheap knock off of the Watchmen. Which goes right back to being insulting to the Watchmen story
But what Alan Moore did was the exact same things he didn't use the characters but made the reader think of them it is the same thing you can't be mad when one person does it then the next person does. And this book has been in the works for years it evolved from a sequel to 52 this was not an attempt to just copy Watchmen as much as to restart the interpretation of the DC Multiverse. In fact it might not even be the same look at his plans for Question and Captain Atom they are not the same as the way the Watchmen counterparts are. "
You make some good points. Why Moore didn't come up with completely original characters is something I can't really speculate on, but what I do know is that Moore's version of the Charlton characters are not just better than the originals, their legendary compared to the Charlton characters. And that's what at the heart of this debate. Morrison's work leading up to this has been sub-par, and fans of the Watchmen story don't want to see some sub-par rip-off, sequel, parallel, or whatever else you want to call it, of the Watchmen. It's insulting to the genius of the original work.
" @Marius138: It is not a copy of Watchmen it is the Charlton characters in the same fashion and the Watchmen is a story already done it is the Charlton characters it's ending is from the Outer Limits that story itself is also not original. Look at Alan Moore's last couple of books or half his work it is the same thing which is take older concepts and reuse them. "
First; the only reason Moore created original characters for his story was because DC wouldn't let him use their characters. So yes the Watchmen are mirrors of the Charlton characters but if Moore had had his way it would have been the Charlton characters in the first place.
Second; the Outer Limits episode your referring to is The Architects of Fear, and Moore didn't actually know about that episode until he was well into making Watchmen. He does however give a nod to it in the final issue after he did learn about it.
Third; DC taking the Charlton characters and putting them in the same fashion as the Watchmen is copying the Watchmen, because it's the only way they can get away with it. Moore refuses to sell out to them and give away his rights to the Watchmen characters so they have to resort to this lame way of imitating his work.
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