DC Entertainment is soon expected to announce that DC Comics will publish a new mini-series based on characters introduced in Watchmen, a celebrated 1980s comicbook series, without its original creators, writer Alan Moore and illustrator Dave Gibbons.
Published from 1986 to 1987, and and later collected as a graphic novel, Watchmen chronicles a band of disillisioned crime fighters who struggle to maintain moral clarity amid the real artocities of the 20th Century.
Moore, who has distanced himself from DC Comics and the industry at large, described the new venture as “completely shameless” in a New York Times interview. “I tend to take this latest development as a kind of eager confirmation that they are still apparently dependent on ideas that I had 25 years ago.”
But DC executives see the prequel as a chance to keep Watchen characters fresh in readers minds. “It’s our responsibility as publishers to find new ways to keep all of our characters relevant,” Dan DiDio and Jim Lee, the co-publishers of DC Entertainment, said in an official statement. “After 25 years the Watchmen are classic characters whose time has come for new stories to be told.”
Gibbons has taken a neutral position in the debate. “The original series of Watchmen is the complete story that Alan Moore and I wanted to tell,” the illustrator told New York Times. “However, I appreciate DC’s reasons for this initiative and the wish of the artists and writers involved to pay tribute to our work. May these new additions have the success they desire.”
The cinematic version of Watchmen, which featured a 60s rock & roll soundtrack, was release as a blockbuster action film in 2009, hauling in over $185 million on on a $130 million budget. Critics of the film complained it was too political, too long, overly character-driven and contained too much frontal nudity of Dr. Manhattan. But the film received praise in equal numbers.
“The film is rich enough to be seen more than once,” film critic Roger Ebert said in a review. “I plan to see it again, this time on IMAX, and will have more to say about it. I’m not sure I understood all the nuances and implications, but I am sure I had a powerful experience. It’s not as entertaining as “The Dark Knight,” but like the “Matrix” films, LOTR and “The Dark Knight,” it’s going to inspire fevered analysis. I don’t want to see it twice for that reason, however, but mostly just to have the experience again.”
Analyzing the divided response, Geoff Boucher of the Los Angeles Times felt that, like Eyes Wide Shut, The Passion of the Christ or Fight Club, Watchmen would continue to be a talking point among those who liked or disliked the film.
If the film’s reception and the heat of the current debate surrounding news of the prequel is any indication, Before Watchmen is sure to generate equal amounts of praise and rancour among readers once it is published.