Damon Lindelof's Watchmen

Because of "Watchmen." Decades of historians have been trying to let the world know about this massacre, and it took an alternate history comic book drama to break the wall of racism. IDK whether to laugh or cry, but let no one say fiction has no power in the real world. https://t.co/l7ixJN5JlQ

— N. K. Jemisin (@nkjemisin) February 20, 2020

https://variety.com/2020/tv/news/watchmen-cast-coronavirus-psa-washmen-1203547415/

So now Lindelof is serially publishing an alternate reality time travel Hilary fanfic thing: https://nextdraft.com/something-something-something-murder/

sorry I mean Hillary.

streaming for free all this weekend: https://consequenceofsound.net/2020/06/hbo-watchmen-streaming-free-juneteenth/

Maybe I'll give this a shot...

Pretty great season of TV imo

Gonna try to watch this ifpi can figure out a way to stream on my TV

So it was fairly entertaining, perhaps a bit sillier than I was expecting, and lingered too much on flashbacks, but I appreciated how true it was to the original, even down to its approach to plotting, while building and expanding upon that world for the modern day. I do think it was clearly made with more seasons in mind, and it's a little disappointing they aren't continuing.

Also, this went right over my head

if you're all watching the Watchmen for free on HBO this weekend don't miss what the writers did here.

Happy Father's Day from Fred T and Sons. pic.twitter.com/2jYIkxaL9r

— Zeddy (@Zeddary) June 21, 2020

Powered through it all yesterday, goddman outstanding.

WATCHMEN (HBO, 2019) pic.twitter.com/mM8uYIFhAh

— Alan Sepinwall (@sepinwall) July 1, 2020

goddman outstanding

"Goddman" is the naked blue guy, yeah(?)

I really wish this season had stuck the landing, so much of it was so great

Same! Great buildup, and the finale was like a Heroes episode

omg that's exactly right

this needs to get another season if only to redeem itself from that

Alan Moore, who has not willingly written for DC Comics (bar one six-page 9/11 charity story in 2001) since the 1980s, due to their interference with and theft of his work, had their #1, #3, #5, #6 and #7 best-selling comics in 2019.

That year, DC had $20, $25, and $30 paperbacks of Watchmen in print with different covers, and $40 and $50 hardcovers of the same book.


(#4 was a YA book about Raven from Teen Titans, the other four were Batman comics, including the one that had his penis removed.)

I still don't get why he or his lawyer didn't insist that the Watchmen contract read, "until the comic goes out of print, or 5 years from now, whichever comes first" (or choose your own time period) -- if it was so important to him that the rights revert. I gather that the comics world is/was apparently... unique... in how it operated (still operates?); but the idea that a creator of any kind would trust a corporation not to follow the letter of a contract, but rather would stick to some vague notion of its "spirit," is hard to wrap my head around.

I’ll chip in some money if Alan wants to sue DC

Technically he didn’t even own the characters in the beginning right? Due to charleston. And did DC have any creator owned work then? What would the precedent be for them?

Not sure there were any other OGNs that DC was regularly reprinting in '85
I don't blame Moore for not seeing this loophole tbh

I would blame his lawyer (if he had one) - their job is to look for loopholes. "What if my client's comic is so successful, that it's the first to stay in print for decades?" It seems so obvious, coming from another field - add a timeframe. But again, I comics are weird special unique.

What a dumbass for not predicting something that had never happened before.

I'm not calling him a dumbass, I'm saying it seems his lawyer didn't look out for his interests if he trusted DC would let the book go out of print just because "they always have before, and why would this masterpiece be different."

the other four were Batman comics, including the one that had his penis removed

what a way to find out about this

did Bane do it?

Joker

https://static1.cbrimages.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/goodcomics/2014/05/boner5.jpg

In related news, the DC comics app has a rotating carousel of series they recommend at the top and it currently features Promethea

Sorry, to be more exact: AT&T/Warner Media/Warner Bros./DC Comics have an application that features movies/tv/comics that has Promethea in a carousel of content

That DC acquisition of his ABC assets through Wildstorm must've really burned. You'd think he might have had the power to prevent that from happening that that point in his career, though.

DC would have told him to go pound sand before agreeing to a hard window with a rights reversion. They've never been big fans of giving creatives more power.

But then that kills the argument that DC violated the (unwritten) understanding of the agreement by keeping the books in print (...if I understand the argument correctly).

In related news, the DC comics app has a rotating carousel of series they recommend at the top and it currently features Promethea

― solo scampito (mh), Thursday, July 9, 2020 2:12 PM (yesterday)

This is especially galling, as a) him getting attached to the story kept him working for DC five years longer than he initially intended to work on ABC at all - longer than his supposed imperial phase there in the 1980s! - and that DC fucked over a) the work b) the readers c) years of effort by an editor and d) the artist and co-creator's interest in working for them ever again* when they axed the intended best-presentation edition forever after Levitz fired that non-sexual-assaulting editor who'd kept Moore's new work coming into the company for EIGHT years after they bought an entire company and appointed a Vice-President just to cunt him over for one year's scripts, out of pique at Moore finally getting shat off at the editor for having to report all the pissant dickery Levitz was putting Moore's work through, out of also pique genuine legal caution.

That DC acquisition of his ABC assets through Wildstorm must've really burned. You'd think he might have had the power to prevent that from happening that that point in his career, though.

― Nhex, Thursday, July 9, 2020 3:02 PM (yesterday)

It burned for Moore's readers at the time, that he took his usual legal approach of believing a human over distrusting the corporation they had just been given millions of dollars and a vice-presidency to misrepresent. Jim Lee flew to England to tell Moore personally, and he announced (iirc) "Jim Lee is an honourable man." He absolutely could have avoided it at the time, twice, but had conceived the entire ABC line as a way to keep the artists employed after Rob Liefeld had fucked them over (and in at least one case, stolen their physical art), and would have lost them this replacement year of work if he'd walked.

DC would have told him to go pound sand before agreeing to a hard window with a rights reversion. They've never been big fans of giving creatives more power.

― Donald Trump Also Sucks, Of Course (milo z), Thursday, July 9, 2020 3:42 PM (yesterday)

But then that kills the argument that DC violated the (unwritten) understanding of the agreement by keeping the books in print (...if I understand the argument correctly).

― Pat McGroin (morrisp), Thursday, July 9, 2020 4:01 PM (yesterday)

Yeah, I disagree with Milo here - the window was intended as firm at the time. DC have never kept the books in print as far as I know, which is where the spirit vs the letter of the agreement comes in.

Technically he didn’t even own the characters in the beginning right? Due to charleston. And did DC have any creator owned work then? What would the precedent be for them?

― dan selzer, Thursday, July 9, 2020 11:50 AM (yesterday)

He and Gibbons owned the characters from the beginning of creating the characters, ie when Giordano said "this proposal is dope but it's not really going to leave us with much room to do anything else with the characters we just bought, why don't you make up new ones, instead of ones that DC just bought from a 1920s dance craze for which I designed the steps, and set it in a stand-alone universe, not the DC universe?"

I still don't get why he or his lawyer didn't insist that the Watchmen contract read, "until the comic goes out of print, or 5 years from now, whichever comes first" (or choose your own time period) -- if it was so important to him that the rights revert. I gather that the comics world is/was apparently... unique... in how it operated (still operates?); but the idea that a creator of any kind would trust a corporation not to follow the letter of a contract, but rather would stick to some vague notion of its "spirit," is hard to wrap my head around.

― Pat McGroin (morrisp), Thursday, July 9, 2020 11:37 AM (yesterday)

The Alan Moore who went to his one meeting at DC's offices dressed like this? (if my memory of Letter From Northampton in Heartbreak Hotel is accurate)

Not sure there were any other OGNs that DC was regularly reprinting in '85
I don't blame Moore for not seeing this loophole tbh

― Nhex, Thursday, July 9, 2020 11:58 AM (yesterday)

I would blame his lawyer (if he had one) - their job is to look for loopholes. "What if my client's comic is so successful, that it's the first to stay in print for decades?" It seems so obvious, coming from another field - add a timeframe. But again, I comics are weird special unique.

― Pat McGroin (morrisp), Thursday, July 9, 2020 12:07 PM (yesterday)

What a dumbass for not predicting something that had never happened before.

― Fetchboy, Thursday, July 9, 2020 1:08 PM (yesterday)

I'm not calling him a dumbass, I'm saying it seems his lawyer didn't look out for his interests if he trusted DC would let the book go out of print just because "they always have before, and why would this masterpiece be different."

― Pat McGroin (morrisp), Thursday, July 9, 2020 1:14 PM (yesterday)

As I asked you last time,

If you're aware of any DC collections prior to those at all, let alone any that were masterpieces that could be expected to stay in print in a market with no returns or reorders, please let us know! It looks like The Greatest Superman Stories Ever Told hardback didn't even come out until November 1987 (and immediately went out of print, not even getting a paperback until 1989).

High Society's second buy-by-phone edition didn't even come out until November '87 either, and the first had been out of print for over six months. It may not have been offered to the DM until 1991?

I know I type this shit out every 18 months on here, but there's new bits of dickery this year! c'mon this time it's even the same thread

*obviously it went SUPER-great for him the two times he was enticed back to do major work-for-hire projects. why it has been a whole *checks watch* 24 hours since an arm of Warners announced they had found a new way to (probably) fuck him over on one of those properties!

But what about dickless Batman?

to the Flapmobile

Dave Sim to the rescue, as usual

Yeah, I disagree with Milo here - the window was intended as firm at the time. DC have never kept the books in print as far as I know, which is where the spirit vs the letter of the agreement comes in.

I didn't say that wasn't the stated intention (or that DC acted in good faith), but I'd guess there's a reason for an 'out of print' stipulation as opposed to a pure rights reversal ie DC wanting to keep their options open.

strong derail as usual A++

The Alan Moore who went to his one meeting at DC's offices dressed like this?

If you're aware of any DC collections prior to those at all, let alone any that were masterpieces that could be expected to stay in print in a market with no returns or reorders, please let us know!

The books were the 12 32ish-page issues of Watchmen published in 1986 and 1987.

Again: if (akm not morris) have reason to think and not think these various things, please name any DC collected edition that had stayed in print for 33 years, prior to Watchmen. Please name any self-contained miniseries that DC had ever collected into book form at all before Watchmen. Please name one DC collection of anything that had stayed in print for 12 months, prior to Watchmen. Please name one single DC paperback collection at all, published at any time earlier than Watchmen #11, let alone before Moore and Gibbons signed the contract in 1985.

Again again, I believe that Nelson's offer to horse-trade for sequel & spin-off rights indicates that DC was aware that their rights to the underlying IP were at very best morally dubious, and probably completely non-existent.

Alan wearing a hammer-and-sickle sleeveless T in the streets of New York in 1985 speaks to his starry-eyed belief in the strength of collective agreement imo.

I'd guess there's a reason for an 'out of print' stipulation as opposed to a pure rights reversal ie DC wanting to keep their options open.

yeah I think it just flat-out didn't occur to DC either, as noted upthread.

DC would have told him to go pound sand before agreeing to a hard window with a rights reversion. They've never been big fans of giving creatives more power.

― Donald Trump Also Sucks, Of Course (milo z)

i wonder if there's any correlation between the way they treated alan moore and their difficulty in putting out new comics that can equal some 30-year-old comics alan moore wrote in selling power

nah, probably a coincidence

tbh probably unrelated, no one's putting out material doing Watchmen numbers because the best straight-up superhero book isn't going to be THE graphic novel non-comics readers read.

well they do seem to have the market cornered on people who want to read a comic book where batman has his penis removed, i guess that's good enough

Thank AT&T and Warner Brother's TV/film department, readers wanted it so much some extra copies paid my rent for a month.

I hope alan enjoyed this show

can't imagine why he wouldn't have

tbh probably unrelated, no one's putting out material doing Watchmen numbers because the best straight-up superhero book isn't going to be THE graphic novel non-comics readers read.

neither is Watchmen in 2019 tbh, even with the TV boost, it ranked mid 20s overall with 110k sold, triple its 2018 numbers. still the best-selling superhero comic though.


((Dav Pilkey's best-selling book was #1 with 1.1 million sold; he also had the #2, #3, #5, #6, #7, #8 and #9 2019 best-sellers, for a total of four million books flogged #copaganda #defundthepolice. Raina was #4, of course, selling 455k of her latest in three months, and at #11, #13, #16 and #17 for over a million units shifted of her creator-owned work. It's an exercise for the observer as to whether these are "non-comics readers," or the actual real comics audience vs superhero readers.))

The only good superhero comic is the one where batman has his dick removed

oh what happened to robin then?

laid an egg iirc

graysonned in an AOL Time Warner beef