Damon Lindelof's Watchmen

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

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https://preview.redd.it/kgtb9cismec51.jpg?width=485&auto=webp&s=a32c6350094f144d894c8e8810bbaec8a20aa2ee

Finally broke down and started this show, though I haven't read much of the thread.

Thoughts after two episodes: the casting is great, the acting is fun, the production values are movie level, the score is good, the ideas at play seem generally interesting and worthwhile and the script and plotting are hot garbage. There's also an ugly, oily taste to the childish absorption with ultra-violence; the brutality=serious drama HBO formula is in full effect here. It doesn't much move the story forward in any way but it does seem gratuitous as fuck and clearly designed to make sure viewers understand this ain't no funny book this is GRIM AND GRITTY pilgrim.

All the above was EXACTLY how I felt about Leftovers. I quit that after two episodes and I would likely drop this too except I want at least one episode with Jean Smart as I love watching her act.

I can't imagine how anyone unfamiliar with the source material is coping with this world-building; it seems vague and confusing if you're coming in cold but very predictable if you've read the book.... worst of both options, I'd guess.

The other more obvious and glaring post-George Floyd problem with this show is that (at least so far) it pits a masked unchained police force against civilians and removes the humanity from everyone involved. Given the current scene in Portland and soon to be Chicago, Kansas City, Detroit and maybe coming soon to a city near you, this is some poisonous make-believe.

ulysses, I know people must say this all the time, but you stopped The Leftovers right before liftoff.

The other more obvious and glaring post-George Floyd problem with this show is that (at least so far) it pits a masked unchained police force against civilians and removes the humanity from everyone involved. Given the current scene in Portland and soon to be Chicago, Kansas City, Detroit and maybe coming soon to a city near you, this is some poisonous make-believe.

This is actually dealt with really well I think (except for the ending, which I hated more than most)

The leftovers is an all-timer. Way better than this show imo

i mean, the cards they're playing even two episodes in (and the fact that HBO decided to air this free as a sort of Black Lives matter nod) absolutely suggest that's where we're going, sure. But maybe those very serious, very harsh realities are better dealt with in a series that doesn't see a car electromagnetized away by a night owl UFO?

a lot of my immediate antipathy likely comes down to just not being able to cope with lindelof or his schtick. his work at its best seems generally like the brightest ideas we came up with in high school about how a fight with wolverine and the hulk would REALLY go down.

Lost burned me terribly and I've hated every film of his I've ever seen.

I don't think the masked cop dilemma was handled well at all honestly. Like the fact that the hero cop protagonist forcefully tortures a prisoner for information on his accomplice's hideout in the very first episode... and the show never once attempts to call any attention to that act for the rest of its duration like it was in any way wrong or problematic is... extremely problematic! Not to mention by the end the entire masked cop commentary and plot is mostly dropped by the wayside in favor of more typically comic bookish sci-fi schlock.

I also think this show does a wonderful (horrible) job of dehumanizing basically every person of color that isn't Angela in the end. I don't want to veer into too deep spoiler territory if you do choose to pick it up again ulysses (because I agree the gritty in-your face patented HBO ultraviolence is obnoxious in the initial episodes but thankfully subsides at least a bit as the show goes on).... but this show has an unfortunate and disturbing habit of disposing of black characters that aren't fortunate enough to be the heroine violently and often instantly after they have finished serving their initial passing relevance to the overarching plot. In enough of a pattern for a show that was pointedly trying to make some insightful commentary about race that seemed extremely juvenile.

fwiw Leftovers works as almost an "answer series" to Lost in that it deliberately swerves to avoid the same pitfalls and into much richer territory. at its best (the middle stretch, mostly), Watchmen does something similar - actually if anything, it overcorrects, in that a longer, less narratively tidy season would have made for a better show.

xp!

also worth mentioning once again that Leftovers is as much a Tom Perotta project as a Lindelof one, and likely a key reason it's the best thing he'll ever do

I stopped watching lost a few episodes into the first season because I thought it was shit