Comic Vine News

162 Comments

Brutally Honest: Why A Watchmen Spin-Off Doesn't Matter

Why I don't agree with Alan Moore

No Caption Provided
It's safe to say that when Alan Moore speaks, the comic book industry and it's fans listen. At times reluctantly, but out of respect for his genius, they listen. If you've been paying attention recently, then you probably caught some glimpse of the recent interview featuring Moore where he discusses DC Comics' desire to sell back the rights of The Watchmen to him (Alan Moore) in exchange for the secondary rights of The Watchmen and its characters. What that means is that DC wants to give Alan Moore back the rights to The Watchmen so that they can create spin-offs, video games and perhaps even a sequel with the secondary rights of the characters.  Obtaining the secondary rights of The Watchmen would mean that DC would be able to integrate characters like Rorschach into Batman continuity, for example if they really wanted to. In retrospect that would be kind of neat, but is it a good idea? As you can probably guess, Alan Moore doesn't think so. In a recent interview, he spoke out about why he no longer wants the rights to The Watchmen, and how DC Comics has "raped what [he] had thought to be a pretty decent work of art."
 == TEASER ==
 

...But of course, those people (Paul Levitz) aren’t there anymore and it was a different regime, and I had heard that the new Head of DC had announced that she (Diane Nelson) really wanted to pursue some of DC’s key properties, by which I assume she probably meant WATCHMEN.  I think she may have even mentioned it, I don’t know.  So I said to Dave (Gibbons) that yes, I had heard about this and he was saying that he knew the thing that I always wanted was the rights to WATCHMEN back.  This was said with the kind of understanding that if they gave me back the rights to WATCHMEN, then I would in return sign over the rights to secondary properties such as, oh I don’t know, Rorschach comic books, sequels, prequels, all of these things…
TV series, things like that?
Yeah, all of these things, potentially, when you think about the different mediums these could be exploited in.  Potentially endless properties that could be spun off of WATCHMEN.  Now, I stepped in and said to Dave that actually, no I had grown so sick of WATCHMEN over these last 18 months that I didn’t want the rights back anymore.  If they had offered them back to me back when I wanted them, ten, twenty years ago, then maybe this could have all been resolved in a friendly fashion.  But no, I wasn’t going to take the rights back at this stage after they had pretty much, in my opinion, raped what I had thought to be a pretty decent work of art.  I didn’t want them throwing me back the spent and exhausted carcass of my work and certainly not under terms that would apparently allow them to go on producing witless sequels and prequels ad infinitum.

So the question is whether or not by allowing DC Comics to use The Watchmen characters, elements from the original story, integration of The Watchmen into the DCU, creation of spin-offs, cartoons, video games- you get the idea; would that be exploiting the original Alan Moore book? More importantly, does it take away from the original story?
 
I really don't think so. To be honest, no matter what DC does with the secondary Watchmen properties, no matter how many spin-offs, video games, cartoons they make using The Watchmen characters; nothing will take away from the brilliance of the original story. It doesn't matter what happens because I know, and all of you know, that if there ever is a Watchmen video game, Alan Moore would have absolutely nothing to do with it. That being said, who cares if The Watchmen becomes a video game or an animated cartoon? Nothing will take away from the original graphic novel. 
What do you guys think? Do you agree with Alan Moore that spin-offs of Watchmen would exploit the original story and it's characters, or do you feel that the original story is so strong, that it's untouchable? Also, does DC Comics want to exploit the story?