Watchmen - Hardcover

Moore, Alan; Gibbons, Dave

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1848560060 ISBN 13: 9781848560062

Publisher: Titan Books Ltd, 2008

Synopsis

"Watchmen" redefined what superhero comics could be, and re-introduced the medium to an adult audience with a gripping, labyrinthine script and ultra-detailed artwork.Rorschach, a half-psychotic vigilante, must convince his ex team-mates, now middle-aged and retired, that he has uncovered a plot to murder the remaining superheroes - along with millions of innocent civilians...Even reunited, will the remnants of the Watchmen be enough to avert a global apocalypse?With a powerful, chilling storyline, masterfully told by comics supremo Alan Moore and beautifully rendered artwork by Dave Gibbons, "Watchmen" - soon to be a smash-hit movie - remains a cornerstone of Western comics.

About this title

Review:

Has any comic been as lauded as Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' Watchmen? Possibly only Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns but Watchmen remains the critics' favourite. Why? Because Moore is a better writer, and Watchmen a more complex and dark and literate creation than Miller's fantastic, subversive take on the Batman myth. Moore, renowned for many other of the genre's finest creations (Saga of the Swamp Thing, V for Vendetta, and recently From Hell, with Eddie Campbell) first put out Watchmen in 12 issues for DC in 1986-87. It won a comic award at the time (the 1987 Jack Kirby Comics Industry Awards for Best Writer/Artist combination) and has continued to garner praise since.

The story concerns a group called the Crimebusters and a plot to kill and discredit them. Moore's characterisation is as sophisticated as any novel's. Importantly the costumes do not get in the way of the storytelling, rather they allow Moore to investigate issues of power and control--indeed it was Watchmen, and to a lesser extent Dark Knight, that propelled the comic genre forward, making "adult" comics a reality. The artwork of Gibbons (best known for 2000AD's Rogue Trooper and DC's Green Lantern) is very fine too, echoing Moore's paranoid mood perfectly throughout. Packed with symbolism, some of the overlying themes (arms control, nuclear threat, vigilantes) have dated but the intelligent social and political commentary, the structure of the story itself, its intertextuality (chapters appended with excerpts from other "works" and "studies" on Moore's characters, or with excerpts from another comic book being read by a child within the story), the fine pace of the writing and its humanity mean that Watchmen more than stands up--it retains its crown as the best the genre has yet produced. --Mark Thwaite

Review:

"* "Watchmen is peerless." - Rolling Stone * "His sci-fi detective masterpiece Watchmen made him (Alan Moore) the comic industry's de facto leader back in 1986" - The Guardian"

About this edition

• Publisher: Titan Books Ltd
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 1848560060
• ISBN 13: 9781848560062
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 436