by Mike Hansen
Cover of Spider-Man: One More Day
Actually, TWO quotes, from the same event:
“On an emotional level, I get it. What is interesting is that in a conversation with the pissed off people, you have to chase the logic tree. ‘DC doesn’t have the rights to do this.’ Actually, they do. ‘Alan Moore doesn’t like it.’ Well, Alan Moore is a genius, but he has been abusing characters in the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen like having Mr. Hyde anally rape Invisible Man to death which Robert Louis Stevenson wouldn’t have approved of.”
“Did Alan Moore get screwed on his contract? Of course. Lots of people get screwed, but we still have Spider-Man and lots of other heroes.”
– J. Michael Straczynski at C2E2’s Before Watchmen panel
Just a few questions for JMS…
– So it’s cool for a publisher to rip off the creators of a comic, including lasting works of greatness like Watchmen and Spider-Man, as long as everybody gets screwed? Or as long as you get to work on it, whether or not the creator approves of the project?
– What’s it like working for a publisher that you know screws over your fellow creators? Is it not your problem, as long as you get paid?
– Imagine if the publisher of Rising Stars and Midnight Nation, your acclaimed works that you created and own, found a contractual loophole that allowed them to publish new material without your permission or control, while you’re alive and the work remains under copyright (not that Image Comics would ever do that). How would you feel about that? Do you think it might feel worse than having your acclaimed run on Amazing Spider-Man end with a completely rewritten final story without your say or control?
Enjoy sleeping on your big bed made of money, sir.
Related articles
- C2E2: Before Watchmen All Access Panel (comicbooked.com)
- Before Watchmen: Not Interested. Here’s Why (alldaycomics.com)
- C2E2 LIVE: DC All Access: “Before Watchmen” (comicbookresources.com)
- C2E2 2012: Did DC’s “All Access: Before Watchmen” Panel Have Fans Saying “Hurm,” or “Hurm!” (geek-news.mtv.com)
- As The Watchmen Turns: Gibbons Feels Guilty and Moore’s Still Not Happy (geek-news.mtv.com)
- C2E2 2012: DC COMICS All Access: BEFORE WATCHMEN Panel LIVE! (newsarama.com)
- Alan Moore: ‘There’s no point in suing over Watchmen’ (digitalspy.co.uk)
- WonderCon 2012: Before Watchmen With Straczynski And Lee (comicbooked.com)
- Before Watchmen, DC Comics Publishing Prequels to Watchmen Series (laughingsquid.com)
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