All this talk of Watchmen has got me thinking.
Watchmen hands down is my favourite comic book, and one of my favorite stories period.
Not for the edginess or anything but because Watchmen fundamnetanlly is a charactdr study, and an ensemble charcater study at that.
Its Superheroes but rather than focus of spectacle or even the murdur mystery that on paper is core to the plot, its all about delving into these people and seeing what drives them to do what they do and how it effects them.
Of course there are other elements of brillance. The Popul Vuh inspired graphic design structure gives the whole thing a wonderful theatric sense and the dialouge is really cripse, but I treasure the book so much because its based on something so rare in genre fiction, treating the characters as acrual chatacters and not hallow vehicles for spectacle.
Now when I say Watchmen is my favorite book I dont mean to put it on a pedestal, in fact I want to read something that surpassed it.
So does anyone have any recs for comics like Watchmen, books really built on exploring the characters as people and the world around them?
I also suppose we could also talk about character dynamics in general in comics and Watchmen overall.
Superman: Secret Identity is my favorite character driven comic.
>>83080160
>Watchmen hands down is my favourite comic book, and one of my favorite stories period.
that's one of the most ignorant normie posts I've seen in a long time
>>83080233
>muh Cerebus
From Hell, by Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell
Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron
pic related
I rec it not because its smart but because it pierces the reader's mind.
>>83080160
>Watchmen hands down is my favourite comic book, and one of my favorite stories period.
Sorry, it's not cool to like Watchmen anymore.
>>83080160
>So does anyone have any recs for comics like Watchmen, books really built on exploring the characters as people and the world around them?
Astro City, hands down. This is the book that you should read if you're looking for that particular aspect out of comics.
>>83080336
Fuck forgot pic
>>83080400
all thanks to hack snyder, before watchmen, and rebirth
>>83080400
>>83080476
>he lets others define his taste and favorites
truly the memest of posters
Ghost World is a character study of angsty teen girls in the 90s. I like angsty teen girls in the 90s.
If your ok with being in for the long haul, I'd say that Claremont's X-Men from the Dark Phoenix Saga to Inferno (Plus New Mutants) are some of the best comics to come from Marvel for a really long time.
>>83080160
Unpopular opinion. The Dark Knight is a better book. And its more bold artistically experimenting with wide screen storytelling and Miller never uses blocks of text to have to universe build instead weaving the details into the conversation. Watchmen is at places clunky and unfocused. Indulging to much in experiment without payoff.
>>83080210
I fucking love that you said that because I spent the last half hour or so thinking and thats what I came up with.
Basically this thread started when I read this Moore quote on how the industry hasnt really moved on from Watchmen quality wise. And so feeling that was a bit of crock I started thinking of all the books I read to find one better than Watchmen.
I tried and I couldnt.
Which is a shame because I think the goal of any communuty should be progress. Comics should be better than they were in 1985 just like our phones and civil rights are.
And yet I was struggling to find something that went past a book that was, yes very good, but certainly not a divine peak of creativity never to be touched.
I am actually disapointed my favorite book is Watchmen.
>>83080447
Yeah great stuff snuggled up with a tpb in highschool.
Man I missed so many lunches and classes reading comics and websurfing in that library
>>83081451
I really dug tdkr'd first half, I think it went to shit in the second when the 80s started kicking into Frank.
>>83080160
>So does anyone have any recs for comics like Watchmen, books really built on exploring the characters as people and the world around them?
Millar's Ultimates
You should try Avengers Forever OP.
It does a good job exploring who the team members by using odd pieces to fill in the roster. Plus, it defines who Kang is and made him my favorite Marvel villain.
Watchmen is my favorite book too. I think it exemplifies a technique a lot of stories I love use, which is to toss you into a deep, established world, give you just enough history and backstory as needed to move the plot forward, but still evoke the idea that this is a fully fleshed out world that the story takes place in. It's the same principle that makes the original Star Wars trilogy work so well.
But ultimately what makes watchmen work SO well is that there is nothing else like it. I would say instead of looking for similar types of stories, look for artists who tell the kind of stories that can only be told as effectively by using the comics medium, and stories that utilize the comics medium to its fullest potential. Now that's a big, bad, broad category that includes Carls Barks duck comics, Will Eisner's graphic novel work, Art Spiegelman's Maus, early Peanuts, Krazy Kat and Ignatz, Frank Miller's Daredevil, Hernandez Bros, P Craig Russell...
Really, there's so much top shelf, soul enriching comics to read. Just start crossing of the list of whatever bourgie/artsy/scholarly "must read" list you can find. Most of the stuff that's critically praised and hyped up by literary types earns that status.
But there's still only one Watchmen.
>>83082217
I really fucking loved the vibe Ultimates had of this entire superhero culture and universe setting grtting started from the ground up. It felt like a roc doc.
Really peaked around the start of U2.
I wish he focused more on that than the cheap action theatrics.
>>83080160
>Watchmen fundamnetanlly is a charactdr study
And a shit one. Moore seems to think that Freudian psychoanalysis is an actual science when in reality it's on par with astrology.
>>83082061
People give Moore shit for being some kind of Grumpy wizard. He's right, though. Comics never advanced from a technical standpoint since Watchmen.
>>83082560
How do you feel about art that uses religious symbolism? The idea that the lens has to be scientific sounds like an objectivist talking point.
Wait, I get it. You're Rorschach! No wonder you didn't like the book.
I thought Ultimatum was great. Check it out.
>>83082661
Gonna need a little more meat before you fling that one into the lake my man.
>>83082742
But it was. I though t the whole thing was amazing.
>stupid characters that had terrible writing were killed off
>magneto was a badass
>was something you don't see every single time
>>83080160
Only reason normies like watchmen is for rorshach. They couldn't give two shits about the movies plot they just want more le edgy masked anti hero.
>>83082572
I fucking hate how right he is.
>>83080160
Marvels
The Dark Knight Returns was better I think. Moore was using his characters and his world to parody superheroes.
Miller made Batman into an actual, flawed human being, without putting characters through needless edgyness like rape, parent was a whore, stuff like that.
>>83083401
Miller isn't the first to do so with Batman.
>>83083441
I know, Denny O'Neil did it even earlier, and is arguably better than both Moore and Miller.
Marshal Law, the first book is honestly better then Watchmen. And i dont mean that as a dig to moore or anything, but ML is just that good.
>>83082572
>>83083263
Jesus, go fucking suck his dick or something. Moore IS just a bitter old man.
You guys are clearly under-read and think comics revolve around super heroes and the big two.
There are hundreds of thousands of different titles out there, many as good as or even better than Watchmen.
Try reading something that isn't in a "TOP 10 ESSENTIAL GRAPHIC NOVELS" list.
>>83084657
t. Indiean
>>83082661
Ittastes like chicken
>>83083401
Sure no "name" characters are raped but there is rape. And Selina Kyle owns an"Escort Service." So yes, whores and rape.
DKR is filled with parody. Watchmen is a deconstruction. Both are great but your line of reasoning, if genuine, is faulty.
>>83084719
Yeah, no shit I'm talking about indie comics.
You don't get to talk shit about the state of cape comics and then refuse to read anything that isn't big two, you retard.
>>83084800
>DKR is filled with parody. Watchmen is a deconstruction.
Both are deconstructions, but if one of them is a parody it is definitely Watchmen, since DKR is literally a Batman story.
>>83084803
Big 3 are the majority of cape comics tho.
>>83084838
But my point is that comics go beyond super hero shit.
>>83084893
I don't care. Cape or bust.
>>83084963
You clearly do since you're discussing this in this thread.
But sure, you'll just start being defensively ironic and shitpost instead of regarding my recommendations, so whatever, keep sucking Moore's cock and be a casual forever.
>>83085084
I don't even like Moore but ok.
Artistically, I think Blacksad and Siegfried are top notch.
For pure heart, hard to beat I Kill Giants or Yotsuba.
For great stories, I still push Transmetropolitan, Sandman, and Punisher Max: Born.
20th Century Boys gets a mention for nealy being a comic version of a Stephen King short story. Too bad the comic kind of just fizzles.
>>83085084
You havent even named any books
>>83085327
I'm going you sound like a total fag.
But I couldnt make it through the first chapter of ikj
I think I tapped out when they wete talking on the beach
It was just so dull.
A shame because I had Joe himself sign it in person after talking to him for like 90 minutes
>>83085413
It was not an easy starter.
I also forgot to add Batman: City of Crime to my list. Kind of wonderful to get that Chinatown meets Gotham vibe.
how do you people see watchmen in comparison to film and literature?
>>83085606
>>83085413
Well reading that got me to check.
I got to the end of chapter 2
I am actually gonna finish it tonight.
I have a big polygraph retest for a big gig tommrow and I suppose I could use the strength
The watchmen is a good examination on the nature of comics in an outdated 80s setting that people have too much nostalgia for.
Its passive aggressive in how it looks at comics and now its creator cant get the rights back.
The Boys is a better examination of the nature of comics, and is Blatently hostile vulgar comic, and DC couldnt wait to give the rights away to its creator.
>>83085738
Pretty good. Really uses the art graphically. Issue is there are tons of pretty good books like that. Comics have this bad habbit of grading on a curve.
Marshal Law is aight.
>>83085834
They offered Moore the rights in exchange for him agreeing to do prequels and sequels
He said no
>>83081451
>Miller never uses blocks of text to have to universe build
What about all those news interviews with Not Reagan
>The Popul Vuh inspired graphic design structure
How is it in anyway inspired by Popol Vuh? gotta use them big words to make yourself sound smart
Not exactly a comic, but Worm is a damn good read.
https://parahumans.wordpress.com/
Devilman for me its a proto-watchmen that does the end of the world way better and in a way more dangerous cold war.
Also have the top 2 comic fight scene ever (Devilman vs Silene, 86 pages of pure raw fighting)
Also, THIS FUCKING PAGE, HORY SHIT
>>83091176
I wish more of Go Nagai's stuff was published in the US, guy is a genius.
I mean yeah Glenn Danzig's comic company translated it in the 90s but we need more.
>>83091518
there is a supercool crossover in netflix this year
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wnmZgkGK9c
flex
>>83082061
>Comics should be better than they were in 1985 just like our phones and civil rights are.
Not really. It's a Jacob's ladder of quality: all the people here are getting better, but there are people leaving and talentless newbies coming all at once. Broadly, quality shouldn't advance but fluctuate. This really is NOT like phones, where technology has advanced and simply has gotten better. Art evolves alongside culture; that's not good or bad. After a certain amount of time, there simply isn't room for "improvement" in the same way as, say, creating new film techniques. It's been so long that any "new" thing you could think of has probably been done before. Though I do think he's right; things haven't moved onward because people like it the way it is. Reminds me of F451, not to go all doomsday.
I can't speak for heroes, but in general, I think there are a lot of good comics coming out in recent years. I read a lot of foreign stuff, though.
>>83085327
I would recommend Monster over 20th Century Boys, just as something that feels complete.
>>83080233
Are you saying he does notk ow his own favorite comic?
>>83085849
I'm ambivalent towards the art. One one hand, the realistic art looks kind of muddy with the thick black outlines, but I really liked the alternating colors in scenes without much movement. The layout itself bored me to tears, often making me feel like I may as well have been watching a movie, but the pacing was great BECAUSE of how well they utilized that uniform look.
As a piece of literature, I don't like how people see it compared to film or . . . literature. I enjoy reading literary criticism of novels, wherein the writer talks about not only how strongly the themes are put together, but how those ideas hold water. In other words, people can discuss whether or not they think the ideas presented are ACCURATE and CORRECT without really discussing whether the piece is, itself, well put-together.
With Watchmen, I often feel that doesn't work. That's likely a combination of the age of the medium and the current culture compared to the culture(s) from which literature has sprouted. There are loads of "classic" novels; there are very few classic comics, and most of them aren't that old. To bring it back to my point, when I try to talk about the things presented in Watchmen (or other Moore works) that I disagree with, I often find people arguing back as if I was saying that it was not well written. And while I will admit that his work isn't my favorite, that isn't my intention.
>>83093802
20th Century Boys feels a little too complete. Cut out the third act and you have the best mango this Earth has ever known.
New Frontier, and I'm not just saying that because Cooke just past away. It is a masterpiece of the super hero 'genre' that delves into what makes these characters who they are and doesn't sink itself to the "must be dark and gritty to be thought provoking" mindset.
>>83082572
>>83083335
GOD. Do you realize Richard Mcguire's here came out two years after watchmen, right? Theres a clear example of formal technique innovation, only two years after your supposed cornerstone of comics. And it's actual technical advancement, it introduced ways of working elements of comic usually taken for granted. It even had remarkable influence in such a big name as chris ware's, so it's clearly an innovation within the medium, not an isolated incident.
And that's just the clearest example that came to me, there's has been with no doubt more since.
And make no mistake, i highly aprecciate moore's work, but these statements are simply wrong
>>83082061
Jesus Christ could you be more wrong?
>>83080160
So want a book with
>muh realism
>"the heroes are the real bad guys!"
>"lol aren't superheroes silly?"
>edgy objectivism (because let's face it, you almost certainly idolize Rorschach)
>gore
>to be seen as someone with good taste in comics without actually having to read them
You're probably going to want to read The Dark Knight Returns.
>>83080160
In terms of structure?
Which is what you ought to be impressed by?
Tom King's Omega Men.
In terms of fun, tasty supplementary after-issue materials like newspaper articles, pastiche advertisements, and comic strips?
Greyshirt: Indigo Sunset
A mini-series based on his characters that Moore actually explicitly praised.
