dave gibbons | the m0vie blog

New Escapist Column! On “Peacemaker” and “Watchmen”…

Posted on February 11, 2022 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the penultimate episode of Peacemaker released this week, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look at how the show – along with a lot of James Gunn’s work – exists in conversation with Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmen.

Gunn has been very candid that Watchmen is a major influence on his films, particularly his superhero films. However, what’s most striking about Gunn’s use of Watchmen as a source of inspiration is the fact that he actually engages with the text. Many of Gunn’s projects, particularly The Suicide Squad and Super, are very much in conversation with Watchmen, asking what that core text means in a slightly different modern context. That is just as true of Peacemaker, which not only draws from the comics that inspired Watchmen, but also extrapolates boldly out from Watchmen.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: On Second Thought | Tagged: alan moore, dave gibbons, escapist, in the frame, James Gunn, Peacemaker, the escapist, watchmen | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On Zack Snyder’s DCEU as a Joyride Through Comic Book History…

Posted on March 26, 2021 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the release of Zack Snyder’s Justice League last week, it seemed like a good opportunity to dig into the movie’s portrayal of Superman.

One of the more interesting aspects of Snyder’s work on Man of Steel, Batman v.s Superman and Zack Snyder’s Justice League is the sense in which it offers a capsule account of a certain stretch of comic book history, effectively dramatising the characters’ journey from the “dark ‘n’ gritty” comics inspired by Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns to the more aggressively and pointedly reconstructionist work of Grant Morrison on stories like Justice League or Final Crisis.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Comics, Movies | Tagged: alan moore, comic books, continuity, dave gibbons, escapist, final crisis, frank miller, grant morrison, Howard Porter, in the frame, justice league, the dark age of comic books, the dark knight returns, watchmen | Leave a comment »

Justice League Unlimited – For the Man Who Has Everything

Posted on December 18, 2010 by Darren

This post is part of the DCAU fortnight, a series of articles looking at the Warner Brothers animations featuring DC’s iconic selection of characters. I’ll be looking at movies and episodes and even some of the related comic books. We’re winding down now, having worked our way through the nine animated features, so I’m just going to look at a few odds-and-ends, some of the more interesting or important episodes that the DC animated universe has produced. The one adaptation of his work Alan Moore is actually happy with is well worth a look.

Van, when you were born, it was the happiest day of my life. When I first saw your beautiful little face, your tiny fingers squeezed my hand so tight, like you never wanted to let go. I’ve watched every step, every struggle…I-I’ve… but, Van… Oh, Rao help me… but I don’t think you’re real. I don’t think any of this is-is real…

– Superman confronts the fact that none of this is real

Alan Moore is one of the best comic book writers out there – and he’s perhaps the greatest writer ever to work with the character of Superman. Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? is an oft-referenced fond farewell to the Silver Age Superman (which prompted a similar storyline for Batman with Neil Gaiman’s Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader? in the wake of the character’s recent “death”), but I’ve always preferred his one-shot story For The Man Who Has Everything. Adapted into animated form as one of the first episodes of the relaunched Justice League Unlimited series.

Super-dad!

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: alan moore, batman, black mercy, dave gibbons, dc animated universe, dc comics, dc universe, dcau, for the man who has everything, Joe Chill, justice league, justice league unlimited, krypton, mongol, Smallville, superman, wonder woman | 7 Comments »

Wednesday Comics: Kamandi

Posted on August 28, 2010 by Darren

Earlier this week I reviewed Wednesday Comics, a rather spanking anthology from DC Comics. I kinda figured, however, it might be worth my while to break out some of those fifteen stories on their own (but not all of them) and discuss them, as it’s easy to lose sight of a particular writer/artist’s work in an anthology. I thought I’d turn my attention to one of the conspicuously non-superhero titles in the anthology, an adaptation of the classic Kirby comic, Kamandi.

Although Kamandi only debuted in 1972, there’s an argument to be made that the character is better suited to this particular format and style of storytelling than the DC superheroes which otherwise populate the collection. Created by the legendary Jack Kirby, Kamandi is the story of the last boy on earth, attempting to survive in a post-apocalyptic future ruled by hyper-evolved talking animals (rats, cats and – most viciously – apes). The character has a lasting cult appeal, but was never necessarily the most popular property at the publisher, but it’s nice that they dusted him off for this project. I have to admit being a bit surprised at the creative team – Dave Gibbons is regarded as an author, but made his name as an artist, so it’s strange to see him writing this – but it works, it really comes together and suits the unique format of the project perfectly.

Gibbons successfully apes the adventure comics of yore...

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: Comics, dave gibbons, dc comics, jack kirby, kamandi, ryan sook, wednesday comics | 2 Comments »

Wednesday Comics

Posted on August 25, 2010 by Darren

Hawkman unsheathes his knife and crawls into the gasping T-Rex’s jaws, thinking “Sadly, this is not the craziest thing I’ve ever done.”

– Hawkman

Wednesday Comics is an amazing little experiment, a bit of comic book nostalgia delivered by some of the most talented people in the business with a smile on their face and a skip in their step. For those who don’t know, DC Comics – always the more boldly experimental of the two major companies – ran a twelve-week collection of newspaper comic strips. Fifteen strips bundled together, the reader was offered one page of a given comic at a time on a super-sized newspaper sheet, with a full story told week-on-week. It was a bold little experiment and while the whole is almost certainly greater than the sum of its parts, there’s much to love here.