Search results
exploitation. Notable amongst these so-called mature revisions were Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns (discussed in Chapter 3) and Alan Moore’s Watchmen (discussed in Chapter 7). The point to make, however, is that although social attitudes have affected the evolution of the genre, it is not true that these changes were forced on an inherently limited and conservative concept. Change was built in right from the start. This is the reason that they are so open to creative development and remain so popular today. As Henry Jenkins has argued, calling changes to a superhero
nationalist and imperialist ideologies found in ‘Dan Dare’ (in the Eagle , 1950–1967); down to much deeper critiques, more removed in time from the period itself (such as in Alan Moore's League of Extraordinary Gentlemen , 1999–2007). 74 Images of empire and imperialism from the past have been a ready-made source of material for political cartoonists down to the present day, serving as a perfect means of critiquing neo-imperialist tendencies. Similarly, the desire to contest royal and imperial authority shaped the French
superheroes regularly take animals as their totems, Animal Man represents the totemic relation itself and articulates our deep kinship with and dependency on the animal kingdom. Aside from Animal Man, another character that clearly marks our connectedness and mutual dependency, this time to the realm of plants and vegetation, is Swamp Thing. In the first chapter of Book 1 of Alan Moore’s run (Moore, Bissette and Totleben, 1987), we find Swamp Thing, formerly the chemist Alec Holland, in a cryo-chamber, presumed dead after being shot. He is the ‘property’ of a company
. Modern Gothic and horror artists still work in the stereoscopic medium offering images of monsters, witches, axe-murderers and vampires but buyers should display caution. Some of these tableaux are really lenticular images, which jump under the viewer’s gaze and display a certain, transitory depth but are based on a different form of technology, as are contemporary holograms. Alan Moore and Kevin O
herself to a ‘coffee machine’ that has been ‘abused’. Thus, ‘lycanthropy’ is an alternative to the patriarchal control of both the home and the contemporary workplace. Unlike in Alan Moore’s graphic story ‘The Curse’, in which a beleaguered and menstruating housewife turns her lycanthropic rage against her husband, ripping him to pieces in their family home, Shakira’s ‘She Wolf
replacing their Doctor Rhythm drum machine with Kevin Haskins. The band recorded one highly recommended album of macabre, twisted minimal pop to underground applause before breaking up following an American tour in 1984. During this time, David J had released two solo albums and collaborated with other musicians. He also meshed his creativity with fellow Northampton resident, the iconic comic book artist Alan Moore, in the short-lived band The Sinister Ducks. It was in this fractured environment that a Bauhaus reformation
that Ginger’s close and complex relationship to her sister Brigitte (who becomes a werewolf herself in the sequel) keeps Ginger as a member of a social unit throughout the film. See also, Alan Moore’s graphic story ‘The Curse’ ( Swamp Thing 40 (September 1985)), in which Phoebe, though a predatory and lonely lycanthrope, is constructed through her role as
’s novel. Perhaps Steffen Hantke had this in mind when he observed that a special relationship seems to exist between Shelley’s Frankenstein and modern writers of neo-Victorian fiction (250). While some of the most famous neo-Victorian texts (works like William Gibson and Bruce Sterling’s The Difference Engine , Neal Stephenson’s The Diamond Age , or Alan Moore’s League of Extraordinary Gentlemen ) make no reference to Shelley’s Creature, many other pieces bear out Hantke’s observation, including the two texts on which this chapter will
lavish sets.’ 105 The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen was loosely based on the initial volume of Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill's graphic novel series, first published in 1999, which features a collection of famous Victorian fictional superheroes, all outcasts. Moore had sent an initial treatment to Murphy while he was producing From Hell (2001), based on another of Moore's graphic novels about Jack the Ripper. Moore had become the central author in the burgeoning ‘steampunk’ cultural
reprieve, asking Gilliam to direct the graphic novel Watchmen , Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ classic comic book series about conflicted superheroes who exist in an alternative version of America’s history. 1 Gilliam was drawn to Watchmen , with its dark overtones and caustic take on American dreams, as well as its ambitious scope, making it for him ‘the War and Peace of comic books’. 2