alan moore – PopCult Reviews

Comic Book Review – Top 10 Compendium

Top 10 Compendium (2022)
Reprints Top 10 #1-12, Smax #1-5, Top 10: The Forty-Niners, Top 10: Beyond the Farthest Precinct #1-5, Top 10: Season Two #1-4, Top Ten: Season Two Special #1
Written by Alan Moore, Phillip De Fillippo, Xander Cannon, and Kevin Cannon
Art by Gene Ha, Xander Cannon, and Jerry Ordway

In 1999, Wildstorm Comics announced a new imprint, America’s Best Comics (ABC). This initiative would be centered around the work of Alan Moore, best known for comics like Watchmen, From Hell, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and more. Titles published under this banner included Promethea (a personal treatise from Moore on his magic beliefs), Tom Strong (an homage to pulp heroes), and the book Top 10 (a police procedural). Moore worked with artist Gene Ha on the first Top 10 mini-series and the follow-up graphic novel The Forty-Niners, with other creatives handling later series. The idea behind Top 10 is an intriguing hook: what would the police be like in a city full of superheroes and other fantastical beings?

Comic Book Review – The Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume Six

The Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume Six (2014)
Reprints Swamp Thing #57-64
Written by Alan Moore and Stephen Bissette
Art by Rick Veitch, John Totleben, and Alfredo Alcala

As Alan Moore’s Watchmen maxi-series was making waves in comics, he was also writing the final issues of Swamp Thing. The writer was interested in connecting the elemental hero with the space/cosmic elements in the DC Universe. While the delve into the occult was successful because Swamp Thing’s character lent itself to that genre, this foray into science fiction is a more mixed bag. Moore is clearly being more experimental, and that causes the series to lose some of the humanity that made it so compelling in the early collections. These aren’t poorly written stories, but I could see them turning off some readers because of how Abby gets sidelined for a big chunk.

Comic Book Review – The Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume Five

The Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume Five (2011)
Reprints Swamp Thing #51-56
Written by Alan Moore
Art by Rick Veitch, John Totleben, and Alfredo Alcala

Coming off an incredible piece of horror writing, Moore keeps things chugging along at full steam in the pages of Swamp Thing. Our hero has faced the ultimate evil and has been the only one to stop it. However, there was lots of trouble bubbling over in the land of the living that directly affected the Swamp Thing. While the Crisis on Infinite Earths seems to have little consequence in these pages, we begin to see our main character connect with traditional superheroes outside of Houma, Louisiana, with this particular volume including a clash in Gotham City with Batman.

Comic Book Review – The Saga of The Swamp Thing Volume Four

The Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume Four (2010)
Reprints The Saga of the Swamp Thing #43-45, Swamp Thing #46-50
Written by Alan Moore
Art by Stephen Bissette, John Totleben, Stan Woch, Rick Veitch, Alfredo Alcala, Ron Randall, and Tom Mandrake

This collection from Moore’s Swamp Thing run sealed the deal for me. I haven’t ever read better moments of horror in a comic book than some of the sequences in these issues. Moore knows how to take surreal imagery and turn it into dread-inducing moments where reality bends & warps. In that distortion, we are treated to a story that blends horror with epic dark fantasy. It’s fascinating to see how Moore set a standard for the occult corner of the DC Universe that has held strong four decades later.

Comic Book Review – The Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume Three

The Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume 3 (2010)
Reprints The Saga of the Swamp Thing #35-38, Swamp Thing #39-42
Written by Alan Moore
Art by Stephen Bissette, John Totleben, Stan Woch, Rick Veitch, Alfredo Alcala, and Ron Randall

This third volume of Swamp Thing stories starts with an issue published the same month Crisis on Infinite Earths #1 hit the stands. Now, there isn’t a direct link between the two things right away, but Moore eventually shows he was well aware of the storyline and finds a clever way to fold it into this ongoing series. There are times when Swamp Thing feels wholly disconnected from the greater DC Universe; this would increase more when it became a Vertigo title in the 1990s and became utterly self-contained. Before we get to some of Moore’s big moves, the book begins with a chilling two-parter about how Americans have left their home a toxic nightmare.

Comic Book Review – The Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume Two

The Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume Two (2009)
Reprints The Saga of the Swamp Thing #28-34, Annual #2
Written by Alan Moore and Len Wein
Art by Stephen Bissette, John Totleben, Shawn McManus, Rick Veitch, Alfredo Alcala, Ron Randall, and Berni Wrightson

Now that Alan Moore has reset the table for Swamp Thing, he wanted to tell stories you weren’t finding in most of the books published by DC and Marvel. Having established that Swamp Thing was not a resurrected Alec Holland but a mass of plant matter imbued with life from the chemicals Holland was doused in allowed different narratives to be spun. To close out that chapter of Swamp Thing’s life, he gave us “The Burial,” the opening story of this collection. The creature is seemingly visited by the ghost of Alec Holland and relives the events that led up to the scientist’s murder. It concludes with Swamp Thing finding Holland’s remains at the bottom of the bog and giving them a proper burial. That part of his life is officially over; now it’s time for something new.

Comic Book Review – The Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume One

Saga of the Swamp Thing Volume One (2009)
Reprints The Saga of the Swamp Thing #20-27
Written by Alan Moore
Art by Steve Bissette, John Totleben, Dan Day, and Rick Veitch

By 1983, the “cool kids” knew about Alan Moore and Swamp Thing introduced him to the rest of comics fandom. Before being brought to DC Comics, Moore had been working away on U.K. titles and Miracleman, the revival of a British superhero intended to be their version of Shazam. His work on the weekly science fiction anthology 2000AD got the attention of DC editor Len Wein, who hired Moore to take over the title from Wein himself. Swamp Thing had initially debuted as a one-off in the horror anthology House of Secrets #92. Later, the character would be reworked, transplanted to the modern day, and become part of a relatively formulaic ongoing series. Moore’s arrival drastically changed the book’s status.

Comic Book Review – Miracleman Volume 3

Miracleman Volume 3: Olympus
Reprints Miracleman #11-16, Annual 1
Written by Alan Moore
Art by John Totleben

After the first six issues of Miracleman published in the United States by Eclipse, they got Alan Moore to return to continue the story. This was happening right as Moore was breaking out as the writer on the critically beloved Swamp Thing and Watchmen. Because so much time had passed between the events of the original UK Marvelman short comics and these reprints, the writer decided to use a framing device, jumping a few years ahead. Now Miracleman is reflecting on what happened while flying through a palatial tower. The reader would immediately wonder where he is and what led to this place, creating an evocative narrative hook.

Comic Book Review – Miracleman Volume 2: The Red King Syndrome

Miracleman: The Red King Syndrome
Reprints Miracleman #5-10
Written by Alan Moore
Art by Alan Davis and Chuck Beckham

In 2012, researchers at the University of Cambridge did a survey of the British people about their beliefs in conspiracy theories. It was found that 60% of Britons believe at least one conspiracy theory. Some of those theories accepted by residents of the U.K. include the government hiding the exact immigration numbers in the country, a plot to make Muslims the political majority in the kingdom, and most telling, that while they are told their country is a democracy, everything is run by a power elite. (The Guardian UK). These theories about the actual workings of the world have percolated in Western cultures for centuries, but it was the 1980s and 90s where they came to full fruition, able to guide the momentum of elections and referendums. In this second volume of Miracleman, Alan Moore fleshes out a conspiracy related to the rulers of the world that speaks to some more significant metaphysical points.

Comic Book Review – Miracleman Volume 1: A Dream of Flying

Miracleman Volume 1: A Dream of Flying
Reprints Miracleman #1-4
Written by Alan Moore
Art by Garry Leach and Alan Davis

Your first question may likely be, “Who is Miracleman?” Well, you start with Fawcett Comics and their flagship character Captain Marvel. You know him today as Shazam. Captain Marvel was more popular than Superman at one point in the 1940s. Elvis Presley’s hairstyle is based on Cap’s sidekick, Captain Marvel Jr. In 1951, DC eventually sued Fawcett claiming that Cap was too similar to Superman and thus a copyright violation. The courts ruled in favor of DC and Fawcett ceased publication of Captain Marvel. Years later, DC would buy the now failed Fawcett Comics and fold Cap into their properties.