Is it possible (and/or right) to continue Watchmen without Alan Moore?  The question is so oft posed and the resulting criticisms so well documented, it almost feels tiresome to repeat.  Art vs. commerce and yadda, yadda, yadda… I have nothing new to add to the ol’ Moore vs. DC debate.  I love Alan Moore and Dave Gibbon’s Watchmen.  On general reflex, I considered a prequel without their involvement at best foolhardy.  But also understand that from a market standpoint, Watchmen prequels are good business and an inevitability with or without the creators.  And so here we are with Before Watchmen – a prequel nobody really asked for, but one everyone still wants to read regardless (myself included).

This past week, I was invited to DC headquarters to sample the initial issues from the seven runs of Before Watchmen (each run focusing on an individual character or group: e.g. The Comedian, Rorschach, Nite Owl, Ozymandias, Silk Spectre, Dr. Manhattan and Minutemen).  I’ve been sworn to secrecy on plot points and narrative spoilers, but allowed to share general thoughts (I think) on whether or not you should pre-hate this comic you’re probably still going to buy anyways.  For more thoughts (some of which surprised myself), hit the jump.

In situations likes these it’s best to sigh and then shrug.  DC Comics has officially announced that they’ll be launching Before Watchmen, prequel comics based on Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmen.  While there have been murmurings of Watchmen prequel and sequel comics for years, the prequels will really happen now with writers and everything.  DC Comics asked Alan Moore for his blessing, but he (unsurprisingly) refused. He then returned to the woods to forage for nuts and berries.  However, Gibbons released a statement saying,

“The original series of Watchmen is the complete story that Alan Moore and I wanted to tell. However, I appreciate DC’s reasons for this initiative and the wish of the artists and writers involved to pay tribute to our work. May these new additions have the success they desire,”

Hit the jump for more, including a first look at the covers for the prequels.

Bleeding Cool is reporting that DC has some pretty definite plans to move forward with several sequels or even prequels to the Watchmen comics.  Why now, after over 20 years after the original graphic novel was published?  The popularity of the book since the release of the film adaptation’s release is one reason, but the driving force behind these plans is DC Comics’ Dan Di Dio.  Since previous DC Comics president and publisher Paul Levitz stepped down, new executive editor Dan DiDio seems determined to make a Watchmen sequel and reap the financial benefits.  Levitz prevented any continuation of the story despite various attempts to do so, most significantly in the Countdown multiverse, because doing so would be a terrible move creatively and would also go against the wishes of Dave Gibbons and Alan Moore.  Since Alan Moore decided he wanted nothing to do with DC as well as with Watchmen years ago and also refused to have anything to do with the film adaptation, it’s pretty likely that he’d never agree to get behind it, considering that he and Dave Gibbons reportedly have rights to first refusal.  Regardless, plans for a sequel seem to be moving ahead faster than most expected.

More after the jump:

This Tuesday, Warner Bros. is releasing the “ultimate cut” of “Watchmen,” a 5-disc box set intended to do the graphic novel justice–something that writer Alan Moore would be (but still isn’t) proud of.  The feature included is an hour longer than the theatrical release, and there are plenty of bonuses to be seen.  Go through it all with me, one disc at a time, after the jump.

After over two decades of controversy, fan anticipation, lawsuits, and thousands of naysayers claiming that it could never actually happen, Alan Moore’s groundbreaking graphic novel Watchmen finally got its silver-screen translation.  Although Moore’s name is conspicuously absent from the film’s credits (Dave Gibbons is oddly given solitary “co-creator” credit for the graphic novel), this is an adaptation that does more than stick to its source material.  It literally becomes it.  Warner Bros. has released director Zack Snyder’s extended cut in a two disc DVD set.  The added sequences manage to enhance the movie and further Snyder’s testament of devotion to the source material. Read my review after the jump:

Watchmen is one of the best films of 2009. It’s challenging, subversive, fascinating. It can’t compare with the original graphic novel, as made by Dave Gibbons and Alan Moore but it never could. Watchmen, the comic book was a revelation in its time. It took a part of our culture (superheroes through comic books) and perfectly dissected it. From the panels on down, it dealt with why they were created, and their limitations -from the character’s personal sexual hang ups to using their archetypes to show what they meant, and how they failed. My full review of the director’s cut is after the jump: