4 Alan Moore stories that are better than Watchmen

Watchmen is a good, and even a great, comic. But the best ever written? Hardly—and it's not even Alan Moore's best work, either. Here are my picks for Moore stories slightly more deserving of the praise that's heaped on Watchmen.

1. Miracleman*

Much of what Moore does in Watchmen he did first and better with this series. This reimagining of Marvelman, the UK's homegrown Captain Marvel knockoff, is the grandaddy of all "what-would-it-be-really-be-like" superhero stories. Few comics stories so fully embody the concept of superheroes as mythology: the title character is, quite literally, a god; his chief villain, former sidekick Kid Miracleman, is far more demonic than the word "villain" implies. Little surprise, then, that Neil Gaiman's follow-up run (incidentally his best work ever, too) treats Moore's 16 issues as scripture on which to build an exegesis. Add to all that career-best art from the likes of John Totleben, Alan Davis, and Garry Leach, and you've got my pick for the best comic of all time. 

2. From Hell

Moore's meticulously-imagined recreation of Victorian London is far more than a Jack the Ripper story. Using the 1888 murders as a backdrop, the story explores the nature of mysticism, insanity, and evil. Nothing in this story is out of place, and at times—such as when the killer seems to travel through time after one of the murders—the reader gets a glimpse of bizarre transcendence, too.

3. "The Anatomy Lesson," Saga of the Swamp Thing #21

This is the one that really started it all, launching not only Alan Moore's career in American comics but also singlehandedly creating the entire idea of mainstream mature-readers comics. Moore had an inspired way of wrapping up the loose ends of the previous writer's plot threads: he killed the title character in his first issue, and in this, his second, he quite literally rebuilds him from the ground up. Neil Gaiman, Grant Morrison, and Warren Ellis—in other words, the last 20 years of comics—owe everything to the model Moore created here. And all that in 23 pages! (DC has made "The Anatomy Lesson" available for free here. Be arned that the coloring is wonky; Swampie is yellow instead of green-and-brown. Maybe they mistook him for the Floronic Man?)

4. "Watchmaker," Watchmen #4

If I have one complaint about Watchmen, it's this: it doesn't live up to the promise of this, its single best chapter and possibly the best single issue of a comic ever created. The rhythm of Dr. Manhattan's melancholy origin story is simply perfect, and in his time-detached reminiscences we get a glimpse inside the mind of a god. Here is a part that's greater than its sum.

Runners-up (or "about as good as Watchmen"):

Promethea: Like Watchmen, the series is a bit too long for its story. But Moore's exploration of his own religious/magical ideas is fascinating, and the art is simply gorgeous. 

Top Ten: Alan Moore has a darned good sense of humor, and this superhero-cop mashup is his funniest. 

Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?: This "last Superman story" is a great meditation on the nature and meaning of an icon.

A Small Killing: You'd be forgiven for never having heard of it. This collaboration with Oscar Zarate is a character study of an advertising executive who begins to question the path his life has taken. Short and sweet (or should that be "sour"?)

*Some would say "Marvelman," the title under which the series began in the UK. But later—particularly in the Neil Gaiman issues—the term "Miracle" becomes an important part of the setting. If and when the series is ever reprinted or completed, I for one hope they stick with "Miracleman" as the title. 

Oh, and also, I really wish they would stop calling Zack Snyder a "visionary director." 

Comments

[Debrevis de la Fontes]

Zach Snyder has vision. They gave him an eye test and everything.

[Elliot]

Well, not for the first time, we've been thinking some similar thoughts. I was just reading Miracleman for the first time ever over the last few days, while noticing all the Watchman hype, and I thought "Hmm, Miracleman is better and smarter than Watchmen... and so is some of Moore's other work."

I don't think Miracleman is MY favourite ever. Sometimes Moore's prose is just too gushingly self-indulgent, and some of his big, clever ideas seem a little hokey or threadbare. I guess that's the problem with a mere human trying to write with the intelligence and worldview of a god. Still, it's powerful, original stuff, some of his best work ever. And reading it I came across many things that later writers have since ripped off or elaborated on. (Which I HAD thought was original to them...)

Top Ten was the comic I had the most fun reading last year... which is what my 'best of' blog post is going to say... when I get around to finishing it.

I certainly agree with your other selections - except for From Hell and A Small Killing which I really must get around to reading...

[Elliot]

PS: One tiny detail that irritated me about Miracleman was the line about an alien liking the "Eskimo" language because it had "all those words for snow." Of course there's no one Inuit language, and they don't have any more words for snow than English does - maybe less, depending on how you count "words."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eskimo_words_for_snow

Maybe it was realizing that I knew more about something than the "super-intelligent" narrator did which kicked me back out of my absorption in the story. And there were a few other things like that, where I'd think "Heck, I could do a better job of godhood than this guy."

[Erin]

Watchmen isn't my favorite work by Alan Moore, but I think it's the one most deserving of the label literature... with everything good AND bad that implies.

"Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow" is probably my favorite.

[Gabriel Mckee]

Elliot: I think a lot of my love for Miracleman comes from my idiosyncratic reading order: I had read a couple of the early Moore issues, and then stumbled across the Gaiman ones. I hadn't seen a single issue of the Olympus storyline, but Gaiman's issues treat it as a mythical event, a genesis narrative for their society... which is pretty darned cool. I can certainly accept that those issues may have built up Olympus a bit... but when I was finally able to read it, I was hardly disappointed. Also, I LOVE John Totleben. A lot. Way more than I love Dave Gibbons.

Erin: Really? Even more deserving than From Hell? (I mean, not that I am a big fan of labelling one thing as against another "literature." Heck, I'd call D.R. and Quinch "literature.")

[Erin]

You got me: I've never actually read From Hell. Keep meaning to get around to it, though.

But, of the comics I have read, Watchmen is the one that most felt like literature. That's not limited to Moore's work: that's including every comic I've ever read.

Now, to be clear, this isn't the same as saying it's the BEST comic I've ever read: I have a much harder time settling on any kind of metric to make that sort of distinction.

But, when I got to the end of Watchmen, I said: "That felt like reading a work of literature."

Considering that this places it in the same company as Moby Dick and The Grapes of Wrath, I'll leave it up to others to decide whether this is in fact a compliment.

[Shaun]

Imagine if two visionary directors like Paul W.S. Anderson and Zack Snyder got together to make a film. It would be teh awesome.