Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, and Comic Code

Reading Neil Gaiman's blog and he just came across an interview he did of Alan Moore back in '85.

I still need to read Watchmen. The movie comes out next week. That or I'll enjoy a movie with little knowledge of the original so I'm not comparing it for the whole couple of hours.

I'll be seeing it in Imax at the midnight showing with Mike and the guys, and again Monday when they go to visit their professor Scott from up north. Ice cream cake and a comic movie. Does it get better?

So, earlier in class, after a talk about the U.K. and vague laws that make almost anything count as pornographic, there was a discussion of the Comic Code, and how it wasn't so much a law as something imposing that offered safety to weary parents. It doesn't mean something won't get put out, although some stores refuse to carry anything for adults or people freak out if there is an adult section where everything is sealed in plastic in a backroom. This article covers it. Moore talks about how Swamp Thing had very controversial topics and DC decided to publish it anyway, without the code sticker. The world didn't end, and sometime in the years after, Vertigo was been created for adults who like pictures with their adult subject matter.

And wonderfully so, Sandman is my favorite series and is very intelligent. I bought the Vertigo Encyclopedia a couple months ago and intend to use it as a personal guide for graphic novels to read.

I think I'll put V for Vendetta on. Mike and I were discussing it earlier.