And so the end is now no longer nigh but upon us, the horsemen ride and the bacon have hit the sky besides them; Before Watchmen is here, look upon it ye mighty and despair – as a certain Pharaoh’s poem once said – for if the hype is to be believed it brings with it the end of the industry and perhaps existence itself. While weeping may be one valid response to the sight of this issue on your local stores stands there is another much saner one, one that will despite all of the debate be the standard reaction: buying it. That is exactly what I did, then I read it and now I am here to write a little about what I thought of that experience; kind of like I would if this were just another new title, which is exactly how I am treating the series.

Watchmen was the first comic book that I ever read and so it does mean a lot to me, but so does Batman to a whole host of boys and DC release new Bruce books monthly without any uproar, it’s just accepted as what they do. Maybe if I were also someone who saw the cultural impact that comic had on the industry, or maybe if I were more of an obsessive personality (One of my greatest disappointments in life is that I am too tempered to ever go into a zionist rage over an art announcement) then I would think differently, but I don’t so here we are. As with those Batman books some of these Before Watchmen titles will be good while others are sure to be bad and so I aim in future to simply say of the issues in which camp they fall and why, with a bit of metaphorical deconstruction thrown in for fun; there won’t then be so much of an intro for each issue. So now to the issue itself. Read the rest of this entry »