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[Mothra]

I thought Watchmen was already a prequel to Watchmen. Knowing any more about the characters would almost certainly ruin them.

Are they so creatively bankrupt at this point that they're not content just trying to emulate Watchmen for 25 years, they now have to straight up just make more Watchmen? God, come up with new ideas.

They tried that with Galacta: Daughter of Galactus and it was a disaster!!!

Best play it safe from here on out (to eternity)

[Brentai]

#46: Silk Spectre I gets raped a different way in every issue (but stll always on a pinball table.)

#47: All of the original Minutemen have actual super powers but lose them and decide to tell everyone that they never had super powers.

[Ziiro]

Counting the days until "Saturday Morning Watchmen" is a real thing.

[Thad]

Bears noting that Alan Moore pitched Watchmen prequels back in the '90's.

So, thing one: Alan Moore's beef isn't against Watchmen prequels ON PRINCIPLE, it's just his usual gripe about how thoroughly DC screwed him.

Thing two: the problem is not that they're doing this without Alan Moore.  This would be a bad idea even if Alan Moore were doing it himself.

Thing three: I'll say one thing, Silk Spectre is bound to be much more pleasant as written by Darwyn Cooke than it would be if written by Alan Moore.

[Mongrel]

#48, the Minutemen from Watchmen turn into the Minutemen from 100 Bullets. Dr. Manhattan probably responsible somehow.

[Ted Belmont]

What's the phrase you'd use for "Rolling in their grave" but for people who are still alive?

Because I'm pretty sure that's how I'd describe Alan Moore.

Rolling in his beard

[Zaratustra]

Alright, I'm placing my bets.
let's say... two of the series will be pretty good (I'm betting on Comedian and the pirate one)
Four will be solid but mostly pedestrian empty plots like most of the New 52 books
and two will be a hideous mess that will posit all sorts of fan-enraging points (probably Rorshach and Ozymandias)

[Büge]

#49: Ozymandias gets hooked on Bigfoot Bonkers. He's beaten by an eight-year-old and vows revenge.

[Thad]

and two will be a hideous mess that will posit all sorts of fan-enraging points (probably Rorshach and Ozymandias)

See, I'm not much of an Azzarello fan but I think he's a good pick for Rorschach.

REALLY not much of a Bermejo fan, though.

[Zaratustra]

So JMS caught breath of the Babylon 5 comparisons and you can bet he pulled the "totes not the same thing" card:

 “First, we have to take the word ‘permission’ off the table. Warner Bros. owns Babylon 5 lock, stock and phased-plasma guns, just as DC owns the Watchmen characters. [...] But I get that we’re talking about the emotional aspect of all this, not the legal stuff, which is pretty cut and dry,” he wrote. “So again: apples to apples. How would I feel if Babylon 5 were being made and I were shut out of anything to do with it, despite my desire to be involved? I’d feel pretty crummy about it. But as it happens, that has absolutely nothing to do with this situation in any way, manner, shape or form.”

“If Warners offered me creative freedom, money and a budget to do the show the way I wanted, up to and including my completely owning the show, and I said no to that deal, and if after Warners waited TWENTY FIVE YEARS for me to change my mind they finally decided to go ahead and make B5 without me … then I would have absolutely zero right to complain about it,” Straczynski wrote. “Because it was my choice to remove myself from the process, it wasn’t something foisted upon me by anybody else.”

http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/2012/02/before-watchmens-straczynski-addresses-babylon-5-comparisons/

He has a rather narrow view of "foist" there.

[Thad]

Warner Bros. owns Babylon 5 lock, stock and phased-plasma guns, just as DC owns the Watchmen characters.

Huh.  I wasn't aware WB had agreed to revert ownership of B5 back to JMS after it stopped selling the show on DVD, and then just kept selling the DVD's forever.

[Thad]

Kevin Smith was offered one of the prequels, turned it down.

Good for him -- though he's probably got a whole lot more money than the guys who said "Yes," so he can afford to be nobler.

[Bal]

Also, he may have realized that he does not write good comic books.

[Brentai]

Not to be a dick but it sounds like he was more worried about being directly measured against Moore than anything else.  He's never had any problem adding dick jokes and gunbows to other franchises with a long amalgamous history of writers.

[Mongrel]

It may even be simpler than that: This is Kevin Smith after all. Everything else aside, he has a good nose for fanboy sentiment.

He may have just figured this carries a very high chance of being reviled and figured he didn't want to dance on those particular train tracks.

[Thad]

Also, he may have realized that he does not write good comic books.

Well, I quite like every comic he's done that's been set in the View Askewniverse.  I mean, clearly that's not what you meant, but they are in fact comic books and I do think they're good.

I also really liked Quiver right up until the end with all the Satanism and child sacrifice.  That was a big WTF at the end of a series that had been a lot of fun up to that point.

And Spider-Man/Black Cat proved that he's at least worthy of being compared to Alan Moore on the subject of adding a bunch of rape to a story for no goddamn reason.

It may even be simpler than that: This is Kevin Smith after all. Everything else aside, he has a good nose for fanboy sentiment.

He may have just figured this carries a very high chance of being reviled and figured he didn't want to dance on those particular train tracks.

Didn't stop him from retconning "Batman pissed himself" into Year One.

Granted, my immediate reaction to all the fanboy bitching about that was "Guys, Year One is still Year One; he didn't actually change it."

But then I watched the Year One DTV and damned if I could keep "Batman just pissed himself" out of my head during that scene.  Have to side with the fanboys on that one -- Smith may not have actually ruined Year One, but he DID permanently and negatively impact my enjoyment of it.

Of course, getting raked over the coals for that is probably WHY he's leery of shit like this.

[Mothra]

It still boggles my mind that he thought for a moment that it was a good idea.

[Brentai]

Rule of Funny.

NOTE: Rule of Cool always preempts Rule of Funny.  Never forget this.

[Thad]

But it WASN'T funny.  And it doesn't seem like he INTENDED it to be funny -- his defense of it hasn't even been "Come on guys, it's just a pee joke, what did you expect from me?", it's this trying-too-hard "I've talked to firefighters and it happens in stressful situations, even to the bravest people in the world."  (Although he DID kinda give a mocking-the-fans "And DC let me print it and it's canon now, so haw-haw."  Which is childish but what the hell, fans who obsess over canon totally deserve to be mocked for it.)

The context of the scene isn't that it's a cheap joke.  It's Batman, in a moment of vulnerability, admitting something embarrassing to a new hero who is self-conscious that he doesn't have what it takes.  Its importance to the story is that Batman is starting to trust this guy and open up to him.

Which makes it all the more weird and out-of-place.

(Also at the end [spoiler]the new guy turns out to be Smith's awesomely-named-but-lame villain Onomatopoeia, and as soon as Batman trusts him enough to bring him to the Batcave and reveal his identity, Onomatopoeia turns around and fridges his girlfriend.[/spoiler]  Really, what the fuck, Kevin Smith?)

[Büge]