For the past year or so, Rob Liefeld has been doing a podcast called Robservations. In the most recent episode, Rob discusses Alan Moore's feuds, mostly with DC Comics over Watchmen and ABC.
For the most part, his observations are taken from things he read on the internet and often incomplete stories. But occasionally, he'll talk about his own experiences, which is when the podcast gets interesting.
For this blog, I try to keep things on the topic of Supreme and Awesome, which Rob brought up a number of times:
- Rob talked about Moore coming to work on Violator vs. Badrock (Rob was as shocked as the rest of us when Moore agreed to that one!).
- He also talked about how Moore demanded to be paid when he turned in a script, by turning in vouchers, and that it wasn't uncommon for Rob to pay out $20,000; $40,000 or $60,000 at a time. (at about 37:55)
- He reiterated that Moore offered up Steve Moore as the continuing writer for Supreme while Alan Moore worked on his ABC line.
- Rob said there was no truth to rumors that he was shopping Awesome to DC as his funding was drying up (at about 47:38)
- The most interesting part for me (even if it doesn't have much to do with Awesome) was when Liefeld said that Jim Lee had invested too much money in his Gen13 film and as a consequence had to sell Wildstorm to DC.
There's not much new here, but Liefeld is a good storyteller. But fair warning, it's advisable not to take everything as pure fact.
Khoury himself met, and interviewed then met again, Alan Moore for a complete book-interview and G. Khoury stated he had been told the first Spawn (the Moore one - issue 8 ''IN HEAVEN'') was possibly offered a truly high payment in residuals -- 100k.
ReplyDeleteAn interview somewhere else, by T. McFarlane had McFarlane also say the issues for Gaiman, Frank Miller, and Moore were some high residual payment - 100 thousand!
The fact was true about the women's 'MARVEL WHIRLING' ad in LEAGUE...GENTLEMEN - a full run of an for #5 was destroyed/pulped - because they (DC, publishers, whichever person) felt the Marvel Syringe ad should replace the 'D OUCHE' part because that word with MARVEL might offend another publisher.
Moore, true, has principals, but looking at the history of publishers, the rights for comics, the royalties and disputes including Jack Kirby and family, Moore was not the first and not the last with problems [he is in no way the first to get the shaft] by tactics of publishing companies.
Anyway: just imagine, a comic and script for one single issue for a comic of around USD 100K.
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Those early Spawn issues were selling some insane numbers, so I don't doubt it. Moore may not act like it, but he certainly has been well paid for his time in comics.
DeleteI just wanted to say how much I appreciate this site. Thank you for doing what you do!!!
ReplyDeleteHappy to. Thanks for coming to check it out.
DeleteRight, but Liefeld (for better and worse) represents a certain part of the comics community that can't see beyond the standard properties of the "big two." Many people think about what could have been if DC had let Moore do a serious Superman run (though I can't imagine it would be better than Supreme).
ReplyDeleteBut I agree that Moore moved on and was interested in much different things than Liefeld would be interested in. Frankly, I'm interested to see how Moore does as a novel writer. I suspect he will find the business side of such much less disagreeable than comics has been.
I do sometimes think about what-ifs related to Alan staying in DC and doing Superman but you know, even then I'm deeply aware that it wouldn't have lasted long and inevitably Alan would go to other companies that allow creator-owned project of some kind, just like lots of others did at that time. I guess I can't help thinking about Alan's superhero stuff because it's all fun! the guy can really write fun, entertaining stories even if theme can be deep/philosophical. but again, I am deeply aware he's not doing that ever again at this pt unless he changes his mind 180 degree.
ReplyDeleteyeah Rob sadly represents sort of comic fandom, the very vocal chunk of it that is all about (standard) superhero. listening to a lot of his podcast, it really bugs me that he really seems to hate comic that's not really commercial, especially ones that came out during his professional career. he said Walt Simonson's Fantastic Four was bad because it didn't sell and it didnt feature standard "FF vs Dr Doom" stuff people are familiar with...not that Im too familiar with Walt's run, but im pretty sure there are lots of people who liked his run because it was different from what was coming out back then, and he tried out lots of kooky time travel stuff. so yeah Rob is kind of entertaining guy but his narrow scope of what (good) comic should be is kind of irritating... in his opinion comic kind of has to have that action movie element. I wonder what he would think if he encounters Eddie Campbell's autobio stuff
Yeah, I think you're right. Moore wasn't going to stick long with DC no matter what happened. I wish the self-publishing had worked out better for him, but if it had, we probably never would have gotten Supreme or ABC.
ReplyDeleteI think you got Rob's mentality exactly right. He looks at it in terms of an action movie. 1) Is the action cool? 2) How much money did it make? And that's fine. There's room enough for everyone to like what they like. It's just sad because he's sitting on some of Moore's work and we'll never see it because he doesn't think it would make money. Oh, and I sincerely doubt Eddie Campbell's stuff is Rob's cup of tea.
yeah I'm not entirely against Rob's idea of comic books, he's said reading comics helped getting through tough situation in his family regarding his father's illness so I know his passion is somewhat real. I'm a bit sad that he is pretty narrow when it comes to taste or what he respects in comics. he kinda trashes Alan a lot too because Alan got out as soon as Awesome's money dried up or whatever...that's so spiteful. if he's sitting on Alan's Awesome work...wow that's sad, he needs to open the vault for that, im sure at least some people would appreciate it and maybe someone younger like myself would rediscover it.....I found out about 1963 from Cartoonist Kayfabe (I know, its recent) and looking at 1963 and Supreme, it really changed the idea of Alan being just hater/bitter old man who complains about superhero movies. like....the guy LOVES superhero comics. his bitterness must come from business shenanigan or just how he just wants to move on from "gritty" and "real" superhero thing people still imagine from him
ReplyDeletealso action movie influence, I have to chuckle every time I remember that his idea of Cable is to merge arnold schwarzenegger from Terminator AND Predator...like that's so dumb but kind of ingenious considering Cable is kind of a huge character.
Yeah, Supreme and 1963 show a side of Moore that he didn't dwell on very long, a side that loved the optimism and silliness of superheroes. It's my favorite thing about the Awesome works.
ReplyDeleteAs for Liefeld, I imagine everything Moore did will come out eventually, but probably well after most anyone will care.
There'll always be some of us who care immensely, and we'll be all the more thankful for it.
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