After Awesome Part 1: ABC and Tom Strong

As I've now finished all of Moore's Awesome issues that came out, I'm going to start dealing with what came next in a series I'm calling After Awesome. I'll take a look at all the Supreme, Youngblood and Glory series that came out since (I might ignore Prophet since we never saw Moore's proposal and I have no idea how different his series would have been). I'll also take a look at the ABC line with a view to how they were a direct offshoot of Awesome. If there's anything else you'd like me to add to this group, just shoot me an email or put it in the comments.

So let's start with America's Best Comics. When news started to get around that Awesome had died, Alan Moore's phone started ringing, offering him work. Having some respect for Jim Lee, he decided to take Jim Lee's offer and set up a whole line of comics under the imprint: America's Best Comics. (He had already set up League of Extraordinary Gentlemen there, which was why it was creator owned when the others weren't.)

Part of his plan was to set up the comics with his Awesome artists. He set up Tom Strong for his Supreme artist Chris Sprouse. He set up Top Ten for Youngblood artist Steve Skroce, though Skroce turned the series down. He set up Promethea for Glory artist Brandon Peterson, though Peterson turned him down, too. Alex Ross helped Moore find new artists for those two series. Tomorrow Stories featured some of his favorite artists in Melinda Gebbie, Rick Veitch and Jim Baikie (all three who had worked on Supreme).

I'm not going to get into all of the ABC series because there's not a ton of overlap with the Awesome work, but I do want to talk about Tom Strong now and Promethea in a separate post.

Rob Liefeld, when talking about the ABC line, said:

"...much of the ABC line is made up of poorly masked Awesome characters and story outlines he prepared for us. If I was as sue-happy and litigation driven as some suggest I be, I believe I could draw direct connections to many of the ABC characters and their origins coming from pages of Awesome work we commissioned from him. In short order, Tom Strong is Supreme mixed with his Prophet proposal."

Without being able to see the Prophet proposal, it's impossible to know if this is true. But let's look at how Moore handled Prophet in Judgment Day. He first appeared in the prologue in the Judgment Day Sourcebook:

 

Maybe it's just that he's drawn by Chris Sprouse, who would go with Moore to create Tom Strong, but it's hard not to see the physical similarities. There was also this page from Judgment Day Omega where Prophet tangles with the Tarzan-like character, Zantar:

 

Moore based both Prophet and Tom Strong on the Doc Savage and Doc Strange style adventurers (Moore wrote that Prophet was "The Man of Marble" while later he wrote Tom "Doc" Strange into the pages of Tom Strong as an alternate version of Strong):

 

So, at least on their surface, whatever Moore had planned for Prophet and what he ultimately wrote as Tom Strong were probably similar. But how does the comparison to Supreme come in? Well, there's actually a lot of overlap.

Supreme, in The Story of the Year, did more than tell a story, it told the history of Superman (and broader) comics from the '30s until the '90s. Tom Strong tried to do something similar, but less obviously, using the covers. As Todd Klein, who handled the design of the covers, said on his blog:

"Tom Strong is a character with a decidedly pulp background, combining elements of Tarzan, Doc Savage, Tom Swift and other pulpish characters, but of course with plenty of modern touches. When Alan and I first discussed the cover possibilities, he suggested we look at old pulp covers, as well as action-adventure and science fiction covers from all eras. With that in mind, we tried to give each issue a completely different style, while staying in those parameters. This was not a new idea in comics: Will Eisner's Spirit, and early issues of Mad Magazine come to mind as other examples, but it definitely added to the design challenge. Instead of just having one familiar logo and layout, with different art and colors each time, we were trying for a new look each issue (though there were some repeats)."

Here are a few examples:

 

"We're firmly back in the pulp era for issue 6, with this great art by Dave Gibbons, which he began on paper and finished and colored on the computer. I gave him the title for the playing card, which he placed into his art. The logo and design were inspired by The Shadow, another great pulp era icon."

  

"Issue 13 was one of many direct comics pastiches we did, this one inspired by MARVEL FAMILY #1 from 1945. I had fun recreating Tom's logo and all the cover type in the style of the original, seen below. Artist Chris Sprouse did a great job of capturing the feel of the original while remaining true to his own vision of the characters."

 

"Another fun comics pastiche of FANTASTIC FOUR #26's cover by Jack Kirby, one of artist Chris Sprouse's favorites, and the second of three Kirbyesque covers on the series. Hey, if you're going to steal, you might as well steal from the best. As usual I had too much fun recreating the cover lettering, probably by Artie Simek, as seen in the original below."

Another stylistic choice Moore made was to split his Tom Strong stories into three-act features, just as he had done with his Supreme stories.

The content of the issues had a number of similarities to Supreme, too.

Supreme is a character who has been alive since the 1920s, with Tom Strong pre-dating him some, and surviving an extraordinary long time through the use of the Goloka root. He's an accomplished scientist, just as Supreme is, and he's very defensive of his family. Both families have talking pets with Radar and Soloman.

 

Supreme, through the Supremacy device, featured countless different versions of Supreme and his supporting cast. Moore also created alternative versions of the Strong Family, through the use of alternate dimensions. Do you need me to draw the parallels between Squeak the Mouse Supreme and Warren Strong the cartoon bunny version of Tom Strong?



In the pages of Supreme, a whole universe of silver-age heroes are abducted by the villain Hulver Ramik and put in suspended animation until they can be rescued decades later. In the pages of Tom Strong, Strong and Tom Strange rescue a whole universe of silver-age heroes who have been put into suspended animation for decades around the world of Terra Obscura.

 

Finally (appropriately enough), here is Moore's final page of Tom Strong when he ended the series with issue #36:

And here's how he ended The Story of the Year in Supreme, when he might not have been sure he was going to do a second year on the series:

 

I can certainly see Liefeld's point, even if I doubt Moore would have purposefully stolen any ideas from the Prophet proposal. Then again, without seeing the Prophet proposal, we'll never really know.

And this isn't to say there aren't plenty of ways that Supreme and Tom Strong were different. As Moore answered that question himself:

"As far as I know, the only similarities between Tom Strong and Supreme are that it's me and Chris Sprouse doing them. With Supreme, when I was handed the character, he was pretty much a straightforward Superman knock-off. I was trying to make into a good Superman knock-off."

The ones that stand out are Supreme's Superman-like superpowers vs. Tom's upbringing and tribal medicine being one. Tom's family and kids vs. Supreme's bachelor. Tom Strong is more interested in pulp-style adventures vs. Supreme's more superhero-based stories. But there are similarities that are hard to ignore.

Anyway, next time I'll take the other argument when Liefeld said, "Promethea is Glory."

The Rick Veitch commission

I talked before about how lucky I was to get to meet Chris Sprouse and get a commission of the Family Supreme from him. Well, I had one other commission I wanted to get and it was from the artist who was there from (nearly) the beginning to (nearly) the ending and best represents what Supreme was about: Rick Veitch.

I knew what I wanted for a commission, and there was only one artist who would be perfect. While Sprouse probably is better known for Supreme, as it really launched his career, Veitch made Supreme into something special, capturing the heart of Superman comics as they evolved over the decades.

He sometimes takes commissions at his website. So I bugged him and bugged him and bugged him for more than a year before he finally said that he'd do it. This is what I asked for:

I was wondering if you would have any interest in doing a cover for an imaginary Supreme #64? A cover for how the series should have ended.

Considering that Supreme was a homage to the silver age of Superman comics and about the incredible power of the imagination, I thought maybe something similar to Curt Swan’s cover of Superman #423. After all, this would be a cover for a true “imaginary story!”

It could suggest that it was going to tie up all the loose threads: the attack by the Daxes, the return of Radar and Talos, the secret of supremium, the marriage of Supreme and Diana Dane, the final battle with The End, or whatever else you might like to do.

He said sure and I worked out a rough layout for what I was looking for.

My art skills are sick!

I mentioned about how I had heard Alan Moore had planned for Radar's planet as well as Judy and Talos's planets to come help battle the Daxes, so that's why I wanted it on there. I also mentioned that I had heard Moore planned to do a third year exploring inside the supremium meteor, to which he replied: 

About the rumor concerning Superme going into the Supremium.  I can confirm that Alan had planned a new story arc with that very plot. Supreme would have met all the Superman knock-offs in there.  Whole thing went up in smoke when Leifeld went bust.

He asked me to send reference images, because he didn't remember all the characters. He even asked me for images of The End's face, which of course, there never were any. Eventually he settled on a Darkseid-like face, which is awesome since I had heard Moore planned for The End to be a version of Darkseid.

I also asked him a number of questions, to which he was nice enough to answer for me: 

Q: Did you ever read the New Men, Prophet or Allies proposals? There’s been so much speculation about those. 

A: Didn’t read them.  But I did work up about 20 character sketches for the Awesome Universe that Alan was building. [Ed -- You can see them here] 

Q: Why did you stick around for the back-up story in Supreme The Return 3 and the amazing Kirby story in 6 when both Moore and Sprouse left after Awesome went under (the first time)? 

A: Alan and I knew Rob was poison but we loved working the Silver Age stuff so much we kept doing it even with the late checks etc. 

Q: How did you come on the series? There were quite a few mentions that Swan was going to do some of the flashbacks? 

A: Alan originally envisioned Swan but his health had taken a bad turn.  So he asked me. 

Q: Did you reach out to the other artists who had worked on Superman and Supergirl comics to help you on the flashbacks or did Moore (I assume it wasn’t Eric Stephenson)? Like Jim Mooney for the Suprema flashback and Bill Wray for the Mad Magazine homage? 

A: Eric Stephenson brought in Jim and Bill.

He then sent me this rough:

Then a tighter sketch:

The only change I had was Judy Jordan's costume didn't have two Js.

I couldn't get Todd to do a commission (he's much too busy), so Rick connected me with Steve Conley to handle the Klein-like lettering. I told him that I wanted it to be from Image and be #64 but to otherwise feel as much like Superman #423 as it could. He did a great job:

It then went back to Rick who did the inking over the lettering, making it feel all of a piece. And here's the result:

Just for fun, I had it colored in a flat style much like Superman #423:

 
It's been a dream of mine to get something like this for a long time. It's beautiful and will be hanging in my office very soon. I'm also thinking of using it for a little project I'll talk about later.

Here's what Rick said about the final piece:

It was a blast doing. I like the idea of printing the lettering too. Makes for a lovely final piece!

I couldn't agree more!

Wizard: The last Alan Moore Supreme interview

Let's go down the League of Infinity's Time Tower stairs a little way and come out in May 1998. Awesome has pretty much closed up, though they weren't really telling anyone yet, and another issue of Supreme wouldn't show up on the stands for an entire year!

However, in Wizard Magazine, Awesome was fully promoting their comics, including this half of a two-page ad:

 

This trade paperback would never come out. This Alex Ross painting would eventually be used as a Wizard giveaway. And Supreme with Alan Moore and Chris Sprouse would only come out for one more issue, and certainly not monthly!

Tucked away in the issue was a two page spread on Supreme, featuring a wonderful pin-up by Chris Sprouse:

 

Most of the "article" is devoted to what Moore had already done with Supreme, but they interviewed Moore (presumably before he found out Awesome was toast and bailed). This was just as he was finishing up his scripts on what would become Supreme: The Return #3-6 and Supreme #63. He even talked about his plans for #64 and what might be beyond:

SUPREME'S ROMANCE with Diana Dane takes a step forward in April's issue #59, when Supreme takes Diana on a tour of worlds. "He takes her to Prisimworld, which is made entirely of light," Supreme writer Alan Moore says. "Then they go to the year 2150, where they meet the female Fighting American IV. And then to the Supremacy, where all the other-continuity versions of Supreme and Diana exist. All the Dianas get together and have a little coffee morning to compare notes, something which makes Supreme slightly nervous.

All of Supreme's affection for Diane doesn't sit too well with his best friend, however. "In issue #60, Radar, who's been feeling left out, basically reaches dog puberty, and goes out to find his own love life," Moore says. "Those two issues will be a little lightness before #61, which is a fairly mind-bending encounter with the alien Supremium Man."

After that, Supreme will find a new civilization deep in the Himalayas with extremely familiar overtones in #62, which will serve as a break before stuff starts to hit the fan with issue #63. "Supreme #63 will be called 'Revelations,'" Moore says. "It will feature the return of a major villain, an interlude and dark clouds gathering for #64, which will be at least double-sized and features a massive war between two different cultures that has been building for a little time now."

And after that? "Right now, #64 may be my last issue," Moore notes. "It all depends on whether or not I can find a new line of stories I feel is interesting and worth developing. There's one possibility that [Moore's friend, writer/artist] Rick Veitch and I are talking about, so we'll see where that goes."

The rumors I've heard suggest that Moore planned to have the Supremacy and Daxia fight in issue #64 with Talos's world and Radar's world eventually joining the battle and shifting the balance to help the Supremes to win.

Rick Veitch and others have talked about Moore's plans for a third year, with the idea of Supreme exploring inside the supremium meteor. One rumor I heard, which Veitch confirmed, suggested that Supreme would have run into other superman figures from comicdom, perhaps like Moore's own version of Marvelman, etc.

A fun little comicstrip found at Alan Moore World

One final fun little nugget from the Wizard article: they asked Moore about issue #50, Sprouse's first issue:

SUPREME #50-The beginnings of the Supreme/Diana Dane relationship, featuring Supreme recounting some of his more colorful relationships. "One of the better balanced issues so far," says Moore, "and [penciler] Chris Sprouse's first issue, which I thought looked wonderful."

It's hard to read this and not get nostalgic for what an amazing run it was and get wistful for how it all ended so badly. 

Weekly reading: Supreme #63

Supreme #63

Published by Awesome Entertainment in April 2012

The covers:

Title: Revelations

(As always: Supreme is currently out of print. There are a number of ways to read it, which can be found on the How do I read Moore's Awesome works page.)

For twelve years I knew there was a script for this issue and I always just assumed it would never see the light of day, much less actually be turned into a comic. Then came word in 2011 that Erik Larsen, of Savage Dragon fame, would be relaunching the series, starting with Alan Moore's last script.

Holy Malloly!

According to Larsen, he was interested in dealing with Rob Liefeld's original idea of Supreme, about a supreme being with no morals holding him back. He decided to start with Moore's last script as a good launching spot to get there.

Unlike a million other promises by Rob Liefeld this one did materialize. It wasn't drawn well. The covers suck. It leaves us on a cliffhanger that Erik Larsen completely manhandles in following issues. But you know what, who cares? It's an issue of Alan Moore's Supreme that I never expected. And that's always a great thing.

So let's dig in.

Supposedly, Checker, who had published the collections, raised a stink about Image publishing this issue, feeling that they had the rights to all of Moore's Supremes. But Image prevailed and decided to renumber the Rob Liefeld series to go back to the original numbering and add up all the other series to get to what might be considered the real numbers. So this became Supreme #63 because Supreme ended at 56, then there were 6 issues of The Return and then this one. So, I guess Supreme Sacrifice didn't count. Never mind, I'll get to that later.

Looking at those covers above, it's like a contest to see what's the worst art they could use to promote this book and it was a three-way tie, so they all got covers!

On the inside front cover, they swipe Todd Klein's credits page even though it has nothing to do with the Story of the Year storyline:

But at least they have taste.

The issue starts with the Omniman comic-within-a-comic as Omniman of the present is confronted by a Oscar the Omnibunny and Original Omniman. They take him to a Supremancy-based Omnigarchy. We see Darius Dax reading the comic in a comic shop, which carries forward the nice meta commentary Moore had been building on in previous issues.

But Dax is troubled. The concept sounds familiar to Daxia, which is too much to be a coincidence.

In the Citadel, Diana Dane is strolling through Supreme's zoo, where she meets Luriel, the angel. She asks if Luriel still has a thing for Supreme, but she can never be with Supreme because she's real and Supreme is just an imaginary idea.

Then Suprema flies up and confronts Diana. Diana recognizes her from the coffee shop back in issue #52A, so Suprema is irked that Diana knows her secret identity. Suprema wants to make sure Diana isn't an alien trying to get retribution on Supreme by marrying him and then destroying him.

Suprema: "Sorry to ask, but you'd be surprised how often that happens." Ha.

Suprema and Diana talk for a bit before Suprema admits: "Y-You think I'm prissy, don't you? I mean everybody in Youngblood thinks I'm prissy! Even Twilight, she's my best friend, and she does this impression of me that's all squeaky, like a cartoon?"

It's a nice vulnerable moment for Suprema that isn't quite ruined by Larsen's art.

Diana tells her that she just needs friends who don't have superpowers. She offers to hang out, which Suprema thinks would be peachy. Supreme flies up and he heads off with Diana to get dinner.

Meanwhile, Dax decides to go to Daxia to share his revelation. He meets up with Darius Duck and they go to talk with King Dax. Our Dax tells them about the comic and how he thinks there must be a Supremia. But if so, they don't know anything about Daxia and are ripe for attack.

Our Dax has a tryst with an evil Diana Dane (Dianax), and there's the subtle hint dropped that they might plot to overthrow King Dax.

Moore has a nice structure of the issue going switching back and forth from Supreme to Dax, seeing the parallels and differences in the characters and worlds.

In the Citadel, Supreme and Diana's date is starting to heat up as he takes her to his room to see the hand creating the universe. At the same time, Dianax is caught in bed by her husband Daxian, whom our Dax kills.

As Supreme and Diana share a wonderful moment of lovemaking, the Daxes gear up and head for war.

The issue ends with a cloud of Daxes about to attack the Citadel while Diana, in Supreme's arms says, "It feels as if the Earth is moving, a-and as if the sky is opening...and as if there's nothing in the world but love."

 

And that's the end of Alan Moore's Supreme. Considering all that has happened, I find it hard to believe he'd ever return to pen a finale. In one sense, this was the way Supreme had to end, on a cliffhanger. Moore had too many jokes about revisions coming at the worst moments for it not to end this way. And read Diana's words again. The Earth moving. The sky opening. And then a world that is nothing but love. Doesn't that sound like she's moving into the Supremacy?

I can reconcile it in my head, but the heart is unsatisfied. I want the war with the Daxes. I want to know how supremium is involved. I want to reconcile the idea that they're stories, which Supreme is coming to realize. I want to see Talos and Radar bring their worlds into the fight. I want too much, I know. But I'll talk more about that later.

Larsen started his run writing the series with Supreme #64. I'll talk about that run late next week. While I'm conflicted on it, I want to make this clear. I'm eternally grateful that Larsen decided to draw this issue. he didn't have to and it could have easily stayed buried for many more years. The only reason we have it is because of Larsen, and for that, he will always get credit in my book (or on my blog, which I'm sure will make him sleep easier at night).

Starting next week: After Awesome!

As always, please check out the Annotations Page for more details and references and be sure to let me know any that I missed. 

The myth of Lilith

As described in his proposal, Alan Moore intended for the magic of the Awesome Universe to transcend any one set of myths or beliefs. He wanted something that worked across many belief systems. So it makes sense that he would adopt Lilith as Glory's antagonist, as she was referenced by a few cultures before she turned up in the Hebrew Bible.

I knew little of the Lilith myth before Glory, so I thought it might be worthwhile to take a look at who she is. This comes from Ancient-Origins.net:

In some sources she's described as a demon, in others she is an icon who became one of the darkest deities of the pagans. Lilith is one of the oldest known female spirits of the world. Her roots come from the famous Epic of Gilgamesh, but she was also described in the Bible and the Talmud.

In Jewish tradition, she is the most notorious demon, but in some other sources she appears as the first woman created on Earth. According to a legend, God formed Lilith as the first woman. He did it in the same way as he created Adam. The only difference was that in place of pure dust, he also used filth and residue. Traditionally Lilith means ''the night'', and she is related to attributes connected with the spiritual aspects of sensuality and freedom, but also terror.

Lilith’s name comes from the Sumerian word ''lilitu'', which meant a wind spirit or a female demon. Lilith was mentioned in the Tablet XII of the Epic of Gilgamesh, a famous poem of ancient Mesopotamia dated back to not later than c. 2100 BC. The tablet was added to the original text much later, c. 600 BC, in its later Assyrian and Akkadian translations. She appears in a magical story, where she represents the branches of a tree. She is described with other demons, but researchers still argue if she was a demon or a dark goddess. At the same time, she appeared in early Jewish sources, so it is difficult to find out who mentioned her first. However, it is obvious that from the beginning of her existence in the texts she was related to Sumerian witchcraft.

In the Babylonian Talmud, Lilith was described as a dark spirit with an uncontrollable and dangerous sexuality. She is said to have fertilized herself with male sperm to create demons. She is believed to be the mother of hundreds of demons.

Lilith was known in the culture of the Hittites, Egyptians, Greeks, Israelis, and Romans as well. In later times, she migrated to the north of the Europe. She represented chaos, sexuality, and she has been said to have cast spells on people. Her legend is also related to the first stories about vampires.

Lilith appears in the Bible, in the Book of Isaiah 34:14, which describes the desolation of Eden. From the beginning, she is considered as a devilish spirit, unclean, and dangerous. The Genesis Rabbah describes her as the first wife of Adam. According to the book, God created her and Adam at the same time. Lilith was very strong, independent, and wanted to be equal with Adam. She did not accept being less important than him and refused to lie beneath Adam for copulation. The marriage did not work and they never found happiness. As Robert Graves and Raphael Patai wrote in the book The Hebrew Myths:

''Adam complained to God: 'I have been deserted by my helpmeet' God at once sent the angels Senoy, Sansenoy and Semangelof to fetch Lilith back. They found her beside the Red Sea, a region abounding in lascivious demons, to whom she bore lilim at the rate of more than one hundred a day. 'Return to Adam without delay,' the angels said, `or we will drown you!' Lilith asked: `How can I return to Adam and live like an honest housewife, after my stay beside the Red Sea?? 'It will be death to refuse!' they answered. `How can I die,' Lilith asked again, `when God has ordered me to take charge of all newborn children: boys up to the eighth day of life, that of circumcision; girls up to the twentieth day. None the less, if ever I see your three names or likenesses displayed in an amulet above a newborn child, I promise to spare it.' To this they agreed; but God punished Lilith by making one hundred of her demon children perish daily; and if she could not destroy a human infant, because of the angelic amulet, she would spitefully turn against her own.''

Due to the misunderstandings and disappointments related to Lilith, God decided to create a second wife for Adam--Eve.

Nowadays, Lilith has become a symbol of freedom for many feminist groups. Due to the rising level of education, women started to understand that they could be independent, so they began looking for symbols of feminine power. She also started to be worshiped by some followers of the pagan Wicca religion, which was created in the 1950s.

This appeal was enhanced by artists, who took her on as a muse. She started to be a popular motif in art and literature around the Renaissance period, when Michelangelo portrayed her as a half woman, half serpent being. He presented her around the Tree of Knowledge, and increased the importance of her legend. With time, Lilith became more attractive for the imaginations of male artists like Dante Gabriel Rosetti, who created her image as the most beautiful female being of the world. The author of ''The Chronicles of Narnia'', C.S. Lewis, was inspired by the legend about Lilith in the creation of the White Witch. She was beautiful, but dangerous and cruel. He mentioned that she was Lilith’s daughter and the she was determined to kill Adam and Eve’s children.

Less romantic pictures of Lilith appeared in the mind of James Joyce, who called her the patron of abortions. Joyce pushed Lilith into the feminist philosophy, and started the process of adopting her as a goddess of independent women in the 20th century. When women started to receive more rights, they started to disagree with the man-concentrated vision of the world, including the Biblical story about the beginning of the life on Earth. The name of Lilith appears as a national literacy program in Israel and the title of a Jewish women's magazine. The ancient Sumerian legendary female demon is one of the most popular topics in feminist literature related to ancient mythology. Researchers still discuss if she was created as a real demon, or as an untrue warning of what may happen if women receive more power.

Here's what Moore had to say about Lilith in his Glory proposal:

"Now, as it happens, according to the lore of the Qabalah, the realm of Demeter (also called Malkuth) hos a kind of resident goddess/demoness who sort of represents the negative or "evil" side of the material world. This is LILITH, and I think she'd be perfect as a main female villain for Glory. She was the first wife offered by God to Adam, but when he rejected her, she went off in a temper and started copulating with demons to produce a race of monsters and abominations, over whom she ruled as Queen of the Night, one of her other titles. Imagine something like a Kirbyized and more beautiful version of the bad fairly Malificence from Disney's Sleeping Beauty and I think you'll get the picture."