I’m reading ACCA Thirteen Territory Inspection Department by Natsume Ono right now, and I’m getting a couple things out of it. First, there’s interesting stuff going on with expressiveness. The book suffers generally from how little expression characters show in dramatic moments. Like, I get it, it’s a serious story, the characters are all very serious. There’s just a good showcase of moments where there should be a break from the norm, and we don’t get it. When a character does have a big expression, though, it feels really powerful. At the same time, all the minor characters who don’t show up a lot (especially the inspection department supervisors) come alive and leave a big impression in a few panels because they’re so expressive. Second, the art style is very pretty and put together, yet it’s also very loose and minimalistic. Ono isn’t afraid to leave a panel messy or not fill in details, as long as the idea comes across with the important parts. I’m really keying in on it here because it feels like a book that relies on very defined features, yet it also gets away with quickly applying the basics and a couple loose lines. I’m into it.
My brother shared with me a quote from Alan Moore that I can talk about for a while. Idk exactly when this is from, but the short version is that Moore was asked some question about the popularity of superheroes, and said it was bad and that the first superhero movie was Birth of a Nation. You know, the movie about the Klan being heroic. Basically every single point in his long answer, except one, is stupid and irritating in a way that inspires some good writing on my part.
So, first off: He’s an old guy who thinks the world is wrong because it’s different than when he was a kid. That’s really most of Alan Moore’s problem. He’s very self-important and thinks he’s a super genius, so he’s always thought the world was going down the wrong path. That hasn’t changed, and now he’s become the stodgy old fart he was always meant to be. That’s usually what I think people mean when they complain about “cultural stagnation.” Because like…so what? We’re still into stuff from a few years ago, therefore we’re all going to suffer from…something vague and unspecified? Most of human history was “cultural stagnation.” Like, it can’t be understated how no one alive today (me included) can truly understand how extremely different the 20th century was from any other point in time. It’s more technological and cultural change than in the past several millennia combined, in just a few decades. So yeah, maybe things aren’t whatever Moore recognized as groundbreaking as a kid and in constant revolution because we’re at the tail end of a massive collective trauma that’s resulted in a worldwide fascist movement we simply want to survive through, and maybe have some hope?
That’s the next thing. Moore has never understood what superheroes are. I was assigned to read Watchmen, Moore’s biggest claim to fame, in a college class. I couldn’t get through it. If you’re unfamiliar, it’s one of the most famous superhero comics that is held up as a groundbreaking deconstruction of the genre. I would argue it isn’t. Moore has this idea that superheroes are an evil concept where we glorify violence against the oppressed committed by broken men who refuse to go to therapy, in celebration of the system and the status quo. That’s basically still his critique to this day.
I’m not going to defend everything that’s happened in superhero comics, as there is absolutely a history of them essentially acting as super cops and a lot of bigotry baked into stories. All that said, that’s not at the core of what a superhero is supposed to be. Anyone who knows the genre knows the basic formula. You have a person who has some traumatic event happen to them that both gives them powers/inspires them to train and motivates them to fill a seeming void in society. The system sucks and they can do better. People with power like the government or corporations, who choose to use it to help others rather than themselves. It’s why I’m displeased with how often superheroes are used as metaphors for the government and the status quo these days: The villains will always look sympathetic and correct if you don’t let the heroes stand up against the actual problems in society. They’re meant to be idols of our highest ideals, people who don’t compromise on doing what’s right because they have the power to do the things we can’t.
I do get the issues in the genre that Moore identified. The issue is that he identifies those issues as the intention and goal of superheroes as a concept. It’s why Watchmen is filled with straight up mass murderers who wear masks, and are then inexplicably worshipped as godlike heroes. There’s no attempt to grapple with the actual motivation, just an overly serious, droning, depressive stare into nihilism. If that’s what you think superheroes are, then it makes sense you find their popularity bad. But for all the faults of the genre, superhero fiction and its creators are still working towards the true sense of hope that underpins everything. People liking superheroes isn’t about glorifying state violence against minorities, or the abject cruelty of the one percent.
The specific connection to Birth of a Nation stems from that view. Because Moore identifies superheroes with the history of racism in superhero comics, he sees the Klan as the prototypical superhero image. A racist in a mask committing violence against those they don’t like. I don’t know if I even need to explain why Superman, a socialist hero created by two Jewish men, isn’t a fascist image of the perfect white race. Like…Ok, so Taylor Swift is beloved by white supremacists, as I understand it. I won’t get into how she’s dealt with that, because I haven’t followed her career. I think it’s fair to say it’s not her fault nazis like her: She’s an attractive blonde who sings about “not having a real man” (as nazis would hear it) and came up in the traditionally conservative and whites-only country music scene. They were always going to find her appealing. In the same way, Superman and Batman can’t help that white supremacists love them. They’re white (or white passing, in Superman’s case) and do world-shaping adventures where they look cool and strong. That doesn’t mean they’re white supremacists or deliberately meant to be fascist icons. Like…I don’t have the words to finish this thought, but no. Despite the history of the genre, I think it’s safe to say no one making superhero comics looked to the Klan for inspiration, and that even on a basic filmmaking level, the tropes simply don’t line up for Birth of a Nation.
Another part of Moore being a stodgy old fart is that he has this messed up relationship with the past. In his explanation of why superhero popularity is bad, Moore claims that superheroes are inherently childish and anyone who likes them is purposefully rejecting adulthood to attempt to be a child forever. Do I even need to point out how he sounds like a schoolyard bully? I already discussed how the appeal of superheroes is their being a symbol of hope. I think Moore either doesn’t understand hope as a part of adulthood, and/or superficially rejects anything with bright colors. It really seems that simple. He only sees the world as darkness and adulthood as the time of suffering and eventual death. If anything bad exists in the world, that’s all the world is, and goodness is a lie. Only the bad can be true. It’s a surprisingly common view of life, like being stuck forever in the moment when Dorothy finds out the Wizard is just a man behind the curtain. Grow up? If you don’t like cool action fighting and bright colors, then it’s fine to be boring, but at least recognize when people are looking for hope. That’s literally the point of hero worship. It’s not childish to want a hero or to enjoy superficially flashy things.
As a superhero fan, I’ve always had to see and deal with that stigma. Despite them always being broadly popular, there’s always that stigma. It’s bad to like them, it’s bad that they’re popular, it’s a sign of societal collapse one way or another. A lot of surprisingly serious people think this way, and love bringing it up as a brave and important salvo in the war to save culture. Superhero fiction has been extensively and negatively impacted by this, with multiple generations of creatives working as hard as they could to prove they aren’t the Adam West Batman show. There’s never been a time when it was ok to be a superhero fan. If someone says they like basketball, it doesn’t conjure any specific cultural vision of who that person is, because sports being broadly popular with all types of people is accepted like water being wet. If anything, not being into sports might be a mark against you in some settings. We all know what others assume when you bring up superheroes. You still commonly hear people discuss their fandom with shame and self-deprication when they’re in non-fandom settings. We can’t just let people like what they like.
Let me let you in on a little secret: Unlike insects, we don’t fundamentally change who we are as we grow up, we just learn what hoops we have to jump through to be accepted. People do go through phases and might “grow out of” certain interests, but that’s not the same as saying certain interests are exclusive to childhood and a sign of mental illness when they exist in adults. Sometimes we just like stuff, no matter the intended audience or how long ago our fascination began. We could just accept each other no matter what, without socially policing the aesthetics of adulthood, especially when those aesthetics are capitalist exploitation and white Christian nationalism.
It’s also just really strange how Moore and others decide what counts as cultural stagnation. Superheroes are bad, we can’t have any sequels in movies, but we should definitely keep reading Shakespeare. Like, at some point in the answer, Moore said superhero popularity reflects an unhealthy attachment to the 20th century, and I’m still not sure what that means. At what point are we required to dislodge and disassociate from the past? Why is it good to abandon all history, culture, and tradition, simply because a few people personally feel like “it’s all been done before”? What’s the criteria for when a continued fascination with some aspect of the past is a revered classic, and when it’s cultural stagnation? What are the consequences of cultural stagnation? I think people sometimes just say important words when they don’t like the popular thing or are resentful that their niche interests aren’t popular. I’m not sure that’s what Moore is doing, because I get the feeling he actually believes the things he says. But I also wouldn’t be surprised if I read his treatise on why the MCU has to stop immediately but we can still do productions of Hamlet, and came away thinking he just hates that superheroes are popular.
The one good point I thought he made was in criticizing Marvel and DC. They’re a powerful duopoly in the industry, and their entire business model can be described as copyright abuse. I think breaking their whole world would ultimately be good for the medium and the world at large. Moore spoke to those feelings. But he then immediately crossed a line by calling every creative who works on their books cowards who refuse to stand up to bullies. I don’t think I need to explain this one, either, do I? The comics industry is run through freelance work. Most people who make comics struggle to avoid homelessness. Even if they do work for Marvel and DC, the powerful companies that make or break careers and set the standards for how every other company operates. These are well known facts. Calling all those creatives barely scraping by cowards because they accepted a contract without or instead of staging a revolution is cruel and misguided. Screw you, Alan Moore.
I can’t leave without hitting him for the hypocrisy. I once saw him do a serious interview in a shirt that said “Sperm” in Superman letters. He once wrote a comic that was supposed to be a spell to bring about the end of the world. He wrote a comic that’s supposed to be about a revolutionary taking down authoritarianism, but is really just a vigilante torturing a woman for days while an authoritarian regime implodes due to its own issues, unrelated. Watchmen is filled with a ton of blatant bigotry and misrepresentation of minority people. Dude’s incredibly childish and comfortable with all sorts of socially regressive crap. He went to work in comics, knowing they were dominated by superheroes, and did all the things he attacks them for. He claims to be more serious because he refuses to feel joy. In short, shut up.
Weekly Art Blog 8/10-8/17/2025
Life in the Gutters 