Alan Moore’s contributions to 90s comics might be considered a little strange. Sure, there’s the seminal From Hell co-starring Eddie Campbell, and the reckless hours he spent playing around with Todd McFarlane’s world in Violator and various Spawn comics, but other image partners Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld and even Jim Valentino dabbled in other areas a little. Along with his own 1963 production with Stephen Bisset, John Totleben, Rick Veitch and Dave Gibbons.
You probably have a preconception that Moore works for Image. These are probably derived from the stereotypes of early Image books. However, upon reading it, you get the sense that Moore was having fun. His spawn material is super fun. His WildC.ATs feels like the closest he’s ever come to writing the X-Men itself (aside from Captain Britain with Alan Davies and a charity-funding one-shot). and his work in a corner of Liefeld’s image (or as his own publisher, Awesome Entertainment). man. The best. It feels like a lost masterpiece these days.
But Supreme wasn’t the only thing Moore was working on for and with Liefeld. His goals were much, much higher.
“The darkness is getting darker.”
Featuring a veritable who’s who of Moore, Liefeld, John Sibal, Colorist Corps, Richard Starkings & Comic Craft, and other artists like Flashback and Testimony (see below for names of all esteemed artists), Judgment Day aimed to redefine the Awesomeverse. Comes with a murder mystery.
If the immediate thought you get from it is that it has similarities to Watchmen, that’s fair. Although this is a completely different beast. This isn’t a hard, gritty story about how ridiculous a proposition it is to apply real events to superheroes; it’s a harsh, gritty story about how ridiculous a proposition it is to apply real events to superheroes. … hang on. The content will be quite meta. In a sense, it’s as if Moore is scolding himself for bringing about a grim and harsh dark age in the comic book world. There is also a free tour through the history of comics, from the pulp era to the present day. Using Youngblood’s character as the core. And offer hope for the future.
It’s pretty ambitious for a comic whose main story was written by Rob Liefeld, but it worked. And I don’t think it would have worked nearly as well if it had had anyone other than Liefeld, maybe anyone other than his corner of the image character. It’s not a superhero deconstruction, or even a cruel superhero, although there are some jabs. A reimagining of the love, joy, and wonder of superheroes. It’s only a three-issue manga, but many people probably don’t even know it exists.
“Even legends die, son. Listen, I want you to take this and get me out of here.”
Created by Moore, Liefeld, Sibal, Starkings, ComicCraft, and a host of other creators, Judgment Day was meant to overhaul Liefeld’s character, reshape many characters, and serve as a blueprint for what was to come next. It’s similar in shape and fashion to what Moore, Chris Sprouse, and their collaborators have previously done with Supreme. There was even an “Aftermath” issue where Moore and Gil Kane released teasers of some of the properties Moore was up to next. Includes Yungblud, Glory, The Arise, Max Image, and more.
Unfortunately, Awesome Entertainment went bankrupt. Moore and Scroce’s Youngblood ran for two issues (a little), but that was pretty much it. Moore’s Glory script was eventually published in Avatar magazine with art by Maratt Michaels, but stalled after issue two (I’m not sure why, but I’ve seen conflicting reports). Some similar ideas and approaches have surfaced in the form of America’s Best Comics, but it would have been interesting to see all the original ideas with original characters.
And it’s a shame that this era can almost be considered a lost medium at this point. Publishing rights were acquired by Checker Book Publishing, and the collection (minus the Prelude issue for some reason) was released in 2003. However, their collection leaves me a little dissatisfied. While the print version isn’t terrible, the digital release isn’t quite as good (as you can see in the art in this article, which is one example where a letterer that simply tells the text to be in all caps is correct in terms of readability) and was removed from Amazon a while back due to quality issues. I think some of that was due to not having the source files to actually print, but I’m not sure if that applied to all of their releases or just the specific parts of the Hellraiser books they released.
Classic Comic Encyclopedia: JUDGMENT DAY
judgment day
Screenplay: Alan Moore
Pencilers: Rob Liefeld, Gil Cain, Stephen Platt, Keith Giffen, Adam Pollina, Dan Jurgens, Chris Sprouse, Steve Skrose, Jim Starlin, Terry Dodson, Marat Michaels, Cedric Nocon, Jeff Johnson, Rick Veitch, Ian Churchill
Inkers: John Sibal, Gil Kane, Joe Weems V, Bill Ray, Al Gordon, Larry Stacker, Alan Weiss, Rachel Dodson, Norm Rapmund, Dan Panosian, Rick Veitch, Marlo Arquiza.
Colorist: Tanya Hollier, Donald Skinner, Andy Troy, Brett Evans, Jimmy Yu, Ron Reif, Richard Hollier, IHOC & Quantum FX Color
Author: Richard Starkings & Comiccraft
Publisher: Awesome Entertainment (Original Edition) | Checker Book Publishing (Collection)
Release date: June 1997 – March 1998 (original issue) | November 2003 (collection)
Read the past works of the classic manga encyclopedia!
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