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Underground > Comic Books >

Grant Morrison interview at Comicon Pulse.

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17:00 / 28.11.03

"...too many Stans, too few Jacks."

17:42 / 28.11.03

I like "Alan Moore himself ran screaming from this kind of story and began an ungainly, 15-year long attempt to reinvent himself as me"

Grant can't seem to help but take the piss out of Alan Moore. I'm quite sure Moore hates him back, but has he ever said anything publicly?

17:43 / 28.11.03

"Even Alan Moore himself ran screaming from this kind of story and began an ungainly, 15-year long attempt to reinvent himself as me."

And the explanation of his "religion" clarifies a lot of The Filth, and the nature of the supercontext. Excellent read.

Matthew Fluxington

17:44 / 28.11.03

I don't think there is any person in the comics industry more desperately in need of mockery than Alan Moore. So kudos to Grant, you know? Someone needs to attempt to even the scales a bit.

Suedey! SHOT FOR MEAT!

17:48 / 28.11.03

That was fun. Grant so obviously in a chirpy, horribly entthusiastic cocky mood. Good!

17:55 / 28.11.03

Matthew: Oh yeah, I completely agree. I'd just like to see him getting angry with the skinny wee baldie scottish man, rather than having to use my imagination to picture him silently seething in a Northampton terrace house. Possibly with steam coming out of his ears.

Suedey! SHOT FOR MEAT!

17:56 / 28.11.03

Also: good to see lots of good artists attached to his projects. Now, where's Cameron to tell us more about seaguy... ?

the rake at the gates

18:32 / 28.11.03

so what drugs do we think he was on at the time of that interview, i'm thinking speed.

at least he's finished pop mag!c, thats been coming soon for god knows how long

18:39 / 28.11.03

Tell you what, as a bookseller, I can let you know right now that if he persists in calling it Pop Mag!c he won't sell more than a dozen as no fucker will be able to look it up properly even if you want to order it...
Hoorah. More Morrison!

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

19:09 / 28.11.03

Grant is full of shit in the best way. He's class as fuck and he knows it, the wonderful brilliant git.

19:30 / 28.11.03

"Alan Moore himself ran screaming from this kind of story and began an ungainly, 15-year long attempt to reinvent himself as me."

This is so right on in certain respects I can hardly stand it, Tom Strong being a case in point. Problem is, Moore's just no damned good at it. Tom Strong is so calculated and self-conscious in its "out-thereness" that it ends up feeling quite flat, lacking the spontaneity and aliveness of the Silver Age comics it so purposefully attempts to outdo. Moore's at his best with meticulously planned and refinedly executed books like Promethea or, obviously, Watchmen, where his talents really shine, GM's opinions to the contrary notwithstanding.

In any case, the Morrison/Moore feud has always cracked me up--these two guys are like the comic world's literary personifications of the order and chaos points on the kosmic kompass. From that POV it's surprising they don't fling more of this kind of mud than they do.

19:48 / 28.11.03

But is it a proper feud? Morrison has been regularly slagging Moore for as far back as I can remember, well, since Zenith at least, but are there any recorded instances of Moore even mentioning Grant?

19:56 / 28.11.03

I now realise, too late that I've asked that question three times now, and therefore look like a nutter. Sorry

Suedey! SHOT FOR MEAT!

20:05 / 28.11.03

Alan Moore will only enter in to any correspondance via communication with his beard. His beard is holding his Grant rage back (along with who knows what else? It keeps him indoors and is all he has to speak to!)

Let us track him down and shave him - and we will see the new man who emerges from underneath.

Grant's mentioning the pirate capatain nobeard clearly points us in this direction.

20:14 / 28.11.03

yeah, it'd be great if you sneak up on Alan Moore and tear off his wig and false beard, and find it's been Grant Morrison underneath all this time. Moore is just his real life 'Xorn' persona. That'd set a few threads wagging, debating whether or not this would constitute a 'step backwards'

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

20:36 / 28.11.03

Xorn was great though.

Who'd miss Alan Moore?

22:58 / 28.11.03

One thing I've wondered is why, with their feud, has Grant put a bunch of nods to Moore in his work, like featuring Watchmen in Animal Man, and putting a picture of Rorshach in Marvel Boy.

And I heartily agree with his point about Moore becoming Grant. Promethea book III features a lot of themes that are direct from The Invisibles, Flex and stuff going back as far as Animal Man, with a direct rip of the "I Can See You" page. I'm not saying this is bad, the book is incredible, but it was still done first, and better in The Invisibles.

Matthew Fluxington

23:09 / 28.11.03

Gosh, I really don't even care if Moore's recent work is anything like Grant's, I just think that an ultra-serious "dark" guy like him who has a huge stinking beard and thinks that he is a wizard is overripe for parody/mockery, and the comics industry has been too chickenshit to goof on him for the longest time. It's too bad that it mostly comes from Grant though, because from him, it's a little too pot-kettle-black. At least Grant is a silly guy with a great sense of humor. That's always his saving grace.

23:22 / 28.11.03

Patrick, both Moore and Morrison were influenced by Bryan Talbot, who did the "character looking out at the reader" thing years before either of them. I don't think Moore is copying Morrison at all, just that they have the same points of reference.

Matthew Fluxington

23:33 / 28.11.03

And even if neither of them ever read Bryan Talbot, it's still not the most unique concept in the world.

--

02:23 / 29.11.03

Personally, I find such feuds pretty childish, but that's me.

12:28 / 29.11.03

of course moore and morrison read talbot - talbot gave morrison one of his earliest breaks in comics and iirc moore wrote an intro for the collected arkwright waaay back when.

as for moore never coming off hard and slagging morrison - it's all there between the lines in the interviews. note the number of times moore has gone on record as saying arkham asylum was a disgrace 'but the art and lettering were good', recent comments about the redundancy of 'memes' as a theory, the 'i'm an ipsissimus too' one-upmanship...

morrison of course is on record calling moore the king of comics, and this was gm in his pugnacious dandy pre-invisibles period.

i think there's plenty o mutual respect for the dished-out goods - perhaps moore doesn't say much because it's pretty clear that morrison gets there first with the ideas, though moore generally takes the opportunity to articulate them more thoroughly [best example= doom patrol 51? c.'92 : 1963 c.'93]

fuck i know too much about that shit innit?

12:30 / 29.11.03

Promethea book III features a lot of themes that are direct from The Invisibles, Flex and stuff going back as far as Animal Man

So that's where Moore was getting all of that crazy occult stuff from, it was all in The Invisibles first. Why did I never spot that before. You should do some annotations or something.

12:36 / 29.11.03

I like this bit:

I split my head open on a concrete step when I was six years old and have a furled scar in the center of my forehead between my eyes. This event caused my mind to "sore" big time and I now like to pretend that I once had a Dalek eye there which was amputated for my own good and the good of mankind.

14:43 / 29.11.03

That whole interview is one of the funniest things Ive read by someone who isnt actually being paid to come up with such comedy genius.

16:25 / 29.11.03

Now if we could only get him to update his website, say, once every 6 months or so...

19:34 / 29.11.03

Roared with belly laughter on this but Grant can be such a wanker at times. Honestly, what was the point of that Moore comment?

I agree with Sypha, this is getting too childish. This is a forty three year old man we're talking about here.

But it was a very enjoyable interview. Am excited about the biography and Vinamarama. Go Grant!

21:18 / 29.11.03

well, isn't Grant a big boy who plays with kids' toys anyway?

good read. everytime I see an interview with Moz I get charged up with this weird mad energy which gives me an urge to create.

having interviewed him once I can tell it's like having Red Bull with LSD. or something like that.

04:47 / 30.11.03

Matthew.. hey, small point but I would not at all call AM "dark" or ultra-serious. more like cheerful and friendly. (yep, and I speak from personal experience.)

09:54 / 30.11.03

World in your bathroom, ok, Grant is 43, but in his head, he's about 17.
As most of writers are.
Those who are grown up are not so good writers. (insert bad Austen writers here...)

"Who's the best dancer : Fred Astaire or Christopher Reeve ?"
See what I mean ?

14:32 / 30.11.03

I thought that Morrison didn't care for Moore's Watchmen more for the fact that it wasn't as "imaginative" (if that can be applied) and was poking at superheros too roughly.

Splended interview though. I especially liked the end of 2004 comment.

Regrettable Juvenilia

16:00 / 30.11.03

On New X-Men:

I'm pleased with it all, even the Fantomex bits nobody else liked...

Arf.

16:01 / 30.11.03

"Even Alan Moore himself ran screaming from this kind of story and began an ungainly, 15-year long attempt to reinvent himself as me."

Oh dear. Is Alan Moore writing another series about a bald anarchist secret agent and his dead cat?

Seriously, someone who has been repeatedly slapped down for his heavy "borrowing" from everyone from Michael Moorcock to Raymond Smullyan to Alan Moore himself shouldn't be so quick to throw stones. Or is Grant just upset that Moore seems to be better at both comics writing and magic?

17:14 / 30.11.03

Or maybe he's just trying to be funny.

18:17 / 30.11.03

every writer borrows. they both do it. so?

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