Some more’s just been reported on the movie adaptation of V for Vendetta, including how Alan Moore’s disassociated himself from the production. :

THE most vivid characters in Alan Moore’s graphic novels are antiheroes of ambiguous morality and identity: costumed avengers like Rorschach, the disturbed street vigilante of “Watchmen,” or the crusader known only by the letter V, who commits catastrophic acts of terrorism in the dystopian tale “V for Vendetta.”

With inventions like these, and a body of writing that spans nearly three decades, Mr. Moore, a 52-year-old native of Northampton, England, distinguished himself as a darkly philosophical voice in the medium of comic books — a rare talent whose work can sell solely on the strength of his name. But if Mr. Moore had his way today, his name would no longer appear on almost any of the graphic novels with which he is most closely associated. “I don’t want anything more to do with these works,” he said in a recent telephone interview, “because they were stolen from me — knowingly stolen from me.”

In Mr. Moore’s account of his career, the villains are clearly defined: they are the mainstream comics industry — particularly DC Comics, the American publisher of “Watchmen” and “V for Vendetta” — which he believes has hijacked the properties he created, and the American film business, which has distorted his writing beyond recognition. To him, the movie adaptation of “V for Vendetta,” which opens on Friday, is not the biggest platform yet for his ideas: it is further proof that Hollywood should be avoided at all costs. “I’ve read the screenplay,” Mr. Moore said. “It’s rubbish.”

Not that this really makes it clear why Moore finds it rubbish, but then, I’m sure that no matter his standings, he never intended for the original book to be seen as something that literally disrespects victims of terrorism, and makes everybody out to look like a jihad worshiper.

And after how books like From Hell and League of Extraordinary Gentlemen were exploited by Tinseltown as well:

…he [Moore] has refused to allow any more movies to be made from work he controls. In the case of work whose rights he does not control, he has refused credits on any film adaptations, and has given his share of option money and royalties to the artists who illustrated the original comic books. That position is so radical that though his colleagues say they respect his position, few in the film industry can understand it.

“It’s very simple, but they don’t seem to hear it,” said John O’Neill, the illustrator of “The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.” “They just gravitate towards offering more money.”

Last year, when Mr. Moore received a phone call from Larry Wachowski — who, with his brother, Andy, had written and directed the “Matrix” movies — to discuss the “V for Vendetta” film that the Wachowskis were writing and producing for Warner Brothers, Mr. Moore felt he had made it clear that he did not want to be involved in the project.

“I explained to him that I’d had some bad experiences in Hollywood,” Mr. Moore said. “I didn’t want any input in it, didn’t want to see it and didn’t want to meet him to have coffee and talk about ideas for the film.”

But at a press conference on March 4, 2005, to announce the start of production on the “V for Vendetta” film, the producer Joel Silver said Mr. Moore was “very excited about what Larry had to say and Larry sent the script, so we hope to see him sometime before we’re in the U.K.” This, Mr. Moore said, “was a flat lie.”

“Given that I’d already published statements saying I wasn’t interested in the film, it actually made me look duplicitous,” he said.

In a telephone interview, Mr. Silver said he had misconstrued a meeting he had with Mr. Moore and Dave Gibbons nearly 20 years ago, when Mr. Silver first acquired the film rights to “Watchmen” and “V for Vendetta.” (Mr. Silver no longer owns the rights to “Watchmen,” though Warner Brothers is still planning an adaptation.) “I had a nice little lunch with them,” he said, “and Alan was odd, but he was enthusiastic and encouraging us to do this. I had foolishly thought that he would continue feeling that way today, not realizing that he wouldn’t.”

Mr. Silver said he called Mr. Moore to apologize for his statement at the press conference, but that Mr. Moore was unmoved. “He said to me, ‘I’m going to hang up on you if you don’t stop talking to me,’ ” Mr. Silver recalled. “It was like a conversation with a tape recording.”

Through his editors at DC Comics (like Warner Brothers, a subsidiary of Time Warner), Mr. Moore insisted that the studio publicly retract Mr. Silver’s remarks. When no retraction was made, Mr. Moore once again quit his association with DC (and Wildstorm along with it), and demanded that his name be removed from the “V for Vendetta” film, as well as from any of his work that DC might reprint in the future.

Man, reading this, I sure feel sorry for Moore, for the abuse he’s suffered at the hands of Horrorwood. With the way that the movie industry is floundering now, it’s to be hoped that Moore won’t have to put up with any more of this embarrassment much longer. IMO, he’s right to just stick to comic books and other literature. It works much better that way.

, giving a few more clues:

The script, by the Wachowskis, differs considerably from Moore’s novel, which is set in the 1990s and contains allegorical digs at Margaret Thatcher’s Britain. The film, set in a ravaged, crumbling London in 2020, when most of the rest of the world has been destroyed by biological warfare and viruses, has been updated to reflect current fears about what a future totalitarian state might repress - free speech, homosexuality and Islam, among other things.

Moore’s outspoken denunciation of the project has proved a major embarrassment, although the filmmakers have attempted to brush it aside.

They can try, but, if free speech and Islam clash with each other, then all I can say is - they’ve failed.

Update: has more to say on the movie.
Some .

Earlier this week, the MSM’s comics representative, Captain Comics, , scheduled to debut March 17:

…McTeigue might turn the property into a simple morality tale, or worse, an action film. But hopefully the movie will make us think just as much as the graphic novel does.

For my part, I’m looking forward to it - and to the ensuing debate about who and what “V” is.

Or, maybe not. Because of this very wretched movie that not only refutes what Capt. Comics is saying about making us think just as much as the novel, but might also make him want to think twice about looking forward to any other such debates either. From Debbie’s article:

Based on the , “V” comes complete with all the bogeymen the far left loves to hate: NSA spying and wiretaps; government renditions and torture complete with Abu Ghraib hood fashions; lecherous, elderly Christian clerics in collars raping young girls; Islam, gay rights, and free speech under attack; and even a Bill O’Reilly-esque evil cable talk show host/wicked pharmaceutical billionaire/heinous military officer combo rolled into one character.

And I wouldn’t be surprised if it didn’t even attack O’Reilly for any of the right reasons either (no, I can’t stand O’Reilly; he interrupts people, and he’s basically a right-wing moonbat himself). But that aside, if the similarities here make sense, then that shows that this could certainly be an attack on America for “violating” the rights of terrorist scum being held in Abu Graib, with total disregard for innocent victims of Islamofacism such as Daniel Pearl.

…America and the war on Iraq are the enemies–along with Christians and the right–in this movie. We are treated to newscasts about how “America’s War [on terror] spread to England.” One character–a gay, British Jay Leno type who hosts a latenight show–keeps a secret vault of prohibited items, including a giant poster of “the Coalition of the Willing,” depicting the American and British flags surrounding a swastika. Think about our troops fighting and dying in Iraq, before you decide to give your dollars to this film. Do you really think they are Nazis?

Also in the secret vault of sacred prohibited items: a Koran. Portman, whose Evie is the “heroine” of “V,” asks, why the Koran? “Are you a Muslim?” she asks the late-night host. “No, but its [the Koran’s] images are beautiful.” Then he comments about how he can be executed for possessing the Koran. (Not a peep in this film about the thousands who’ve been executed in the name of the Koran and “its beautiful images.̶

Puh-leeze. If anything, both Britain and the U.S. have bent over backwards not only for the Koran, but for its extremist Muslim followers. Where Christian displays are absolutely forbidden in any schools, despite so-called “freedom of speech”; where Ten Commandments are removed from the Alabama Supreme Court, despite their being the basis for our legal system; children are required to learn about Islam, read from the Koran, and behave as Muslims in elementary schools, in the name of “tolerance” and “education.”

In “V”, while Islam and the Koran are treasured but prohibited, Christianity is pure evil. Nice juxtaposition, when in real life, the 19 hijackers, the ‘93 WTC, U.S. Embassy, U.S.S. Cole, and British subway bombers were hardly Christians. Hmmm . . . what religion were they? We don’t recall , saying on Friday in his post attempted-murder 911 call, that he tried to use his jeep to kill Americans in the name of Jesus. No, he mentioned someone else’s name, another religion . . . which are both nowhere blasphemed in “V.”

I agree, it’s the screenplay for this movie that’s evil, and yet one more in Hollywood’s increasing attack on Christianity.

It gets worse:

We’ve already mentioned the high-ranking Christian priest, who regularly rapes young girls procured for him through an “agency.” Before the priesthood, he was an evil military officer at a hospital where politically dissident youth had experiments conducted on them for the government (complete with Abu Ghraib-style hoods).

Then, there’s the government. It’s run by a religious Christian zealot. But not just any Christian zealot.

No. Chancellor Sutler is the supreme evil Christian. In order to get elected, he and the Bill O’Reilly-esque character (remember, before he became a cable host, he was a pharmaceutical CEO and made billions) arranged for hundreds of Brits to die from chemically poisoned water. The government said that terrorists did it, a story which became accepted fact and the conventional wisdom in media coverage….

It’s no coincidence that the symbol used for his government is some sort of Cross-come-Swastika combo. Not offended yet?

Under religious Christian zealot Sutler, gays are rounded up, imprisoned, tortured, and executed. Ditto for any dissidents, any left-wing activists, anyone who dares speak out against or flout the Chancellor’s actions. Tell that to the , which seems to be running legal policy in our country, these days, and its partner in crime, the , the wealthiest “public interest” group in the U.S., to the tune of hundreds of millions. We don’t see any prospect of them being rounded up by the government anytime soon, unfortunately.

Nor the filmmakers who exploited Alan Moore’s property for their own brainless biases, . I wonder what the moviemakers would say if they knew , on the other hand.

Overall, the most outrageous thing about “V” is the ending. Instead of vanquishing terror, all of Britain sides with the terrorist hero of this movie. They celebrate his murder of all the top officials in government, his blowing up of the Houses of Parliament and other government buildings.

Terrorists and terrorism are the heroes, the government fighting them and trying to keep us safe are the enemy.

This is the glorious revolution? Osama Bin Laden must be very proud.

And tragically so. How DARE Capt. Comics act totally oblivious to what Debbie has the guts to let us know about! And as far as I’m concerned, if this is what moviemaking and even comic book adaptations are going to amount to, then it’s best for the film industry to just close down.

writes about the area’s first comics convention and one person here says:

The comic books of today are more geared toward young adults in their 20s and 30s, said Larry Wiese of Superstars and Superheroes shop of Davenport. “Now there’s more talent that goes into them and the superstars of the comic books are the artists,” he said. “The artists are demanding more money which has priced kids out of the market.”

Good gosh! So the artists - or illustrators - are to blame for the rise in price? Whoa, how I long for days when plenty of artists weren’t trying to differ from each other by too far a margin.

Not to knock most artists and writers, but if they were to stop trying to fleece the industry of only so much cash, maybe the prices could go down a bit.

Still, there’s something here that I can certainly appreciate:

Comic books might not be as popular today were it not for the talents of the late artist Will Eisner who pushed the genre into new directions with 60-plus years of work and the popularity of Marvel Comics with the baby boomers, said Bruce Reynolds of St. Louis, Mo.

Yeah, I think I agree with that alright. Eisner was the man indeed.

says that manga is a $125 million business in the US, and is even bigger in Europe. Yep, that’s good to know.

The talks about the One Year Later project at DC, and tells us that:

Something will happen to Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman during the crisis. They won’t be around, at least for a year. Drastic changes are happening across the board, but those are the Big Three.

Beginning this week, every DC comic book starts a new storyline “one year later.”

Batman, for instance, returns to a crime-infested Gotham. Supergirl has joined the Legion of Super Heroes. Green Arrow is mayor of Star City.

After “Infinite Crisis,” a weekly series called “52″ — which will be told as close to real time as possible — debuts to fill in the one-year gap.

Nothing like this has been tried before.

Nope, I guess not, but in any case, I really don’t see the point of absenting any of the threesome for over a year. But also, I really don’t get it why:

…old Jim Gordon came out of retirement to take up the reigns as police commissioner again. They even let that slob Harvey Bullock back on the force.

They couldn’t have let Jim Gordon get the rest he deserves? Or even Harvey Bullock? Considering the damage DC did when the Joker slew Gordon’s wife several years back, I’d think that having him come out of retirement reeks of something ludicrous.