Magic Words (Alan Moore’s…)

    (Avatar, 2002)

Did you ever see a Kevin Smith movie? Clerks and Dogma are Kevin Smith movies. If other hands made a movie out of Smith’s current Spider-Man/Black Cat: The Evil that Men Do comic book, it would not be a Kevin Smith movie, it would be a movie based on a Kevin Smith comic book.

Similarly, Alan Moore’s Magic Words is not an Alan Moore comic book. Miracleman, Swamp Thing, and From Hell were Alan Moore comics. Watchmen was an Alan Moore comic book. Magic Words is a comic book based on Alan Moore lyrics.

Alan Moore is a renaissance man. Not only a writer of comics and occasional cartoonist (remember Maxwell the Magic Cat?), Moore also writes poetry and songs. In this volume, a variety of European artists interpret Moore’s lyrics.

The results are not bad, verbally or visually. Some of the pieces are as replete with occult iconography as Moore’s Promethea. Others, such as “Leopardman at C&A” and “14.2.99” are detailed SF pieces. The artists, mostly unknown in America, call to mind such talents as Moebius and Paul Pope. It’s not a bad comic book at all.

But it’s not an Alan Moore comic book.

— S.A. Bennett
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  NotesWriterArtist
#1

November, 2002
Cover Price: $6.95
2 copies available from $1.99 		Alan Moore, Art BrooksSergio Bleda, Martin Caceres, Vicente Cifuentes, Juan José Ryp, Alfredo Torres, Jacen Burrows