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Comics legend Alan Moore believes Superman has lost his meaning

By Ashley Hurst

Acclaimed English comic book writer Alan Moore, pictured at the Edinburgh International Book Festival where he talked about his latest work. The three-week event is the world's biggest literary festival and is held during the annual Edinburgh Festival. The 2010 event featured talks and presentations by more than 500 authors from around the world. (Photo by Colin McPherson/Corbis via Getty Images)
Acclaimed English comic book writer Alan Moore, pictured at the Edinburgh International Book Festival where he talked about his latest work. The three-week event is the world's biggest literary festival and is held during the annual Edinburgh Festival. The 2010 event featured talks and presentations by more than 500 authors from around the world. (Photo by Colin McPherson/Corbis via Getty Images) /
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Alan Moore is one of the most celebrated comic book authors ever, having written titles like Watchmen, V for Vendetta, Batman: The Killing Joke and Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? Moore is famously known for speaking his mind about the comics industry. He doesn’t like adaptations; he’s never watched an adaptation of any of his work, even going so far as to disown them, as with HBO’s Watchmen show.

When he talks about comics — or better yet, moans about what they have become — we listen. Most recently, he took aim at the modern interpretation of Clark Kent, aka Superman, opining that the most famous superhero of them all has lost his meaning over the years. “He was an immigrant, like most of them, but he was not forced to dress in the drab browns and grays of most of the other people on the 1930s breadlines,” Moore told Screen Rant. “He was wearing bright primary colors and he could leap over the streets that they were having to trudge down looking for work.”

He cites a few examples of how the early Superman was completely different from the American symbol of hope we have today. He fought for social justice. He was, above all, an activist:

"The early Superman beat up strikebreakers, and threw a slum landlord over the horizon. Obviously, that Superman didn’t last a long while. He was pretty soon taken from his creators and made a much more socially respectable middle-class and right-leaning character."

Alan Moore thinks Superman has gotten away from his roots

In those early comics, Superman beat up wife-beaters; fought against corrupt members of government; and supported the unemployed. He wasn’t really tangling with all-powerful monsters who threatened the world, but rather everyday, real-world issues.

Moore’s comments can definitely provide food for thought for writers who might be drafting the next Superman story, whether in comics or for the screen. Hollywood won’t give up on the Last Son of Krypton anytime soon, that’s for sure! But what kind of Superman will we get next?

dark. Next. Shazam! star Rachel Zegler thinks critics just like to “hate on fun”

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