'Before Watchmen' Len Wein: 'It's about time for prequels'

Published Jul 29 2012, 17:45 BST  |  By Hugh Armitage

Before Watchmen writer Len Wein has said that it was "about time" for the prequels.

Wein - who served as editor of the original series - has accused co-creator Alan Moore of being "selfish" regarding his resistance to the ongoing DC Comics project.



"I said, 'It's about time'," he told ComicBook.com. "Alan had the opportunity for a quarter of a century to do some of these stories and he decided not to.

"It's time somebody did it, especially at the quarter-century mark," he continued. "Some of us that were around when it started, may not be around at the next quarter-century mark."

Wein - who disagreed with Moore over the conclusion of Watchmen - was the creator of Swamp Thing, a character which helped launch Moore into the American superhero comics spotlight.

"I find it extraordinarily selfish of Alan to take the position he's taken," said Wein. "Had I taken that position with Swamp Thing, he might not have the career in the States that he has now.

"It's an industry of characters, and everybody gets to play in everyone else's sandbox," he continued.

"People ask me how I feel about the way other writers have treated my characters over the years, and my response is, 'Gee, I wonder how [Jerry] Siegel and [Joe] Shuster and Bob Kane, and Stan and Ditko and all those guys felt about how I treated their characters'."

Wein is currently writing Before Watchmen: Ozymandias and the 'Curse of the Crimson Corsair' backups as part of the project.

Watchmen co-creator Dave Gibbons recently said that he does not consider the title's spinoffs to be in canon.