Source: comicbook.com

7. Who’s Watching?

(Multiversity: Pax Americana #1)

So fun fact: Grant Morrison and Alan Moore don’t really seem to like each other all that much.

Mostly owing to Morrison accusing Moore of stealing central ideas for his greatest works from the 1977 novel Superfolks. I’m not getting into those accusations at this time (I’ll cover them in the future) but essentially, this is Morrison trying to one-up Watchmen. It’s fascinating.

Watchmen takes place on a nine-panel grid? Pax Americana functions on a 16-panel grid. Watchmen wasn’t allowed to use the Charlton Comics characters? Americana does. Watchmen plays with time? Americana takes place completely in reverse, but reads fluidly no matter what order you read it in.

The book is about the team Pax Americana, a group of heroes split up due to multiple factors, who galvanize again when one team member, Peacemaker, murders the president of the United States. From the insane Question, who parodies Moore’s (or Ditko’s, honestly) dialogue in a beautiful pseudo fourth-wall break, to the mentally broken Captain Atom, the whole group are fascinating takes on Watchmen as an idea. I’d honestly want to see a full maxi series of this, and not just one issue, no matter how perfect that issue is.