M 2008-10-26

0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:

I'll be honest. I saw the movie before I read the book. But the movie doesn't hold a candle to the book. I did like Wilhelmina Harker's portrayal in the movie, but in all cases, the book was far superior to the movie. I really enjoyed the art and storylines, and am sad there are only two books to this series, aside the Black Dossier.

Grant Spatchcock 2008-09-30

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

Lighter in weight and tone than From Hell or Watchmen, League appears on the surface to be more rompy fan fiction than reinventing the comic. It was while reading the net's wiki 'Notes on League of Gentlemen' that I began to appreciate each panel's detail and 'mass culture references', to quote TMBG. Three words - a friggin' joy. Now, if I could just summon the moxy to delve into 'Lost Girls'.

Dave Fernandes 2008-08-27

0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:

It seems that each new read of Alan Moore makes me realize once again that D.C. had no idea what they had in Alan Moore. To call him pure genius may be the most accurate way of describing his work. It's not writing -- it's art. In League, I found myself unable to grasp onto the characters at first -- I expected serious and grim and my mind was demanding that feel. I had no idea Moore had such a terrific sense of humor. He's having fun with the material while at the same time evoking the time honored idea "there is no good, just shades of evil".
In this plot a series of literary characters from the Victorian era pop on the screen. If you had to read 20,000 Leagues you know of Jules Verne and Captain Nimo. You might also know of the Invisible Man or Jeckle and Hyde. In short, we have quite a spicy mixture of characters out to stop a takeover plot. There are hints of James Bond with characters such as (James, M, and Bond). We have a reference to Moby Dick and it goes on and on. Moore spins a tale that on the surface seems racist but what he's really trying to show is that our own racism against others is our glass house since we are selves can be far worse through our own inability to not realize our vial flaws.
I loved the book. It's a great read. My only regret was that the main villain was someone far too often used and of course I won't reveal it. Moore could have been more imaginative but so what -- he's still a genius and I stand by that statement.

J. Sherman 2008-08-08

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

I very rarely give the first volume of anything a perfect rating, but to give the works of Alan Moore anything less seems more likely of readers who are simply turned off by his dark, grisly style. And my "creased and dog-eared copy" of "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" (illustrated by Kevin O'Neill) tells such a tale, which isn't any less fascinating. Five of the most legendary figures in Victorian literature are assembled to save 1890's England from both external and internal threats. Suffice to say that Moore favors less than reputable characters in his work. From the drug-addicted Allan Quatermain to the anti-social Invisible Man to Dr. Jekyll's murderous alter ego Mr. Hyde, don't expect to find a favorite among these not-so-fab five. What you should expect, however, is an intriguing action story that will put you on an emotional rollercoaster. Moore also throws in the written six-chapter prologue "Allan and the Sundered Veil" while O'Neil adds a gallery of covers from the original graphic novels among other features.

This comic is unrated: Graphic Violence, Nudity, Adult Language, Adult Situations.

Bill Slocum 2008-03-16

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

Great literary characters have a tendency to outlive their mortal creators, by finding second and third lives in cultures far removed from those which created them. Here, in the first volume of a collection of graphic novels, a quintet of Victorian-era protagonists are enjoyably thrust into the late-20th-century medium of the comic book.

It is 1898. Mina Murray, heroine of "Dracula" with her maiden name reassumed, is charged to assemble a team of social miscreants whose skills are badly needed by the British Empire, confronting a mysterious menace from within. Captain Nemo (Jules Verne's "20,000 Leagues Under The Sea") brings his submarine "Nautilus", while Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr. Henry Jekyll contributes his unrestrained alter-ego Mr. Hyde. H.G. Wells' "Invisible Man" is somewhere on hand, too, and then there's Allan Quatermain, legendary African explorer from the H. Rider Haggard stories.

One of the most notable aspects of this book, a collection of six sequentially-issued comic books published in 2000, is its treatment of Quatermain, least notable of the main characters, as its central figure. Aged, strung out from drugs, somewhat blinkered in his attitudes, he represents the guiding spirit of the era in all its good and bad ways and something of a pin cushion for writer Alan Moore's modernist barbs. At the same time, underneath the action and bloodshed, it is Quatermain's redemption as a full-blooded hero that propels this story out from the chapbook and comics milieu it cheerfully inhabits.

Between the chapter sections lie warnings of what lies ahead: "Mothers of sensitive or neurasthenic children may wish to examine the contents before passing it on to their little one, removing those pages which they consider to be unsuitable." Moore is described in a brief bio, written in the same tone, as the author of such prior works as "A Child's Garden of Venereal Horrors" and "Cocaine and Rowing: The Sure Way to Health."

There is some truth to the warning regarding sensitive offspring. Though it plays with the idea of being a Boy's Own Adventure, it in fact is a graphic novel in more ways than one. The first two chapters alone contain three rape attempts, and the one that may have been successful (as well as statutory) is played for a devilish laugh. People don't just die in "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen", they are ripped limb from limb, or have their brains bashed out.

Icky, yes, but Moore and artist Kevin O'Neill earn your indulgence for the intelligent way such R-rated liberties expand and intensify an immersive storyline. More problematic for me was the central conflict, which seems to serve no purpose except to facilitate some corker artwork of London's East End under airship attack.

Still, it is a visual treat, here, there, and everywhere, using the England of 100 years before as a kind of launching pad for trippy phantasmagorias. Moore plays with the conventions of the Victorian era, but he also respects them in a curious way. His combination of historical attentiveness, wit, and (especially in the chapbook supplement "Allan and the Sundered Evil") facility with period language makes for a splendid tale well told. Wells and Stevenson would be impressed.