Weird Comics History, Episode 23: Twilight of the Superheroes

Weird Comics History, Episode #23


Twilight of the Superheroes
A Pitch by Alan Moore for DC Comics


Today we’re going to revisit one of my favorite shows we ever made… the episode where we discussed Alan Moore’s rejected pitch for a DC Comics event called Twilight of the Superheroes.


If you’ve never heard of Twilight… well, I think you’re in for a treat.  If you’ve only heard bits and pieces… strap in, because we go through the entire thing here!


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Twilight of the Superheroes was one of the very first things I added to the never-ending list of topics we wanted to cover in Weird Comics History… even before we split off onto our standalone show.  It’s just not something you see discussed all that often, which is weird considering this is a treatment put together by a then fresh-off-of-Watchmen Alan Moore.


I remember “discovering” Twilight back during my USENET days… probably right before the turn of the century.  I lost an entire weekend to it… it was that engrossing.  As the years passed, I’d forgotten a great deal about it… and when I got into podcasting, I’d only remember bits and pieces from the pitch… the “Houses of Heroes”, Captain Marvel’s part… and, of course, the Constantine twist… though, don’t worry… Alan Moore assures us (time and again) that this is not a John Constantine story (even though he’s kind of the lynch-pin of the entire thing).


We received a lot of great feedback on this episode… and, I tell ya what, it was one of the most fun projects to sink our teeth into.  From here, I decided to (very slowly) start investigating more rejected comic book pitches for future episodes… and, as of this writing, I’ve got about 80% of a Superman 2000 script in the can… which will, unfortunately, probably never see the light of day.


If you’ve never heard of Twilight of the Superheroes, I sure hope you give this episode a listen… you might not be able to look at some of your favorite superheroes the same… ever again.