Melkorjunior wrote: "I love Watchmen, League (the first volume anyway) and Tom Strong as much as the next guy but I wouldn't say Moore creates characters so much as he does riffs on existing concepts."

You do realize that's the point of those books, right? Which is something Miller doesn't even attempt to do when he does his Sin City pastiches. Sin City is the ultimate fan fiction because it has nothing to say. That's rarely a charge we can level against Moore, even when he's playing with Batman and Superman.

"Also, about this idea Moore has that Marvel and DC should have some top-flight talent capable of creating a book that takes the public by storm like Watchmen did: Watchmen came out in 1985."

Every other medium continuously produces popular and critical hits. The comic industry has been stagnating since the late 1980s in this regard.

"But I'd say that, just for example, Ennis's Preacher or Vaughn's Runaways are just as good as Watchmen and also just as wildly different from what came before."

In what way are either of these books remotely in the same league artistically speaking as The Grapes of Wrath or Mrs Dalloway or Slaughterhouse Five? Because that's the level we're talking about with Watchmen according to that notorious Time list from a few years back. That gives us a pretty good insight into how people outside the industry are looking at the book. We're seriously expected to believe Runaways is going to stand a chance against Their Eyes Were Watching God? Really?!