Wired's Underwire blog premiered these two clips from Patrick Meaney's upcoming documentary on the Scottish writer, teasing his particular take on George Bush (and world leaders in general) and why our Earth would seem like hell to fictional characters:


Featuring not just a lengthy interview with Morrison about his life and work - including the alien abduction that led to his 1990s series The Invisibles - but also contributions from friends and collaborators like Blackest Night and Green Lantern writer Geoff Johns, Seaguy and Invisibles artist Cameron Stewart, and DC Executive Editor Dan Didio, Meaney plans to have the movie (tentatively called Grant Morrison: The Documentary Film) complete in time for a world premiere at SDCC 2010. We'll see you in line.

Counterculture Comics Hero Grant Morrison Gets a Biopic [The Underwire/Wired]

If You Loved The Denseness Of Watchmen:
From Hell
To my mind, this is Alan Moore's masterpiece (and one we've already recommended - 500+ pages that look behind (and beyond) the legend of Jack the Ripper to offer a dissertation on murder, majesty and London, ably (and atmospherically) illustrated by Eddie Campbell. As full and as deep as Watchmen at its best, but with more subtlety and patience, From Hell offers a rich experience that may not offer as many people in costumes, but may be all the more rewarding for that. [Amazon]

If You Loved The Way The Book Played With The Comic Medium:
Or Else
On the face of it, Kevin Huizenga's work is almost the very opposite of Watchmen; in many cases autobiographical and entirely devoid of superheroes or apocalyptic scenarios. But Huizenga shares a fascination - and desire to experiment - with the language of comics that goes beyond what Moore and Gibbons did in Watchmen, moving into abstract images and wordlessness that takes the medium in directions that Dr. Manhattan would be proud of. The best example - and the place to start - would be Or Else #2, "Gloriana," where a sunset turns into something altogether more unusual and magical.

If You Loved The Adult Approach To Superheroes:
Sleeper
Ed Brubaker and Sean Philips' story of a superpowered secret agent who goes undercover in a criminal organization only to get in way over his head - emotionally and strategically - offers up both the nods to comics' past (Especially in the twisted secret origins that pepper the series) and the "real people who just happen to have superpowers" aspects of Watchmen, but take the latter much further; the characters here aren't the iconic archetypes and stereotypes of Moore and Gibbons' book, but much more genuine, believable, and recognizable as us. Brubaker and Philips' Incognito, which just launched a couple of months ago, is in a similar vein and well worth checking out as well. [Amazon]

If You Loved Dr. Manhattan's Cosmic Perspective:
The Invisibles
Much longer, chaotic and disorganized than Watchmen, Grant Morrison's long-running story of the 1990s The Invisibles crosses time, dimensions and questions the very nature of reality on a regular basis. Ripped off by The Matrix, The Invisibles is a much more individual work (although stealing from multiple sources itself, shamelessly) that wants to change the way you look at the world, if you let it. [Amazon]

If You Loved The Near-Future Setting Of Watchmen:
100%
I've recommended Paul Pope's work here enough to make it clear that I'm a massive fanboy, but that doesn't change the fact that 100% is the ideal follow-on if you liked the small details that made Watchmen's world so similar-but-different to our own. Focusing on the characters allows him to sneak in all manner of alternate-world SFisms without you noticing until it's too late, but this is a beautiful and necessary book that, come to think of it, should be made into a movie of its own. Just keep Zack Snyder away from it. [Amazon]

If You Loved The Cold War World-building of Watchmen:
American Flagg
Howard Chaykin's American Flagg - a 1980s contemporary of Watchmen - takes the Cold War paranoia of Moore and Gibbons in a whole new, satirical, direction and to the world of 2031, where America's government has moved to Mars, turned corporate and taken on a particularly Russian approach to some subjects, allowing former television star and new "Plexus Ranger" Reuben Flagg to try and keep the peace in a future Chicago. Sharing a similar dark humor to Watchmen, it's as much a product of its time, but well worth checking out. [Amazon]

If You Want Cold War World-Building In A Near-Future Setting Complete With An Adult Approach To Superheroes, But Without That High-Brow Shit:
The Dark Knight Returns
Okay, there's really no avoiding this one although, chances are, if you've read Watchmen, you've also read this; Dark Knight, created around the same time as Watchmen, and the book that made Frank Miller into the superstar megalomaniac that he is today, still stands as a singular achievement and the book that Batman stories are still measured against today. And why not? Whether it's the satire of Reagan's appearances, the cynical re-view on Superman or the dystopia of Gotham taken to the Nth degree, there's a lot to admire about this book even twenty years (and countless rip-offs) later. [Amazon]

If You Want To See Where It All Started:
Miracleman
Moore's first series of note - now, sadly, out of print and lost in a legal mess over rights issues - wasn't just the start of his career, but also the the first major deconstructionist superhero work in mainstream American comics. Taking a cloned version of Captain Marvel and pushing him into a more realistic world without entirely undoing everything that came before, Moore rehearsed many of the ideas in Watchmen here, but in a less formal, more human way. One day, this series will hopefully return to bookstores and everyone will see the connections; for now, spend your time in back issue bins and on eBay looking for the original issues or collected editions.

If You Want A More Optimistic Period Piece About Superheroes:
DC: The New Frontier
In many ways, the polar opposite of Watchmen (The cynicism and despair of that book being replaced with a boldness, optimism and strong belief in the inherent goodness of its characters), New Frontier is no less an achievement. Darwyn Cooke's beautiful take on the origins of DC's Silver Age characters (focusing mostly on Green Lantern, but taking in so many more along the way) is, in its own ways, as much a love letter to comics and superheroes as Watchmen is, but simply one that chooses to focus on the happier side of things. And, with Cooke's amazing artwork (presented in a three-panel format for the entire book, in much the same way that Watchmen adheres to a nine-panel format throughout), I have to commit potential heresy and admit that New Frontier looks much, much better than Watchmen. [Amazon]

For those unfamiliar with the Area 51 game, the plot revolves around the outbreak of a mysterious virus in Nevada's infamous mysterious military base that transforms people into zombie-esque mutants... and leads a HazMat team of investigators to the discovery of an alien spacecraft hidden under the base. Talking to MTV's Splash Page blog, Morrison explained how he approached the movie:

That’s the existing idea and I have to get to the core of that, dismantle it, and make it work. It’ll be a totally different view of the aliens and the whole mythology.

What does that mean? Morrison's NDA stops him from explaining any further, but judging by his work on things like The Invisibles, The Filth and even We3, we can probably expect something somewhat psychedelic and unlike the usual movie version of alien invaders - but what else would you expect from a man who claims to have been abducted by aliens in the early 1990s?

Grant Morrison Talks ‘Area 51’ Video Game-To-Film Script [Splash Page]

The comic series, which ran from 1994 through the year 2000 and "influenced" (which is to say, was completely ripped off by) The Matrix , personified and explained the eternal struggle between good and evil as a war between agents of the anarchist Invisible College and the Outer Church that spanned centuries and included time travel, psychic warfare and lots of things blowing up. Unsurprisingly, certain things would have to have been changed for the smaller-scale BBC Scotland adaptation but, according to Morrison, those things weren't what you'd expect:

[In the television version, protagonist] Dane has been changed to from a Liverpudlian to Glaswegian to assist the BBC SCOTLAND budget.

Otherwise, the completed scripts (two out of a planned six) stay remarkably close to the source material, adapting the first issue of the comic series and introducing newcomers to the ongoing war happening under everyone's noses without their knowledge. With rumors of a big-budget movie continually circulating, here's hoping that the project will make it into production at some point soon.

Invisibles TV [Grant Morrison]

"Give me some sugar, I am your neighbor!" Morrison growled as we started. He jumped right in, happily answering even the most controversial questions from the audience; we've got a recap below.

To what extent do drugs play a role in your creative process?
They were very big in The Invisibles. I was a very straightedge kid until I was 30 years old — I didn't touch anything, and I was anti-drinking, anti-drugs, everything. But I got to 30 and I kind of decided to treat myself as a laboratory and become something else — I wondered how much you could mess with your own personality. I became a tranny for awhile; I used to dress up as a girl, and I was beautiful! I just started to take tons of psychadelic drugs, though I was never into amphetamines or anything. But I'm getting old now, so I don't do so much of that.

Did that also have a role in your experience in Kathmandu?
The Kathmandu thing was really weird. I had taken a little bit of hash — but just a very little bit. That experience was so profound — nothing like that has ever happened to me again. Part of taking so many drugs in the 90s was trying to recreate the experience: the clarity of everything was so much more real, the way things are made ... all this is just cheap dream compared to the place I was. I've taken DMT, high doses of mushrooms, high doses of acid — nothing took me back. I've never been able to go there again.

In the script for Arkham Asylum there's a joke about two nuns and a donkey. Is that a real joke?
That is a joke. Two nuns find this gigantic penis, and they're working away, and the Mother Superior says "Oh my God! Look what's happened to Flannen McCafferty!" The idea is that some old guy's donkey dies and the donkey's got the biggest dick in the wall, so he cuts it off and throws it over the nunnery wall, which takes me back to the punchline, and ... I can't tell jokes. That's the only joke I know and I still can't tell it.

What writers have inspired and influenced you?
There's a ton of 'em. A lot of playwrights: Peter Shaffer, David Sherwin, Alan Gamma, Timothy Leary, Tolkein, the Beatles, the Buzzcocks, the Sex Pistols ....

What's going on with the film for We3?
The film's script's actually better than the comics script. There's a lot of stuff happening at New Line right now, though. We've been through like 16 different directors, because none of them just really got the movie for me, but they've been really good about it. They really want to create the book. The animals will be CGI, but everything else will be real.

What kind of music do you listen to?
I started out as a punk, I used to play in bands. I was a weird punk, a psychedelic punk. My three favorite bands are the Beatles, the Buzzcocks, and the Sex Pistols. We used to play psychedelic music and speed it up really hard. Just psychedelic pop is my favorite music — stuff that lasts three minutes but transports my head.

Where will you be taking Batman?
To the grave. [laughs] There's a new Batmobile, and it's one of the greatest drawings ever — Daniel really surpassed himself on this. I kinda wanted to humanize the guy, 'cause he's been such a dick for awhile. But if you were Batman, you would be a dick, so that's fine. But underneath it all there's Bruce Wayne, this aristocratic kid who was just growing up and probably going to be a doctor, and then suddenly BANG BANG — so there are psychological weaknesses underneath that superman. It's a total deconstruction of Batman. I've just written the second part, where the bad guys actually take him down, and I'm thinking, "how's he going to get back from this?!" The way I'm doing this is possibly the most shocking Batman revelation in 70 years.

You mentioned putting a lot of autobiographical stuff in your comics. Have you ever considered doing a real autobiography?
Nah, you wouldn't believe it. It makes more sense in comics. They were always more like real life to me. David Lynch is more real life to me than any soap opera. All of our lives have weird shit. British kitchen sink cinema in the '60s was like that, about people having abortions and everything, but what they missed was the weird stuff — everyone has dreams and fantasies, everybody's mother's seen a ghost, everybody's got a weird witchy relative. Like — have you seen the South American dwarf on the internet? Have you guys seen that thing? That's the world we live in — filled with gaps and weirdness and strangeness. I'm just trying to be realistic. This is realism to me.

How did you get into comics?
I took some pages that I'd drawn to a convention in Glasgow — a convention just like this one — and I showed it to a bunch of guys doing a magazine called Near Myths, and they paid me for it! They paid me like 10 pounds a page. I was a poor kid, so to me that was like I was a millionaire. "Hey, I can do this, I can make money!" I thought, and then, twenty years later ... [laughs]

What do you think about the fact that you're a character in the DC Universe?
I think it's pretty cool. And they tried to kill me, but I just keep coming back!

When you were young, who did you want to be?
The Flash — he was the coolest. He was always getting turned into puppets and paving stones and stuff. It was like he was constantly tripping. Also, he's got the greatest suit — the way Carmine Infantino would draw his ass in the books! And the boots, those inch-thick treads. I still want those boots. If anyone here can make boots like that, please.

What do you find most enjoyable about your work? What are you reading right now?
The Filth is my favorite all-time thing I've written. It's the most consistent. It's really wrapped 'round its themes quite well. What am I reading — just superhero comics. I'm a boring guy. Geoff Johns' Green Lantern, Davis' Avengers. Just basic stuff. I'm just like everybody else — I like what's cool and popular.

What do you think of the different Batman movie versions?
Something like Batman can be interpreted so many ways — I love the Adam West Batman, and I love the Christian Bale Batman more than ever. That guy is good — I think that's the best Batman ever. Batman's so adaptable, you can do almost anything with it and it still works. I don't like every version. There are a lot of really good superhero movies, and a lot of really bad ones. [someone yells "Batman and Robin!"] Batman and Robin — Yeah, but the colors are brilliant! Just switch off your brain and think, "okay, I'm watching the gay Batman"!

I heard that Final Crisis begins with the funeral of Captain Marvel ...
Yeah, that's true. It was originally in a thing called "Hyper-Crisis" which I pitched years ago, at the time when I was leaving X-Men — not to say Marvel is dead, 'cause it's a colossal industry, but for me it was kind of over, so I wanted to do this thing where everyone was standing at Captain Marvel's grave. I wanted to do this thing with the Chronovore, where he had eaten the first years of the 21st century, so there was no 21st century, and Superman and his allies had to build a bridge of events across this abyss. It means you have to go tell Batman, "if you don't do this, we're all gonna die, 'cause we need this event to be rivet 205." It was kind of interesting, but I'm glad they went with Identity Crisis instead.

What are you doing next?
Next year I'm doing this thing called War-Cop, this other atomic bomb thing which is kind of psychadelic — back to being me again, a little bit.

Can this really be THE final crisis?
It's definitely the final crisis for me. But who knows? You cannot predict what these people will do in the future. If Final Crisis sells, then there will be more crises — there's no stopping it.

Your characters tend to escape the comic book and go into the real world. Does that happen in Final Crisis?
I was always fascinated with dimensions as a kid. I was five years old, trying to draw the fourth dimension: "I know I can draw a point, a line, a square, a cube ... arrgh!" There won't be any of that in Final Crisis, no. But the idea was: Superman, Batman, they're much more real than we are — created long before any of us were alive. Superman is still vital and young and communicating to people. When we're dead and gone and dust, there will probably still be a Superman. And the world that they inhabit is a two-dimensional world. You can pick up different comics from his whole span of existence, but it's all still there. I began to imagine: what if there were things above us, on a hyper-cube level, if there were people who could look down on us like we look down on Superman, and see the entirety of our lives? The same way we can see the entirety of lives in the second dimension? The experience of The Invisibles in Kathmandu was kind of an actualization of that reality — that there are things up there that can see the entirety of Earth time and Earth space like that. It's an ongoing fascination for me.

What happened in the last issue of The Invisibles? I've read it like 20 times and I have no idea.
Yes, you have. Of course, you have! What happened was that thing you read and all those words. That's what happened.