Alan Moore's comic Watchmen posits a fictional world in which costumed vigilantes are not celebrated as superheroes but have been outlawed by society. Watchmen takes its readers on a critical journey through the preceding decades of the superhero tradition. It displays formal finesse, tells a compelling narrative and has become the central example of the wave of sophisticated comics which emerged in the mid-1980s. Watchmen was written by Alan Moore, illustrated by Dave Gibbons and coloured by John Higgins.
Set in 1985, Watchmen's story develops along the lines of a murder investigation. The Comedian, one of the costumed vigilantes, has been murdered. He was a superhero in the government's employ. Rorschach, the only vigilante still actively fighting crime on his own authority, takes finding the murderer into his own hands. He calls upon his former...
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Citation: Kukkonen, Karin. "Watchmen". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 28 March 2009 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=25852, accessed 09 June 2026.]
