‘Watchmen’ Writer Alan Moore Retiring from Comic Books

The end is nigh for Alan Moore’s comic book career.

The Guardian reports that Moore, 62, said during a London press conference for his work Jerusalem that he believes he has about 250 pages left in him.

“I think I have done enough for comics. I’ve done all that I can,” Moore said. “I think if I were to continue to work in comics, inevitably the ideas would suffer, inevitably you’d start to see me retread old ground and I think both you and I probably deserve something better than that.”

Moore is working to complete current obligations, including a final League of Extraordinary Gentlemen book, and is considering working on films or literary novels after that. 

“After that, although I may do the odd little comics piece at some point in the future, I am pretty much done with comics,” said Moore.

One of the most influential voices of his generation, Moore is credited (along with The Dark Knight Returns’ Frank Miller) with revolutionizing the medium in the 1980s and bringing comics to new levels of literary complexity and respect. He’s known for his prickly relationship with Hollywood and DC Comics, refusing to be involved or credited in big screen adaptations of his work such as V for Vendetta and Watchmen. The most recent adaptation, the DC animated Batman: The Killing Joke, was released this summer. 

His statement is reminiscent of those made by director Quentin Tarantino, who has said he’d likely retire from filmmaking after his tenth film. 

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