[...] a section reminiscent of V for Vendetta, she begins receiving encouraging notes from a friend who claims to be a fellow prisoner, but does [...]

[...] having to do so many appearances to hand-sell Kickback his new graphic novel, in the year of V for Vendetta. It’s certainly become a different market over the last few [...]

I will say that I thought that the movie Evey was distinctly inferior to the one in the book; her role in the film was only to push a lever. Her role in the book was much more expansive, and involved more change. The book Evey was also sixteen, not twenty-something, so the book featured much more of her growth toward adulthood.

I also disagree fairly strongly with Jer about the relative darkness of the book, but that’s based on the fairly obvious shift in focus from the book to the film. The book is fundamentally anarchic; the movie is fundamentally democratic. The thematic differences in endings arise thence.

Jer, thanks much for the insight. The depressing approach of V is another reason I’m not eager to reread it. And I don’t want to launch into a discussion of Moore’s treatment of his female characters, but it didn’t surprise me that she was just a plot device most of the time. For a genius, he unfortunately falls prey to the same blinders that many male comic writers share.

Interesting look at the behind-the-scenes production of the book…

Two – they actually say that they make Evey less of a pawn in the interviews, huh? I read the book again AFTER watching the film and I was struck that Evey in the book is a total follower – she never makes a decision on her own. Even at the end, when V ostensibly forces her to make her own decision to stay with him, she appears to be suffering more under the aegis of Stockholm Syndrome that actually making her own decision. I thought the film actually did better in this aspect, where Evey finally starts taking her own life into her own hands at the end, after V’s brutal “shock therapy”. Of course, she’s a pawn through the rest of the book, because she’s the “go-along, get-along, good citizen” who doesn’t really think much about what’s going on, and is only trying to live her life. In the novel, Moore is not very subtle about it (going as far as making her a prostitute), while in the movie its a more metaphoric form of prostitution (working for the state-run media giant), but its effectively the same.

Three – The book is really, really depressing compared to the movie. Everything (and I do mean EVERYTHING) in the movie is much, much darker in the book. Right down to the ending, where in the movie its one of hope, where the citizens finally start to take some responsiblity for the monster they’ve sat back and allowed their government to become, while in the book the citizens turn into a mob-minded monster to destroy the monstrous government. Partly its a work of its time, but partly its a work of Alan Moore at THAT particular time in his life (which may amount to the same thing in literary criticism, I’m not a literary critic, so I can’t say).

Fourth – thanks for the history of the “Making of V” for DC. I imagine they’ve had their investment returned to them in spades by this point — that’s a book that I don’t think they’ve ever had out of print since they first compiled it.