V For Vendetta - Alan Moore.

It's 1997 and Britain is ruled by the firm hand of Fascism. No one can move or speak with out the leader being aware of it. Breaking a law or speaking against the regime means instant death. One man has had enough and he decides to set the people of Britain free. Through creating anarchy and chaos he tries to wake the people up to their chains.

This is one of Alan Moore's first graphic novels. When making comparisons to Watchman (which I couldn't help doing) it's easy to spot. It's nowhere near as complex. Plus the art work is inferior. It's not as detailed and I could ignore the art to concentrate on the story without feeling that I was missing out. Only the face of V himself really stood out which was probably the point.

Still, it's a dystopian story which is what I like. Very similar in style to 1984 in terms of 'Big Brother is watching'. Here though you get to see what happens when one man switches those cameras off. Definitely interesting. I have only two real complaints in that regards. I think more could have been made about the history. It was mentioned a few times that there was a war which resulted in the fascists taking control. Apart from brief mentions, including mentions of racial cleansing, there wasn't much else. Watchmen did that part better. I also found that I easily mixed some of the characters, they were so interchangeable. Only one or two had real depth. Again this was something that Watchmen did better.

Despite my complaints I did enjoy it. Whilst the art work was poor the story itself was superior to the first few graphic novels I tried. Only when compared to Watchmen (from my small graphic novel reading experience) does it come up short.