by the YMB Staff

YMB has learned that early last year, DC Comics began taking submissions from writers for a top secret project... a sequel to the opus "Watchmen."

"With the movie coming out, it just makes sense to capitalize on that," DC Executive Editor Dan DiDio is quoted as saying at a recent secret conference call with retailers. "We got, literally, tens of submissions and picked the best one."

"We figured that Hollywood was going to make a sequel anyway, and this way we get to maintain control of that. And with this one we don't have to deal with Moore, which is nice."

Who is the writer tasked with writing the sequel to one of the most beloved comics of all time? None other than fan-favorite John Byrne. Byrne explained the sequel's premise on the call: "Basically, there are a lot of continuity errors in the original book and I wanted to explore those and fix them. Those get fixed as we follow the basic plot of the book, which is: What if the extra-dimensional squid monster Ozymandias created was real? And from another dimension? And there were more of them? And they actually did decide to invade Earth? Dr. Manhattan said at the end of the first volume that he was going to go off and create life. What if he decided to create evil, psychic, Earth-enslaving squids?"

Art will be handled by none other than fan-favorite artist Frank Quitely. The artist said on the call: "DC gave me a huge lead time, six months, and I've absolutely got the first issue just about done. I'm even going to draw some of the other issues, too."

Byrne continued: "I have no idea what this guy is drawing half the time, but the civilians seem to like him, so whatever."

"John's giving me a lot of great stuff to draw, and I hope to be able to draw some of it. The fight between Omni-Rorschach and Dr. Manhattan in issue eleven should be fun. Hope I get around to it." Always-a-bridesmaid-never-the-bride-on-big-event-comics Doug Mahnke will provide art for "whatever Frank doesn't bother getting to," DiDio revealed.

This fall readers will be able to uncover all the secrets still waiting to be revealed in the Watchmen universe! How did Rorschach survive Dr. Manhattan's disintegration? Did the newspaper publish his journal? Do the members of the power-pop tween band (and children of Nite Owl and Silk Spectre) Nite Spectre have powers? And is Ozymandias gay? "Watchmen II" is scheduled to be released the same week the movie hits DVD/Blu-Ray.

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