There are a lot of authors over the years who have disowned cinematic adaptations of their work after the fact, but Alan Moore was against the V for Vendetta (2005) film before it was even released. In a New York Times interview with Moore after the film was released, the timeline was made clear: although studios had insisted Moore was excited to see his legendary graphic novel adapted, Moore had already released statements refuting that idea. Moore might not be the easiest writer to work with, but his main concerns about V for Vendetta as a film make sense: while the original story focused on a dystopian, post-apocalyptic world influenced by real life British Thatcherism, the film updated the concerns to the UK during the War on Terror.
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While the update might have made sense to the filmmakers at the time, it ultimately dates the film, and takes away the harshness of the world of the original V for Vendetta. It becomes more of a cartoonish ‘what if’ about the possibility of extreme overreach in an overreaction to Islamic terrorism, instead of how the UK descends into chaos after a nuclear winter, as in the original graphic novel. The UK becomes fascist in an attempt to restore order in a post-apocalyptic setting. The film also defanged V himself; he becomes more of a compassionate renegade freedom fighter than a revolutionary, angry anarchist terrorist.
Alan Moore Was Right about the V for Vendetta Movie
Moore might have summed up his overall complaints best in a now-archived interview with MTV: “Those words, ‘fascism’ and ‘anarchy,’ occur nowhere in the film. It’s been turned into a Bush-era parable by people too timid to set a political satire in their own country.”
He’s right; there was no real need to completely shift an adaptation about British fascism into a more drained concern about where the world was headed after 9/11 and with America under George W. Bush. Fascism has frequently been a concern in British literature: George Orwell’s 1984 is an early example of those concerns becoming groundbreaking storytelling, and the original V for Vendetta was following in that tradition when it was being published between 1982 and 1985.
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Sometimes, an update of the source material makes sense, but this update ignores the whole point of V for Vendetta: it’s less a cautionary tale and more a philosophical debate about fascism and anarchism, which seem widely contradictory. However, the character of V wasn’t supposed to be a hero; he was supposed to be a conflicting figure for readers, and that’s probably why the true protagonist of the graphic novel (and the film) is Evey Hammond, and why she is his successor in the end… in the graphic novel. Evey in the film is a troubled young career woman; Evey in the graphic novel, is a teenage prostitute who ultimately takes on the mantle of V.
Arguably, the film is the way it is because that’s how it could get made in 2000s Hollywood; it becomes a much broader story, with a lot more sentimentality and less of a hard-liner stance, period. It rewrites contemporary history instead of proposing a terrifying possible future. At this point, the film feels dated and out-of-place; the filmmakers clearly want to make a point about America, but they’re doing it through the lens of UK politics, and it just… doesn’t make sense. It didn’t back then, and it definitely doesn’t now.
V for Vendetta Could Use Another Chance
Hollywood will probably never get Moore back in their good graces, but that’s no reason not to try adapting V for Vendetta again. HBO may have it easier with their ‘remix’ of Watchmen (2019), given that Watchmen is set in the United States, and therefore, it’s easier to ‘graft’ contemporary American concerns onto the original story, as the TV adaptation did. If an adaptation of V for Vendetta was to be undertaken today, it would have to be given to a creator with a steady hand, who refuses to go for broad strokes tying the events of Vendetta to our world today, and sticks to the point of the story: the political-philosophical quandary at the center questioning the role of extremism no matter where you are on the political continuum.
Television would probably be the best place for a new adaptation of V for Vendetta; it would allow for the world to be more fully established at the start, and it would mean the core story wouldn’t be rushed along the way. TV has also become a place for some truly vital political discussions; because TV shows get more time than just a standard movie allows more room to explore viewpoints and challenge audience assumptions. Alan Moore was right about V for Vendetta as a film, and while he may never enjoy an adaptation of his work, V for Vendetta as it was originally written is still a story that means something in our world today.
