You can think of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ “Watchmen” graphic novel series as an extended answer to a set of questions about the superhero as an idea and an ideal.
What kind of society produces masked, costumed vigilantes? What kind of person puts on the mask to begin with? How do people, ordinary and extraordinary, react in the face of the incomprehensible, from total annihilation to the otherworldly?
Since Moore and Gibbons’ original series was published in 12 issues from 1986 to 1987, other writers and artists have created within the universe they built. Warner Bros.