The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Volume I was published by America’s Best Comics (a DC imprint) in 1999-2000. Written by Moore and illustrated by Kevin O’Neill, it assembles characters from Victorian fiction into a team: Mina Murray (from Dracula), Captain Nemo (from Verne), Allan Quatermain (from Haggard), Hawley Griffin the Invisible Man (from Wells), and Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde (from Stevenson).
The concept is deceptively simple — Victorian superhero team-up — but Moore’s execution transforms it into something far more complex. Every background detail contains literary references; every character is faithful to their original depiction (including the racism, imperialism, and violence of their source texts); and the plot examines what it means that an empire requires monsters to defend it. The League works for British Intelligence, but its members are outcasts, criminals, and freaks.
The series expanded across multiple volumes over two decades, eventually encompassing all of fiction as a single continuous universe — from The Odyssey through 1984 to the present day. Moore’s larger project is to treat the entirety of human fiction as a shared mythology: every story ever told exists in the same imaginative space, and the League is the point where these fictional realities intersect.
Original issues (America’s Best Comics, 1999-2000): Six issues, Volume I.
Market values:
- Volume I #1, near mint: $30–$100
- First collected edition (2000): $15–$40
- Absolute Edition (slipcased): $50–$100
- Complete series across all volumes: highly variable