Watch Alan Moore put on a 'Show' as the Man in the Moon in first trailer for his trippy new movie

Alan Moore may be known for his extensive bibliography — much of which has been adapted for TV and film — but now he's trying his hand at something new: writing and starring in a feature film. 

And as can be seen in the trailer below, it may not be what fans of his comic works, like Watchmen or League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, might be expecting. (Though it's certainly more in line with his recently published work.)

Titled The Show, the film is set in Northampton, in the English midlands, and stars Tom Burke (The Musketeers) as Fletcher, a man on a mission to find a stolen artifact for a menacingly insistent client. But his quest soon finds him drawn into a strange world just below the town's surface, one filled with "dead Lotharios, comatose sleeping beauties, Voodoo gangsters, masked adventurers, unlikely 1930s private eyes and violent chiaroscuro women." However, soon enough, Fletcher finds that his dreams and reality have started to blur together and that he might not be able to return to the "real" world. 

Of course, if the trailer wasn't trippy enough with the inclusion of bizarre quick-cut visuals set to the tune of an edited track of "Bloodrush" by Andrew Broder (and featuring Denzel Curry), it has the added bonus of showcasing Moore himself, dressed as a version of the "Man In The Moon" himself, right down to the glittery silver makeup and hair shaped to resemble a moon. His character's name is Frank Metterton, though not much else is known about him, other than the fact that he seems somewhat musically inclined. 

The film is directed by Mitch Jenkins, Moore's collaborator on a series of Kickstarter-funded short films set in the same sort of Northampton "netherworld" that The Show seems to be an extension of, even featuring Moore's character from the film ("seasoned radio entertainer" Frank Metterton) in one of them. The shorts have since been put together for a larger piece titled Show Pieces, which you can now find streaming on Shudder.  

Rounding out the cast alongside Burke and Moore are Siobhan Hewlett (Sherlock), Ellie Bamber (Les Miserables), Darrell D'Silva (Van der Valk), Richard Dillane (The Dark Knight), Christopher Fairbank (Guardians of the Galaxy), and Sheila Atim (Harlots). 

The Show had been selected as part of the 2020 SXSW line up before the festival was cancelled due to the spread of the coronavirus pandemic. It is currently one of the selected films for the 53rd Sitges Festival Internacional de Cinema Fantàstic de Catalunya in Spain, where it will premiere later this month. 

No news on when the film will be released in the United States.