The characters in Watchmen are all based on those of a publisher, Charlton, that (at the time) had been newly acquired by DC. As Alan Moore’s original draft would have left many of these characters dead or indisposed, he was asked to create new characters instead. Although they didn’t get used in Watchmen, many of the Charlton characters are still in use by DC today.

In context to my current rereading of Watchmen, I am incredibly happy that The Blue Beetle, The Question, and Captain Atom (their doppelgangers are Night Owl, Rorschach, and Dr. Manhattan, respectively) did not find their way into the story. Although this is partly because of a sort of protectiveness I have for the characters, it is also because would also ruin the integrity of the work itself. Alan Moore brings these new characters to life (if it can be called that) in a cold, dark world, which requires them to behave a certain way; if they had even a tiny bit of back story prior to page 1 of Watchmen, it would be hard to take this attitude for granted. By choosing to use fresh characters, Alan Moore is granted infinitely more control over his entire universe. As a result, there is a cold underlying feeling that runs through the story, and each of its characters. As a reader, this ‘chill’ is constantly reinforced by the characters behaving as if something major is about to break; we believe this sentiment so much so, that when it actually happens, it isn’t completely out of left field (even if it is in the form of a space squid).

Ultimately, the DC comics, Alan Moore, and the readers got so much more from his creations than they would have if he had chosen to keep his original roaster of characters. For the Charlton characters, their purity was kept intact even as they all got to live another day, while Alan Moore got to make his world as dark and gritty as it absolutely needed to be.