Why does everything have to be a movie? Why not leave well enough alone? Watchmen is fine just the way it is. It doesn’t need to be turned into a dumbed down CGI flick.
::Goes to beat head against the wall::
Even if they end up making a good movie, there are as many interpretations on the book as there are readers. Hell, we can’t even agree as to who the lead is. The trick will be to duplicate that on film. It can be done but it will be very difficult. I have a moderate degree of faith in the director and writers attached to this, but a film adaptation of this book is going to be DAMN tough.
Me, I think Rohrshach, the psychotic right-wing nut, was correct. I’m definitely NOT an “ends justifies the means” type of guy. I don’t see the ending as Rohrshach’s inability to grow. I see the ending as…I don’t know…a degradation of our national morality. “The ends justifies the means” seems to be a core tennet of the current administration and the neocon movement in general. So I think even though the story is set during the Cold War it definitely still has some relevance. Rohrshach died because he didn’t fit into this new world. I don’t think his inflexibility was lack of growth. I think he was right not to go along with what happened.
**Chuck **is right?! What am I, chopped liver?! 
Okay, maybe RC offers a reasoned, articulate support to the assertion…and he’s right. I agree with your argument, too. And the one that asserts that Nite Owl represents the reader’s perspective - all things pointing to that character (and SSpectre) as the ones who go through an arc of change that is the main path of the narrative.
As for how the movie will be - well, I assume not great, but I kinda dig the thought of Watchmen getting its cross-over moment in the sun, when everyone from my 70+ year-old mom to my little kids hear about it when the movie comes out. If a few of the folks who hear about it read the book along with seeing the movie, then that’s a good thing.
And while I agree the story would best be served by a multi-hour mini-series, I would prefer it, as I have stated at least a couple of times on this board, to be done by Pixar - i.e., a top-quality, story-and-character-driven, CGI movie…I would prefer it if it wasn’t trying for 100% verisimilitude like, say, that Final Fantasy movie - I think the characters should be abstracted just enough to make it clear that this exists in its own universe…
In popular cinema terms, Nite Owl and Silk Spectre are Will Turner and Elizabeth Swann and Rorschach is Captain Jack Sparrow. The two lead characters are a couple that the story is happening to while another more colorful character is the one who’s making the story happen. If Pirates of the Caribbean existed only as a theoretical plot, Will and Elizabeth are almost unnecessary - they are important because it’s a movie and they represent the audience.
And to expand on my analogy, Ozymandias is Barbossa and Manhattan is the Aztec curse.
Hmmm. So who’s the annoying little monkey?
I’m scared I won’t be scared. When I first read the book, the actual horribleness of everything that transpires hit me in the ned and had me gaping at the pages agast for several minutes before my brain shrieked in dismay and made me go get a drink.
I don’t think they can pull that off because, not only our expectations are too great, but these things typically aren’t done well.
Of course, I cannot wholly give up hope. V for Vendetta was a much better movie than a book in my estimation. The film really did give you a sense of despair and powerlessness and finally relief and hope at the end. The book just seemed silly and confusing.
Lastly, I’m concerned about the overarching background tention. As someone said earlier, the Cold War is long gone. I heard once they were going to use terrorism as the setting, but if so, can they get that to work? If not, what will they use?
I’m going to read some more into this.
I wonder about this. Watchmen wasn’t really action-packed, and the art wasn’t exactly its strong point. It always felt like a movie as I read it, the transitions and interspliced scenes, but it’s too long. The superheroes don’t have superpowers, and it’s less action/adventure than gritty drama. BTW I hear they’ve been trying to work out how to adapt this for years, much like h2g2. That didn’t turn out too well, either, IMO.
Me!
I’m optimistic about this, without having seen the director’s previous movies. The scriptwriter having written the first two X-men films is a huge plus in my opinion, and I never saw Watchmen as unfilmable. Difficult sure, impossible no. The movie version of V for Vendetta ( a comic I’d rate higher than Watchmen) pretty much slaughtered the story, and I loved it anyway.
“h2g2”?
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
I’ve been thinking more about this over the course of the day (I even ran out to my comic book shop to kick it around with the owner. I love owning my own firm in that I can screw around at will…as long as it’s not too often).
Let me posit this for you all.
Nite Owl and Silk Spectre are the point of view characters (mostly) and the leads because they’re the only characters that remained human through the entire thing.
Rohrshach is clearly psychopathic. He routinely does horrific and terrible things and shows no regret or remorse. He’s removed from his humanity by both his childhood and the incident with the dogs and later his pattern of behavior.
Ozymandias is inhuman because of his mental perfection and intentional distance from the feelings of others. His ability to contemplate only his plan while dismissing the feelings and deaths of millions shows that he’s given up his humanity for his goals. Just like his incidental discussion of the marketing for his perfume line all humans are to him is units for market analysis and impact. This is highlighted in the way the newsstand guy hugs the kid (expressing human contact) in the moment before both die.
The Comedian, while dead, had also given up his empathy with other humans through his decision that others were just obstacles to be dealt with in his pursuit of personal gratification. His casual killing of the pregnant women in Viet Nam is evidence of this. Even Dr. Manhattan, at that point, sees that for the horror it is. But not The Comedian.
Dr. Manhattan. Has completely and literally lost his humanity. He’s no longer able to relate to humans on any worthwhile plane other than the godlike intellectual. “Human life is interesting…I think I’ll go create some.” is a great line.
But only Nite Owl and Silk Spectre are, in all of the cast, human in all phases. They see the insanity around them. They know the horror that’s going on and try to take steps to stop it. When Ozymandias pulls off his horror show they also know that there’s little they can do about it and decide a change in life is in order.
Note, also, that in the Pirate comic the character is defined by how he gives up his sanity and humanity and eventually that comes around to haunt him by killing and destroying in what he believed, in his insanity, is a good and worthy cause.
And just as simple as that I find that all the characters, other than Nite Owl and Silk Spectre are insane and inhuman to varying degrees and for varying reasons. The only real possibility for the audience to identify with a character as the lead is Nite Owl and Silk Spectre.
But they aren’t making the film for the however many tens of thousands (or even hundreds of thousands) of people who read and got the source material. They’re making it for the tens or hundreds of millions of people who’ve never read it or even heard of it. Comic book movies can’t make money if only comic book fans go to see it.
I could understand if they were making a movie adaptation of Finnegan’s Wake and decided they needed to bring it down a notch to make it accessible. But we’re talking comic books here - was it really necessary to simplify the Fantastic Four or Daredevil or Hellboy? I think most people would have been able to follow the original stories.
Sure, but the length figures into the complexity. Watchmen is 12 issues long, with a lot of characters and backstory. Trying to fit all of that really complex story into 2 hours – even 3 hours, if you want to take a shot at trying to sell that to the money people – is going to be hard and wind up confusing people.
My approach to movie adaptations is to lighten up. Movies are different from books or comics. Would you expect your favorite book or comic to undergo some alterations if it were being adapted for radio or a stage play? I do, and I figure I’ll take the movie as its own thing.
As a result, I enjoyed League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. If I think of it as an adaptation of the comics, it sucks. But if I think of it as a brainless action movie that happens to share the same neat concept, I can enjoy it.