It’s a companion to the obligatory Watchmen comic.

It’s important to understand the impact and subsequent importance of Alan Moore’s Watchmen.  Superheros were never as interesting or developed before this template for superhuman emotion came out.  For the first time you see the stereotypical John Wayne character not only being human but being human in a way you couldn’t possibly imagine.  The weight and pressures manifest in such powerful and raw ways, you need a powerful and raw mind to convey what might happen.  Pride, vanity, self-preservation, all of these typical human conditions play out on the Watchmen stage in such a realistic way it’s no wonder that so many find so much importance in the book.

And that’s the tone that is set.  The book is so cult it’s become dogmatic.  Who wouldn’t want to see this novel translated to film?  Just the idea of it was exciting, but to see actual teaser trailers turn to full length trailers was overwhelming.

But I should have seen it then.  Like so many other good things, the big studios (the only ones capable of funding a proper adaptation) would inevidably destroy the Watchmen movie.  The early trailers were so jammed with action it was hard to believe they could actually fill a full minute spot.  There’s really only a full minute worth of action reading in the book, but surely they had to polish the movie up to bring in the action fans.  Then we heard Rorshach say the unbelievable, he refered to the heros as “Watchmen” something so contrary to the book it was blasphemous.  But ok, maybe they just made up a sound bite for the preview to bring in the unenlightened crowd.

I should have seen it then.  The movie started out well enough.  The intro scene was very creative and inventive and kind of comforting.  While giving a quick introduction to people who hadn’t read Watchmen it also gave those of us who had lots of little inside jokes.  The murder scene was also well done.  I felt like the twist ending was a bit compromised with such a blatant display of the mastermind, but the actual fight was distracting enough.

The disappointments started rolling in soon after that.  Wrong characters placed in the wrong scene talking to the wrong people saying the wrong things, it was just one cringe after another as they tore Alan Moore’s story to shreds.

The other flaws in the film are written in many other reviews.  Ultimately I have this piece of advice for anyone who asks me if they should see the movie.  If you’ve ever read Watchmen, you should wait for DVD.  If Watchmen is new to you then please see the film, but in order to salvage a bad taste for anything Alan Moore, please read the book afterward.

Geez  Louise, Papa Cheese,

Noah