Oh, Now They've Done It

A week or so ago, Warner Brothers released photos of the costumes for the characters in their upcoming Watchmen movie. You can check them out on this slideshow at Yahoo, or just go to the movie's official website.

So, I guess since they have character costumes, and, looking at the website, they appear to have sets and whatnot, I guess they're actually going to make a Watchmen movie.

I've lamented the fact that this would eventually happen before, and I'm really not that pleased about it. It's being done without the cooperation of Alan Moore, who passes on participating in any film version of his work. I mean, look at how pissed off he looks in that picture on the right. Does that look like a guy who's happy to have his masterpiece turned into what will probably be a piece of shit movie? I think not.

Not that any of this is a surprise. Studios have been attempting to turn Watchmen into a movie almost since it was published (as you can see by the "2006" date in the teaser banner that tops this post). This property has been in turnaround for nearly 20 years. And I can understand why.
It's an incredibly dense story, with three or four storylines going on at once, one of which is the narrative of a comic-within-a-comic that mirrors the main plotline. And it's not a "happy" story, by any means. It's violent, depressing, with Nixon still President, and the U.S. is on the brink of war with Russia. It's also got a take on terrorism that might hit a little close to post-9/11 New York City.

And you can't exactly make a faithful adaptation when Moore is of no help. Joel Silver or whatever producer is running this thing can't call Moore and say, "Alan, I'm having some trouble with Chapter 3 here. Any story ideas?" They'll be greeted with a "Go fuck yourself," or some other witty Briticism. The only reason his name will appear at all in the credits is because the Writers Guild requires it to. Otherwise, I'm sure he'd take a pass. Really, this has the makings of a disaster written all over it.

But, I thought the same thing when I heard they were turning the Sin City books into a movie, and that movie was, literally, the comic on film. Maybe Watchmen will turn out the same.

But I doubt it.