watchmen

Chris Knight's avatar

…I will be in a movie theater, beholding the film adaptation of Watchmen.

This is a day that I have literally been waiting for, ever since early 1990 when I first read the book. More than that if you count that the first time I heard about Watchmen at all was in summer of 1988 and the very first whispers of adapting it into a movie.

I’ve been writing about the attempts to turn Watchmen into a full-length feature from the very beginning of this blog. Most of the time, it’s been to share my belief that this is a book that has been and will remain impossible to film.

But all the same, here we are: on the eve of the release of Watchmen in cinemas.

I’m heading out early this evening to join some friends who have likewise been waiting a long time for this movie. Will ...

Read more

Chris Knight's avatar

Alan Horn, head of the movie studio at Warner Brothers, demanded that the smoking be cut out of the film adaptation of Watchmen to such an extent that Laurie won’t be enjoying that weird but neat-looking pipe of hers. According to director Zack Snyder, it was either remove the smoking or “the movie wouldn’t have been made, literally.” Although the Comedian will still be puffing his cigars because he was deemed “evil” enough.

So let me get this straight: Watchmen is a story that includes a hero who is racist and anti-black (Captain Metropolis), another who speaks favorably of Hitler (Hooded Justice), features a brutal rape scene, shows a little girl murdered then cut to pieces and fed to dogs, has a main character who is struggling with sexual dysfunction, and maybe a dozen other very bad images and concepts…

…and yet showing a grown woman smoking is supposed to ...

Read more

Chris Knight's avatar

Wil Wheaton is one of us: a proud geek who “gets it”. And if Wheaton (perhaps best known from his work in the movie Stand By Me and his portrayal of Wesley Crusher on Star Trek: The Next Generation) says that “I can’t think of a better, more faithful, graphic novel adaptation, ever” about the film version of Watchmen, then his word is bond.

And if the movie is as good as the early whispers about it already are, then… dare I say it? Yeah I will: it wouldn’t surprise me if Watchmen rivaled The Dark Knight for box office gross. And maybe… maybe… even Titanic.

Mash down here for Wil Wheaton’s gloriously complete and epically profanity-laden review of Watchmen....

Read more

Chris Knight's avatar

Ever since the first time I read Watchmen, I’ve thought it would be neat to have an action figure of Rorschach to decorate my shelf or computer desk with.

It’s taken twenty years, but today I finally get my wish…

Found it at Books A Million in Greensboro while out on some business this morning.

Now all we need is for someone to make a big plush Rorschach doll that goes “Hurm” when you pull the string 😛...

Read more

Chris Knight's avatar

Collider.com is reporting that director Zack Snyder has confirmed that there are three cuts of Watchmen. The first will be the theatrical release that will come out two weeks from tomorrow, and will run for 2 hours 36 minutes.

The theatrical cut will be coming out on DVD probably “around Comic-Con of this year” (mid-July or thereabouts) and at the same time there will also be Snyder’s “director’s cut” clocking in at 3 hours and 10 minutes!

But that’s still not all. Later this fall will be the “ultimate” cut of Watchmen coming to DVD and Blu-ray. That version will incorporate the animated Tales of the Black Freighter footage that is coming out as a separate home release next month. This version will be 3 hours 25 minutes long.

I must say: that is gonna be one strange day two weeks from now when Watchmen comes out. I’ve ...

Read more

Chris Knight's avatar

If you’ve never read Watchmen (what’s the matter with you? Go read it now!) then this requires some ‘splainin’. In the graphic novel there’s this kid who’s reading a pirate comic book at a newsstand. The comic book, Tales of the Black Freighter, is shown to us the readers as a “story within a story” and it parallels a lot of what’s going on in the greater scheme of Watchmen. Zack Snyder didn’t have enough time to include it in the feature film adaptation of Watchmen, but it’s important enough that it’s coming to us next month as an animated feature on DVD and Blu-ray! And the word is that months afterward when Watchmen itself is released for home consumption, that an “ultimate edition” will be coming out that splices together the live-action movie and the animated Tales of the Black Freighter.

So with that ...

Read more

Chris Knight's avatar

The marketing for Watchmen never ceases to amaze me. This time it’s an Eighties-style scrolling street fighting arcade game based on the Minutemen. Plunk in your virtual quarters and play as either Nite Owl or Silk Spectre as you clean up New York City of the 1940s.

Maybe if you rack up a high enough score, it’ll unlock Hooded Justice and Mothman as playable characters 😛...

Read more

Chris Knight's avatar

EXTREMELY encouraging word from the Watchmen panel at New York Comic Con yesterday. The thousands in attendance were treated to the first 18 minutes from the movie, which shows the fight between Edward Blake and his assailant, and then a montage of the Watchmen world’s history playing out to Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are-A Changin'”, followed by Rorschach’s initial investigation of the murder.

And then, the audience at New York Comic Con got to behold something that I know for darn near certain that every Watchmen fan has been hoping and praying would make it into the movie…

Two words: “Prison Cafeteria”.

And yes: Rorschach says it. We are finally going to get to hear him say the line, on the big screen.

I’ve a lot to do tomorrow, but I plan on spending a little time seeing if there’s a theater in Greensboro that’s gonna have a midnight ...

Read more

Chris Knight's avatar

Exactly one month from today we’ll finally get to see the Watchmen movie. And I think it’s safe to say: the biggest anticipation of the past twenty years has been for how well Rorschach will translate to the big screen. Empire has the exclusive premiere of this latest video journal, which focuses on Rorschach’s background and that very neat mask that he wears.

And if you’ve read the book, perhaps it will interest you to know that this clip has a fleeting glimpse of our favorite antihero in a certain pose wielding a meat cleaver…

...

Read more