Since 1987, nerds and comic book fans have waited for some kind of movie to be made based on the graphic novel Watchmen.  Personally I didnt read it until the late 90′s, but Ive waited a long time nonetheless. Before I get into the review let me explain my process up into the release date…

Watchmen teaser poster

Last summer I saw the first preview for Watchmen, and just about shit myself.  I was more excited than if I was getting my biography made into a movie.  After I saw the first preview I went home after the flick and google’d the shit out of anything that had to do with Watchmen, and got bittersweet info.  First I discovered the director who made 300 was making Watchmen, which was like expecting the warm embrace of a beautiful woman and getting a strongly thrusted knee to the man garbage.  Dont get me wrong, I liked 300, but that style just wont work for Watchmen.  Watchmen is brutal, bloody, gritty, and psychologically perplexing and fucked up.  300 required the IQ of a monkey to comprehend and was bright, pretty and clean. With male perfection shown off oh so well in perfectly sculpted abs.  So I didnt see the correlation here other than they were both graphic novels.  Second I found out the movie wasnt coming out for another 7 months.. which in marketing is said to “help build buzz”.. and in mitch is to piss me off by having to wait so long.  Slowly but surely the time passed and new trailers came out.  But one imparticular just floored me.  It was set to a slow version of Smashing Pumpkins The Beginning Is the End Is the Beginning, and it just about made me cream my pants.  I was excited for the movie all over again.  Then of course about 2 weeks before the release they put out a trailer with a poppy, douche baggy, rock balad that made me want to punch my tv set.  But you have to appeal to everyone, not just intelligent, amazing and creative folks.. like myself.

So with all the bittersweet knowledge in my brain I knew the movie would never come close to the comic book, but I went and saw it any way.  When I sat down I didnt have a whole lot of excitement and I didnt expect much, but when it comes to the best piece of literature Ive ever read, Ill go see its film adaptation.

The Comedian

The movie started pretty well, with a rough fight scene and the death of one of the main characters, The Comedian played by Jeffrey Dean morgan which was a helluva job on the casting, the guy looks just like him.  Then followed a pretty decent collage of Americas past to set the stage in this alterate reality 1985.  (Which was a great way to cut down on the run time of the movie, even though it was just shy of 3 hours.) Then it hopped right in with the character Rorschach being established as the detective of the group and showing him discovering that the dead guy was the comedian and that somebody might be bumping off old superheroes.  I wont divulge the entire story for those who havent read the book, or seen the movie yet but the story follows pretty closely to the novel with only a few minor changes, but with the same effect.   Including PLENTY of Dr. Manhattan’s weener.

All in all I say that the movie was entertaining, but nothing of a classic.  The director,  Zack snyder, did a better job than I thought he would but theres a lot of directors that could have done better.  One thing that kept bothering me was the lack of original music to help drive a good movie. Zack Snyder tried to get clever and add another layer to the layer filled story of watchmen with music like All along the Watchtower by Jimi Hendrix.  The lyrics and music had a deeper meaning, sure, but its a movie not a marijuana smoke session.  I dont need a deep fucking soundtrack of lyrics, I want movie music that helps drive the plot.  Also with this movie there was obviously a shitload of  CGI and some of it absolutly necessary like with Dr. Manhattans character and his abilities.  But just like 300 there was a lot of CGI blood which looks fake as hell and takes away from the gritty down to reality brutality of Watchmen.  It wasnt ALL CGI blood which Im happy to announce, but when ever a brutal beating/mauling/murder/slashing is complete CGI it looks too fake and takes away from what the original author intended.  A gritty, cynical and real take on what superheroes would be in reality.

So in the end, just the timeframe is worth admission.  3 hours for 8 bucks, thats not bad to be entertained and have stuff to look at… Go see it and let me know what you think.