Watchmen: Crowning Moment of Suck
THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILERS.
For every comic fan in the world, this weekend will have special significance. This, the weekend of March 6, 7, and 8, was when the long-anticipated Watchmen movie was released (in the US). As you probably know, Watchmen was attempted multiple times by various directors and abandoned each time, and fanboy Zach Snyder finally made a releaseable version. And you know what? He should've abandoned it too.
OMG, what a freakin' disappointment. I've been eagerly anticipating this movie since even before that kickass trailer before The Dark Knight, and now I wish i could've just left it to the imagination. It was just so - off. There are a lot of specific things wrong with the movie, but it also "felt" weird, and I'm not being very specific, but it was a combination of dialogue (oh, the dialogue), acting, and plot pacing that just made it feel totally strange.
Main problems: The violence. Oh man, the violence. I'd say the novel Watchmen is 'pretty' violent, maybe moreso for its time but this movie was just ridiculous. Do you remember Dr. Manhattan exploding thugs and then watch their intestines drip from the ceiling? No? Or Nite Owl break a man's arm so blood sprays onto the person next to him? Or a guy's arms getting sawed so his buddies could try to kill Rorshach? The list goes on.
The plot/pacing were atrocious. Way to rushed and jumpy. I feel bad for my one friend who hadn't read the book, as I (at times) had trouble following the plot: "Wait, the SWAT team is there already?" "They're going to Antarctica already?"
THE HALLELUJAH SEX SCENE. O.M.G. It was as close to porn as they could get, and my friends and I practically fell out of our seats when Laurie hit the flamethrower at the climax. *shudders*
A lot of the novel stuff happened without any explanation. Rorschach drops his journal off at the New Frontiersman, which had not been mentioned previously. The Comedian makes a joke about Hooded Justice's S&M tendencies, without any explanation later. Ozy has a weird-ass cat creature following him around? Etc.
Laurie was just terrible. The actress sucked, her role was seriously degraded, and it pulled down every scene she was in. Ozy was...alright, though if he was supposed to be American they really needed a new actor who could actually do an American accent. The Comedian...I ♥ Jeffrey Dean Morgan, but...it was just 'off' too. Especially the scene where he killed the pregnant woman in Vietnam. Was he supposed to be angry? I couldn't tell what emotion he was trying to do. Dr. Manhattan was alright, he didn't have much to do, Nite Owl was good, and Rorschach was amazing. Hands down the best part of the movie (which, admittedly, isn't saying much).
The soundtrack was fucking ridiculous. I really should not have noticed it as much as I did.
My favorite scene (besides the opening credits, which I saw at Comicon and were gorg-eous) was the whole sequence at the end, when Nite Owl and Rorschach go to stop Ozy (though they didn't have the snow Segways!!). I'm not sure why - a lot of my friends didn't like that part, because it was too Matrix-y, but I thought the actors/characters worked off each other and were just better. Dr. Manhattan actually did stuff besides teleporting and making weird stuff on Mars, Laurie trying too shoot Ozy made me almost like her ("You asshole!"). It was weird how Ozy didn't yell "I did it" - that part and "35 minutes ago" is practically iconic for fans of the book. Nite Owl's NOOOOOOOOOOOOO at the end came off as really strange - he definitely stood for like 2 minutes watching Rorschach and Dr. Manhattan, and didn't try to stop them at all, I mean, what did he THINK Dr. M was going to do?! I did like how Ozy let Nite Owl beat the carp out of him. That being said, the Rorschach/Nite Owl subtext was highly, highly amusing.
Speaking of Rorschach, he was not nearly as much as a psychopath as he was in the book. The movie tried a little (espcially the 'origin story' scene, and biting the kid's cheek instead of cigarette-in-the-eye) but it was just...no. Rorschach never exploded anyone into millions of gory bits, unlike some other people I could mention...
Hollis didn't die. He had one scene that was pretty pointless, other than to show how sucky Nite Owl's life was.
Hmmm, the ending - which I TOTALLY CALLED. I did. Technically, in my original hypothesis it was just Dr. M destroying New York, but more cities is fine too. And yes, it technically wasn't Dr. M, it just 'looked' like him. While this ending supposedly had the same effect as the giant squid, there were some problems - why didn't' the rest of the world just blame America for the destruction, especially if they couldn't find Dr. Manhattan to kill him? America created, and wantonly used Dr. Manhattan, and in most eyes definitely to blame for his supposed role in the devestation. And why wasn't anyone trying to find Laurie, and/or blaming her as well, since her departure was a catalyst for his 'freak out' (which obviously isn't what happened, but the public doesn't know that). Some problems, but overall an 'ok' part of the movie. Also, Laurie and Dan didn't go all incognito after, though they did go visit Laurie's mom (who seemed like an important part of the movie, as in she was in a lot more than some other important things, but didn't really do/mean anything). Eurgh.
Was there an embargo in cigarette smoking in the movie? Laurie didn't, and the kid who bullied Rorschach wasn't smoking either...Comedian did have a cigar, however.
Yeah, it wasn't supposed to be panel-for-panel, word-for-word, (and it wouldn't necessarily be better if it was), but the parts that were straight from the book really stood out as cheesy or just plain weird. Overall, a sub-par action movie at best, and completely failed at what it was trying to do - a worthy version of the greatest graphic novel of all time.
For every comic fan in the world, this weekend will have special significance. This, the weekend of March 6, 7, and 8, was when the long-anticipated Watchmen movie was released (in the US). As you probably know, Watchmen was attempted multiple times by various directors and abandoned each time, and fanboy Zach Snyder finally made a releaseable version. And you know what? He should've abandoned it too.
OMG, what a freakin' disappointment. I've been eagerly anticipating this movie since even before that kickass trailer before The Dark Knight, and now I wish i could've just left it to the imagination. It was just so - off. There are a lot of specific things wrong with the movie, but it also "felt" weird, and I'm not being very specific, but it was a combination of dialogue (oh, the dialogue), acting, and plot pacing that just made it feel totally strange.
Main problems: The violence. Oh man, the violence. I'd say the novel Watchmen is 'pretty' violent, maybe moreso for its time but this movie was just ridiculous. Do you remember Dr. Manhattan exploding thugs and then watch their intestines drip from the ceiling? No? Or Nite Owl break a man's arm so blood sprays onto the person next to him? Or a guy's arms getting sawed so his buddies could try to kill Rorshach? The list goes on.
The plot/pacing were atrocious. Way to rushed and jumpy. I feel bad for my one friend who hadn't read the book, as I (at times) had trouble following the plot: "Wait, the SWAT team is there already?" "They're going to Antarctica already?"
THE HALLELUJAH SEX SCENE. O.M.G. It was as close to porn as they could get, and my friends and I practically fell out of our seats when Laurie hit the flamethrower at the climax. *shudders*
A lot of the novel stuff happened without any explanation. Rorschach drops his journal off at the New Frontiersman, which had not been mentioned previously. The Comedian makes a joke about Hooded Justice's S&M tendencies, without any explanation later. Ozy has a weird-ass cat creature following him around? Etc.
Laurie was just terrible. The actress sucked, her role was seriously degraded, and it pulled down every scene she was in. Ozy was...alright, though if he was supposed to be American they really needed a new actor who could actually do an American accent. The Comedian...I ♥ Jeffrey Dean Morgan, but...it was just 'off' too. Especially the scene where he killed the pregnant woman in Vietnam. Was he supposed to be angry? I couldn't tell what emotion he was trying to do. Dr. Manhattan was alright, he didn't have much to do, Nite Owl was good, and Rorschach was amazing. Hands down the best part of the movie (which, admittedly, isn't saying much).
The soundtrack was fucking ridiculous. I really should not have noticed it as much as I did.
My favorite scene (besides the opening credits, which I saw at Comicon and were gorg-eous) was the whole sequence at the end, when Nite Owl and Rorschach go to stop Ozy (though they didn't have the snow Segways!!). I'm not sure why - a lot of my friends didn't like that part, because it was too Matrix-y, but I thought the actors/characters worked off each other and were just better. Dr. Manhattan actually did stuff besides teleporting and making weird stuff on Mars, Laurie trying too shoot Ozy made me almost like her ("You asshole!"). It was weird how Ozy didn't yell "I did it" - that part and "35 minutes ago" is practically iconic for fans of the book. Nite Owl's NOOOOOOOOOOOOO at the end came off as really strange - he definitely stood for like 2 minutes watching Rorschach and Dr. Manhattan, and didn't try to stop them at all, I mean, what did he THINK Dr. M was going to do?! I did like how Ozy let Nite Owl beat the carp out of him. That being said, the Rorschach/Nite Owl subtext was highly, highly amusing.
Speaking of Rorschach, he was not nearly as much as a psychopath as he was in the book. The movie tried a little (espcially the 'origin story' scene, and biting the kid's cheek instead of cigarette-in-the-eye) but it was just...no. Rorschach never exploded anyone into millions of gory bits, unlike some other people I could mention...
Hollis didn't die. He had one scene that was pretty pointless, other than to show how sucky Nite Owl's life was.
Hmmm, the ending - which I TOTALLY CALLED. I did. Technically, in my original hypothesis it was just Dr. M destroying New York, but more cities is fine too. And yes, it technically wasn't Dr. M, it just 'looked' like him. While this ending supposedly had the same effect as the giant squid, there were some problems - why didn't' the rest of the world just blame America for the destruction, especially if they couldn't find Dr. Manhattan to kill him? America created, and wantonly used Dr. Manhattan, and in most eyes definitely to blame for his supposed role in the devestation. And why wasn't anyone trying to find Laurie, and/or blaming her as well, since her departure was a catalyst for his 'freak out' (which obviously isn't what happened, but the public doesn't know that). Some problems, but overall an 'ok' part of the movie. Also, Laurie and Dan didn't go all incognito after, though they did go visit Laurie's mom (who seemed like an important part of the movie, as in she was in a lot more than some other important things, but didn't really do/mean anything). Eurgh.
Was there an embargo in cigarette smoking in the movie? Laurie didn't, and the kid who bullied Rorschach wasn't smoking either...Comedian did have a cigar, however.
Yeah, it wasn't supposed to be panel-for-panel, word-for-word, (and it wouldn't necessarily be better if it was), but the parts that were straight from the book really stood out as cheesy or just plain weird. Overall, a sub-par action movie at best, and completely failed at what it was trying to do - a worthy version of the greatest graphic novel of all time.