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Media | A2Q Archives | A2Q on Twitter | A2Q #78 | March 3, 2009
Watchmen: Motion Comics hits Blu-ray this week, and is only a very small part of the merchandising juggernaut that is accompanying the release of the comic-adaption Watchmen to theaters. Adrian Veidt would be proud. I have wildly conflicting emotions about the big-screen release: on the one hand, the trailers have been fairly decent and the look of the film appears to be faithful to the book. On the other hand, the extended clips that have been flooding the internet have featured less-than-impressive acting and way too much slow-motion. After all, one mustn’t forget that Watchmen is coming from the same director that brought us 300. Style over substance isn’t what I want from an adaption of a source material that is overflowing with substance. I guess we’ll all know in a few days — I hope that the film is good, but I’ll be going in with lowered expectations.
As far as the motion comic, I checked out the first issue on iTunes when it was initially released. It made me realize how long it had been since I had read the graphic novel, so I dug that out and read it instead of subscribing to the series. I’d suggest you do the same.
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I can’t help but read “HD Picture & Sound” on the Beverly Hills Chihuahua box as a threat, not a feature.
O hai, Clarice.
What’s up with the Wonder Woman DVD? Is it from a show I never watched or a direct-to-video film?
You think the trailers have looked good? They look terrible to me. This could just be the result of lousy marketing, but if they’re presenting an accurate portrait of the film, then it looks to be pretty much the same superhero antics that the book was trying to deconstruct. Without wanting to get into a big argument, I would say that it’s a pretty massive category error to call Watchmen a “superhero comic” in the same sense that Bat/Spider/Iron/Super/etc/man are.
Of course, even beyond that, I vigorously question why every single beloved cultural artifact NEEDS to become a film at ALL. Oh yeah, money. That was easy.
I will be so damn happy when the Watchman movie has come and gone just so people will stop posting that damn picture of Milhouse all over the internet.
I’m just bracing myself for an even bigger torrent of reviews/features all using the oh-so-clever “Watching the Watchmen” headline.
mrbuu82: Wonder Woman is a direct to DVD animated film in the same vein as Justice League: The New Frontier. I’ve heard it’s very good. Plus, Nathan Fillion voices the male lead.
I will have to remember to see it soon.
^hah, I think jonn1 is malfunctioning.
I see all of the Watchmen spinoffs/videogame adaptations/phone based MMOs (seriously) as proof that major studios don’t get it. After The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and V, I don’t see why anyone is still interested. Plus, it’s from the director of 300. Bleh.
And yet, despite the fact that I’m sure it’s going to be terrible, I’m going to go see it. Not out of some morbid curiousity, but because I have a friend who wants to go. This is the same friend who dragged me to see Doom in theaters, and Watchmen can’t be that bad, can it?
The trailers looked “cool”, but as I say in the main text, they lack context. All the cool, slow-mo imagery in the world won’t save this movie if the characters are leaden and the substance of the plot lost.
As far as the Milhouse picture, I thought it appropriate for a column which is covering the Watchmen marketing juggernaut, if only a small sliver.
What the studios don’t seem to get is that they’ll never please the fanboys. Here I see a movie that most critics are panning for being an unnecessarily slavish adaptation of the comic, and yet comic fans are saying it’s not faithful enough. They finally make the perfect direct comic to screen adaptation that everyone has been asking for since the first comic adaptation, and it turns out no one likes it – neither fans nor the uninitiated.
Just a follow up on Wonder Woman if anyone’s interested.
Overall it’s recommended, she’s more likable than her Justice League/Unlimited incarnation and doesn’t come off as prudish here. Overall plot is better than the average for movies of this sort but nothing stellar. Action and animation are good too.
Plus, I loved the drinking scene.
Much obliged, smacketh.