Zack Snyder and HBO Reportedly In Talks For A "Watchmen" Tv Series
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God I hope so.Johnny Novgorod said:
OT: This really should have been how they went about it in the first place. Watchmen is too dense of a story to do as a single story, and too intertwined to do as a multi movie project. A miniseries was always the best live action format to use.
Credit where credit is due:
Snyder took source material that was deemed "unfilmable" and wound up with something merely mediocre. It looked great and I actually prefer his streamlined ending, but Snyder went for sleek, "cool", and grandiose where Moore went for grimy and sort of pathetic.
Snyder took source material that was deemed "unfilmable" and wound up with something merely mediocre. It looked great and I actually prefer his streamlined ending, but Snyder went for sleek, "cool", and grandiose where Moore went for grimy and sort of pathetic.
The only good thing about this is that it MAY bring new people to that wonderful book. But please, for the love of all things holy, keep Snyder away from this. He doesn't even understand the source material, how on earth could he ever bring it to life on screen? Get some more qualified people involved.
I really just wish DC would leave it alone. Ugh.
I really just wish DC would leave it alone. Ugh.
He does not understand the material for this are you MAD?Fox12 said:
Go watch the Ultimate Cut. And I have read the books for crying out loud
But anyway yes when I read the book I always thought if any adaption is needed the best way to do it is to make it a mini series heck the Novel to me felt like it had the pacing of an HBO mini series.
I really don't think he does, but to be fair, he did as well with Watchmen as most filmmakers do with a novel adaptation as complex as that. I think most film adaptations of Pride and Prejudice tend to get important details wrong, for instance.Samtemdo8 said:
The problem is that Watchmen is so incredibly dense that only the absolute best film makers could ever hope to capture its complexity. And most of them are busy doing original work. A lot of the philosophy was cut out of the scene with Rorschach, for instance. The chapter is a brilliant combination of psychoanalysis and an exploration of Nietzsche's philosophy. None of that made it into the film, and I don't think Snyder would have even understood it unless he happened to be well read in 19th century German philosophy.
Or how he completely missed how Ozzymandias was doomed to failure, because the world will immediately fall apart after he dies. We know this will happen because he's based on a poem about pharaoh Ozzymandias and on Alexander the Great. The film completely missed that point, and even seemed to imply that he made the right choice.
It's not that Snyder is bad, it's that Watchmen is an incredibly dense novel. I learn something new every time I read it. The only reason I know as much as I do is because I basically analyze literature for a living, so I specialize in this sort of thing. And I'm sure I only understand a fraction of what's in that book.
Not only that, but the book has nearly perfect pacing, with nearly every frame of every page having a symbolic purpose. No wasted space whatsoever. The book really is unfilmable, I'm not even sure Stanley Kubrick could handle it. I think Snyder understands the story, but not the themes or philosophy.
I'll give him credit, though. I thought Snyder's use of Dr. Manhatten made a lot more sense then the space squid did. That was my only real problem with the novel.
If Zack Snyder's Watchmen is any indication of what can be expected from a future series, He has no business being attached to it in any capacity. He took one of the more intelligently written comics, hollowed out any depth it might have had, and tried to make an action movie from the skin. The end result was as enjoyable as field dressing a deer.
Removing the squid and replacing it with Dr. Manhattan was also a really stupid decision. The ending goes from one of many possibilities for humanity to one of abject terror.
Removing the squid and replacing it with Dr. Manhattan was also a really stupid decision. The ending goes from one of many possibilities for humanity to one of abject terror.
That's just the point - content-wise the book itself really is too dense to be adapted to film, and I think Snyder did a very good job of cutting the content down to size in a way that makes it work for a film without becoming an unstructured mess. I have the comic at home, read it and liked it. I have the movie, and I like it too. They're ultimately two different beasts, both special in their own way, and I really can't find myself agreeing with folks who argue the film to be a lesser experience. Snyder was approached to do a film based on source material that is incredibly hard to adapt, and he rose to the challenge; the guy trimmed off the fat (and by that I mean good characters and story bits that weren't necessary for the whole to be fully cohesive) AND came up with an alternative ending that synced better with the less convoluted plot (while also being entertaining), and that deserves major kudos.Fox12 said:
Yes, all the stuff you mentioned is more than valid. No, it wasn't needed for the story to come together in the end. Films based on books sacrifice depth - they always do, and they have to. Otherwise we'd end up with 6-hour films.
It's all a matter of taste in the end, I guess, but from my personal experience I can say it's possible to enjoy Alan Moore's masterpiece without looking down on the silver screen adaptation.
To some degree, I can understand. I won't pretend it wasn't a joy to see Rorschach on screen, or that Dr. Manhattans backstory and music weren't great. There's certainly nothing wrong with enjoying the film.Sonicron said:
But the mere fact that it had to sacrifice so much depth is the problem for me. It automatically makes it the lesser work of art, in my opinion. I also don't think there was any fat to trim, except maybe that black freighter stuff. Thematically, I think that Snyder missed the point of the story. That's why part of me wishes they'd just leave it alone. The films not that bad, though. Not nearly as offensive as that Before Watchmen stuff DC tried to throw out.
I agree that he managed to salvage the basic story without too much damage, plot wise, though I was still somewhat confused during my first time seeing it. But a good novel is about so much more then just the basic story. Some of the most important parts of the narrative were cut out, and Moore's themes were almost entirely gutted. The problem is that great works of art often have a message, and any adaptation that fails to convey that message is a failure by design. I would be okay with the story being trimmed if they at least got the themes right.
God I hope they don't. I don't know what the rest of the fans are smoking, but the absence of giant squid is one thing that the movie undoubtedly did better than the graphic novel. Ozymandias is supposed to be the smartest man on the planet. At least in the movie he did something that was actually smart. Giant squid isn't. It's stupid. It's bad comic book villain kind of stupid.Zontar said:
I don't really know what the point would be. The movie, however you may have liked it, was already incredibly loyal to the source material right down to the shot composition and even certain pieces of dialogue were taken from the book verbatim. It had the central narrative while sacrificing a lot of extraneous elements (some of which were in the Ultimate cut), and the only benefit I could see from a TV adaptation is to include all those. I think an episodic structure would suit the narrative better, but when it was already pretty well contained in a 3 hour movie, I don't see the benefits being worth the hassle.
Why?
Why adapt something that already had a movie when you can do something new? I want new stories, not remakes, reboots and re-imaginings.
I'm fine with adapting a novel to tv/movie, but there is no need to do it again when the first adaption is fine. If you can't come up with a new great story, at least adapt something that we haven't seen on screen before.
Why adapt something that already had a movie when you can do something new? I want new stories, not remakes, reboots and re-imaginings.
I'm fine with adapting a novel to tv/movie, but there is no need to do it again when the first adaption is fine. If you can't come up with a new great story, at least adapt something that we haven't seen on screen before.
How was the Ozymandias of the movie smart by having the whole ordeal blamed on Dr. Manhattan, who left Earth and the threat of annihilation with him, smarter then making people believe that dimension jumping aliens existed? With how things went in the movie, the unity that formed would be short lived since the menace which caused it would be gone before anyone had time to even think about it, while in the comics it was omnipresent and would always be in the back of everyone's minds.Adam Jensen said:
Rorschach's journal makes sure that his plan can fail either way. But think about this. If not for the journal, the only way that anyone can actually find out Veidt was bullshitting in the movie would be if Dr. Manhattan told them that Veidt was behind it. But he knew that Dr. Manhattan would ultimately see the reasoning behind his actions. Meanwhile, just because he's the smartest guy doesn't mean he's the only smart guy. It's perfectly reasonable to assume that someone would find out the truth about the giant squid sooner or later.Zontar said:
And the "menace" of Dr. Manhattan is never really gone. He still exists, regardless of where he is. His intentions are unknown and his power almost limitless. And you know how paranoid the politicians are.
I seem to find myself typing this quite often these days, but... must we? Seriously?
Yes, I know, there's probably still some money to be milked from this cow, and petty, immaterial concerns like "what is the point of adapting a comic that was specifically designed to take advantage of the comic book format to begin with" don't figure in the decision-making for these things, but still.
Yes, I know, there's probably still some money to be milked from this cow, and petty, immaterial concerns like "what is the point of adapting a comic that was specifically designed to take advantage of the comic book format to begin with" don't figure in the decision-making for these things, but still.
Why? It's a being supposedly from another dimension which is half destroyed, half phased into buildings and all dead, there's nothing on the creature itself which would hint towards it being a fake, and outside of the surviving members of the Watchmen there's no one alive who is aware it's fake.Adam Jensen said:
Plus, in the movie Dr. Manhattan DID say he didn't do it before storming off to another galaxy, a scene which had him show more human emotion then any other post accident scene.
The problem with making Dr. Manhattan the great unifyer is that he symbolizes America's nuclear might. I mean, he's named 'Dr. Manhattan', for Christ's sake. That would inevitably make other nations blame America for this guy, and they'd be right back where they started. And the other thing is that Manhattan has a link to humanity, which decreases his perceived threat level around the world. And the world has already known about him for years now, they're used to "the superman", so he's not some mindboggling new danger that utterly shocks the world.Adam Jensen said:
The idea behind the giant squid is great, but the logistics stretches ones suspension of disbelief quite a bit. And I'm also sure that someone would eventually find out that this creature was some cloned monster. Bubastis was genetically engineered, too, and I doubt Veidt had exclussive access to this cloning technology.
OT: Seems a bit pointless, since Snyder already made the movie. What, are they gonna redo the scenes from the movie with the same actors?