Fox originally had distribution rights that TW assumed had expired and reverted. However, there was supposedly a consent provision and the the distribution rights never fully reverted back to Warners. Fox, as a competitor, moved to annoy the crap out of TW. I don't think Fox wants the distribution rights back or even money as much as they want ownership rights back to some other movies and TV shows that Warner Bros. have been holding onto. It's a corporate tit for tat, and Fox has TW by the balls if their case is solid. Warners always had the rights to the film (much to Alan Moore's, the creator of Watchmen, chagrin).
i remember hearing that warner owns the rights to the adam west batman tv series and fox wanted to distribute them (since they own some other rights to the show) and so they made some exchange where that show can be released now on dvd. this is just what i heard on the radio weeks ago i dont know if anything happened since. i havent read watchmen yet but i keep hearing a lot of great things about it. I may go to the book store today and pick up a copy of it. I know I saw the link earlier about the whole story online, but I dont like sitting a reading comics/books on my computer screen.
I think it is probably impossible to fully capture The Watchmen in a movie as the nature of it is tied to the graphic novel format, and it truly is a graphic novel as opposed to a comic book. I just read some of it again last week and there are a lot of subtleties to it and Alan Moore uses the conventions of comics to work with the story which will be difficult to translate to a movie where the focus is likely to be on action. I'm kind of expecting this movie to be like the Dune movies and Sci-Fi Series that never were able to convey the complexity or even some of the key points of the book.
You know what is strange about reading the Watchmen now? I can't stand a lot of the art in it. I know the trend in movie-making for a long time has been to do 'remakes'.. I would be very interested to see someone put in the effort to keep the writing exactly the same, but to go in and update the art to something a little more slick. My main beef is with the female characters. They are supposed to be these sexy vixens, but they all look like Aunt May in SpiderMan. Ugh.
I think that's partly due to Alan Moore wanting to depict them more realisticly and not as sex pots. Part of the story is about Dr. Manhattan's relationship to his original fiance and to Silk Spectre falling apart because while he stays eternally youthful their looks start to fade. I also think Alan Moore's style whether deliberately or not is to draw more like the comics of the '50's and 60's rather than the more stylized graphic novels now.
While I agree that there are aspects of the graphic novel that will never be able to be captured on the movie screen, I think this adaptation of Watchmen will be as close to the original as you will ever see (of course, that is likely to be true whether this movie is good or bad, I suppose). From what I have heard, the trailers kind of pushed some of the action bits from the movie to get butts in the seats, but the movie, overall, will have approximately the same amount of action as the graphic novel, which is to say only three scenes of real note, from what I remember. The more and more I hear from critics and fans that either saw the partial screening or the entire movie in Portland a while back, the more and more excited I get.
I agree. I know they had the intent of making it real, but I didn't get used to the style until the 3rd book.
Are you talking about those things on iTunes, the Motion Comic? It's not a cartoon, they just kind of manipulate the original art from the book to make a semi animated comic book. It's got music, sound fx, but it's read by one guy so when he does the voices of female characters, it's kind of funny and takes you out of the moment. http://www.watchmencomicmovie.com/watchmen-motion-comics-episodes.php It's like a few steps up from a book on tape basically. Kind of cool if you want to check out the book without reading it. I couldn't find any on youtube except for this one thing where a guy takes parts of the motion comic where Rorschach is talking and uses audio of the writer, Alan Moore reading instead of the guy who does the motion comic. <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/BUfuj_5Z9l8&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/BUfuj_5Z9l8&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>
I just watched the exclusive clip and I like it a lot more than what I saw in the trailers. <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/zrC3C_WwaCA&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&feature=player_embedded&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/zrC3C_WwaCA&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&feature=player_embedded&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object> Maybe since its a lower quality it doesn't seem as stylized as what was shown in the trailers and captures the grittiness of graphic novel. I also like how in lower quality the suits look more like the Batman and Robin suits from the 1960's rather than slick metallic suits of recent superhero movies. To me that says a lot more mocking superheroes that Alan Moore was getting at. Plus the Philip Glass soundtrack kicks @ss over the Smashing Pumpkins.
Alan Moore will disown it if he hasn't already. Since DC owns the rights, he can't do much about it, but if V for Vendetta is any precedent, he'll likely sign away his royalties to Dave Gibbons. The horrible script for V for Vendetta left me with little regard for Hollywood's adaptation of comics. Alan Moore is an anarchist, and the anti-authoritarian and anti-Thatcherite morality themes are never far from his best works. Taking them out renders his works into second-rate genre escapism, which is all about what his graphic novels try very hard not to be about. And putting the "300" people in charge of it all? Yuck.
Well we'll find out in about 6 weeks. However, no way this turns into the huge steaming bowl of fetid turd juice that was V for Vendetta.. If you have not been keeping up with the progress on the Watchmen movie, it looks like they are going to do it (mostly) right... no big squid at the end, so we'll have to see how that goes, but it probably won't be something that makes him want to disown it.
No, he just looks that way. Here he is talking about being on the Simpsons: <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/Z-ha-PtyRlU&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&feature=player_embedded&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/Z-ha-PtyRlU&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&hl=en&feature=player_embedded&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Moore "He is a vegetarian, an anarchist,[18] a practicing magician and occultist, and he worships a Roman snake-deity named Glycon."
"Moore is a practicing magician who worships a Roman snake deity named Glycon which he acknowledges to be a "complete hoax." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Moore#Magic
Went threw the Watchmen motion comics and novel last night. Didn't sleep basically. Took at least 6 hours of my life. It was worth, it was everything it was hyped to be. Whatever snake he worships count me in.
