WatchmenComicMovie.com Forum

The teaser trailer was amazing. The set up of shots in combination with the perfect for Watchmen Smashing Pumpkins song just sold it.

Granted it's a fan made trailer, but this would have been a much, much better direction for the marketing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GoN0P-kcwis

_________________
"With our thoughts we make the world."
-- Gautama Buddha

I loved all of the trailers and tv spots but I can definitely see how those who were uninitiated could get the idea that this was an all out action movie. They probably should have toned down the action parts and emphasized the plot more. The emphasis on the action is especially evident in all of the tv spots except one.

This tv spot got it right. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGt16wC1 ... re=related

I also like the nbc character profiles. They seemed to have more plot points in them because they focused on the individual characters. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFjIIyvgVaA

_________________
"The world is a fine place and worth fighting for." I agree with the second part.

"There's a cello in your house now."

Is it just me, or did that spot make it look like Dr. Manhattan was the villain?

^ Hmm, I guess.

My boss saw the movie (DC) the other day. He said he really liked it though he would have liked it if there was "just a tiny bit more action." I had talked to him about the movie before, so he kinda knew what to expect as far as the tone. He said, "If I had started watching that movie thinking it was an action film, I would have either fallen asleep or turned it off halfway through."

I think that is one of the biggest reasons for the less-than-positive response from audiences. And I don't think it's completely unfair. If everyone went to see The Dark Knight expecting a romantic comedy, everyone would have hated it.

_________________
"Computer unnecessary."

This may just be me. but I felt like repeated viewings of the movie just made it better. When I first saw the movie. I think I came in trying to nitpick everything, and didn't like it very much. When I first saw the DC, I made myself promise to just enjoy the movie, and as it turned out I did. I saw it a third time, and I noticed all these easter eggs, and lot of the more subtle things. You can really see the delicacy in making the movie, you could tell that the people who made, truly loved the source material. They didn't sell out, and that I think is really important.

Since the book got better the more times you read it, then you know the movie did something right, when it got better after repeated viewings.

I don't know if I'm amused or disappointed that the blurbs on the DVD back cover manage to conveniently reverse the entire question raised by the movie. Instead of implying something along the lines of "what gives superheroes any more of a right to control the world than anyone else?", it's "OH SHIT SOMEONE'S KILLING SUPERHEROES AND IF ALL THE SUPERHEROES ARE GONE WHAT ARE US PUNY MORTALS SUPPOSED TO DO!?"

I guess that's expected though. The marketing boys are just trying to milk as much money from this as they can. It's a smart move; the fans will still buy it no matter what and the average buyer will get suckered into buying it, thinking its another superhero action flick.

Agreed. They should've made it clear that this was more of a drama than it was an action/adventure movie. Had they done that, the movie would've been more successful, I'm sure.

The problem is the book is taking a genre which is native to the medium of comics and deconstructing it, often showing how silly the whole thing is and how daft the people feel in their costumes. However, superheroes rarely work in cinema, largely because films are generally stuck in the real world with real physics: It takes a huge amount of effort to create a world in which superheros become believable on screen, often taking liberties to make a parallel version that works for cinema (take The Joker's recent appearance for example). While the comic can just have fun knocking everything down, the movie has the job of first convincing you superheroes might exist in the first place, before knocking it down.

To tell movie audiences "everything you thought you knew about superheroes is wrong" is a risk: Unlike comic readers, it can't be assumed that your average cinema goer has much knowledge of, or opinion about superheroes at all. By selling it as a superhero movie, people enter into the spirit of it as a superhero movie (knowing also that it is not rated for children).

Besides, it is actually a superhero movie! If people feel cheated that it (gasp!) defied their expectations, it only shows the fickleness of movie audiences. I personally hate to see films in which nothing unexpected happens.

LOL I hated the descriptions on the back of the DVD. They completely missed the point. On purpose too probably.

_________________
"The world is a fine place and worth fighting for." I agree with the second part.

"There's a cello in your house now."

I totally disagree. How many superhero movies have been in the last 10 years? The average person knows enough about superheroes to say "Oh, it's one of those superhero movies, right?"

People go into a superhero movie expecting lots of action and cool visuals. That's why a common complaint about Watchmen is that it didn't have enough action. What they mean is that it didn't have enough action for a superhero film.

If you went into Watchmen expecting a romantic comedy, you would hate it.

I don't think it's totally unfair to give audiences a fair impression of what kind of movie they're paying to see. The trailers should not have emphasized the action so much. I really think that if people had a more accurate impression of what to expect, they'd have liked it a lot more.

I hesitate to call Watchmen a superhero film. It does have superheroes in it... But when I say "superhero movie," it just puts all the wrong images in people's heads.

_________________
"Computer unnecessary."

Trust me, the average person knows enough about superheroes, to understand watchmen. In fact, I haven't read a DC or Marvel Comic in my life until I read Watchmen; but with all those cartoons I watched when I was little, and all those movies, and even I could tell Watchmen was deconstruction of superheroes.

One of the great things about Alan Moore's writing is how he doesn't get bogged down within a particular genre: Watchmen is almost as much a comedy/satire, horror, sci-fi, conspiracy thriller, film noir and murder mystery as it is a superhero yarn. Like Dennis Potter's work, you can often be laughing and crying in the same scene. You can see the difficulty in creating a trailer that reflects the film, especially when cinema audiences are used to quite stubborn genres.

I have all these eloquent thoughts about subjects like this, but I can't seem to be able to type them out. All I know is that as a fan of the comic before I knew there was a film, the trailer raised up hopes. I saw the amount of epic footage in the trailer and assumed they would do the comic justice. Believe me, I thought the film was very good but it didn't give the same sense of being immersed in the Watchmen world. I think the trailer was misleading because they showed all of what they thought were the most exciting parts. It lead the wrong crowd in, hoping for Batman again. They didn't get it. Maybe Watchmen is just too flummoxing to the average film viewer. I know plenty of non-fans who think the film was crap just because they thought it was too confusing. I didn't think it was confusing at all, even for someone who hadn't read the GN. But hey. Anyhoo, please ignore my ramblings...

_________________

You that never done nothing
'Cept build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it's your little toy - Bob Dylan

Personally I would say that is because literature, comic or non-comic, tends to just be a more immersive medium. You get to know the characters over days or weeks, not a couple of hours, and they speak almost with your own voice and not ruined by a bad performance. Similarly, and you also have plenty of time to chew over challenging ideas, while a film has barely any time to make you think about anything, a problem for something like Watchmen. Often, the best you can hope for is a "roller-coaster ride" in movie form.

Indeed. But the film was good simply because it realised Watchmen on screen. There's something magic about seeing favourite characters simply moving around. I think the film didn't give you the same sense of impending doom as the comic, that was one thing that really stood out to me.

_________________

You that never done nothing
'Cept build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it's your little toy - Bob Dylan

I do agree that the impending doom feeling of the comic wasn't quite there.

I still don't understand this complaint.

The entire opening scene establishes the Cold War and the feeling that doomsday was approaching. They even created brand new scenes throughout the film to further elaborate on the tensions between the U.S. and the Soviet Union.

Almost every scene in the film in some way references, develops, establishes, and / or contains the recurring theme of a nuclear holocaust.

What more could they have done? They worked in the Cold War and Doomsday aspects into almost every scene. Honestly, I’d say that it was one of the few things about the film that surpassed the comic book. The comic, to an extent, relies on the reader placing themselves into the tumultuous 80s of the real world when the real Cold War was escalading to fully achieve the atmosphere of Armageddon.

_________________
"With our thoughts we make the world."
-- Gautama Buddha

I think there is a sense of impending doom in the movie, but mainly because many secondarry characters got cut, it wasn't as fleshed out as it could've. I certainly agree that they did a good job using Nixon to show the escalation, and the parts in the beginning helped a lot. It's going to be great when we get the ultimate cut, with Bernie back in.

I thought the GN did a good job with giving you a sense of impending doom. You had all those scenes with Bernie and all the people he had a conversation with. Plus you had that scene with the man killing his family and then committing suicide because he was scared of nuclear holocaust.