We’re back again today with coverage of the Watchmen and Spirit panel…

Before comic-con I was easily more excited for the Spirit, but the more I see of it the more worried I get. Whereas with the Watchmen the more I see the more excited I am to see it, except that I am skeptical because I don’t trust the director. The trailer they showed for the Watchmen looked really good. Dave Gibbons the co-creator of the comic book, said that he is really happy for the way things are turning out, which is really encouraging, but I am constantly reminded of how poorly 300 turned out. It looks good, but all I can say is we will see.

The footage for the Spirit doesn’t look very good, I am still going to give it a chance, but I am worried. I don’t know that first time director Frank Miller knows how to direct actors. I just hope what he knows about storytelling and dialog, make up for what he lacks as a director. (I don’t like the kid that they got to play the Spirit, he seems kinda like an idiot, mullet and all.)

During the panel they talked a lot about how true they were being to Will Eisner, but to be honest it doesn’t look to me that they are being all that true to the characters, and that it is definitely “Frank Miller’s The Spirit” and not “Will Eisner’s The Spirit” I hope it is good.

The last panel I went to was a Vertigo panel, that was semi-interesting. They announced a new line they are going to be releasing called “Vertigo crime” The whole line is going to be hard cover black and white books in the crime and noir genre. They are getting some best selling crime novelists to write some of the books. Brian Azzarello is kicking off the new line with a book called “Filthy Rich” I haven’t read to much of his stuff, but I liked his run on Batman, so I am definately interested in his work.

They announced some other cool things, but what I was most interested in was what Bill Willingham had to say about Fables. He said that the series is essentially going to be starting over after issue 75, and that issue 75 is going to be a mad man. 50 pages, all double page spreads. I assume it is all going to be the dirtiest part of the war. Since this issue is mostly about art, he said that he left some of the stuff that happened in the artists hands (Mark Buckingham), he also declared that Mark Buckingham is a sick man, and he shouldn’t be held responsible if everyone’s favorite character dies, and made it sound as if they would.

Well that’s all for my comic-con coverage, I wish I could have been there all week.