Part one is presented below, part two will be available later.

Swank-mo-tron: Welcome, fellow robots, to the first roundtable we’ve had in a while (perhaps the first of 2009?) and to celebrate this occasion, we’re round-tabling the new film adaptation of The Watchmen, which comes to theatres on Friday. Let us begin by saying that we’d like to thank Zack at the Geekshow Podcast for the heads up about the screening.

Having said that, it’s still a few hours since I’ve seen the film and I’m still conflicted about how I feel about it. Honestly and truly. I’m trying so hard to not be the guy who’s like, “The book was better.” But that is obvious. There’s no way the movie could have been better than the book. And there were moments in the movie that were utterly brilliant. The opening with The Comedian, the business on Mars, the prison sequences, the death of Rorschach, etc… But other times I was thinking to myself, “I’d rather be reading the book.” I mean, there were a couple of times were shivers registered on the tingle-o-meter on my back unit, and other times when my optics teared up, I have to admit that right now.

I enjoyed this film. But it felt like it lacked the poignance and greatness of the graphic novel. Again, I’m trying to separate the book from the movie, but it was baggage that I brought with me from the book that helped propped the film up for me. I think the use of music was fantastic, the production and art design was great, the attention to detail was astounding. But there were weak links. Malin Akerman (Laurie) was stunning to look at but was a terrible actress (and trying to give her Dr. Manhattans best lines about endings in the end was perhaps the biggest misstep in the adaptation), Nixon wasn’t the best (seriously, we all just got done watching Frank Langella and this guy was all make-up), and they tried a little too hard to wink at me for having read the book.

So, what did everyone else think?

Kill-tacular-tron: I really really enjoyed the movie. It definitely drifted away from the source material towards the end of the movie. I felt that Zack did a good job of cutting out the extra scenes that weren’t necessary, but still nodding at the geeks that were looking for the scene.

For instance, I really like in the book when the fire breaks out and they use Archie to save the tenants. And while they’re being transported to a safer area they are given some coffee. In the movie there isn’t time for coffee, but as Silk Spectre is cleaning up after everyone gets off the ship she puts some coffee cups away in the dash. A polite nod while not taking up too much of our time.

I agree with Swank, we shouldn’t compare the movie and the book because they are different animals. But the movie certainly didn’t pack the same punch the book did. I feel like I might have enjoyed it so much because I was filling in the gaps with previous knowledge I had gained from the book. The general public may not have such a good time with this movie. It may just turn into another Sin City. For some reason I highily doubt hearing a lot of people not famiar with the source material enjoying this movie.

Proletaria-Tron: Well I waited until the morning after to really think about the movie, last night I just wanted to take it in. But so far I’m going to have to agree with Swank and Kill. Good movie, but if you haven’t read the book you really might not like it.

It was a brutal and violent and sexy movie, and it might be a little over the top for the movie going public. There were a lot of little nods to the book and I enjoyed that just because I could fill in the blanks and finish the story for myself. I think the new ending works well especially considering how much extra time would have been needed for books ending. Most of the acting was good, I think Dr. Manhattan (Billy Crudup) was done perfectly. He had a sadness and kind of boredom to him the entire time. The Comedian (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) was awesome, he was a brutal asshole and it was perfect. However, Silk Spectre (Malin Akerman) as sexy as she was just paled in comparison to the people she shared the screen with. I’m waiting to see if everyone bitches about Rorschach’s voice as much as they did Christian Bale’s Batman because to me they sounded exactly the same.

Kill-tacular-tron: On the subject of Rorschach… best character in the movie. Hands down.

Proletaria-Tron:Rorschach was awesome, especially in prison. But I dug the Comedian. Hard to choose the best.

Swank-mo-tron: I guess I could agree to that, too.

Budgetron: For years I avoided reading this comic; when I was very young it was because it was the early Image days and the art sucked, and then as I got older, it was because I’d been told so many times how brilliant and earth shattering the story and the message was and I just didn’t care. Well, now that I’ve seen the movie, I can say I wasn’t blown away like many of you out there. Now, let me start out by saying that I love comics. I really do, I love all of them, not just super heroes and not just mange, but all comics. I guess thats why the story of Watchmen didn’t blow my robot ass off its hinges.

We as a comics community have a tendency to rant and rave about a comic when an author or artist goes out of their way to say anything smart in them. Why? Well, it’s because I think we are, as a comics community (primarily the superhero reading community perhaps?), embarassed of our little four color worlds we hide within every Wednesday. So when a “smart comic” comes around, everyone gets excited and proud of the “little medium that could”. But in my opinion, Watchmen is nothing more than teenage angst wrapped in metaphor. I mean, there were no new ideas explored or dissected, and no weighty themes that haven’t been shouted through the mic at a Minor Threat show 29 years ago…so what’s the big deal?

The world sucks and is full of power hungry assholes that can’t be stopped even by the few who have the power (or will) to do so? The American dream is to rip America apart from the inside out, sparing the few at the expense of the whole? Humankind is most likely NOT worth saving because we don’t care to save ourselves? Are these the weighty concepts everyone is so in awe of? I think this shit everyday.

But I digress, I’m here to tell you what I thought of the film, and I enjoyed it. I felt our heroes spent a little too much time wondering aloud, “What’s going on?” when we could have been learning who they were (esp the old Night Owl, Rorschach, and The Comedian), but I did feel it was a very well made film, and although not exactly the kind of movie an average super hero flick attending audience migh twant or expect, it was an overall good time.

I felt the first half of the film was breathtaking, the structure of story and characters were great (although I didn’t feel the “mystery” was really all that intriguing) and I very much enjoyed the most effed up character (Rorschach) in the film, being the biggest seeker of justice. Very interesting. The acting was bad in part, but overall great. The production design was impeccable, and although at times the music was a bit jarring, I felt that overall, the choices for music in the film were very good.

I liked it. I wasn’t blown away by the story, or the movie, but I liked it. This is a very hastily written, yet long, review, so I will not go back and rethink things. Screw you guys if you think I’m blabbering on too much.

Kill-tacular-tron:I feel like you make an interesting point. While I don’t agree that the story is over hyped (because I thought the same thing before I read it), I feel like the movie might be over hyped. The whole point of the story as I saw it (in the book) was the characters. And their relationships and the way they saw and interacted with the world. A lot of that had to be cut for the movie. Rorschach’s “origin story” in prison was neutered.

Also, a lot of the character development was beefed up for the Hollywood movie. The scene with the fire (which I had discussed with Dr. Cyborg) was a big exciting event climaxing with an explosion chasing Silk Specter out of the building. The sex scene that followed was just short of pornographic, while in the book it was much more subtle and romantic. I would be interested to see what you would think of the story after reading the book and comparing the two…

Budgetron: On the subject of Rorschach, I could have watched him all day, and I understand there’s more psychiatry scenes in the book? That makes me happy, it was one of my favorite bits in the movie, also, his martyrdom was pretty awesome. But really, the best character was Dr. Manhattan. Like Nick said, the boredom and separation from reality that Billy Crudup (or the effects team that completely CG’d his performance) was able to convey was pretty brilliant. When I first heard his voice I knew, even without having read the book, “Ok, this guy doesn’t give a crap about anything, he’s detached as hell”. I mean, shit, what says, “I don’t care” more than being naked all the time?

You see, it wasn’t the sex scene that bothered me so much as the fact that they spent 3 minutes on something like that when they could have better utilized it elsewhere, because obviously there was a lot to say that wasn’t said at all.

So check back in a little while for part two, where we hear from Citizen-bot, Clang! Boom! Steam!, Pencil-bot, Mandroid and others!

(UPDATE: Part Two!)