Why you should be watching the Watchmen

Oh boy ... this doesn't bode well for the future of high concept graphic novel films.

In it's second weekend in theaters, Watchmen only grossed $17.8 million. Not bad for an average movie, but not good for the second weekend of a highly-anticipated one with a budget of roughly $150 million. With this past weekend added to its gross, Watchmen now stands at $85.8 million. After Weekend No. 2, The Dark Knight, the last big "comic book" movie, had already grossed $313.8 million.

The Dark Knight Watchmen ain't.

But I didn't expect it to be. The Dark Knight was the perfect storm of elements that could result in as huge a movie as it turned out to be. I had high hopes for Watchmen though. As I've previous blogged, I absolutely loved the film. As close to a faithful adaption of the graphic novel as I think we could have ever seen or ever will see.

The future of artistic, faithful graphic novel/comic book adaptions kind of rested on Watchmen though. Zach Snyder managed to convince Warner Bros. to let him make a film set in 1985, surrounded by the Cold War and clocking in a two and a half hours. If studios are unable to see a return on their investments in this kind of movie, we're going to be stuck with what I like to call the "FOX comic book movie." You know ... the kind where every line has to be a one-liner, major characters that "people wouldn't get" are eliminated, and a PG rating is sought. Take a look at Fantastic Four: The Rise of the Silver Surfer to see exactly what this kind of movie looks like. Galactus was turned into a hungry cloud, Johnny Storm was constantly cracking jokes and hitting on girls ... and it was rated PG. Yay, lame movie ...

There are a lot of really, really brilliant graphic novels out there, some of them currently somewhere in the process of becoming a movie. Y: The Last Man, Bone – these are the properties that are now in danger of being bastardized by a studio culture that is going to be scared of losing hundreds of millions on a a film that may not score big numbers at the box office.

Take Bone for example. Jeff Smith's creation has already dodged the crappy-film bullet once. Paramount and Nickelodeon had rights to the series at one point, and, according to some reports, those studios were ready to make a film with characters voiced by kids and filled with N'Sync and Britney Spears songs. (Now, I'm getting this part from Wikipedia, but I've heard it in other circles.) Bone is an epic, layered, monumental work and for it to be treated this way is a shame. Thankfully this version never materialized.

Here's where the Bone story may get slightly more interesting: Warner Bros. now has rights to make the film(s). The very same Warner Bros. that is currently on the line for millions of dollars if Watchmen doesn't make its budget back. There's a very real possibility that once a studio like Warner Bros. has been burned on this kind of thing, they won't go back again. While you may have never heard of Bone or Y: The Last Man, you should care about the fate of these books. If movies like Watchmen fail, get used to PG movies featuring the latest songs from the Jonas Bros.

So even if you don't think Watchmen is for you but you want to see books faithfully adapted into films, even if you're not sure Watchmen is worth your $10 at the box office but you know another Jonas Bros. movie definitely isn't worth that $10, even if a Rated-R film may not be your thing but a Rated-G Superman is something you'd never consider, please go see Watchmen.