Remove ads, unlock a dark mode theme, and get other perks by upgrading your account. Experience the website the way it's meant to be.

Watchmen (HBO) TV Show

Discussion in 'Entertainment Forum' started by airik625, Sep 21, 2017.

  1. airik625

    we've seen the shadow of the axe before Supporter

    SteveLikesMusic likes this.
  2. tucah

    not champ Prestigious

    in for lindelof
     
  3. domotime2

    Great Googly Moogly Supporter

    i actually LIKED the movie...and obviously i believe in Lindelof so this has my interest 100%
     
    coleslawed likes this.
  4. Leftandleaving

    I will be okay. everything Supporter

    Excited for this
     
  5. Joel

    Trusted Prestigious

    assuming they're keeping the ending from the graphic novel in tact, I'm hyped
     
  6. Full Effect Ed

    ...In F*cking Full Effect Prestigious

    I wasn't mad at the changed ending. A nuclear explosion made more sense to me for the setting than a squid lol
     
    RyanPm40 likes this.
  7. Joel

    Trusted Prestigious

    It made sense, sure - I wasn't upset about it but I still want to see that ending in all its glory. It'd be tough to pull off but would be some amazing imagery
     
    Full Effect Ed likes this.
  8. OhTheWater

    Let it run Supporter

    interesting
     
  9. VanMastaIteHab

    Trusted Prestigious

    Very interesting
     
  10. Anthony_ Sep 21, 2017
    (Last edited: Dec 3, 2019)
    Anthony_

    A (Cancelled) Dork Prestigious

    Re: the original ending, I think changing it made sense for the film out of pure expediency's sake considering the feature-length runtime. Not a fan of the film at all, and I don't think the ending was good by any means, just understand why they changed the ending.

    In a series, though, the mystery of what all those artists are doing can be teased out over the course of the run, just like it was in the book. It'd be a cool twist for anyone who hasn't read it.
     
    Joel and RyanPm40 like this.
  11. Anthony_

    A (Cancelled) Dork Prestigious

    I'm fully expecting this series to be good. Watchmen was only ever considered "unfilmable" because it's far too dense to be a movie and nobody ever considered making it a TV series. Obviously HBO is perfect for it and Lindelof really regained a lot of credibility through The Leftovers that he lost after Prometheus and Lost. I don't see any excuse if this turns out bad.
     
  12. David87

    Prestigious Prestigious

    Can they get the same guy (who's name escapes me right now) to play Rorschach? I don't know if I could get used to a different voice haha
     
  13. airik625

    we've seen the shadow of the axe before Supporter

    You think he lost some credibility after LOST?
     
  14. Anthony_

    A (Cancelled) Dork Prestigious

    A lot of people disliked the way it ended, and thought it faltered quite a bit in the middle seasons. Nobody was really celebrating when it was announced that he was working on Prometheus and then when that movie came out people wrote him off entirely. He really rehabilitated his image with The Leftovers.
     
  15. RyanPm40

    The Torment of Existence Supporter

    I mean, it's short enough to fit in a pretty average-sized graphic novel. How they can stretch that beyond a season is beyond me, but I'm excited to watch regardless.
     
  16. Anthony_

    A (Cancelled) Dork Prestigious

    I wouldn't call it average-sized by any means, it's pretty long. And also by "dense" I meant there's a lot going on in it, not necessarily the length alone.
     
  17. RyanPm40

    The Torment of Existence Supporter

    I have the book right in front of me, and it's no thicker than my thumb. Plus, a page in a graphic novel is a heck of a lot less text than in an actual novel. I read it in like 2 days as a 14/15 year old kid.

    Fair enough, I agree there's a lot going on, but I still think it's doable in a film, and if done correctly, it would make for a pretty short tv series.

    But, hey, I loved the Snyder movie. I'm still on board for the ride and am excited for this as well.
     
  18. Anthony_

    A (Cancelled) Dork Prestigious

    I just don't agree at all, and yeah you maybe read it that fast when you were 14/15 but you probably didn't grasp everything going on at that age, the allegory, the symbolism, the social commentary, etc. I mean, I read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer in first grade but I probably didn't really understand a lot of it. And, I mean, it's not doable in film, we have proof of that already. This should be way better.
     
  19. RyanPm40

    The Torment of Existence Supporter

    This is also fair, I'm sure I didn't grasp all that. But I'm not sure your point there. For instance, there are a lot of inappropriate messages in Disney movies that I didn't catch as a kid- doesn't take away from the fact that those messages were there and "meaningful" to others. The content of the book or movie doesn't change based on an audience member's interpretation of it.
     
  20. Anthony_

    A (Cancelled) Dork Prestigious

    I never thought I'd see someone try to argue that Watchmen is something a 14/15-year-old could fully grasp haha. Hey, to each their own, I just don't agree.
     
  21. RyanPm40

    The Torment of Existence Supporter

    Never said that, in fact I said that I am sure I didn't grasp it at that age. All I'm saying is that me "grasping" the story doesn't change how much content is physically there heh. I'm very weary that this series will be full of a lot of fluff that never happened in the comic. I hope I'm proven wrong.
     
  22. Anthony_

    A (Cancelled) Dork Prestigious

    I guess I just misunderstood the second part of your comment, don't know what you were trying to say there then. Anyway, like I said, to each their own!
     
    RyanPm40 likes this.
  23. RyanPm40

    The Torment of Existence Supporter

    No worries man, I like having a discussion :).

    I guess what I mean to say is that the book is not that long, so therefore a great series depicting it would have to be a short one. I feel that HBO wants $$, so I worry there will be a lot of fluff, or them trying too hard to "spoon-feed" us the meaningful messages by over-explaining things to increase the length.
     
  24. Joel

    Trusted Prestigious

    The book is short by some standards but the ideas are big. It felt stuffed into a two and a half hour movie so I have no doubt they could spread things out and explore the characterization more deeply in a television format. Eight hour long episodes would be good, I think. Plus, they'd actually be able to tie in the Black Freighter which would definitely take up quite a bit of time to tell that story well.
     
    Anthony_D'Elia likes this.
  25. Nyquist Sep 22, 2017
    (Last edited: Sep 26, 2017)
    Nyquist

    I must now go to the source Supporter

    So in regards to the movie, a few years back I saw a fan edit that I liked called Watchmen: Midnight (edited by Joshua Wille) wherein he incorporated elements of the Under The Hood doc included in the special features as well as Tales of the Black Freighter. Joshua reshuffled a few things around from the Ultimate Cut and I thought it was a little better, but I also wanted it to go further than it did. So I downloaded Watchmen: Midnight (I liked the color grading he did to deepen the palette so it wasn't all washed out like Snyder is prone to do) and made my own cut out of it.

    I kept some things, but I changed a lot. Basic rundown:

    1.) Under The Hood - The biggest issue I had with Watchmen: Midnight was that he had wanted it to be closer to the book just to see what it would be like, but the finished product and experiment wasn't as close as it could be. He cut the film up into the twelve chapters using the motion comics and some of the Under The Hood doc. He took those pieces of Under The Hood and had them playing on Hollis Mason's TV screen in place of the supplemental prose found at the end of each chapter in the book. The thing is, he only did the first few chapters and then the rest of the movie played out mostly as it usually does. I loved the idea of incorporating Under The Hood, but I was disappointed that he didn't use all of it and that the chapter bookends didn't necessarily match what was on the page. So I sat down with the book, re-edited all of Under The Hood so that it would match exactly what I was reading (as well as I could possibly get it), downloaded and ripped more material online (I included all of the short teaser videos that were posted online in advance of the film's release like "World In Focus: 6 Minutes to Midnight", "NBS Nightly News", The Keene Act Public Service Announcement, Adrian Veidt commercials, etc.) and then did the exact same thing Joshua had done with Hollis Mason's TV. Now there's supplemental material at the end of every single "chapter" in the film except for one: the end of Chapter 5 when Rorschach is arrested. In the book the supplemental material here is about the author of Tales of the Black Freighter and the fact that he is missing. That ultimately pays off in the book, but is a completely non-existent plotline in the film so there's no material to support it. Therefore it's the only chapter without a bookend. Since the bookends also now extend beyond Hollis's death, once that happens the supplemental material now plays out on the TV at the bar, in Sally Jupiter's home, and on Veidt's wall of screens for chapter 8-12.

    2.) Tales of the Black Freighter - The Ultimate Cut was problematic in that they just dropped in huge chunks of Black Freighter at random, seemingly just to get it out of the way. There was very little rhyme or reason to it. Joshua's Midnight edit made some slight alterations to this problem but, again, I felt like it wasn't as thorough as it could be. So I did the same exact thing I did with Under The Hood. I sat down with the book and re-edited all of Tales of the Black Freighter so that the right pieces of it would be inserted into the film at the same time they appear in the graphic novel.

    3.) Structural Order - Joshua's cut, as I mentioned, edited the film into the twelve chapters like the book but the chapters were still discordant with the book itself. Now, admittedly, the way I cut it together in the end doesn't necessarily mean that I think it's better this way. I just like the idea of it as an experiment. If you're going to make a cut of the film that is as close of a comparison as possible, then why not go all the way? So after I sat down and re-edited all of Under The Hood and all of Tales of the Black Freighter, I did the same exact thing with the film itself. I read through the book as I was editing and cut the film up to pieces and then put it back together again until it was as close to the graphic novel's structure as I felt I could possibly get it. This also means that anything that wasn't in the graphic novel got removed. No jail fight, no cop finding Rorschach in The Comedian's apartment and shooting him, some of the slow-mo was cut down, a lot of the over-the-top gore was cut out, any time they are referred to directly as "Watchmen" is gone, etc. Joshua's cut also removed some of the pop songs and replaced them with pieces of score, but he left a couple pop songs in that I still didn't like so I took those out and replaced them with more score. Now the only two pop songs left (because they are literally impossible to replace due to the dialogue and sound effects layered over them) are "I'm Your Boogie Man" by KC and the Sunshine Band during the Night Owl/Comedian riot scene, and "All Along the Watchtower" by The Jimi Hendrix Experience when Night Owl and Rorschach fly Archie to Veidt's research facility in Antarctica. Joshua's cut also trimmed down the awkward sex scene so that it's exactly what you get in the graphic novel. That is probably the edit I was most grateful for. Joshua also cut out that opening montage set to Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A' Changin'", moved it to the end of the film, and then replaced it with The Smashing Pumpkins' "The Beginning is the End is the Beginning" which was used in the trailer. I liked this alteration so I left it as is, however I did put the Dylan song in the film where it shows up in the graphic novel.

    So anyway, I think it's an interesting experiment to view it this way. My cut is 4 hours long (with the credits it's actually 4 hours and ten minutes) and not perfect by any means, but I do think it's interesting. The order, the pacing, the tone, the character beats...a lot of those changes make it feel like a different film. Obviously I can't change the ending to a Squid (sorry), but I thought some folks in here might be interested in checking this out if and when you have the time. I posted it on my Vimeo account with a password so that I wouldn't draw some...unwanted attention (I once made a three and a half hour cut of How I Met Your Mother season 9 with an altered ending and received a cease and desist letter from 20th Century Fox, which is something I treasure). It's pretty heavily compressed because it's a four hour long video that was also ripped and re-edited from someone else's edit so please forgive the digital artifacting. Anyway, here it is if you have four hours to waste:



    Password: TheVeidtMethod
     
    Brother Beck, coleslawed and Anthony_ like this.