Topic: Watchmen (Read 41382 times)

Bongo Bill · « **Reply #240 on:** March 07, 2009, 10:09:47 PM »

Not to mention it was written in a time period when many sane people expected that nuclear holocaust was inevitable.

Mongrel · « **Reply #241 on:** March 07, 2009, 10:23:03 PM »

RIOTS.

PROMISCUITY.

ANTI-WAR DEMOS.

DRUGS.

BLACK UNREST.

...

Damn, sounds like a good time!

Friday · « **Reply #242 on:** March 07, 2009, 11:18:48 PM »

Saw it, loved the shit out of it.

Never read the book, it's very possible it does not live up to it.

Don't care. Awesome movie.

Bongo Bill · « **Reply #243 on:** March 07, 2009, 11:29:36 PM »

People who haven't read the book keep popping up in the strangest places, but I never thought I'd see one here.

Niku · « **Reply #244 on:** March 07, 2009, 11:32:35 PM »

I didn't read it until the first trailer for the movie came out, or around that time anyhow.

Friday · « **Reply #245 on:** March 07, 2009, 11:44:02 PM »

Quote

People who haven't read the book keep popping up in the strangest places, but I never thought I'd see one here.

Never liked comic books, to be honest. Never sure why. It's just the medium, I guess, for some reason I find them very hard to read. Like, I get a headache hard. They confuse me and I find the story and action very difficult to follow, unless it is very simple. maybe it's just cuz i'm blonde lol

Obviously, now wanting to read Watchmen. Will post my thoughts afterward, but I doubt it will make me like the movie less.

Detonator · « **Reply #246 on:** March 07, 2009, 11:49:37 PM »

I never ever read comics, and I still bought fucking Watchmen.

Cthulhu-chan · « **Reply #247 on:** March 08, 2009, 02:24:35 AM »

I had read Watchmen, back before this movie even seemed like a remote possibility.

Some of the dialog came across stilted, but I definitely loved it. Ozy came across as a bit more human, and Rorschach had some really powerful scenes. It wasn't perfect, but it's far better than I could have ever hoped.

Pacobird · « **Reply #248 on:** March 08, 2009, 07:35:52 AM »

Quote from: Rico on March 07, 2009, 06:46:47 PM

Quote from: Bongo Bill on March 07, 2009, 05:52:22 PM
Maybe they were right to call it "unfilmable." If this movie fails to capture the essence of its source material, it was not for lack of talent or appreciation, which is more than can be said of most adaptations. I'm going to go watch it again.

I'm going to call bullshit on that, because while parts of the movie strove to be almost stupidly-faithful to the comic book, they also went way out of their way to not only overemphasize comic-book violence as has been noted repeatedly here but they even CHANGED THE ENDING.

I propose that if they appreciated it all that much they could've at least filmed the damn story as it appears in the damn book.

It's an interesting problem, isn't it? The actual story is far and away the least important and enduring part of the book.

Thad · « **Reply #249 on:** March 08, 2009, 11:13:55 AM »

It is a comic that is read even by many people who do not generally read comics. (See also: Maus, Ghost World.) As a point of trivia that every review of the film seems compelled to bring up, it's the only comic on Time's list of the top 100 novels of all time.

...though frankly I find all that to be bullshit as it still implicitly accepts that comics is a "lesser" medium than, say, text or film, and suggests Watchmen is a rare exception in being as good as "regular" books.

Friday · « **Reply #250 on:** March 08, 2009, 11:25:45 AM »

Quote

...though frankly I find all that to be bullshit as it still implicitly accepts that comics is a "lesser" medium than, say, text or film, and suggests Watchmen is a rare exception in being as good as "regular" books.

God I am so fucking tired of this kind of thinking

I mean granted most video games and comics are not art

then again

most movies, books, paintings, etc, are not art, but instead cheap fucking hackwork

like, wow, most videogames and comics

How the fuck did we as a society get the idea that these two mediums are incapable of producing art? Was it the sixties? Was it all the LSD? Cause I can't see anything logical but maybe if you factor in flying dogs landing on your face, I dunno

Disposable Ninja · « **Reply #251 on:** March 08, 2009, 11:33:44 AM »

Things for kids can't be art, Friday. See also: animation.

MarsDragon · « **Reply #252 on:** March 08, 2009, 11:34:41 AM »

I imagine because they mostly started in fairly recent memory (our grand and great-grandparents time for comics, parents/older siblings and our time for video games) and because when they did, they were for children, and things for children are generally seen as being less artistic than things for adults. Did that sentence have enough clauses? Plus there was that matter with the comics code ripping out almost all other genres of comics besides superheroes and making those superheroes pretty lame in the bargain.

Children's books can be artistic because we know that books in general can be artistic, but a lot of people haven't gotten the memo that games and comics can be artistic yet.

And then Disposable Ninja gets in with a much more punchy reply why I was typing this up.

Friday · « **Reply #253 on:** March 08, 2009, 11:37:01 AM »

I want to find whoever that critic was who said videogames can't ever be art because they are interactive

was it ebert? I think it was ebert

I'm going to find him and lock him in a room with Thad

Royal☭ · « **Reply #254 on:** March 08, 2009, 11:45:31 AM »

He's like forty bazillion years old cut him some slack. He thinks all video games are like Pong, devoid of plot or color.

Also

Quote from: Thad on March 08, 2009, 11:13:55 AM

...though frankly I find all that to be bullshit as it still implicitly accepts that comics is a "lesser" medium than, say, text or film, and suggests Watchmen is a rare exception in being as good as "regular" books.

You know, I've always felt that From Hell was a better novel than Watchmen, but it wasn't as popular so it gets no respect. No respect at all.

And I think the art vs non-art debate is pointless. Technical quality and skill do not a piece of art make. Watchmen is art just as much as the cheap or porn comics are art, just as much as the bronze and golden age stuff is art.

Brentai · « **Reply #255 on:** March 08, 2009, 11:46:59 AM »

What's funny is that to someone who doesn't read comic books Watchmen is like a savage attack on the medium. It's as if Time included it because they liked that on the surface it seemed to be agreeing with them that graphic novels are not real books.

Royal☭ · « **Reply #256 on:** March 08, 2009, 11:49:01 AM »

Except, that's a really glib interpretation of the books. I'd say Watchmen is more substantial to someone who loves and enjoys comic books, superheroes in particular, than one who holds them in disdain.

Brentai · « **Reply #257 on:** March 08, 2009, 11:50:17 AM »

It is, but the people who hold them in disdain don't realize that.

Bongo Bill · « **Reply #258 on:** March 08, 2009, 12:59:49 PM »

Young media take time to develop their artistic footing; people like Moore and Eisner are the ones that discover where it's supposed to be. Your average comic is comparable to your average novel, but novels have had more time to get Great Classics and for budding authors to learn from said Great Classics and make some Pretty Good Classics of their own. With comics, we've still mostly got pioneers, which means that the path that the Talented can attempt to follow to Literary Immortality has not yet been well-charted.

Thad · « **Reply #259 on:** March 08, 2009, 01:22:41 PM »

Quote from: Friday on March 08, 2009, 11:25:45 AM

How the fuck did we as a society get the idea that these two mediums are incapable of producing art? Was it the sixties? Was it all the LSD?

Quite the opposite -- that's about the point where people started RECOGNIZING comics as art.

I just finished reading a book called The Ten-Cent Plague, which I'll probably expound on a bit more later, but the gist is that the sentiment against comics was originally racist and classist -- when the medium first appeared at the turn of the twentieth century, it was essentially entertainment for illiterate immigrants. In the decades that followed, comics became accepted, on up through the early 1940's where they gained mainstream popularity. In the 1950's, however, they became the first flashpoint in the culture war (before Elvis), as a medium that targeted social outcasts and disrespected authority and "traditional values".

Which is, of course, exactly why the anti-establishment hippies of the 1960's found them appealing.

(Which is rather ironic in the case of, say, Doctor Strange, a favorite among the acid set which was created by Steve Ditko, who despite his psychedelic style is a right-wing reactionary and who is in fact the basis for Rorschach.)

Quote from: Final Great Brentai on March 08, 2009, 11:46:59 AM

It's as if Time included it because they liked that on the surface it seemed to be agreeing with them that graphic novels are not real books.

Not exactly. "Graphic novel" is a term people use to differentiate between things like Watchmen and things like Spider-Man, as if there's some important distinction there, as if one is art and the other is schlock. Graphic novels are for adults, comics are for kids, or adults with brain damage.

The original distinction between a comic book and a graphic novel, of course, was simply one of format: comics are serialized, include ads, generally run about 24 pages, and are stapled, while graphic novels are bound and of an indeterminate length and format.

Of course, the problem is that by that definition, Watchmen is a goddamn comic book, because it WAS originally printed in serial, 24-page format with ads and staples.

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Author Topic: Watchmen (Read 41382 times)