BSG, Universe and a Watchmen Review

[meddow]

I'm trying desperately to ignore the fact that BSG has ended. If I don’t think about it, I won't be tempted to find out how it ends and spoil myself. Although I may have accidentally spoiled myself for one small but crucial detail. In terms of my own watching, I've just finished Maelstrom in season three, so I'm getting there.

A trailer has been released for Stargate: Universe, which is looking less like fandom's original fears of Stargate: 90210 and more like Stargate: BSG. Thing is, I’m not sure if I want Stargate to turn into BSG. I like the Stargate as it was back in the SG1 days, filled with team-y goodness, techonobable and humour, not as a BSG knock-off. So yes, juries still out on whether I'll watch

Also, I saw Watchmen.

It's the first time that I've found the opening credits to be the best bit of the movie – which is not meant as a snide remark because it had the best opening credits of any movie I've ever seen – it’s a recreation of over 40 years of iconic moments in American history which give a perfect background to the movie. The movie itself was not bad, but the problem I had with it was that I felt I had seen the movie before, and it's the panel for panel remake is what was to blame. Not only did I know exactly what was going to happen, but I knew exactly what the characters and hell, I knew how the shot would be composed when they said it. The only change was one bit of the ending, and I was spoiled for that bit anyway.

I came out wondering what was the point? The story wasn't updates to give it contemporary relevance (and the fear of nuclear holocaust did feel dated), the director hadn't added anything, having the actors in the roles made it worse for me because I like Jeffrey Dean Morgan and his presence made me like the Comedian and I didn't want to like the Comedian. I suppose it still acted as a great critique of the superheroes, that topped even The Dark Knight.

I went to see it with two members of my family who claim to have never even heard of the graphic novel before the movie came out (which is a lie because I discussed it with them years ago - they were apparently not listening when I was raving on about it). They told me the point was that it expanded it to a wide audience, but 'wider audience' for me means people trying to say how the Comedian (murderer and rapist), Rorschach (ultra-right wing nut job misogynist homophobe) and Ozymandias (can't go there – spoilers) are misunderstood woobies. *facepalm*

Anyway, the people who I saw it with thought it was brilliant and proceeded to give me a big lecture about being a snob after I came out of the movie criticising it, so consider me thoroughly told off.

Comments

[airie-fairy.livejournal.com]

So the world that mocked you for liking Watchmen is now essentially mocking you for not liking Watchmen? Damn, that's fucked up.

[meddow.livejournal.com]

Yeah. When it comes to Watchmen, I really can't win.

not lecturing, but your take on it does make me think...

[frenchroast.livejournal.com]

Hmm. All the stuff you say you dislike is why I liked it. The point of the movie in this case was simply to tell the exact same story in a different medium, which they did about as flawlessly as you can. That's why people are calling it brilliant, and I have to agree, even if it means there was nothing new added to the story (the old "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" approach, which is too rarely employed in most book-to-movie creations).

But at the same time, I totally see where you're coming from--it would've been very interesting to see it updated and given more contemporary relevance (and it would've been easy to do so, what with the whole war in Afghanistan thing). I guess they didn't take that route because often the fans who love the comics/graphic novels flip their shit (in a bad way) when long-loved comics are updated. I have one friend in particular who has yet to get that comics have multiple canons, and half the point of rebooting a series is that it's an excuse to play with the what-ifs from prior canon and create a new canon that's just as valid as the original.

I love remakes/reimaginings, so I would've loved that approach, too, but I'm cool with it as it is, because it's an interestingly skewed period piece if you want to look at it that way. 20 years from now, it'll hold up (as the graphic novel does) as a good snapshot of the fears and mentality of that particular time; it might not if they had updated it to appeal to contemporary audiences (or maybe it would've). I'm sure now that they have this version, however, any future version probably will be changed in some way to make it updated.

As for the Comedian, I just figured part of why they cast him the way they did was to create that dissonance between being disgusted by him and not, the same way you would if faced with an actual hero who maybe you owe your life to but later found out did some really terrible, horrible things to other people. That fits for Rorschach and Ozymandias, too, just in slightly different ways; in a certain sense, those three are very similar characters, put in different circumstances. All three think the world is corrupted almost beyond hope of fixing, and all three end up partaking in that corruption for different reasons.

Either way, I'm totally with you on the *facepalm* for this bizarre view of Comedian/Rorschach/Ozymandias as woobies. They are not misunderstood! They are seriously, seriously mentally and morally twisted people, and to not get that is to not get the point of the whole story (seriously, it's like some people think "Who watches the watchmen?" is a question for fangirl/boy voyeurs).

As for BSG, for your sake I promise to lj cut any spoilers I might post.

Re: not lecturing, but your take on it does make me think...

[meddow.livejournal.com]

I have to admit, the filmmakers must have gone through amazing lengths to painstakingly recreate panels, so from a technological standpoint, the movie is both groundbreaking and a triumph.

I think really, why we disagree comes down to what a view about what an adaptation should do. I think good adaptations adds something to the source material, such as its matching visual beauty the words on the paper, or showing how the original text applies to contemporary concerns. The Lord of the Rings and Atonement I think are a good example of the former, and The Dark Knight of the latter. The nature of an adaptation means it has to take things away from the original. The difference between a good adaptation and a bad one is that a good one adds more than it takes way.

My issue with Watchmen is that it didn't add anything. The visuals were already there and it didn't give the story contemporary relevance, so it's not a good adaption. But then neither did it take much away, so it's not a bad adaptation either. Which I think gets me back to my question of what, besides the technical achievements and as you say, it's snapshot into the mid-1980s mindset (which though is something which the audience could gain just as easily by reading the original graphic novel), was the point?

But then the other view of adaptations is that they should be as loyal a recreation of the source material as possible. And Watchmen is the most loyalest adaption I have ever seen, so in that way its brilliant.

Thanks for the BSG cuts :) I've got one episode of season three to go, and I'm going to start on season four tomorrow so it should be long before I can read what everyone's thought of it.

Re: not lecturing, but your take on it does make me think...

[frenchroast.livejournal.com]

I actually don't disagree with you per se. I think you absolutely have a valid point about adaptions either adding to or contemporizing the original source material. I'm just of the opinion that a loyal recreation of the source material in another medium is a valid kind of adaptation, in addition to the two you cite.

Another issue with Watchmen I think is that it had more to be loyal to than an adaptation of a book would require, and to a certain extent more than most comics. After all, with most books you don't have continuous pictures of characters/settings to adhere to, just the descriptions, so simply choosing someone to play a character adds something that wasn't there before by solidifying those descriptions into one visual form. And with most other comics (Spider-Man, Batman, Superman) there are multiple canons to choose from, so unless the director flat out says "this movie will be an adaptation of the Silver Age Superman," people can't jump on it as "inaccurate." And thanks to this, the writers/directors can--in fact they almost have to--pull from the various canons and create a new canon. With Watchmen you can't do that, because there's only one Watchmen. So you're left with the choice of recreating it as loyally as possible, or messing with it and pissing people off. Even Lord of the Rings recognized the need to loyally recreate visuals they already had, going so far as to employ artists who had once drawn illustrations for the novels to help them design sets/visuals for the movies and recreating iconic shots(and good lord, but I never ever should've watched all 4 commentary tracks to all of the extended edition DVDs, because I know more than anyone who's never actually finished reading those books should ever know about how those movies were made).

I suppose my answer your question "What was the point?" is that the point was to show how the story works in a different medium, because it's a different way of getting the message across. There's no need to create a different message. I like graphic novels, but I honestly relate better to film; for me, hearing Rorschach and the Comedian made them resonate more than they did in the comic, even though the words were the exact same. Seeing the movie somehow made them more real, and certain scenes wrenched my gut in a way the graphic novel never did, even though I've read it several times over the last few years, and understood what I was reading.

The difference between reading a poem and singing it is a comparison that might help illustrate the point I'm trying (very badly so far)to make. Same words, but when you set those words to music, it will probably evoke something different than it would without that music. The song isn't pointless just because you already had the poem, nor is the poem pointless because you don't have it set to music. They're just different ways of expressing the same message. The adaptation in how the message is delivered is the addition provided, if you want to look at it that way.

...sorry, enough of my rambling. Part of this is me trying to work out for myself why it did work for me, since I can see intellectually what you're saying and it makes just as much sense as what I'm trying to say. I guess really there's no reason why we can't both be right.

Re: not lecturing, but your take on it does make me think...

[meddow.livejournal.com]

Wow, I didn't know LotR went to that extent with the visuals.

That's a really good point, and one I didn't think of, about how mediums speak to different people. I'm a bit fan of graphic novels because they work for me as a medium better than ordinary novels, and sometimes (certainly in this case) better than movies.

There is that issue with Watchmen canon that doesn't apply to most comics. But other graphic novels with singular canons such as the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, From Hell, and V for Vendetta had been adapted for movies without such loyalty. But then, I've never read V for Vendetta and From Hell. The only one I've both read and seen the movie is League, which was a really bad movie which actually would have been a lot better if they stuck closer to the graphic novel - so really, that argues your point.

I think this is one of those times when we're both right as well. I can see where you're coming from, particularly with the different mediums point. Anyway, the discussion's been good for me since it's caused me to clarify and articulate my thoughts about the movie, which I had trouble with when I was arguing about it with the people I saw it with.

Re: not lecturing, but your take on it does make me think...

[frenchroast.livejournal.com]

Yeah. LotR was...kind of scary in its attention to detail. Of course if they hadn't, I suppose they wouldn't have had enough material for four different commentary tracks. I'm in the exact same situation with the four graphic novels/movie adaptations that you mentioned, too. I *think* I recall hearing that visually V for Vendetta was similar to the graphic novel, but apparently movie!Evie is less of a whiny brat (which sounds like an improvement) but I haven't read it myself, so I couldn't say for sure.

And yeah, the discussion's been good for me, too, because when I initially read your post, at first all I could think was "but I liked it!" This helped me realize *why* I like it.

Go us and rational, thoughtful discussion! :)

[chocolatepot.livejournal.com]

I agree a lot with everything you said about Watchmen, except that a) the panel-for-panel business didn't bother me that much since I only read the book a week or so before the film came out, and b) I'm a Veidt!wife. All of the people who love Rorschach are driving me up the wall, though.

[meddow.livejournal.com]

I don't know what to make of the Rorschach love. He's a horrific misogynist and all these fangirls are swooning over him. Fandom scares me so much sometimes.

[frenchroast.livejournal.com]

The Rorschach love is scary. Reminds me of the Joker love. Of course, even worse is the fangirls slashing Joker/Rorschach. I think I saw a fic of that somewhere (but I'm not about to hunt it down), and that is just messed up.

I mean, I like fictional bad guys (Sylar, Dr. Crane, Lex Luthor) as much as any girl, but I draw the line at mentally disturbed murdering/misogynist sociopaths.

[chocolatepot.livejournal.com]

I guess sometimes the woobifying instinct can take over even if the subject has terribly few redeeming features and isn't hot.