Since it's the most widely spread topic on lj right now

[lodessa]

[Poll #1367127]



Feel free to talk about what in particular you liked or didn't like about either version in the comments.

Comments

[spectralbovine.livejournal.com]

I loved the comic, and I thought the movie was okay. I was impressed with how well Snyder translated panels into film, but it felt more like an exercise in adaptation than a true film version of the comic. It didn't pack the same punch, have the same effect. Jackie Earle Haley owned, though.

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

I felt like the movie straddled the line between the two things you can do with a film version of something pretty well (being faithful and being creative). Obviously it leaned more towards trying to faithfully translate the original text, but it didn't feel like reader's theater and I loved little things like the addition of the grassy knoll scene with the Comedian. But yeah, it was definitely a fan's movie (although Jeremy, who hasn't read the original, loved it).

[sainfoin-fields.livejournal.com]

I started reading the comic so I could see the movie but I did not get far. I do want to see it eventually but I'm not in a hurry, especially after one of the screenwriters compared the audience who don't get it to rape victims. YEAH.

[spectralbovine.livejournal.com]

Solid Snake has sorely disappointed me. WTF was that, seriously.

[sainfoin-fields.livejournal.com]

My favorite part was how he apologized, and then immediately retracted his apology. Class act, there.

[spectralbovine.livejournal.com]

I didn't hear about the retraction! I just saw the apology that made it worse.

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

Ummm... I don't even think I want to know what that was about.

My favorite thing about the comic was the meta-textuality but that made it hard to engage with at first.

[hamsterwoman]

All the hype around the movie kind of made me want to read the comic.

[etrangere.livejournal.com]

it's a good comic, you definitely should :)

[hamsterwoman]

:) I plan to look for it as soon as I figure out where my new library keeps the graphic novels...

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

I've found they usually shove them in the YA section, although this comic definitely doesn't belong there.

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

The comic is really interesting on a lot of levels. I read it in preparation for the movie and was surprised to find how much it fit into lit theory discourse in a lot of ways.

[caitiedidit.livejournal.com]

I definitely did not like it, but I don't know that I *hated* it because there were pretty interesting things buried in there, especially with the characterization. Granted, the ideas in the comic are hardly revolutionary anymore; there have been a lot of super hero movies that have explore the darker sides of vigilantism, lots of movies starring anti-heroes. Plus most all of the interesting things got lost in how long and muddled it was.

And it was gross, which kind of bothered me. I mean, I expected it to be violent, and I'm not *that* squeamish because I routinely see these sorts of movies (Wanted, Sin City, A History of Violence, etc.), but the grossness in this one was too much me.

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

I'm curious about what you mean exactly by gross in this context. Could you maybe elaborate?

[caitiedidit.livejournal.com]

I mean gross in the most basic sense. People's arms were sawed off, ears were bitten off, dogs chewed on little girl's bones, etcetera. Gratuitous gore is gratuitous!

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

Hmm... It's interesting you mention Sin City, because I found that to be at least as gory as Watchmen in that sense. The only moment in which I really felt was particularly overly gratuitous was the one where the criminals drilled through the guy whose hands Rorschach broke in the prison. But then again, having read the comic book I knew that the dogs were going to be chewing on the little girl's bones so it didn't have the same shock factor.

I actually thought for the most part they did a good job of making it violent instead of gory by having the sound of bones breaking etc. instead of showing them jabbing out of people's arms and such. But, like I said, I imagine knowing what was coming probably completely changed my experience of it.

On the other hand, I suspect that maybe the difference (based on what the story is about) is that the gore/violence was actually intended to unsettle you as opposed to give you a rush. It was extremely ugly, none of the ballet of blood of Kill Bill.

[caitiedidit.livejournal.com]

It is fully possible that time has dulled some of Sin City's goriness for me. But then, I was also expecting Sin City (and this goes double for Tarintino movies) to be gratuitously violent. Not so much with Watchmen. Like, I knew it was rated R, and I knew this was the same director responsible for 300, but Watchmen was marketed differently. Like, I was expecting a noirish mystery set in a dystopia/the thinking man's super hero movie.

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

Yeah, It seems like expectations probably have a lot to do with how gory things seem to us.

[munchkin62.livejournal.com]

I loved it and am buying the comic this weekend.

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

I read the comic a few weeks ago in preparation for the movie, but after seeing it I feel like i need to read it again.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

I thought the movie was great, I still need to read the graphic novel but overall I thought it did amazing as far as the storytelling goes and the characters. Perhaps in certain places I felt there didn't need to be things because of how long the movie went on, it felt slow at places, but otherwise it was good. I'm going to see it again to catch some of the things I didn't see before, but that's my initial reaction.

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the adaptation definitely learned towards faithfulness to the comic over expedited plot, but when you read the comic you will enjoy all those slower seeming spots. I feel like probably the worth things needs 3 readings/viewings to come together completely (either movie, comic, movie or comic, movie, comic) but it was incredibly vivid.

[zoeiona.livejournal.com]

I thought it was excellent; I felt the violence, though gory, wasn't out of place at all; I hadn't read the comic at the time (though I have read it since so I ticked your first option up top) and I still found it easy to follow. I wonder if all the people who couldn't follow the storyline didn't, you know, read books from time to time. Either that or I've looked far too hard at fiction on the meta level - it was just so clear and straightforward.

On retrospect, a thing the comic did really well that the film didn't was emphasising the human cost of the attack at the end. In the comic we knew at least a few of the people who died, and there were bodies and there was blood and it felt serious, as opposed to the bloodless, consequence-less grey destruction in the film. There was no real reason to get emotionally involved with the casualties, unlike in the comic, and I think that that would have made the ending have a much bigger impact.

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

I did the reverse and read the comic in preparation for the movie.

I feel like the violence and gore was used to a purpose that was true to the whole point of the story, so it wasn't gratuitous, especially as it was meant to disturb not thrill.

Yeah, I think people who came in expecting a "superhero movie" were confused, but anyone should have been able to follow it. And speaking of meta... how much did you love all the primary source materials scattered in amongst the panels? Moore really knows how to get my academic excitement going.

Yeah, I understand why they shifted the attack to something more related to the Watchmen (and it not just being about OMG NEW YORK) but the vastness and way it was filmed really dehumanized the experience in such a way as to numb the viewer to it.

[countouttheday.livejournal.com]

I live in a cave.

[lodessa.livejournal.com]

Is it a comfortable cave?