Who Watches the Fanboys? Rethinking Critiques of Zack Snyder’s Watchmen

Opening weekend for Watchmen has come and gone, but the debate over whether or not the film is any good continues. Fanboys and film nerds across the country are discussing and picking apart the minutia of Zack Snyder’s cinematic interpretation of the Alan Moore and David Gibbons classic. In general, the film is polarizing. Several of the nation’s top critics find the film boring and fans think that Snyder and company cheapened the original story due to their unnecessary reverence to the source material and grotesque violence. While reading and listening to the critiques of the film across the interwebz I have reached some interesting conclusions. Critics probably didn’t get the graphic novel (if they actually read it), meaning they have no chance of understanding the film. Fanboys’ major criticisms of the film actually display Snyder’s prowess as a filmmaker and that the film in theaters is not Snyder’s final product.

The first point isn’t hard to prove at all. A quick look on Rotten Tomatoes brings up a wide variety of critical responses. An astute reader can usually tell which writer is familiar with the source material. Claims that the characters are unsympathetic, detached, and unlikable usually clue you in that these critics are clueless when it comes to Moore and Gibbons’ work. They don’t get the ideas in the movie and I doubt they would get the ideas in the graphic novel.

Other critics cop out. They state that Watchmen was doomed from the start and that Hollywood shouldn’t have tried to make the movie in the first place. They argue the graphic novel is much too complex for the silver screen to do it justice. Plenty of fans make the same claim, treating the book as something more scared than the Bible, Torah, and Koran combined. I must plainly state: get over yourselves.

To merely say that it should never have been made in the first place is the easiest way to dismiss it. You don’t have to engage with the work, you can sit atop your high horse and sound elitist. Fans and critics stated that Moore disapproved of Hollywood adapting his work and in their minds that should have been the final word. By that rationale Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971) should never have been made due to Dahl’s disagreement with the studio’s casting and tone of the film. Now renowned as a classic, the film is a part of many people’s childhoods and boasts some of the most quotable lines in movie history. The point is, there are several movies that “should never have been made,” but they were anyway. Hollywood is going to continue making films whether or not you have a hard-on for Alan Moore. Let’s get past our moralistic and unwarranted preconceptions.

People claim that because Moore intended it to be a comic book, it should have just remained a comic book; otherwise, you would be tainting the message and intent of the original work. I guess all those Shakespeare movies taint the stage plays and the film/play adaptations of One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest do the same to the novel. This is another narrow-minded way of thinking that dismisses the film without taking into consideration the possibilities that a new medium will bring. Watching panels come to life on a 50 foot screen with a blaring sound system is different experience then sitting in your dimly lit room reading the paperback. Snyder’s work isn’t trying to make Watchmen any less special, he wants to add to its legacy in the way he knows best: through film.

Snyder has even stated that he knew comic books fans were going to be harsher on him than literary critics were on the Cohen brothers for their adaptation of No Country for Old Men. Let’s give him the common courtesy to at least acknowledge what he’s actually done and leave our nerd snobberies at the theater doors. Alan Moore isn’t God and Zack Snyder isn’t Satan.

So, to the rest of Watchmen community who has seen the film and loathed it, what did you dislike about it so much? Was it the slow motion, “300″ effect? Was it the violence and action? Wait; was it the cheesy sex scene in the Owl Ship? Oh, I got it! It’s because there was an absence of a giant vaginal squid!

I am going to assume that many of you diehard Watchmen fans said yes to at least one, if not all of those questions. However, after giving the movie a close reading I think that all those things stay true to the spirit of the comic and enhance its themes.

First, the slow-mo action effect. Why? Did Snyder do it just to please action junkies and in the process cheapen the Watchmen narrative? Was it a desperate ploy to bring more teenage males into the theater? Possibly, but if you look at the times the effect are used, well it seems as if something deeper is going on.

Nite Owl, Silk Spectre and Rorschach all rely on being super heroes to give them purpose in life. Without it, they are lonely, meandering and even impotent. They quite literally “get off “ on super hero theatricality and the adrenaline that the life of a vigilante brings them. Without it, they are useless. In the original text, Moore makes it abundantly clear that people who are psychologically damaged choose to become superheroes.

So where does Snyder’s action effects fit into this? The excessive violence and slow motion are suppose to convey the cheap thrill of crime fighting that these characters derive from it. The breaking of bones and fetishization of the latex, fisticuffs, and blood reveal this part of the character’s psyche. During the alley fight and prison break Dan and Laurie look at each other to reveal childish grins. Snyder is drawing attention to the level of absurdity that the troubled psyches of the characters need to feel like they have a purpose. Snyder wants us to see how troubled the superhero protagonists are and how far removed from “normal” they would have to be in order to exist in the real world.

This technique isn’t used with Doctor Manhattan or the Comedian, two characters that don’t rely on super heroism for meaning. You may aptly point out that the Comedian does in fact have slow-mo used during the first scene when he is murdered. However, this is done because Veidt’s assassin is the one engaging with him. In a flashback, we see that the Comedian scoffed at Veidt’s idea for a perfect world brought about by a group of caped crusaders. The elaborate assassination of the Comedian displays Veidt relishing his “last laugh”. This foreshadows Veidt’s final plan to save humanity by destroying part of it. In no other scene does the Comedian become subject to the “300 effect.”

Another example: when Nite Owl cries out and accosts Veidt in the final scene, yet Veidt chooses not to fight back. While Nite Owl cycles through all the action moves in a superhero arsenal, Veidt just accepts his abuse coldly. Veidt tells Dan how useless his theatrics are, mocking his superhero antics in order to convey their futility in addressing an actual crisis. Veidt is showing Nite Owl how impotent he is, even with his costume on.

Sex in the Owl Ship. The funky bass line and Barry White type vocals make it seem like a scene in a bad 70’s porno, right? Good, that is exactly the point. Snyder, the same way Moore does, wants us to realize how absurd it is that these characters need to wear costumes and run around at three in the morning in order to get off sexually. We aren’t suppose to empathize with their sexual frustrations, we’re suppose acknowledge their absurdity.

I will admit that the actress who played Silk Spectre did not do a very good job. Her acting was flat and drew attention to the fact that we were watching a movie. It doesn’t matter how attractive she is, she detracted from scenes that contained great performances. I hope fans recognize what a great job Doctor Manhattan, Rorschach and the Comedian did.

Finally, there’s the squid, or lack thereof. Personally, I disliked the squid in the novel and found its 1950’s absurdity cheapened the realism of the world Moore created. However, I think that the presence of a giant squid destroying Manhattan in a post-9/11 world would cheapen the national tragedy and seriousness of the situation. Considering the cultural context of the times, Snyder’s decision stayed true to the spirit of the comic, while simultaneously making the tragedy more realistic for modern audiences.

After all this talk and explaining, what do I think of Zack Snyder’s Watchmen? Well, the film I saw warrants a B-/C+, however I am still reserving my final judgment. After reading different interviews with Snyder, I have discovered that the two and half-hour theatrical cut of Watchmen is not the director’s intended vision.

Due to studio pressures and the limitations of the film medium, Snyder actually wants viewers to experience the film on a DVD. This DVD would include his director’s cut of the film, the animated Tales from the Black Freighter and the Under-the-Hood documentary. Snyder wants fans to engage with his vision of the film as an interactive comic book that can be paused, reversed and fast-forwarded. Like many new directors, his end goal is not exhibted at your local multiplex. Filmmaker’s are for-going the limitations of the Hollywood system and finding new ways to display their artistic vision. This trend makes the job of a film critic increasingly difficult because they are not actually experiencing the final product. Sometimes the final product isn’t even a traditional film.

This is why I am waiting to reserve my verdict. While some of the dialogue and performances of the film were done in a less than desirable way, Snyder’s attention to detail in recreating the world of Watchmen in the film’s production design aptly fits his end medium of an interactive comic book. With all of this I am suggesting that fans not be too hard on Snyder or his vision of Watchmen, at least not until this final version is released.