something about her writings that appeals specifically to Americans
lionization of selfishness
― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Saturday, 24 May 2008 16:54 (sixteen years ago) link
exaltation of selfishness is what i meant, i suppose
― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Saturday, 24 May 2008 16:56 (sixteen years ago) link
Well, she makes the unbridled free market sounds romantic and rugged and individualistic. Like some sort of cowboy wall street. Characters have strong artistic visions, and it's the poor and unenlightened who keep them down.
― Mordy, Saturday, 24 May 2008 21:17 (sixteen years ago) link
Is there somewhere else where this is being discussed?
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/26/business/media/26retail.html?ref=technology
― toby, Tuesday, 27 May 2008 12:41 (sixteen years ago) link
arrr.
― The Real Dirty Vicar, Tuesday, 27 May 2008 15:31 (sixteen years ago) link
That guy reading the Black Freighter is too old! He's only a kid in the comic.
― rener, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 11:27 (sixteen years ago) link
he looks like a real hip urban dood...
bah, the film is going to be rubbish, I see it now.
― The Real Dirty Vicar, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 11:33 (sixteen years ago) link
The Black Freighter stuff... I remember back in the day a lot of people thought it all superfluous and used to skip over it, so it's interesting the extent to which critical opinion now focuses on it.
― The Real Dirty Vicar, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 11:34 (sixteen years ago) link
Critics are suckers for text-within-a-text interplay.
― Matt M., Wednesday, 28 May 2008 13:56 (sixteen years ago) link
^^^^^^this otm
I have never actually read the Black Freighter stuff!
― HI DERE, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 13:58 (sixteen years ago) link
I've always liked it in its own terms... it's a great OH MY GOD, NOOOOOO story. I know there is all this "it is a metaphor for what Rorschach/Ozymandias/the psychiatrist/Sally Jupiter/your mam have become" stuff, but feh.
― The Real Dirty Vicar, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 14:10 (sixteen years ago) link
Yeah, I read it just as an entertaining pastiche/diversion/backdrop-enricher when I first tackled Watchmen aged fourteen or so, and it works fine as that. Subtext aside, the dramatic beats and rhthym of Black Freighter enhance the main storyline nicely as well.
― chap, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 16:11 (sixteen years ago) link
Comics aren't just for kids any more.
― Raw Patrick, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 21:58 (sixteen years ago) link
I am less worried this will suck the more stills I see. It might be ruined by audio, tho.
― Abbott, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 22:19 (sixteen years ago) link
Ooh, Black Freighter is animated!
― Abbott, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 22:21 (sixteen years ago) link
I've always been like "I skipped 300 for two reasons - it looked like it sucked and I hated the comic." So I was really dubious about the same director making the movie of a comic I love. But maybe his thing is such faithful adaptations that if I'll react the same way to them as I do to the source.
For one precedent, I rewatched the "V" movie recently, and I still think it was a really good take on the original (with the targets of satire switched, of course.)
― Oilyrags, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 22:23 (sixteen years ago) link
It's weird. 300 is such a different beast than Watchmen. I'm pretty unwillling to predict Snyder's results on Watchmen based on 300. The plot structures are, y'know, kinda exact opposites. 300 is more or less one narrative thread where the visuals are basically the whole point, while Watchmen has, as Dr Manhattan might say, more moving parts. 300's succeeded in no small part because of its brilliant art direction--though that didn't help Sky Captain.
― Dr. Superman, Thursday, 29 May 2008 02:19 (sixteen years ago) link
Yeah, this sounds cool! Even if it was done for budgetary reasons, I think it's the proper way to do it. In general, I think comic-based movies should be done as animations more often, it's definitely the better format for comic adaptations. I think the animated films made of Corto Maltese and Persepolis were both very good.
― Tuomas, Thursday, 29 May 2008 09:36 (sixteen years ago) link
http://community.livejournal.com/mad_ape_den/9455.html
In words of three letters or less. MAN!
― Oilyrags, Friday, 30 May 2008 13:38 (sixteen years ago) link
Fab.
― chap, Friday, 30 May 2008 14:28 (sixteen years ago) link
Outstanding:
http://img293.imageshack.us/img293/2706/mmpictm2.jpg
― Pancakes Hackman, Monday, 2 June 2008 18:23 (sixteen years ago) link
That looks awesome. Why do people ever call Watchmen realistic then bitch about the ending? Dude, Dr Manhattan! It ISN'T realistic! It's a wonderful little sidetrack to the idea 40s (and etc) or so superheroes existed, at most, in HISTORICAL terms. And a magnificent read.
― Niles Caulder, Wednesday, 11 June 2008 08:03 (sixteen years ago) link
In fact (I may well be the 150000th person to realise this) Dr M's a literal deus ex machina... it 's just annoying seeing so many hate on a perfect superhero story.
― Niles Caulder, Wednesday, 11 June 2008 08:09 (sixteen years ago) link
does anyone else out there think that the psychiatrist's character arc in "The Abyss Gazes Also" is a bit contrived?
― Drugs A. Money, Sunday, 15 June 2008 17:59 (sixteen years ago) link
Nah it just points up how completely fucked Rorschach is
― Niles Caulder, Monday, 16 June 2008 02:10 (sixteen years ago) link
Hey people who own Absolute Watchmen, the huge hardcover reprint: Was it worth it? The larger page size, and the extras? I'm undecided if I should get a copy on eBay - so what's your reviews?
― Chelvis, Sunday, 29 June 2008 22:19 (sixteen years ago) link
ulp, nevermind, my questions were answered in the "Absolute Watchmen Edition' thread, which I could have searched for beforehand, were I more enterprising and less slovenly. We have all learned a lesson here.
― Chelvis, Sunday, 29 June 2008 22:33 (sixteen years ago) link
Graphitti edition, IMO.
/ducks the hail of shoes thrown at him
― Matt M., Sunday, 29 June 2008 23:25 (sixteen years ago) link
New movie production diary and stills showing the original Nite Owl's study. I especially like this one: On the shelf next to Under the Hood" is a copy of Philip Wylie's Gladiator.
― Pancakes Hackman, Tuesday, 8 July 2008 22:25 (sixteen years ago) link
http://io9.com/assets/images/io9/2008/06/WMD-22648_select.jpg
!
― Bodrick III, Tuesday, 8 July 2008 22:46 (sixteen years ago) link
If nothing else this movie is going to be a study in meticulous production design.
― Pancakes Hackman, Wednesday, 9 July 2008 00:23 (sixteen years ago) link
That's what YOU think! A Chicagoan friend of mine was bitching about "Grain Belt" beer signage appearing in that shot of an NY City street.
― Oilyrags, Wednesday, 9 July 2008 02:46 (sixteen years ago) link
It's a parallel history though.
― Tuomas, Wednesday, 9 July 2008 06:11 (sixteen years ago) link
hi dere
― David R., Friday, 18 July 2008 00:51 (sixteen years ago) link
Dr Manhattan appears to be wearing speedos.
― James Morrison, Friday, 18 July 2008 03:44 (sixteen years ago) link
I will be hugely surprised if he spends any time in the finished movie with his atomic tackle out.
― Stone Monkey, Friday, 18 July 2008 06:46 (sixteen years ago) link
There is fuzzy dangle in the cafeteria shot.
― David R., Friday, 18 July 2008 07:04 (sixteen years ago) link
I realized today it's pretty damn hard to explain what exactly this is to people who just saw the trailer tonight with Batman and have no idea what it is.
― Nhex, Friday, 18 July 2008 08:35 (sixteen years ago) link
Is Doc M going to be translucent throughout? Cos he's pretty solid looking in the book.
― chap, Friday, 18 July 2008 13:26 (sixteen years ago) link
I'd suspect that's the solution they used for making him look otherworldly. Otherwise he's just a naked blue guy - and that would just look a bit silly.
― Stone Monkey, Friday, 18 July 2008 14:21 (sixteen years ago) link
"Motion comics"? Really, Warners? REALLY?? http://www.ew.com/ew/static/watchmen/watchmen.html
Much better: the interview with Moore at http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20213004,00.html .
― Douglas, Friday, 18 July 2008 15:33 (sixteen years ago) link
That motion comics thing has been done a dozen times. People just don't get that this won't work. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/14/business/media/14mtv.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=invincible&st=cse&oref=slogin
― forksclovetofu, Friday, 18 July 2008 19:27 (sixteen years ago) link
People just don't get that this won't work.
OH, REALLY NOW?
God bless Nagisa Oshima.
― R Baez, Friday, 18 July 2008 19:33 (sixteen years ago) link
Fine, people just don't get that this won't work IN AMERICA
― forksclovetofu, Saturday, 19 July 2008 05:43 (sixteen years ago) link
Is it just me that can't get them links a-workin'?
― James Morrison, Monday, 21 July 2008 00:01 (sixteen years ago) link
Hahahaha. Now everyone will hate Watchmen as much as I do!
http://www.1up.com/do/previewPage?cId=3168969&p=4
― Mordy, Thursday, 24 July 2008 02:51 (sixteen years ago) link
Watchmen puts both Rorschach and Nite Owl on the streets in a game set exclusively at night, when most of the nation's crime takes place.
― Dr. Superman, Thursday, 24 July 2008 04:24 (sixteen years ago) link
If you're wondering who could possibly replace the much-revered Alan Moore in the scripting department...comic fans will be glad to know that respected comic veteran Len Wein is on board to provide the dialogue.
― Groke, Thursday, 24 July 2008 16:32 (sixteen years ago) link
Swamp Thing In Reverse!
― David R., Thursday, 24 July 2008 16:37 (sixteen years ago) link
You know, this is so dumb I don't feel offended by it at all.
Plus, as far as tasteless vid-game tie-ins go, who could beat this?? (Which I bought, incidentally -- bit too hard during the first level.)
― Chuck_Tatum, Thursday, 24 July 2008 16:42 (sixteen years ago) link