Superhero Filmmakers: Where's Our Watchmen?

New Alan Moore interview at Entertainment Weekly:
http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20213004,00.html

He really does seem to be generous with his time for interviews when it's all about stuff he doesn't really give a shit about or would rather not think about.

except it looks nothing like the comic book...? the color scheme of the book is really bright and garish (duh, just like much of the comic book history the story references). and as for visual ideas its clear there's a ton of details that they've changed for all sorts of stupid reasons. Using comic panels as a storyboard /= tribute to book's visual ideas (actually its fairly cheap and lazy)

-- Shakey Mo Collier, Friday, July 18, 2008 3:36 PM (33 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

dude you need to chill on this

McFarlane owns Miracleman? When did that happen?

Yeah, this is news to me too.

In 1996, Todd McFarlane purchased Eclipse's creative assets for a total of $40,000. It has been suggested that McFarlane was mainly interested in the Miracleman rights; the rest of Eclipse's characters and properties were incidental, though he did not expect to keep them idle. McFarlane's plan was to reintroduce Eclipse's characters through two new Image Comics anthology titles, Todd McFarlane's Twisted Tales and Todd McFarlane's Alien Worlds. However, these were never printed and to date the only Eclipse character to appear again has been The Heap in McFarlane's Spawn title.

McFarlane clearly had plans for Miracleman, but had neglected to consult Neil Gaiman, the last person to have held part of the rights. In 1993, Gaiman had created the characters Angela and Medieval Spawn for McFarlane. Gaiman claimed that he had created them with the understanding that he would retain creative ownership of them, an ownership which McFarlane now disputed. His plans stymied, in 1997 McFarlane reached a supposed verbal agreement (and according to Gaiman, a written one as well) with Gaiman in which Gaiman would cede his half-ownership of Cogliostro and Medieval Spawn in exchange for which McFarlane would trade his rights to Miracleman. A subsequent letter from McFarlane to Gaiman would void this deal, if it ever legally existed, as McFarlane claimed that he already owned the two characters and pointed to a copyright notice on Spawn Issue 7 and cited them as the product of work-for-hire. He also stopped paying Gaiman royalties around this time for the action-figures and other items featuring the characters that were still in print. This was another of the direct causes for the legal action. At the time, no one was aware that the rights for Miracleman were not included in the purchase of most of Eclipse Comics' assets and both men believed that McFarlane held a large stake in Miracleman. That was a fact that would not become clear until after the lawsuit concluded. It turned out that McFarlane did, however, own two trademarks for Miracleman logos. Gaiman and Marvels and Miracles, LLC would take action to try to block him from being able to reregister these trademarks.

He's obviously a complete cunt, especially as he was always shooting his mouth of about creators' rights when Image first launched.

^^^for realz

I am super-pissed there is no collected edition of the stuff, and my brother has all the individual issues we bought as kids :(

slocki you don't understand, the thingy on the celluloid doesn't look exactly like 4-color glossy ergo THIS MOVIE SUCKS QED.

Wait...

So you're mad that, instead of faithfully recreating all of the comic book tropes that were recontextualized in the source material, they are recontextualizing the comic book movie tropes of the past 20 years? Do I have that right?

not exactly - I was pointing out that blueski's criteria for enjoying this film makes no sense

ie this film is not a tribute or homage to the comics' visual style

Oh, okay. I wasn't really paying attention to the part you quoted (lol).

I'd argue that the film is a tribute/homage to the inspiration of the comics' visual style (ie, repurposing the visuals of predecessors in its genre) but I wouldn't argue it very strongly.

that seems to be Snyder's excuse but yeah I don't find it very convincing

You don't find it convincing in that you think it doesn't work or you think he's lying about why they updated the costumes?

oh its probably a little from column and a little from column b

column A bah

40 grand for all of eclipse's creative rights sounds like a total fucking steal; I'm astonished that idiot hasn't done something profitable with it.

He caught Dean Mullaney's nuts in a vise at just the right moment. Eclipse lost their back issue stock in a flood in '93, Mullaney and Cat Yronwode divorced about the same time, and then there was the direct market collapse/speculator bubble-pop that shrank the whole industry.

not exactly - I was pointing out that blueski's criteria for enjoying this film makes no sense

representation of and tribute to != emulating or matching particularly

"40 grand for all of eclipse's creative rights sounds like a total fucking steal; I'm astonished that idiot hasn't done something profitable with it."

Not getting Miracleman sort of deflates it though.

T Ewing sez

I don't think its unfilmability has anything to do with "complexity" or flashbacks (?!) but with the way different narratives are laid on top of each other and interlaced - the juxtaposition of recurring images, dialogue, narrative text boxes that refer to different things on the page at the same time, etc. The comic revels in simultaneous and symmetrical narrative strains in a way that simply cannot be achieved with film (maybe it could be done with a lot of split-screening, which Snyder has apparently not bothered with...?) Moore deliberately exploited comics' unique potential as a medium.

I don't think the Lolita or Naked Lunch comparisons are particularly apt - Lolita is not particularly unfilmable in any way (it has a linear narrative and an unreliable narrator, both of which cinema is well equipped to handle). Naked Lunch is, strictly speaking, nothing like the book, and succeeds because it was made by a master director with the input of the author and largely just uses the text as an inspiration for imagery juxtaposed over the author's own autobiography. The thing is, both of those novels were considered unfilmable due to their sexual content and not because of any structural complexities - neither of them is a book about books (a la Nabokov's "Pale Fire" or Calvino's "If On A Winter's Night a Traveller" is) in the way that Watchmen is a comic book about comics.

I mean someone could've made a movie of Lolita or Naked Lunch at any time - the problem is they would've been censored and/or banned.

shakey can you just wait till you see the goddamned movie before you disprove it

lol, obviously no!

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/31478

Shakey read that link to Tom's piece and, you know, think a bit.

Nicely condescending, Ned.

nicely condescending ned is one of the new supehero characters they've added

I think un-filmable in this case = unlikely to be very good or very interesting in cinematic form. I think Tom touches on one very good reason why this is the case (and it's the one Moore is likely to be the most concerned with) but it's far from the only reason and most of Shakey's points seem to me to be entirely valid ones.

yes

we all agree that it probably wont be good and the reasons why

at this point we are not interested in hearing it shouted at us a billion more times

Well then stop arguing with him then.

I read it. Rorschach is repulsive, I don't buy his "but he made them even more badass!" tack.

If you lose the Black Freighter sequence you’ve got a relatively straightforward story, albeit one with a somewhat eyebrow-raising tonal shift at the end.

Except that this whole sequence is essentially the key to the entire story (as pointed out on some other Watchmen thread by someone else)

x-posts

nicely condescending ned is one of the new supehero characters they've added

costume needs more nipples

you can strip the black freighter layer off no problem. obv that weakens the original story but it's not as if the whole thing falls apart without it.

let us list the ways in which the film will be better than the book

1) shit moves

ya everyone pretty much admitted they didnt "get" it anyway xp

Well then stop arguing with him then.

I should follow your kind and thoughtful example in all things.

Hey if it works for you, go for it.

"ya everyone pretty much admitted they didnt "get" it anyway xp"

Everyone = who?

Eclipse licenses that could easily be made profitable again with a bit of effort:

* Adolescent Radioactive Black Belt Hamsters (give it to kyle baker or phil foglio or ty templeton or...
* Airboy by Chuck Dixon (I'd buy new issues)
* Area 88 (I want manga books for this goddamit!)
* Axel Pressbutton by Pedro Henry, Steve Dillon, and Brian Bolland (easy film conversion)
* Aztec Ace (ditto)
* Brought to Light (due for a reprint)
* California Girls (1987) by Trina Robbins (easy cartoon for WB)
* Cynicalman by Matt Feazell (xkcd owes royalties)
* Detectives, Inc.by Don McGregor and Gene Colan (easy movie)
* Killer ... Tales by Timothy Truman
* Mai the Psychic Girl (easy reprint cash)
* Miracleman by Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, and others.
* Ms. Tree by Max Allan Collins and Terry Beatty (movie)
* Mr. Monster (all time favorite)
* The Prowler (great book, due for a revival)
* Reid Fleming, World's Toughest Milkman (nuff said)
* The Rocketeer (due for a sequel)
* Scout by Timothy Truman (has movie written all over it)
* Tales of the Beanworld by Larry Marder (is this out in reprint?)
* Winterworld (another easy film)
* Zot! by Scott McCloud (another one that I'd buy in two or three reprint books)

thanks for interrupting what would have been a great your mama joke forks.

It's what I do.

know what i do?

* Cynicalman by Matt Feazell (xkcd owes royalties)

wow Eclipse really had some great stuff, I had forgotten - would love to see another collected volume of Zot!

I thought Zot! was collected?

we all agree that it probably wont be good and the reasons why

hey I'm just trying to save you guys from wasting yr hard-earned kopecks on this movie. You'll thank me later

I have a collection of the first 6 issues, never seen any subsequent volumes. I admit I haven't looked in a long time.