The pitfall involved bringing a beloved property into a new medium is only as deep as the respect, praise, worship, and fandom that said property has garnered since it came into being. By that rational, the pitfall facing the adaptation of the Watchmen from comic/graphic novel into film could easily be represented by the Grand Canyon... A daunting task that many said shouldn’t be done and more said couldn’t be done, has been accomplished. Watchmen was released this Friday for an generally unprepared public to see on the big screen

I say generally unprepared due to the crowd in my theater Friday. The concept of a hard “R” rated movie about superheros was lost on a few who thought it would be kid friendly enough to bring a 3 or 4 year old too. Needless to say, the kid didn’t make it through 40 mins before relentlessly acting up enough for the theater to turn against them and they had to leave. I was far enough away that it didn’t really bother me (much) but I was left wondering what on earth were these dumbass people thinking? I saw images in this movie that made me cringe a bit, I cant imagine subjecting a kid to process seeing what happens when Dr. Manhattan explodes gangsters from the inside out.

This is the anti-superman, batman deciding to kill, and mary jane fucking spiderman all rolled into one movie (in spirit I mean). Watchmen as a graphic novel introduced these elements into the comic realm and changed the medium. Watchmen as a movie introduces the same elements into the realm of the theatrical superhero movie. It earns its “R” with unflinching eye on reality that people subject other people to. The dark elements of human nature are explored completely by so called heros who are as crazy and flawed as the criminals they fight against

Watchmen’s strength is its faithfulness to the source and its outstanding cast. It does narrow the focus of the plot from the graphic novel down to make it work better as a film, so if you’re a watch-purist you might find missing things that annoy you. For me the changes worked and still held true to the original spirit. The things that didn’t work for me were the sometimes awkward choices and use of music in the film. True many of the songs were used due to the use of their lyrics in the graphic novel, but using a lyric and using a song are two different things. Hendrix blasting against a snowscape kinda takes away the ominous urgent nature of the scene

Minor musical annoyances aside, there is a great movie to see here. I look forward to a second viewing and to the longer cut of the film due out in june or july.