Watchmen and the Filmgoer's Dilemma
"The book was better."
A phrase you hear uttered by at least one voice in the crowd whenever a movie is adapted from a beloved work of fiction. Novels, comic books, video games, no matter what the source material there's always dissent. The long-time fans come out of the woodwork to frantically stake their claim as the Originals. The Ones Who Knew About It First. There's a bit of selfishness there, almost a protectiveness being displayed. Books and video games are much more of an engrossing, personal experience than film and the depiction of narrative that plays out in your head is as intimate as one can get. When a big-name director and hotshot actors get attached to the movie adaptation of a favorite, it can be jarring. Fear of mangling the source material. Fear of not giving the material the respect it deserves. And maybe a little bit of fear that the movie version will be entirely different than the version you saw in your head. That disconnect is so loathsome to fans they'd do anything to stop it. And by "anything" I mean angrily posting on message boards. And by "stop it" I mean annoy the shit out of people.
There's nothing wrong with enjoying a movie adaptation. There, I said it. Breathe a sigh of relief, fellow nerds! You don't have to act elitist in the face of mainstream movie-goers anymore!
Take Watchmen as an example. This twenty-some-odd year old story has been read and re-read and obsessed over by fans. It's on the Time Magazine Top 100 Novels of all time list, which tells you something. Not "graphic novels", mind you. Novels. It's good. Really good. Incredible, in fact. I just picked up the trade paperback version and read it for the first time this week and it's already one of my absolute favorites, no hyperbole. I am intensely excited for the movie adaptation, which is being shot by the director of 300 in a similar frame-by-frame comic to film approach. Mixed feelings pervade the internets about this adaptation. Some fear it's going to be just another summer blockbuster action movie, failing to display the true gamut of emotions, the sheer gravitas of a world filled with flawed superheroes with everyday problems. Making a Watchmen movie is like, well, making a Lord of The Rings movie. There's so much that would be lost in translation. Watchmen relies heavily on its literary style, on you as the reader becoming engrossed in the words and intimately relating to the characters one by one, chapter after chapter. Even writer Alan Moore has stated he wants nothing to do with the movie, nor does he plan on watching it. What an asshole.
"Nothing is any good if other people like it." It's an indie rock and nerd mantra that I admit I often live by. But movie adaptations of excellent works are inevitable. Why not embrace that fact and treat these films as companion pieces to the greater work? Why not get upset when action figures are created or t-shirts made? Why not take it as a whole and use it to personally enrich your experience and understanding?
One of the things I love to do is to pick apart a story and relentlessly analyze tidbits of mythos. To piece together the puzzle of characters and plot and, ultimately, pick out the differences between book and film. The best fiction is able to engage everyone depending on how much you want to engage with it. From Lost to Shakespeare there's a perfect balance of highbrow and lowbrow content. You can enjoy the weirdness of the island and chat about how Kate and Sawyer are toooooootally made for each other - or you can decipher intricate codes and maps to delve deeper into the mysteries they've laid out for you. Or you can just marvel at how dreamy Sawyer is. How dreamy? SO dreamy.
Shakespeare liked to write fart jokes and add gore to fill the front rows of the Globe with commoners. The cheap seats. In the back were the intelligentsia, silently appreciating the literary tapestry unfolding between bloody sword fights and bawdy displays of machismo and lust. It's classic. It works and it is fantastic.
The fact of the matter is that as fans we want to evangelize what we believe to be truly good while still maintaining the integrity of the product. It's contradictory in a way: we want to keep these things as our own yet we still want to share our enthusiasm with the rest of the world. When it comes down to it we're all just insecure. Who cares if the whole world knows and loves a mainstream version of Middle-Earth, or a watered-down Watchmen? No matter how exposed our favorite works get, it doesn't change how we feel about them. We should learn to appreciate the fact that more people are being exposed to great works of fiction every day.
And hey, if they like the movie maybe they'll read the book.
