‘Watchmen’ Must be Hurting as Screenwriter Begs You to Go See It… Again

Hardcore Nerdity has posted an open letter from Watchmen co-screenwriter David Hayter asking for fanboys and fangirls, those he calls “true believers” who are dedicated for life to “go see [Watchmen] again next weekend.” The gist of the letter can be found in this paragraph:

You have to understand, everyone is watching to see how the film will do in its second week. If you care about movies that have a brain, or balls, (and this film’s got both, literally), or true adaptations — And if you’re thinking of seeing it again anyway, please go back this weekend, Friday or Saturday night. Demonstrate the power of the fans, because it’ll help let the people who pay for these movies know what we’d like to see. Because if it drops off the radar after the first weekend, they will never allow a film like this to be made again.

While I can respect the passion Hayter, and the rabid comic fanbase, has for films such as Watchmen I can’t look at this as a good sign for the film.

Of course, I was looking forward to Watchmen, but I am obviously not the core group Hayter is targeting with his letter so I guess I can feel free of responsibility. He says he is addressing “true comic book fans,” the people complaining “not enough movies take the source material seriously.” “Too many movies puss out,” or “They change great stories, just to be commercial.” To that Hayter says, “Well, I f***ing dare you to say any one of those things about this movie.”

So what do you say true comic book fans? You up for logging off the message board and plunking down another $10-12 to give the film a second, third or perhaps fourth run through?

I’ll tell you what I am going to do after watching the animated Tales of the Black Freighter on Blu-ray a couple of times. I am going to wait for the definitive director’s cut that splices Tales of the Black Freighter into the story and adds additional footage not shown in the theaters. My primary problem with Watchmen was it lost the layering that made the graphic novel mildly interesting to me, but I hold out hope Zack Snyder’s dedication to the source material will render itself completely with the extended version. That, of course, only takes care of the story aspect. I still have the awful soundtrack and terrible and unnecessary sex scene to contend with, but those things can no longer be helped.

It’s funny, I keep thinking of Kingdom of Heaven when it comes to this film. I gave the theatrical release of Kingdom a “C” when I reviewed it (I gave Watchmen a “C-“), but have since fallen in love with Ridley Scott’s director’s cut, which adds so much more to the story including a whole new character. Could Watchmen do the same? Honestly, I don’t really think so, but I hold out hope with a little bit of optimism.

You can read the complete open letter here.