Q&A with Dave Gibbons of “Watchmen”
Questions and answers with artist Dave Gibbons, from the “Watchmen” junket in Beverly Hills, Calif. Gibbons created the comic-book series “Watchmen” with writer Alan Moore, who declined to be involved with the movie.
Q: Will Alan Moore ever see the movie?
Dave Gibbons: I really don’t know. I hesitate to speak at all for Alan.
I certainly… Because he’s asked me not to talk to him about the movie. He’s happy to talk to me, but don’t talk about the movie. I’m unlikely to phone him up and say, hey Alan, it’s really great, why don’t you see it?
Even in the backwoods of England where I come from it’s inescapable. In my little corner store are all the movie mags with Watchmen and Dr. Manhattan, so I suppose he won’t be able to escape it completely.
Q: How do you think the film came out? The book has been called been called “unfilmable” before.
Gibbons: I think it came out really well.
I think to (director) Zack (Snyder), unfilmable is a challenge rather than an, ‘oh, well let’s not bother.’ I think to say anything is undoable shows a lack of vision.
Clearly the movie is a different beast than the comic book. The story in its purest primal form is the comic book. But I Think the movie has a lot of the virtues of the comic book and is an exciting translation of it.
Do you think it was faithful to the book?
Gibbons: I did. In a way, I’m the worst person in the world to ask. Because when I was drawing the comic book, I would sit in my room and close my eyes and see a little movie, and then think, oh yeah, that’s the one - and then draw that. And seeing the movie was to see that for real. …
Certainly a lot of my favorite scenes are there more or less intact. A lot of Alan’s wonderful dialogue is more or less intact. Many of the compositions and set ups that I did are there.
I thought it had an incredible emotional weight as well. The scenes with Rorschach toward the end, you can’t believe it’s going to happen, really.
On every level, the amount of detail, the moral ambiguity, I couldn’t imagine being happier.
Q: What did you think of Rorschach’s inkblots moving on the screen?
Gibbons: That was chilling; we always had an idea that that would be a really scary thing to see in real life. In the comic book of course we could only approximate that by showing it changing. I have met people at comic book convention masquerades with a static mask, and that’s unsettling enough. It’s like running into somebody with really dark glasses, you can’t see what they’re thinking. So to have it moving as well is really eerie and unsettling.
Hilarious Watchmen parody
Go here to check out “Saturday Morning Watchmen,” a humorous look at what might have happened if “Watchmen” had been brought to Saturday morning TV in the 1980s. High points for me: The Jem and Turbo Teen homages.
– Matt Price
Comics Q&A: Alan Moore
Learn about other graphic novels written by Alan Moore besides “Watchmen” in today’s Comics Q&A with Kyle Roberts and Matt Price.
Sneak Peek: Watchmen, New Kids on the Block
Gene Triplett, Matthew Price, and Brandy McDonnell give a sneak peek at The Oklahoman’s Weekend Look. The hot topics are “Watchmen” opening and New Kids On The Block coming to Tulsa.
Malin Akerman endured hardships for “Watchmen”
Former model Malin Akerman, who plays the Silk Spectre in Zack Snyder’s “Watchmen,” said her form-fitting costume, while easy on the eyes, wasn’t easy to wear.
“It was so uncomfortable,” Akerman said at the press junket for “Watchmen.” “I am not going to develop a latex fetish at all. It was beautiful and the design was incredible. But if I were a superhero, I’d wear sweats and a T-shirt.”
Akerman had two months of training prior to filming with a former Navy SEAL to take the role of the Silk Spectre, a second-generation superhero in this film, based on the graphic novel by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons. While she called that training “excruciating,” that wasn’t all the pain she went through to be part of this superhero adaptation. She also had to have a full-body cast made for costuming purposes.
“It’s a strange thing to have straws up your nose and try to breathe through that,” she said. “And also I had to do it in heels.”
A previous operation in her foot means Akerman’s bones aren’t at full strength, she said, and when the body cast began to dry, it also got heavier.
“It started weighing down and I said, ‘Guys, we have to take it off.’ I endured it as long as possible. But luckily it’s not an everyday thing, it’s a one-time situation. But it’s not the most comfortable process.”
Even love was rough on Akerman in “Watchmen.” To play Dr. Manhattan, the superpowered scientist, Billy Crudup was covered in LED lights that would later be covered by CGI work. In the love scene between the pair, Crudup had to keep a distance.
“That love scene was really interesting, because he couldn’t actually touch me,” Akerman said. “Because you had all these LED lights that are scratchy, they’d scrape you. And also the worry about being electrocuted, putting his finger in your mouth.”
Akerman says the end result of all the discomfort was worth it, and she’s proud of the final product in “Watchmen.” Also, director Snyder was constantly keeping the actors motivated.
“When we were all dying down in the 16th hour, he was ready to go … and making sound effects, and getting you into it,” Akerman said. “He was this monster machine. It couldn’t have been any other director.”
by Matthew Price
From Tuesday’s The Oklahoman
Rorschach test: Jackie Earle Haley won coveted role with self-made audition tape
BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. – The role of Rorschach, the masked, driven vigilante in “Watchmen,” was sought by many a Hollywood A-lister, said the producers of the film. The role went to Jackie Earle Haley, the child actor who, until being nominated for an Oscar for his 2006 film “Little Children,” was probably best-known for playing Kelly Leak in “Bad News Bears.”
Encouraged by fan chatter online that he’d make a good Rorschach, Haley made his own costume, and acted out scenes from the screenplay. He sent the tape to the producers of “Watchmen.”
After impressing the producers and director Zack Snyder, Haley became Rorschach – and in the process was reunited with his “Little Children” co-star Patrick Wilson. Wilson had already been cast as Nite Owl, Rorschach’s former crime-fighting partner.
“For me it was kind of interesting, to show up on the set and to basically, at least at the start, to know one guy, to only really have one friend there,” Haley said in a recent press interview. “And I did internally focus on that, because Rorschach only has one friend. And it happens to be the same guy. So there’s a neat parallel there.”
Rorschach is the most obsessive of this group of obsessives; when the superheroes in “Watchmen” are forced to retire by an act of Congress, Rorschach presses on in violation of the law. When one of their own is murdered, it’s Rorschach who believes someone is out to get the masks, and won’t let the investigation stop.
“This guy’s so lost in this world,” Haley said. “The cops don’t like him, the pedestrians don’t like him, his own masked vigilante partners don’t like him. If it wasn’t for Nite Owl, this guy would be absolutely, completely alone. And really, Nite Owl doesn’t even like the guy! If you really look at it, he puts up with him! But he does care.”
Rorschach’s drive results from his neglected upbringing, Haley said.
“He’s a victim of his mom’s own self-centeredness. … He ended up in a home at age 11 only to discover they weren’t much better at raising him than his mom was,” he said. “And I think he finally reached this point in life where he needed this black and white sense of the world. Because he was such a victim of the grey complexities.
“His whole life was falling through the cracks. And if it weren’t for becoming a masked vigilante, this guy would have no purpose in life.”
That focus on what would motivate a character to wear a mask and fight crime was part of what made the graphic novel “Watchmen,” which was the basis for the film, so successful, Haley said.
“People never thought to challenge the assumptions of the comic-book genre,” Haley said. “Watchmen” creators Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons took this medium that was more of a childlike entertainment medium, and decided to take that template and use it in more of a thought-provoking, grown-up manner to examine humanity. And it’s kind of fascinating when you take those two worlds and put them together,” he said.
That world was translated to film through the expertise of Snyder and the hundreds of craftspeople and technicians working on the film. Working on the heavily designed sets aided in the performance, Haley said.
“Zack created this incredible world,” he said. “Walking onto these beautiful sets was … incredibly motivating. You take the wardrobe design department, the makeup design department, all these departments that came together to create each character and these sets – it was total immersion.”
From Friday’s The Oklahoman
By Matthew Price
“Minutemen” sends “Watchmen” fans to video game past
THE NEXT LEVEL
Can’t wait for “The Watchmen”? “The Minutemen” provides a retro look at the kind of game you might have played in the game’s alternate 1985 world.
While fans wait the Zack Snyder film adaptation of “Watchmen” – and the Xbox Live downloadable game “The End is Nigh” – www.minutemenarcade.com/uk has a 2-D sidescrolling fight game in the tradition of “Double Dragon.”
After the site loads, the viewer is taken to a nostalgic, slightly run-down diner. In the corner is a well-worn “Minutemen” arcade game. Insert “coins” and enter an 8-bit world of sound and graphics.
Gamers can play as either the original Nite Owl or original Silk Spectre as they try to take out Moloch and his henchmen in 1942 New York.
There are several Easter eggs for Watchmen fans in the game – from the game’s “Veidt Enterprises” logo, referring to the alter ego of the masked hero Ozymandias to a poster for Rolf Muller’s Park Circus, Rolf Muller being the presumed secret identity of one of the 1940s Minutemen.
The game is simple, and short – Nite Owl and Silk Spectre can walk, punch, kick and jump, though I don’t know that they ever have the need to jump in the game. There are three levels, a street level, subway level, then a second street level ending at Moloch’s theater. Defeat Moloch, and the gamer is rewarded with an HD version of the “Watchmen” trailer.
– Matthew Price
From Friday’s The Oklahoman
Alan Moore interview at Wired
If you want to see what the modern master of comics has to say about superheroes, comics, homage, film and more, check out this Wired interview. There’s a bit of his thoughts on filmed adaptations of his works (in short: he has no use for them), and more about his upcoming “League of Extraordinary Gentlemen” series from Top Shelf.
He comes off bitter but brilliant, for the most part, with a different opinion on current comics than the one I have, anyway. (That said, he admits to not particularly following mainstream comics anymore.)
A funny comment from Moore about ending up working for DC after WildStorm was purchased:
When I returned to work for—well, I didn’t return. I was kind of press-ganged. I had DC buying the company I had just signed contracts with, which is flattering in one way and very creepy in another. It’s like being stalked by a very rich demented girlfriend who can just buy your entire street in order to be close to you.
– Matt Price
“I Watch the Watchmen” widget
Get your Watchmen countdown, info, trailer and more in this widget from the makers of the “Watchmen” film.
“Watchmen” books advance film
WORD BALLOONS
“Watchmen,” the Zack Snyder adaptation of the graphic novel by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, hits theaters next month. In the meantime, DC Comics and Titan Books have created books and merchandise to take fans into the alternate 1980s world of “Watchmen.”
First, the story itself. Named one of Time magazine’s 100 greatest novels, the “Watchmen” graphic novel is available in a variety of formats.
Most impressively, the oversized “Absolute Watchmen” ($75) features 48 pages of supplemental material beyond the 12-issue series. It contains the series proposal, pages from the original script, and additional art. The art was remastered and recolored for the original printing of “Absolute Watchmen,” and it’s now used for all of the “Watchmen” reprints.
Also available are a “Watchmen” hardcover ($39.99), a “Watchmen” trade paperback collection ($19.99) and a single-issue reprint of “Watchmen” issue No. 1 ($1.50).
In addition to the book, DC’s toy division, DC Direct, has created action figures, busts and props of the “Watchmen” characters.
Titan Books, meanwhile, has released four tie-in books surrounding the “Watchmen” film.
“Watching the Watchmen,” written by Dave Gibbons, comes in two editions. The comic-store exclusive edition has a cover featuring the character “The Comedian” and additional pages. It’s also signed by Gibbons and comes with exclusive prints. This edition retails for $50. The standard edition retails for $39.95 and has a cover featuring Dr. Manhattan.
“Watchmen: Portraits” ($50) features black-and-white portrait shots of people in the film, ranging from stars to extras, and was shot by official movie photographer Clay Enos.
“Watchmen: The Film Companion” ($29.95 hardcover, $19.95 softcover) was written by Peter Aperlo and explores the behind-the-scenes making of the film. Aperlo also writes “Watchmen: The Art of the Film,” ($40), which features storyboards, photography and preproduction art. Possibly most intriguing for comic-book fans will be the new art created by Gibbons, as well as alternate takes on the characters by comic-book artists John Cassaday, David Finch and Adam Hughes.
All of the Titan Books releases contain spoilers for the film and graphic novel, so read the book or see the film prior to reading the ancillary material.
Judging from the books, Snyder and company look to have created a rich alternate world, and tried to respect the graphic novel, which has engrossed readers for more than 20 years.
– Matthew Price
From Friday’s The Oklahoman
