Who’d Watch The Watchmen?

Oh, relax, I’m only kidding—despite my heavily critical stance regarding the graphic novel literati love to cite, I’d be just as interested to see the long-rumored movie as the next fanboy—although in my case, it’s because I believe the book has so much backstory that it’s virtually impossible to adapt for the screen in any meaningful fashion, so I want to see how badly it gets decimated. And it appears that we’re one step closer to finally getting our chance: Hollywood Reporter scribe Borys Kit says Warner Bros. just picked up the film rights, which had been at Paramount until the studio cut the project loose last summer. Warner becomes the third studio to take on the film since 2001; although both Darren Aronofsky and Paul Greenglass have been attached to direct at various points, producer Mark Gordon, who’s held the rights for nearly two decades, is currently looking for a new helmsman.

Entertainment Weekly blogger Gary Susman has some casting suggestions, about which I’m not even going to get into unless he invites me out for several rounds of beers, because that’s how long it’s going to take to go through them all and convince him that he’s almost entirely wrong. Besides, I have to keep a tight rein on this comic book stuff or else all you mainstreamers’ eyes will start to glaze over. Not that any of this necessarily matters: If V for Vendetta tanks, Watchmen probably stays on the shelf for a couple more years.

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