We all know that HBO is moving steadily forward with Damon Lindelof‘s (‘Lost’,’The Leftovers’) take on ‘The Watchmen’ and now have learned what changes will be made for TV. Tackling Alan Moore and Dave Dave Gibbons’ iconic work is a big enough project on its own and having to deal with fans while changing a bit of the source material could open a different can of worms.
Things need to change between mediums, for creative freedom, and other reasons as well and Lindelof had the following to say:
“[Adapting] may be the right word, at the end of the day. Do you watch Fargo at all? I wouldn’t call Noah Hawley’s version of Fargo an adaptation because the movie exists inside of his world, and so everything that happened in the movie Fargo, it does precede the television show Fargo. So they find a bag of money in the first season, and you go, ‘Oh, that came from the movie.’ But it’s also, Noah is pulling from other areas of the Coen brothers’ canon, so it evokes like Lebowski, but it’s also his own thing. I think it’s widely known that Alan Moore does not want Watchmen to be adapted, so I’m playing a bit of a game of semantics here in saying, ‘I’m not adapting Watchmen!'”
I think the ‘Fargo’ comparison is a good idea in that he can not only expand upon the world but also go into the stories which were hinted at in the book and even the prequels which were released to a mixed reception. There are a lot of areas that this world can be expanded upon which wouldn’t feel like it was being shoehorned in.
Not that Lindelof or we will have to worry about what Moore is going to think about what ends up on the small screen since he’ll likely never watch it and surely hates the idea with a passion.
The director did get a fun comment in on that, though, as he knows Moore’s loathing of the project will be public sooner or later:
“That’s the spirit of what he did with Watchmen in the first place. It’s not to take [anything from him]. He created this — it’s an original — but the basis for that world is on these other characters that DC had just bought from this comics company called Charlton. And he did rips on those characters. But all of his other work that I love, whether it be Swamp Thing or an amazing Superman story called ‘Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?,’ and a great Batman story. It’s sort of like, the idea that he came in and told iconic stories with characters that he didn’t create, and has now turned around and said, ‘You’re not allowed to do that with the characters that I created.’ So I feel like his own hypocrisy has allowed me to defy all his. [laughs]”
The stakes are high to pull off a good show that fans will enjoy though you can’t help but love Lindelof’s style here.
Are you looking forward to an ongoing series based on ‘The Watchmen’? Is Alan Moore right that no one else can adapt his work or a bit of a hypocrite? Share your thoughts below!
Source: Bookish With Sonya Walger
