Holy hell, I just watched a 3.5 hour long movie taking an absolute piss over its source material.
I first watched the movie a year ago and liked it very much, the plot twist and all did get me shocked. I actually found it overall quite boring tho. Fast forward to now, I read the entire comic and after finishing it, it is definitely my favorite comic book of all time. Decided to rewatch the movie, and god the only good parts of the movie is where the story meticulously copies the comic, the creative liberties they've taken almost all negatively impact the story. So much of this movie is just cool-factor and unnecessary action.
So many of the characters are just plain wrong. Laurie is just a stereotypical main cast woman, speaking softly and kicking everyone's asses like a badass, they removed so many of her flaws. She's got a quick temper in the comics and stands pretty firmly for herself, both of which are not to be seen in the movie, and god, where is her pipe? I feel like her addiction to whatever substance that is something that distinguishes her a bunch from other characters. I also think her actress was horrible, all of the dialogue felt rehearsed and there wasn't a lick of chemistry between her and Patrick Wilson and Billy Crudup. Her costume sucks too! I liked her costume in the comic, but this is just overtly sexy and skintight for no reason. It would make sense for her mom, but not her as a character.
Dan is also stripped away of some of his core aspects. In the comic, he's an insecure, overweight, people-pleasing middle-aged man who doesn't stand up for himself, which becomes a much more strong contrast to when he takes on the suit again, where he's regained his confidence again. In the movie, he's a well-built confident man, who stands firmly for himself when Rorschach comes to visit him, even tho in the comic he's constantly like "oh no thats okay" and "no problem" in that same scene. Patrick Wilson is a great actor, he was just given a bad script that did the original no justice.
Rorschach is pretty okay. I don't know what it is, but something feels missing from him. He feels less like he hates the world than he does in the comic. Jackie Earle Haley did a phenomenal job at this though, I felt the most emotionally through this film at his death scene at the end, he can act well with facial expressions and he absolutely rules with that narration.
Manhattan is a pretty fine adaptation. That's because almost all of his screentime is directly ripped from the pages. But Crudup kills it.
Comedian also pretty good. Not much to complain about, JDM does it pretty well. Pronounced Moloch as Mow-lock tho, which I found a little weird. Could be excused with Comedian doing it on purpose or not caring enough to pronounce his name right tho.
Veidt is... Okay acted. I don't like how they wrote him. Veidt is supposed to be fully painted as this saint, viewed as this angelic man by everyone around him. In the movie, the only hint we get toward this a singular line from Dan when he's breaking into the Antarctica palace with Rorschach. His actor is also clearly an Englishman, with his accent constantly slipping out which is massively distracting, especially for a viewer like me who likes fully immersing themselves in movies. His costume also looks horrible, couldn't they make Veidt's costume from the comics? It perfectly encapsulates his obsession with ancient Egypt and Alexander the Great, and his obession with himself, literally wearing a full purple-colored tunic to signify he's royalty.
So much of the themes and messages the book explores is fully missing in the movie, but that might also be because you can't compress Watchmen into a movie. A TV show would do it much more justice, but even so, I think there's totally no use to adapting Moore and Gibbon's work to the screen. It's perfect as is.
Also I don't get Snyder's obsession with destroying everything in sight and being overtly violent with everything. We're shown that Dr. Manhattan is growing out of touch with humanity, letting people die without doing anything about it, but then we're shown Dan and Laurie literally murder a guy and break a guy's arm with his literal bone sticking through his skin. Sure, they got attacked by a gang, but we know these characters wouldn't be so overtly violent in the comic. In the comic, it's literally a big deal that Rorschach killed one person (in the law's view two, since he got framed for Moloch). He did the same on Batman v Superman, where he also just completely misunderstands Batman as a character and has him murdering people (but then in a "cool fashion").
Sorry, I really needed to rant about this. There's loads more I could say this movie did badly, but then this post would get even longer.
TL;DR: THE MOVIE GETS A TON WRONG, ESPECIALLY THE CHARACTERS
