First 22 Minutes of Watchmen Revealed

First 22 Minutes of Watchmen Revealed

Spoiler Warning! Want to know details of the first 22 minutes of the Watchmen movie? Read on!

By ComicBookMovie - Dec 17, 2008 12:12 AM EST
Filed Under: Watchmen
Source: CHUD

Our friends over at CHUD got to see the opening footage, and this is their report...

The police stare out the broken window of the Comedian's apartment, discussing the crime. 30 stories below a figure holding a sign that reads "The End is Nigh" walks through the puddle of blood that is being sprayed off the sidewalk. The camera zooms away from the building, showing the alternate New York City of the story, filled with zeppelins and a huge Gunga Diner balloon.

Rorschach's narration begins, very faithful to the book. He rappels up the side of the building into the Comedian's apartment. Poking around, he discovers the Comedian's weapons cache and costume. The camera focuses in on a photo of The Minutemen, and then pulls out again, but this time the picture is hanging in Hollis Mason's apartment. We see other photos and newspaper headlines hanging on the wall, and a copy of Beneath the Hood, Mason's memoirs, on the table.

Mason is spinning stories of his days as the Nite Owl to Dan Dreiberg, the second Nite Owl. It's after midnight and Dan gets up to leave; they stop on the porch for a moment as rain falls outside and Hollis asks Dan if he ever misses the good old days. Dan says no, but it seems like he's lying. He leaves Hollis behind, and the camera lingers a moment on the sign for Hollis' auto body shop: Obsolete Models a Speciality. Much of the dialogue in this scene comes straight from the comic.

Dan walks home in the rain, and discovers that his front door has been kicked in. He walks into his brownstone cautiously, only to find Rorschach, mask up, eating cold canned beans at his kitchen table. When Rorschach tells him that the Comedian has been killed (the 'It's human bean juice' joke remains intact), they go down to the basement to talk more.

Again, this scene plays out pretty much the way it does in the book, with Dan and Rorschach discussing who might have killed the Comedian. Dan dismisses Rorschach's claim that it's a mask killer, and here was one of the deviations that might leave fans up in arms: Dan says to Rorschach 'Watchmen are over.'

You may remember there was some controversy when that line, and a Rorschach line about one of the Watchmen being killed turned up in the trailer. The Rorschach line is not delivered in the film the way it is in the trailer - ie, there's no mention of 'Watchmen' - but Dan's line is. Later in the Q&A Haley called the second, brief superhero team The Crimebusters, which leads me to believe means that 'Watchmen' is a phrase used in the film in place of superheroes or alternatively with vigilantes.

As Rorschach walks down the subway tunnel beneath Dan's house, Dan asks him whatever happened to the old days. "You quit," Rorschach responds. Dan sits before the display case of costumes and looks at the Comedian's blood-stained smiley face pin.


Check out the whole article at the source link below.

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da2213viking
da2213viking - 12/17/2008, 12:51 AM
is it really possible? can it be that good? i hope so all these details got me even more anxious.
XMaliciousMal
XMaliciousMal - 12/17/2008, 12:52 AM
You know, honestly, I'm not at all upset about the "Watchmen vs. Minutemen" thing. I think it was easy for them to explain with great amounts of exposition within a book, but I think that when making the movie it takes a simple step to make things easier to understand and leave people who haven't read the novel less confused.

Come to think of it, I'm glad that they made the change. It's much, much more important to me that they keep the basic dialogue and flow of the movie intact (as it appears they have)than that they make a change that makes a helluva lot of sense to me.
FrankGarret
FrankGarret - 12/17/2008, 4:53 AM
I thought it started with Ed Blake's murder.

If true, I guess that's good. But anyway, it's not what the word 'Watchmen' refers to in the context of the movie that keeps from going ga-ga for this.
DeadWebHead
DeadWebHead - 12/17/2008, 5:18 AM
@ FrankGarret: Ed Blake = The Comedian

I can definitely get over them actually using the word Watchmen. No biggie. The rest just seems to go along with the book so well. I expect this to be one of the truest adaptations to date.
MarkCassidy
MarkCassidy - 12/17/2008, 8:08 AM
yeah frankgarret i heard that was the footage shown too..it starts with a fight between veidt and comedian culminating in his swan dive from the window..
BubbaDude
BubbaDude - 12/17/2008, 9:57 AM
Test Screening...all this is subject to change!

There's still plenty of time between now and the premier to show a few different opening sequences so they can judge audience approval.
MarkCassidy
MarkCassidy - 12/17/2008, 10:07 AM
no i went on to chud, this takes place after the opening credits which take place after the comedian splats!
IonParallax
IonParallax - 12/17/2008, 11:40 AM
As I stated yesterday, i'm not commenting any longer on The Watchmen. BUT, I will say, why the heck isn't anyone voting for the fansites? I just voted, and i'm the ONLY ONE who has thus far. What's up with that?
CrookedJaw
CrookedJaw - 12/17/2008, 11:49 AM
see! I had full faith in this movie, and bam! this beginning is just like the books! This movie seems like it's going to be awesome, freakin awesome!
CrookedJaw
CrookedJaw - 12/17/2008, 11:54 AM
and about the whole, watchmen vs. crimebusters thing...that's not such a huge difference to ruin the whole thing, and like it said above, maybe it's a word used to describe vigilantes and such
deanlegend
deanlegend - 12/17/2008, 2:46 PM
who gives a fu@# the film looks cool so lets watch it then say our opinion lets not be too anal about this
IonParallax
IonParallax - 12/17/2008, 3:09 PM
Unless you have no clue about Watchmen, is this really a "spoiler" per se? I mean, it seems rather authentic to the source material, so we all have seen this and are aware of it. For the most part, right?
IonParallax
IonParallax - 12/17/2008, 4:18 PM
VOTE: BOOK OF OA!
TheColonel
TheColonel - 12/17/2008, 8:00 PM
If Kevin Smith says they pulled off. Thats good enough for me.
IonParallax
IonParallax - 12/18/2008, 9:48 AM
Good point Colonel, that's definitely a trustworthy source, at least in my eyes. Kevin Smith rocks.
NoobMike
NoobMike - 12/19/2008, 10:06 AM
That's just 22 minutes still has 2 whole hours to mess it up. still waiting for my squid.
blacksword7
blacksword7 - 12/21/2008, 10:39 AM
omfg will everybody stop whining their asses off about the damn phalymapod! (that's what gibbons said the squid was called) anyway's, i read david hayter's script, ya know, it was the one that alan moore said was as close as anybody could get to a watchmen movie. well from what we've seen of the footage, from the actual movie, it is exactly the same as hayter's. i read earlier that alex tse is not the only person to write the script for this movie, hayter is actually being credited as co-writer, so the "tse" script and the old school "Hayter" script are pretty much the same. and guess what! just like in the movie, the old script that alan moore himself didn't totally hate, NEVER HAD A SQUID!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ozzymandias used some kind of machine to beam a kind of energy beam at the city and everybody dies in a flash similar to the one that killed jon osterman. if alan moore didnt say anything bad about that ending, then you fans who think you are being all loyal and stuff just need to chill. just because alan moore hates hollywood , doesnt mean you guys need to be followers. if he said he loved the film industry, you all would be in total support of this movie. Alan Moore has never been quoted as saying that the Squid is the only way to go. For all you know, he would rather the movie have a different ending so as not to step on the toes of his comic book creature creation.
NoobMike
NoobMike - 12/21/2008, 3:32 PM
I have said many times, the problem I see with the squidless ending. For starters if the comedian finds just scientists building a machine in the island he wouldn't be broken, but if you want to see the problem I have with no squid, check the watchmen movie previous posts, you'll find out all the problems I see to it. I will still see it, with a lot of reserve and I'll let you all know what I think.

Now, I don't care who gave their thumbs up for the movie. The story has to be coherent, I know that it's an adaptation and some things need to be changed, but if it isn't coherent I'll whine my ass off. The other problem I have is with Snyder's inexperience, and the fact that he claims he is being faithful to the original (showing how he adapted the same panels as movie frames into his work) but changes the ending, just say I'm adapting it, my way, if you don't like it [frick] off.
Mankind
Mankind - 12/24/2008, 1:21 PM
noobmikedooshe... your a sook watchmen rule stop being a B@^#H
NoobMike
NoobMike - 12/29/2008, 2:50 PM
I know Watchmen rule, that's why I don't want the movie to suck. Although as it stands right now, guess we'll never see the movie.
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