Oh Snyder…Tsk Tsk

In preparation for a project, I re-watched Watchmen this weekend. Let me get this out of the way – I’ve never been a fan of Zach Snyder. I haven’t seen every film that he’s directed, limiting to myself to his disappointing comic book adaptations instead. I’ll make the argument that 300 was probably his best comic book adaptation because that was the only instance where the source material actually benefited from Snyder’s muted colors and penchant for sporadic slow motion and extended fight scenes. Should there be any more narrative involved with the film, Snyder becomes utterly lost in his own artistic tendencies, producing a film that may entertain during certain sequences but one that is easily forgotten as soon as the film is over.

Snyder’s allergy to good story is probably best exemplified by Sucker Punch, a film he both directed and wrote. The film is filled with characters that suddenly get incredibly strong and gain Superman-like powers with little to no explanation. It also follows a boring structure where the characters have to get three different items after having their quest literally explained to them by a character that exists solely for exposition. What are their names? I don’t know and I don’t really care. Never before have I been too lazy to even provide a plot summary, but this film has broken my back.

So this was the film that proceeded Snyder’s adaptation of Watchmen. Which contextualizes, somewhat, why the studio would let him create his own project from scratch. I remember when the first trailer for Watchmen came out and one of the title cards read, “From the Visionary Director of 300.” I was cynical even at that point. Visionary? Really? You know what, fine, I’ll give it to him, at least 300 looked nice. At the time, I hadn’t read Watchmen yet and I didn’t even know about Alan Moore either. However, during the time the film was announced, my high school was ripe with anticipation because our very own drama teacher played Nixon in the film. It was a minor role (and honestly, looking back, I cannot say that he was the best Nixon I’d ever seen) but still, it was exciting. So in response to all the energy at my school, I finally read the “greatest graphic novel of all time.” After I’d read it, I could finally remove the quotations – it truly was a work of genius.

Now the problem with adapting something like Watchmen is just that – it cannot be adapted. The way in which the graphic novel is genius is its ability to utilize the medium in ways that only this particular medium can be used: the nine-panel grid repeats certain character positions in order to mirror how Dr. Manhattan exists in a fluid time; the chapter title pages all feature a clock that slowly clicks towards midnight; the image of the blood stain on the smiley face is repeated over and over again; we never quite see the entirety of the slogan, “Who watches the Watchmen?” and so on.

At the very core, film and graphic novels are astronomically different because the means in which they juxtapose images is entirely different – graphic novels use space while film uses time. All those techniques mentioned above are examples of a precise use of spacial juxtaposition: from panel to panel, page to page, or chapter to chapter. The fundamental natures of these two mediums are different! So why does Snyder think the graphic novel is a ready-made storyboard for his film? This is not only a failure to understand the graphic novel, but it’s also a failure to understand film.

It doesn’t quite surprise me that Snyder’s latest comic book movie was regarded with much disdain. Dull colors, mass destruction, a lack of story, it’s the same flaws over and over again, yet studios keep entrusting him with comic book adaptations – it’s about as mind numbingly nonsensical as Snyder’s understanding of adaptations in the first place. I haven’t seen Batman v. Superman and something tells me I never will. I know this post reads like a grilling of Snyder…well that’s because it is.

But to be fair, I don’t think anyone can do justice to a graphic novel like Watchmen, so long as we consider the film as an adaptation. The day a good “Watchmen” film is made will be when a director is able to pluck the very themes and motifs of the graphic novel, while restructuring and rewriting a large portion of the source material in order to accommodate a new medium. In other words, the best adaptation won’t be an adaptation at all.