Not even in the face of Armageddon.

Watchmen - 6.5/10. The highest compliment I can give Zack Snyder is that he's made a movie worthy of being talked about. Not just because it's good or bad in equal measure, but because it's not easy to dismiss as bad and it's harder to qualify as good. It's become a watermark for adaptation and why and why bother and what can be changed and what can stay the same and whatever the fuck. So with all of that in mind, he does fuck up. He just doesn't fuck up everything. He continues to have a fundamental misunderstanding of how people behave but, the source material being what it is, just touching on it is all that really needs to happen in order for me to dribble in my pants and occasionally - occasionally - when Snyder isn't jerking himself off through the camera lens or telling his actors 'no, no, say that stupider,' he pulls something great off. Rorschach screaming 'you're locked in here with me' is fantastic and heart-thumping and what's more, it's not dwelt on. That's Snyder's whole fucking problem. '300,' the source, is a story about casual violence. '300,' the movie, is about yelling a lot. Anything that's throw-away or peppered in become centerpieces. He makes highlight-reel movies, big signs and blinking lights pointing towards 'Are you watching this? This is a big moment. You should be watching this.' You take that Rorschach-in-prison moment and compare that to Rorschach's final failure to compromise and how it's dragged out and wringed of everything final until it's empty of all emotion, and Nite Owl wailing over the whole ordeal. Snyder knows how to make a movie, but he can't create a story. The dramatic pile-ups in 'Watchmen' don't have any sort of impact because they're not crafted. They just hang there, tied up over loose ends. The biggest insult I can throw at Zack Snyder is that he turns 'Watchmen' into what it's not supposed to be - a big comic book movie, with heroes and Saturday-morning supervillains (and, to his credit, an ending that actually makes more sense in the grand scheme). He forgets that 'Watchmen' is a human drama played out on a global scale with people who are not entirely us. He has made a movie with clearly defined bad guys - the distant planet and the smug, emotionless toad, and the good guys cry over each other's graves. I will not watch the movie again and come away relating to a new character each time, as I do with its source. The movie doesn't allow for that complexity. He's given us a shining example of what a pure adaptation looks like when it's put together by someone who doesn't entirely understand it. He's given us the 'cool moments' without giving it any sort of heart.

I will never write this much again.