Who Watches the Watchmen?

I’ve writtenbefore about the moral and political relevance of vigilante/superhero fiction, and the best graphic novel dealing with that subject, Watchmen, by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, has been filmed, for release next spring. The first trailer came out last night, and while I have been leery of this project for fear of them screwing it up, I have to say the trailer looks great. Pretty much every second of the trailer is right from the book, and I’ve read that the book pretty much is the storyboard. Seems like the “feel” of the film will be pretty faithful. The director seems to have appropriate respect for the source material and a good sense of detail. They’re doing it as a period piece, and I’ve read that they are not messing with the ending. He did a great job with 300, which is further cause for (guarded) optimism. Of course there are still dozens of ways they could make it suck, but the trailer is a very promising look at what might actually be ok.