Of Nathan and Watchmen

I have a DVD-R of interviews of Nathan Fillion when he was promoting Waitress and Desperate Housewives. He looks so different back then, trying to get the non-Whedonistas to see how cool he is. He made progress, of course, and Dr. Horrible also helped.

Well, it looks like he finally has. Since he is now in an ABC mid-season show called Castle, he has the power of a network behind him. He's is actually touring, from Jimmy Kimmel Live to The View. I skipped his appearance on Good Morning America because I am usually asleep by then. His appearance on Kimmel on March 4 was the better one. I had some doubts about his haircut, and the velour jacket, but he was a hit otherwise. They talked about how he's become a big Comic-Con hit, and how people were dressing like him. He was also concerned when they look better than him, but I have never seen that happen. He was also surprised someone brought him a homemade Capt. Hammer doll. On The View, they totally ignored Firefly/Serenity, and talked about when he was on One Life To Life and that show about Housewives. They did have a clip from Dr. H, and actually gave copies of the DVD out to the crowd. That's fairly impressive, and I hope some are sent to Emmy voters who better give this DVD the honor it deserves....somehow.

Naturally, I will be doing recaps of Castle starting next week, but they won't be as detailed as my recaps for Dollhouse. I just wonder if Castle will really be any good, especially if they plan to keep the female cop he follows as bitter as possible. If we find out, however, that she's convinced he NYPD hates her because she doesn't play ball (despite the fact she gets results anyway), that is a good reason. It's like my concern on how Dollhouse makes Paul Ballard look even dumber than Barney Fife. It's only going to get worse for him after he meets Echo (trust me), and I would hope he eventually finds someone who does believe him...and who isn't an Active. Then again, that may happen well after Laurence Dominic tries to oust DeWitt as head of Dollhouse so he can get rid of Echo and kill Ballard for his peace of mind.

Meanwhile, I got some good news about seeing Watchmen in Imax. As you know, I was lucky enough to get a ticket to a midnight screening at Wondercon, then got turned away because I was part of the evil press. Well, the movie will be at my local Imax theater in downtown Sacramento in a month. Since I have 15 bucks in gift certificates lying around, I will be using them. So, it works out.

As far as reaction goes, the movie has narrowly earned "fresh" status at Rotten Tomatoes, which is the same as a passing grade. The fans seem to be split over whether the movie should be made at all. What's also interesting is that they have different reasons: the casting, Dr. Manhattan's anatomy, changing the ending, what's in and what's out, being too faithful to the series, and whether it has any significance to now. I just know about the first issue, and plot lines I have read from other articles. Now, we are not expecting this to be Dark Knight to the 5th power, or even more fun than Iron Man. Watchmen is what it is, and maybe it should have been split in half, as they plan to do with the movie version of the last Harry Potter book. The fact is, Hollywood wanted more comic book movies, and took on the ultimate comic book series. No matter what, and this also goes to the Twilight movie series, they will get our money. There is enough of an audience who want to see Watchmen on the screen, and they will be coming. If sales are consistent, or there is repeat business, then Watchmen is a success, whether people thought it was unfilmable or not. If it experiences a big fat drop in sales in its second week, like Twilight did, then we'll be getting some "told-ya-so" chanting. There will also be others who think the real version won't be available until the director's cut DVD...which is coming either in the fall or Comic-Con (guess which date makes more sense). No matter what, I will be seeing this in Imax next month.