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Damon Lindelof Says HBO’s Watchmen TV Show Won’t Be A Direct Adaptation

During a recent interview, Damon Lindelof disclosed that HBO's upcoming Watchmen TV series will likely not be a direct adaption.

Ever since it was announced that Lost creator Damon Lindelof would oversee an adaptation of Alan Moore’s beloved DC comic Watchmen into an HBO series, updates have been few and far between.

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Last we heard, the Lindelof project was supposed to start filming its pilot episode in March of this year but has heretofore abandoned that plan. While it’s still scheduled to begin production sometime in 2018, the fandom is eager for a much-needed briefing. Thankfully, Lindelof heeded enthusiasts’ clamoring, obliging their thirst for details in a recent sit-down on Bookish with Sonya Walger.

The architect behind one of TV’s most original and daring shows in recent history – The Leftovers – disclosed to the titular host that his project might not be a direct adaptation of the Watchmen comic, likening his take on Moore’s deconstructed parody of superhero-dom to Noah Hawley’s Fargo.

“[Adapting] may be the right word, at the end of the day. I wouldn’t call Noah Hawley’s version of Fargo an adaptation, because the movie exists inside of his world, and so everything that happened in the movie Fargo, it does precede the television show Fargo. So, you know, they find a bag of money in the first season of Fargo, and you’re like, ‘Oh, that came from the movie.’ But it’s also, Noah is pulling from other areas of the Coen brothers’ canon, so it evokes like Lebowski and it’s also his own thing.”

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During the interview, Damon Lindelof also acknowledged Moore’s forthright aversion to translating Watchmen to the small screen, going so far as to say that the comic book writer’s antipathy to the idea is one of the main reasons why the show won’t be a direct adaptation.

“I think it’s widely known that Alan Moore does not want Watchmen to be adapted, so I’m playing a bit of a game of semantics here in saying, ‘I’m not adapting Watchmen!’”

To date, HBO has only committed to a pilot episode of Lindelof’s budding reboot, but considering his impressive résume, we wouldn’t be too surprised if (when?) the Powers That Be order his Watchmen to series. Because in a realm dominated by The CW’s Arrowverse – not to mention Marvel’s Netflix lineup – a competent, adult-oriented superhero series is long overdue. Don’t you think?