DVD Review: Watchmen: TALES OF THE BLACK FREIGHTER Animated movie
Jimbo here to share my thoughts on Tales of the Black Freighter, the Watchmen companion cartoon. The main question people will most likely have is: "Did it stay true to the written work?" The answer is yes and no. It didn't stay entirely true to the comic that was The Tales of the Black Freighter found in the Watchmen graphic novel. But not to a fault. First off, fans of the book will notice that instead of a nostalgic comic print look, the animators chose a more contemporary anime look. It's different but it works. Some scenes look beautiful, the blood and gore are intense (good thing), and the emotion is there in the faces as well as the well done voice acting.
As far as the basic plot, the movie stays true to the comic. It really is an awesome story with a killer ending so this is a very good thing. The narration is mostly taken from the novel but actually only uses about half of the written material. There are minor adjustments and actually some nice additions (such as the Rorschach test in blood on the sail which seems so obviously cool but was not in the book...).
But seriously now folks, remember, this thing comes in at just over 25 min. so it's by no means epic. It comes packaged on the DVD with the mockumentary, "Under the Hood," which just seemed too boring to even sit through but may have been decent. But, Snyder may have blown the sales of this thing by announcing his "Ultimate Edition" Watchmen DVD with ALL of this stuff plus deleted scenes from the movie etc. that he will be releasing in the fall. I don't know about you but I'm just going to wait for that. Even if it costs $35 bucks it's still a better deal than two $20 DVD's (the actual Watchmen movie + Tales of the Black Freighter/Under the Hood).
Overall, this thing was fun to watch. As a fan of both the Watchmen movie and comic book, and animation in general, I was satisfied with The Black Freighter and it will be awesome to see the two meshed together in the director's cut release.