‘Watchmen: Chapter 1’ Director Brandon Vietti Unmasks the Animated Antiheroes

Today is a big big day for Watchmen fans as the new animated special based on the celebrated book by writer Alan Moore, artist Dave Gibbons and colorist John Higgins, arrives on digital platforms (before it hits Blu-ray and 4K on August 27). The Warner Bros. Discovery Home Ent. title is directed and produced by animation industry veteran Brandon Vietti (Superman: Doomsday, Batman: Death in the Family, Young Justice series) and produced by James Krieg and Cindy Rago. Larry Gordon, Lloyd Levin and Sam Register are executive producers.

The voice cast includes Matthew Ryhs as Dan Dreiberg (Nite Owl), Katee Sackhoff as Laurie Juspeczyk (Silk Spectre), Titus Welliver as Walter Kovacs (Rorschach) and Michael Cerveris as Jonathan Osterman (Doctor Manhattan). Troy Baker, Adrienne Barbeau, Corey Burton, Jeffrey Combs, Kelly Hu and Phil LaMarr round up the rest of the cast.

Watchmen tells an alternate timeline in which superheroes arose in the 1940s and ’60s, changing history in crucial ways. The stories center on a group of retired superpowered vigilantes are pulled into the investigation of the murder of a government-sponsored superhero — laced throughout with Moore’s political commentary and explorations of moral quandaries. The title spawned a prequel comics series (Before Watchmen), sequel comics series (Doomsday Clock) and television series sequel on HBO, as well as the live-action 2009 movie directed by Zack Snyder.

We had the great chance to speak with Vietti today about this faithful multi-part adaptation. (Chapter 1 drops today, Chapter 2 is expected to be arrive next year.) Here is what he told us:

Animation Magazine: Congrats on your latest project. Can you tell us how you got involved with this new Watchmen adaptation?

Brandon Vietti: A couple of years ago, my bosses at Warner Bros. Animation, Sam Register at Peter Girardi, introduced the idea of adapting Watchmen in the most faithful way possible to the original comic. The challenge set was, how we could adapt the book to animation, but really capture the comic-book experience? Moving the source material into the animation medium really excited me because there are so many unique things about how the Watchmen story is told in the comic book, things that don’t translate to film. We had to find out what the heart of the material was and find a way to save that for animation.

Can you talk a bit about the choice of the style of the project, which looks like cel-shaded CG-animation?

As we set out to adapt the book, there was just no question that we were going to do our best to adapt Dave Gibbons’ style into animation: His style is known for a lot of hatch lines on it, and that was something that we didn’t wanted to strip away, but that’s what you do in 2D. Generally you’re subtracting lines, you’re not adding them. So, the challenge was, how can we keep those lines?

We did explore 2D originally, and we tried some in-house testing with those “Gibbons lines,” as we called them. We also talked to some 2D animation studios, but ultimately we came to the conclusion that doing it in a 2D medium would just not work out well for us. We felt it would be much too difficult within our time constraints to do beautiful smooth animation on all of those amazing Gibbons lines. 3D animation became the best option to create texture maps of those lines and keep even the texture of the comic-book page as Dave would pull those lines. We wanted the ragged edge to those inclines, and that that’s something that’s difficult to capture in 2D; but in 3D we can map those textures onto 3D figures and preserve those comic-book textures that we wanted to preserve in the experience.

Which studio produced the animation?

It was Studio Mir [in Seoul, S. Korea]. We had worked with them before in 2D, They helped us with Young Justice, a series I wrote and produced with my co-producer, Greg Weissman. We were very familiar with them and really trust them as they have some amazing artists. We felt very lucky that they were on board. It was a kind of material and filmmaking that I don’t think the studio had approached before, but we had a lot of great discussions about it and they really rose to the challenge.

How is Watchmen different from the other comic-book and superhero material you have worked on throughout your career?

Watchmen is known to be quite subversive to the whole comic-book medium. Back when it came out, comic books had very traditional stories with conventional heroes and villains, but Watchmen introduced a lot more complexities and shades of grey to the characters and to their world. That’ what was so incredibly appealing to me: all those intricacies of character feel much more grounded and realistic. Watchmen brought a level of reality to comic books that people maybe hadn’t seen before, and perhaps didn’t realize the medium was capable of achieving. I think sometimes people look at animation in the same way, so I was excited to be able to help adapt it into. We really hope that this story and the performances from our wonderful voice cast, and the great animation by Studio Mir would introduce a level of reality that that people may not be accustomed to in in animation.

What makes the project stand out is our adherence to the Dave Gibbons world and how we all had to raise our game in filmmaking to capture that sense of realism through the animation and the performances. We had to include shots that capture the comic-book panels and at other times, we had to use the camera and the lighting and the focal length of the lens to make the world feel real.

Any favorite characters?

I really loved Laurie Juspeczy [Silk Spectre II], especially her arc through both chapters and through the course of the original 12 issues. She has a rollercoaster ride of emotions and she has a lot of layers and complexity. I just loved digging into that. We had a great time with Katee Sackhoff finding all of the nuances to bring Laurie to life, and I hope she becomes a standout character for people watching the movie

Did you always plan to do the whole book in two chapters?

It was the best solution to the problem of adapting 12 comic book issues. Finding a good midpoint was difficult, and I think nobody thought we could jam this into one single movie. Two parts just felt right. Yes, it was unfortunate that we had to cut some things, but I think it really tightened things up. It moves pretty briskly, and I hope I don’t think we lost too much of the core of what makes Watchmen.

What is your take on the state of the animation the adult animation industry now?

I’ve heard a lot of people say that it’s sort of rising there’s more and more interest in in adults’ animation. I like to think of what we made as “mature animation.” I know the adult animation term is also applied to a lot of the comedies out there, and obviously, that’s not what we made here. There is a sort of maturity about the content, and I hope that you Watchmen and other great animated shows that offer these mature storylines will start to rise more in popularity as we progress. I think it’s something that’s been missing for a lot of years. I’m happy to see more of it emerging and hope to be a part of that because it’s what I love to do most in animation.

Watchmen: Chapter 1 is now available to purchase on Digital platforms. The movie will arrive on Blu-ray and 4K on August 27.