I know, I know -- we're on Watchmen overload this week, and the last thing you probably want to do is read anything else about the film. But I can't resist. You see, I finally discovered the reason Watchmen should never have been filmed, and left on bookshelves to be discovered by generations upon generations of readers ... the film reviews.

Or specifically, the really idiotic reviews. Like Anthony Lane's piece in The New Yorker, which has had fandom all riled up since yesterday. I think Lane has been waiting a long time for this moment, sharpening his knife in slow, delicious pleasure in order to plunge it into the heart of geekdom. Lane is proud of the fact that he didn't get it; in fact he relishes it. He "never quite worked out" whether the costumed heroes had superpowers or not, and he's puzzled as to why the film is serious when it's based on a comic book. " "Incoherent, overblown, and grimy with misogyny, Watchmen marks the final demolition of the comic strip, and it leaves you wondering: where did the comedy go?"

So what the book was one of Time Magazine's 100 Best Novels? Poo to that! It's a geek thing, worse because it's a smart geek thing, and only the most pathetic of individuals could enjoy it: "Watchmen, like V for Vendetta, harbors ambitions of political satire, and, to be fair, it should meet the needs of any leering nineteen-year-old who believes that America is ruled by the military-industrial complex, and whose deepest fear-deeper even than that of meeting a woman who requests intelligent conversation-is that the Warren Commission may have been right all along."

I'm not sure which is more amusing -- the thought of The Village Voice, Rolling Stone, and Time Magazine* being staffed entirely by anxious virgins or that implication Mr. Lane would like us to know he doesn't fear women of intelligence.

Here's your Christmas present from Warner Bros -- the Watchmen footage from ComicCon that we raved about for so long. Since then, much of it was incorporated into the second trailer, but not as stylishly as it was presented here. (Everything is stylish when accompanied by Philip Glass' Koyaanisquatsi score, though.) But now you can finally see the Dan Dreiberg footage I raved about -- I love, love, love the shot of him pictured above ... almost as much as I love the sadistic gleam in the eye of the Comedian as he looks at Sally Jupiter. This footage is full of those little moments, and it's really a bit eerie to see every panel recreated so well. Only three and a half more months, people. Three and a half more months!

The footage is available as a free download on iTunes -- but Cinematical readers won't have to go through that much trouble, as I've embedded it below. Now our international readers won't be left out in the cold. Watch, geek out, and go buy a copy of the graphic novel for everyone on your Christmas list.

It's the 6th of December, and that means a new Watchmen video diary. This is video #9, which actually freaks me out a little bit, because it seems like yesterday that I was posting the first one. Official trailers, posters, ComicCon panels were miles on the horizon, to say nothing of the film itself. Now, we only have three more to go before the movie will be in theaters. It's going to be over before you know it. You will wake up tomorrow and it'll be March 6th, and you will either have seen it at a midnight showing, or be anxiously waiting your turn.

Anyway, enough about the passage of time -- the 9th journal is online at Omelete, and you can access it by clicking on the link or the photo above. (If either stop working, you're going to have to practice your Portuguese to find it -- it's the little button labeled Videoblog Dir. De Arte.) This one is all about the Easter Eggs buried within the film, little visual nods and set embellishments that will make the graphic novel come to life. It feels a little like we've heard and seen it before, but much of the footage is new, like the close-up of the newsstand above. The surface detail continues to leave me stunned -- and yet, I am horrified Laurie must wear that hideous red smock outfit from the book. If anything was begging to be changed, it was that! Watch, enjoy, and comment.