Let us close out the week with a third Watchmen story, shall we? Dave Gibbons, the artist behind the iconic book, gave an excellent interview to Den of Geek. Of course, the first questions directed at him centered on the upcoming movie -- and while he's not officially involved, Gibbons visited the set and blogged about it in December. He has been unfailingly supportive of the film and all involved; the guy even created the first promo poster handed out at 2007's ComicCon.

He was a little more guarded during this interview, but still admired what he had seen of the filming: "The most important thing is that the Watchmen movie be a good movie. From what I've seen of it, I think it is going to be a good movie, and I think it's going to be as faithful to the original graphic novel as is possible, given the constraints of a movie and the nature of a graphic novel. I think that as long as it's true to the spirit of the comic book, and as long as – in broad strokes - it follows the plot and the characterisations ... I don't think you can ask for every individual detail to be replicated. There are hardcore fans out there who'll be satisfied with nothing less than a word-for-word, line-for-line, scene-for-scene recreation of the comic book. I didn't believe that was ever going to happen. Certainly, from what I've seen of the movie, it looks like it'll be a good movie and very faithful to the comic book. If it isn't, it won't be for want of trying. Everybody's using the graphic novel as their bible, and really doing their best to pay tribute to it, I think. "

Watchmen was always going to be a big deal -- but it actually just got bigger. I was among the fans just counting themselves lucky to get the Black Freighter (and to see Gerard Butler involved in it after all), and it looks just about everything from the graphic novel will make it on screen after all, in one way or another.

The New York Times reported today that in an effort to revive their flagging DVD sales, Warner Bros will be releasing a DVD on 03/10/09 (that's five days after Watchmen hits theatres) that will include Tales of the Black Freighter, and Under the Hood. The latter is, of course, Hollis Mason's tell-all about his life as the Nite Owl.

At some point in the future, Warner Bros plans to release an "ultimate edition" of the film that will splice Tales and Hood in, which means you will have one heck of a marathon. Says Zack Snyder himself, "The überfans of this property are going to go crazy for that."

You can -- or at least you will. Two action figures from the upcoming Watchmen movie have debuted over at Entertainment Weekly. This is sure to fuel the "Zack Snyder is screwing it up!" flames because there's no paunch on Nite Owl. He's boasting a lean and muscular frame, and a very shiny costume. However, I am willing to take a wait and see approach -- maybe this is a very young and fit Nite Owl, a figure from his glory days. Hmm. They did successfully sculpt Patrick Wilson's jaw, though.

Two additional figures are going to be unveiled at the New York ComicCon on April 18th -- I'm betting Oxymandias (especially since he had his own line of action figures in the book) and the Comedian, but the temptation for a near-nude Laurie may prove more tempting to sculpt. They don't go on sale until January 2009, but they will market for the very reasonable price of $14.99. I'm going to hold out for the Black Freighter playset -- I just hope it comes complete with sharks.

Watchmen will be released on March 6th, 2009.

Zack Snyder has released the first video journal for Watchmen, and it's airing exclusively over on ComingSoon.net. There are eleven more to come, each to be released on the 6th of each month, every glimpse bringing us that much closer to awesomeness or total despair.

Journal #1 is all about the set construction and we get glimpses of everything from Doc Manhattan's lab to The Comedian's apartment. I'm honestly blown away by the level of detail they have achieved here. I think everyone was expecting Snyder to fill in with blue screen, as he did before, but everything has been constructed from scratch which fills my heart with joy. The CGI of Hot Gates may have been a grand sight, but there's just no replacing good old fashioned movie making. (I'm going to echo a friend of mine and say what a smart choice it was to hire Alex McDowell!)