"Christ almighty, it's the goddamned Watchmen!"

Terrorists are going to blow up Lady Liberty's brains! If you found Zack Snyder's fisticuffs take on Watchmen a trifle galling, wait until you read Sam Hamm's 1988 draft. Yikes! Highlights include a bungled terror take-down leading to the superhero cock-block, Rorschach literally being a quipping Connery-mold action hero, and Veidt's masterwork becoming a spot of time tunneling. Burton Batman scripter Hamm was briefly on-project when Fox were flirting with bank-rolling the film. Joel Silver was producing, with Ahnoldt Schwarzenegger in mind for nuclear physicist Dr Manhattan - no word if he was to be dubbed for the sake of understanding anything that was coming out of his mouth, a' la Hercules in New York. All this was pre-Terry Gilliam, who immediately tossed Hamm's script out the window when he signed on. Hamm's script is quite the cultural artefact - Watchmen viewed through an 80s action prism. All snarky declarations, and postured threats. "They'd better!"

For dessert, here's a brief discourse on the changes Warners asked Snyder to make. Warner Brothers are not in the business of depth! It's a miracle anything even remotely good gets made isn't it?