Watchmen B 800X600
Living in an urban area as does The Beat, it’s been impossible to miss the WATCHMEN posters and neon signs and promotions popping up EVERYWHERE. We went to the theater last night and got our popcorn delivered in bags adorned with Rorschach — never thought we’d live to see THAT one. The previews included an extended time filler featuring Gerard Way and Zack Snyder talking about how much they love the Watchmen. DC has a mini-site of Watchmen-related desktops and so on.

As all this unfolds, it struck us that it’s kinda cool to see the original yellow Watchmen logo everywhere — it may be 20 years old, but it still pops. Who designed the logo? We asked around, and it was Dave Gibbons, bless his heart — who also had a hand in the original trade dress of the series and collection, aided and abetted by Richard Bruning. (Bruning, now DC’s SVP – Creative Director, was one of the pioneers of applying design principles to genre comics.) The original logo was tweaked for current repro by DC’s current VP of Design, Georg Brewer, and picked up by the studio intact. Proof that good design is good design and stands the test of time.

Plus, you know, it probably would have been a dumbass move on WB’s part to change it, since the recognition is so high.

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1 COMMENT

  1. Here’s a Watchmen-is-everywhere NYC moment. Yesterday I was walking on 14th to the Apple Store. A young couple is walking right behind me. A bus stop Watchmen poster sparked the following exchange between them:

    Boy: We’ll definitely go see Watchmen.

    Girl: We could go ice skating.

    Boy: (Prolonged silence) Uhhhhhhhhhhh, yeah.

  2. Watching the Daytona 500 on Sunday they cut from the race on FOX to show the extended preview and at various times the crawl showing the position of the drivers was “sponsored by Watchmen” with the classic logo in the upper right hand corner for extended periods.

    Part of me was feeling the geek pride. The other part was thinking there’s gonna be some Bubbas out there who are not going to know what to think when they check it out at the multiplex.

  3. Did you notice though, that on the movie posters with the individual characters on them, the Watchmen logo starts on the top and reads downward, while the original started at the bottom and reads to the top. I like the original better.

  4. The thing I’m really starting to wonder about, a question that someone else posed to me, is if the movie studio didn’t change the basic outcome of the ending, will mainstream audiences (and critics) accept or react extremely negatively to an ending where
    SPOILER
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    a violent attack on NYC (pre-9/11 at that) results successfully in world peace?

  5. I was in Borders yesterday and was just dumbfounded by that “cast photo” book.

    Sure, it was neat to see the main characters, but pages and pages of artsy b/w photos of extras?

  6. Such an iconic logo (and trade dress) — I love the chunky sans serif and the clock almost unnoticed at the bottom. Definitely one of DC’s best creative moments of the ’80s. And PJ’s right on with the shout-out to Todd Klein’s article — it shows just how much insight and thought went into its development. Bravo Mr. Gibbons.