I haven’t watch Witch Mountain yet, but couldn’t it be just a good family movie? I mean the way you say it makes it look like the movie is a big Disney turd.

There’s also notoriety. Watchmen isn’t a household name like Batman or Spiderman so I think its attracting audiences the way Sin City did. A movie based on a comic that probably few outside of fandom ever heard about. But people still went to see it because it looked cool and it looked like a dark movie with some action. These aren’t the types of movies that are going to break all-time box office records but they’ll do moderately well. Turning a profit, especially in this economy, is the desired result. They’ve done it.

Lastly, it could be the economy too. I dunno about other folks but I stick to Netflix these days and avoid theaters. It’s just so expensive. So unless you’re dying to see this movie, and you probably saw it last weekend, chances are you’ll save your $20 for groceries or something important. We’re at record levels of unemployment. Watchmen is just not a priority. And if you do go to the movies in these dire times, you want to go with your family and make a day of it. So you go see Race to Witch Mountain.

Watchmen is holding steady at #2 and I suspect it’ll keep in the top 10 for a few more weeks. It’s money making potential is not over yet and so comic book movies will live on.

No one knows (and, by extension, no one cares) about books like Watchmen outside of our little community, and that’s why it didn’t make as much money as people — particularly those within our community — were expecting.

The Dark Knight and Iron Man did just fine. Those were names people knew, in movies done well, featuring big-name actors, targetted at a wider demographic. ( No, you shouldn’t take your little kids to see either of them, but there was nothing in either that I’d have trouble letting at tween or teenage kid see. )

Yes.

“… a plot mainstream audience won’t/can’t understand … ?

They can understand it. They just don’t care to try. It was groundbreaking 20+ years ago. Now it’s just ‘meh.’

… the graphic violence … ?

Graphic violence doesn’t disturb most people. This takes graphic violence and steps it up a notch for no apparent reason. That’s what people don’t care to see.

… or does this mark a significant decline in interterest in comic book movies?

No, it just marks a decline in interest in this comic book movie. Let’s be honest, no one cares about Watchmen. Half of the comic-loving community doesn’t care about Watchmen. Is it an important, groundbreaking work? Sure. It was. But, that was 20+ years ago.

No one saw Hellboy II either. But, the next [insert Spider-Man, Batman, Iron Man, or Superman] film that comes out will, once again, be a huge blockbuster.

It’s like I said a week ago: Snyder effectively took a niche demographic (comic book fans), disected it into a smaller segment (those who cared about Watchmen to begin with, which is a small number despite Moore’s ego telling us otherwise), and culled the numbers of people that could see the movie (only those over 18 due to the R-rating) by ratcheting the violence up to a point where, as the New Yorker reviewed, only those over 18 could watch and only those under 25 would want to.

R-rated movies just simply don’t make as much money as movies that are more family friendly. It’s a fact. You make money by making movies that people can take thier kids to, or can go see with thier teenagers. This movie is, quite clearly, neither.

Had Snyder opted to tone things down, even just slightly, from where the comic book’s original levels of sex and violence were, he could’ve gotten a PG-13 and made, easily, twice as much money.

He didn’t. So, he got beat out by a lame Disney movie (it ain’t like ‘Race to Witch Mountain’ is Bolt or … well, anything from Pixar). Hopefully, people producing these movies will take note.