HBO could rope Damon Lindelof into 'Watchmen' TV series and save us all

Who watches the Watchmen? No one since 2009, but that might change soon as the heroic comic makes its way to television. HBO has reportedly enlisted Damon Lindelof to helm the project, which will move forward without comic creator Alan Moore.

Lindelof himself is a Watchmen fan, but his vision will likely differ from Zack Snyder's 2009 film version. As a self-proclaimed nerd, Lindelof's projects include Prometheus, Cowboys & Aliens, Tomorrowland, and Star Trek, as well as HBO's critical darling The Leftovers, which finished its three-season run.

Watchmen is over 30 years old now but keeps popping up for screen adaptation in an era saturated with comic book media. More and more books and comics are being packaged for television these days, as opposed to film, so a second crack at Watchmen might be exactly what the story needs to make the leap from page to screen.

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

It also helps that Watchmen is a dark, grim comic (set during the Cold War, natch). When the 2009 film premiered, the only remotely plausible comparison was DC juggernaut The Dark Knight (the films released within several months of each other, so Watchmen was unable to take note of Christopher Nolan's tour de force).

Now we have a whole universe of dark Marvel series on Netflix, and HBO's current claim to fame has made a business of darkness and death.