With two new terrible films entering theaters this week — the Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in kids' action film Race to Witch Mountain and the superfluous Last House on the Left remake — Peter Travers recommends that if you haven't seen Watchmen yet, you should. If you've already seen it, you could watch another of Travers' favorite comic-book films, which is the topic of this week's At The Movies.

They're two different Batman films made by two directors in two decades, but both The Dark Knight and Tim Burton's first Batman film top Travers' list of favorite comic-book adaptations. Travers praises the Dark Knight's dark portrayal of the comic and Heath Ledger's Academy Award-winning role as the Joker, while the original Batman featured a stand-out performance by Michael Keaton, still the best ever to don the cape. Other films on Travers' must-see list: Spider-Man 2, Iron Man and the monochromatic Sin City, which featured the true comeback of actor Mickey Rourke.

For every great comic book movie, there's 10 bad ones, and Travers has selected five of the worst to place into his Scum Bucket.

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Welcome to ASK TRAVERS, a mail bog that lets me answer your movie questions, respond to insults that aren't gratuitous (OK, those too), and maybe even ask nosy questions of my own. Plus, if catch me screwing up on my movie facts, yell BUSTED!

Got a question? Just shoot me an e-mail at asktravers (at) rollingstone (dot) com.

From Alexander M:

Travers, you mention that Hollywood mangled Alan Moore's "V For Vendetta". Did you forget about the 3 1/2 star review you gave it upon release? What's the deal?

The deal is that it was Watchmen and V for Vendetta creator Moore who said Hollywood mangled his comic-book children. Not me. I'm ready to defend V for Vendetta to the death. Written by the Wachowski brothers and directed by their protege James McTeigue, V struck me as way more imaginative than the two Matrix sequels. Yes, it fiddled with Moore's prose. But I believe that a movie should never approach a book with limp-dick awe. It stifles creativity. That was part of the problem with Watchmen. It needed to break out more, find its own identity as pure cinema.

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Expectations were sky high for the Watchmen box-office weekend: $70 million at least. That's what 300, the last comic-book movie directed by Watchmen's Zack Snyder, gobbled up. But the Watchmen figure came in low at $56 million, counting the Thursday night showings and the $5.5 million from 124 IMAX screens. The studio suits blamed the R-rating and the nearly three-hour running time. They spun the figures. Watchmen was the biggest opening of the year! The sixth-highest debut on record for an R-rated film! Bragging about sixth place? A weak argument when you consider the that the saggy Matrix Reloaded took No. 1 for an R-rated movie with $92 million. And the defense won't rest. We're told that the Dark Knight opened at $158 million and Iron Man did $99 million because they were rated a more audience-friendly PG-13. Excuses. Excuses. Watchmen, despite respectable business, has to be counted a box-office disappointment. The younger fans just weren't out there in big enough numbers. Is the film's appeal limited to those who grew up with the Alan Moore-Dave Gibbons comic book back in the 1980s? Will the movie grow in business in its second week or sink to even lower depths?

Those of you who saw the film this weekend have your opinions? And so do those of you who haven't seen it yet or never intend to see it. Let's hear your arguments. I'd also like to hear what you think of the film on its own merits—screw the box office. My take is that Snyder actually tried something ambitious and that despite its substantial flaws Watchmen is well worth seeing. What's your take?

My Answer: Rorschach and Dr. Manhattan

Let’s start with Rorshach, played by Little Children Oscar nominee Jackie Earle Haley in what is clearly the movie’s best and ballsiest performance. Born Walter Kovacs, the son of a single mom who turned to prostitution, he is one bitter dude. In the graphic novel, written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Dave Gibbons, Walter utters only one word when he finds out that his mom has been killed by her pimp: “Good.” Walter’s interest in becoming a vigilante is sparked by the 1964 rape and murder of Kitty Genovese, a crime witnessed by neighbors who did nothing to help. It’s material from Kitty’s dress that Walter wears as a hood. As his face moves underneath, a series of shifting ink blots form on the material like a Rorschach test. Haley brings all the pain laid out in the comic book to his performance. As Rorschach, he is driven to fight crime even when he and the other Watchmen are outlawed and forced underground. The scene in which Rorschach murders a child molester is easily the film’s most brutal. But even in a mask, Haley provides a glimpse into the character’s haunted soul. Later, in prison and aching to escape (a great breakout scene), Rorschach is no longer allowed to hide behind the mask. Haley’s face, raw with agony, marks the movie and your nightmares. His portrayal, harshly true to the novel’s darkness, will keep you up nights.

And what of Dr. Manhattan, the only one of the Watchmen with superpowers? He’s blue. He glows. And most of the time he walks around naked swinging an impressive blue, glowing dick. All of which should have made the role impossible for an actor to play. That Billy Crudup does play him and with surprising, even touching gravity, deserves a glowing commendation. A lesser actor would have pushed the campy elements or buckled under while the campy elements pushed him. I mean, how do you handle the scene where Dr. Manhattan, distracted by the metaphysical and trips to Mars, creates two clones to deal with the sexual needs of his lady love, Silk Spectre II (Malin Akerman)? Crudup handles it by never losing sight of the man who is slowly losing touch with his humanity. A lab accident had changed him from physicist Jon Osterman to a figure of god-like powers. His very name, Dr. Manhattan, rings with atomic associations to the Manhattan Project. Crudup uses the softest voice, almost a whisper, to suggest the moral battles raging in the Doc’s blue skull. Through Crudup something comes across that the comic book had but the movie otherwise doesn’t: a tragic dimension.

OK, that’s my take. Got a problem with that? Speak up. Maybe you think the romance between Silk Spectre II and Nite Owl II (Patrick Wilson) kills. I think it damn near kills the movie. On with the debate.

This week At the Movies, Peter Travers takes on Watchmen, what many are hailing as the holy grail of comic book-turned-blockbuster movies. Travers says in his two-and-a-half star review that the film is "caught between the rock of fanboy adulation and the hard place of newbie indifference," and thus is a "cinematic piñata getting whacked from every side." It's awesome and it's awful, Travers says — and unfortunately it's not the holy grail of comic book movies. Travers praises director Zack Snyder's faithfulness to the graphic novel, but that love also hurts the flow of the film. Also earning high marks are the performances of Jackie Earle Haley as ink-blotted Rorschach and Billy Crudup as the mutant physicist Dr. Manhattan. "This isn't a super hero movie — this is a really depressing, melancholy look at how bad these super hero movies can be," Travers says, and all in all, it's worth seeing.

However, some of the Watchmen isn't worth seeing, and that's what also earns the film a spot in this week's Scum Bucket. What doesn't work? The hollow love story between Silk Spectre II played by Malin Akerman ("The poor man's Cameron Diaz") and the miscast Patrick Wilson as the Nite Owl II (Travers argues for Philip Seymour Hoffman in the role). "This is bad stuff in a movie that should have known better," Travers says. If all this superhero talk just confuses you, maybe this would be a good weekend to catch up on all those Oscar-nominated films. For more of the Travers' take on Watchmen, visit him At The Movies.

Another Rolling Stone editor walked in my office a minute ago to say that he watched the trailer for Watchmen and found the whole thing a chaotic, incoherent mess.

This guy admitted he's never read the graphic novel written by Alan Moore and illustrated by Dave Gibbons. But he didn't care. The trailer made him never want to read it or see the movie. Ditto the movie's posters. He hated the one with all the Watchmen characters and the individual posters offering one character at a time. Do you agree or disagree? I'll publish my review of the movie in a few days, but right now I'm asking what you're thinking of Watchmen in advance of its opening on Friday.

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