Who wants to watch this Watchmen?

Up until this morning, I hadn't believed that the recent rumors and news bits about a Watchmen movie were going to result in the creation of an actual completed film — several directors have been attached over the last fifteen years or so, so the fact that 300's Zack Snyder had been signed to direct didn't mean the movie was really any closer to getting made. But now, in addition to a director, we have quite a bit of an announced cast.

And to say that I'm underwhelmed would be much like calling the San Diego Comicon a "nerd get-together."

What the announced cast of Snyder's Watchmen film says to me: low budget. Or possibly: we don't want to waste our SFX budget on the actors. Or even: we don't want to lose our asses in paying out pay-or-play deals to A-list stars when this thing falls through.

I don't necessarily have a problem with any of these actors as I don't know who the hell most of them are. And I'm one of those guys who remembers names of actors, even little-known ones. This cast announcement feels more like they're gearing up to make Watchmen a made-for-cable-TV movie than a Big Hollywood Blockbuster Feature.

Ladies and gentlemen, your Watchmen:

Dr. Manhattan: Billy Crudup. OK, fine, I suppose. I like Crudup, since he had such a large role in one of my most very favorite movies as Stillwater guitarist Russell Hammond in Almost Famous.

Rorschach: Jackie Earle Haley. Haley's coming off an Oscar nomination for his work as a creepy ex-child molester in Little Children, so I'm sure creepy Rorschach's a part he can probably play well. Plus, bonus points for his already being Rorschach-like: he's a little guy, kinda funny-lookin'.

And there ends our not-quite-big-name cast, as we move on to the "who?"s...

Ozymandias: Matthew Goode. Um, well, he was in a movie with Mandy Moore once, so that's got to count for something. Oh, and he's English, which Adrian Veidt... wasn't.

Nite Owl: Patrick Wilson. Yeah, I got nothin' here. Sorry.

Silk Spectre: Malin Ackerman. She's pretty, I guess, though in a completely different way than I'd always pictured Laurie Juspecyzk's prettiness. Past that, your guess is as good as mine.

The Comedian: Jeffrey Dean Morgan. Hey, look, it's Denny from Grey's Anatomy! You know, the guy who died and left Izzy boatloads of money. (Not that I watch that show. Not since it started to suck, anyway.) Hey, waitaminnit... wasn't the Comedian supposed to be from an entire generation before the main characters in Watchmen?

So all in all, a cast which inspires an awful lot of indifference in me. A director who's more concerned with visuals than story (working with source material that's all about the story) and a cast largely made up of relative unknowns... man, if you'd told me a few years ago I'd be looking forward more to an Iron Man movie than Watchmen, I'd have thought you were out of your gourd. But hell, I might be looking forward to Ghost Rider 2 more than Watchmen at this point.