A List Of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago

WE CAN WATCH THE WATCHMEN:That the Watchmen case has settled and the film will arrive in theatres as scheduled is important enough, but two other thoughts from the article.

• The settlement as reported is going to make it very hard for the movie to be profitable. Production costs for the film are reported at around $130 M, and Fox's settlement adds at least $5M in cost, and they get huge gross participation. That means the film will have to gross well north of $300M worldwide to turn a profit theatrically. I'm not sure an unrelentingly bleak, hard R rated comic book movie with no widely known actors or characters can do that. (To give an idea, movies in that range of box office include Twlight, Van Helsing, Liar Liar, and Beverly Hills Cop.) Sure, if geeks approve of the film, the DVD will sell like hotcakes (as will the "Black Freighter" animated DVD coming out in tandem with the movie), but there are apparently radical changes to the ending that may anger some folks.
  
• Apparently, part of the horse-trading that went on to get the deal done involved WB delaying their option to work with Steve Carell on Get Smart 2 so that he and Tina Fey can do a romantic comedy called Date Night together during their respective hiatuses. It's an interesting pairing, to be sure.