The news of a TV series based on Alan Moore's acclaimed graphic novel Watchmen coming to HBO has brought with it speculation on how close to the source material the show will be. It might seem blasphemous to alter Watchmen, but we all know these changes are coming in one form or another. With Zack Snyder's 2009 movie adaptation having already provided fans with a fairly faithful adaptation (up until the ending, at least), taking Watchmen out of the '80s and into the present day could be the best way to get value out of a new adaptation. After all, Watchmen’s world now seems more realistic. We’re essentially living out the chapter on symmetry.

In the graphic novel, Rorschach’s journal tells us it’s 1988, which is somewhat unusual. Most comics eschew that kind of dating so that the stories can be read in the perpetual now, but Moore wrote Watchmen to be reflective of the times—part social commentary, part satire. To modernize the text to continue that theme would actually be respectful to his vision. (Of course, he’ll still hate it, but that’s just Alan Moore). We’ve already experienced Watchmen’s eighties twice already - first in the original graphic novel, and then on-screen in Zack Snyder’s film. Given the meat of the text and the current political climate, there is no better time to have a modern version of Watchmen produced.

Despite its complex, decades-spanning mystery, the real speed of the story is the characters. Whether intentional or not, they have a timeless quality to them, and even if the era they operate in changes, neither they nor their arcs would be changed. For instance, after the Keene Act the Comedian went to work for the government. When engaging with the protestors, we see the Comedian’s new uniform. He looks more like a shock trooper than a superhero, and he responds to the protestors with violence. The scene doesn’t need much of an update to be a commentary on the growing militarization of police.

Watchmen - The Comedian

Updating the story would also allow it to resonate powerfully with modern audiences, in the same way that the original graphic novel did with '80s readers. Imagine the sight of Dr. Manhattan stopping the 9/11 hijackers or the forces of Kim Jong-Un, Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi, Bashar al-Assad or ISIS surrendering to and bowing down to him. The stark imagery will bring it home for the audience, while the question of victory against Liberty forces us to ask the cost of it all (our enemies have surrendered, but because of an overreaching and overpowerful government whose nuclear deterrent is a literal god).

There is possibly no greater irony in this era than those who rally against capitalism and the growing effect that corporations have on our lives, while organizing meetups and protests by using social media apps on their phones. In Watchmen, Adrian Veidt’s multinational company became intrinsic to daily life, with Veidt Enterprises creating products that everyone used: lingerie, cosmetics, action figures, nutrition, television, scientific development, clothing, appliances, publishing, and energy hydrants. Even the Gordian Knot Lock Co. and the Promethean Cab company are subsidiaries of Veidt Enterprises. There isn’t an issue of Watchmen that did not feature an advertisement for or feature somebody using a product created by Veidt’s corporate empire.

In that way, it wouldn’t take much to synthesize a modern Veidt Enterprises by adding technology to rival Apple and Microsoft and banking to the company’s products and services. It would modernize Veidt’s omnipresence and add to his terrifying scope of power and influence. (Though, how awesome of a merchandise tie-in would it be to have a cologne or perfume called Nostalgia released leading up to Watchmen's premiere?)

The fear surrounding corporatization and the impact of the very rich on politics has only risen thanks to people like Donald Trump and George Soros—look at the amount of money Jon Ossoff’s campaign spent—and Veidt Enterprises could be used to explore this as well. Given the resources and space Veidt needs for his end game, it makes sense that he would develop friends in the government and the military to aid him in his planning, unwittingly.

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Watchmen Doomsday Clock

The Doomsday Clock, which was ubiquitous in Watchmen and at the height of the Cold War, has become relevant again as the Washington Post reported on the day of Donald Trump’s inauguration that it had been moved to 2 ½ minutes to midnight. In Watchmen, Richard Nixon was still the president in 1985, having expanded the term limits and the powers of the presidency since he took office in 1968. In real life, we’ve seen the massive expansion of presidential power as oversight has diminished. By bringing Watchmen into the modern world, we can explore the growing surveillance state begun by the Patriot Act and exposed by the NSA document leaks of 2013. For the show, this can all be elaborations of the Keene Act, which made vigilantes illegal. Here, it can be updated to include advanced surveillance methods to make sure that Americans are following the rules.

On the international stage, Watchmen drew heavily from the Cold War as a necessary motive for Veidt’s actions. Currently, with Russian President Vladimir Putin obtaining more power and becoming ever more aggressive given his actions in the Ukraine and Georgia, many have suggested that the world is moving towards a new Cold War. In all of this, however, is a strange dangling thread called Tales of the Black Freighter.

The story-within-the-story is a necessary thematic addition to the Watchmen narrative. The unnamed sea captain from Black Freighter is forced to shed his morals and inhibitions to achieve his goal of returning home before the evil on the freighter arrives to destroy his family and the town they live in. His decline and descent are similar to Veidt’s (even the metaphoric usage of dead bodies comes into play). Moore felt that since superheroes were real (and objects of derision) in-universe, comics would no longer have a use for them. People were more interested in human tales featuring throwback concepts: cowboys, pirates, etc. However, things are different in our world too. Despite its quality, the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise has made pirate stories popular and lucrative for the first time. Perhaps Moore was again just ahead of his time, but the media landscape has changed. It’s unfortunate to say, but nobody cares about comics anymore.

Black Freighter in the Watchmen comic

Comic book sales have never quite recovered from the '90s crash, and it’s rare for a comic book to get mainstream media attention. Whether the modern Watchmen wants to still keep story pirate-themed is up to taste (and truly irrelevant so long as the thematic elements remain). The true alteration needs to come in the method in which it is consumed. Since 1985, an entire generation has grown up on Batman: The Animated Series, seen video games go from side-scrollers to biblical epics, and seen television move from the living room and into our hands. Having the story exist in a new media format would be audacious, but an even bigger risk would be if it was brought into the story as a VR program.

The technology is still growing—very few have access to it—but using VR would add to the texture of the series. VR is a simulacrum of real life, as all entertainment is. However, it is meant to be more life-like than anything else. Imagine a perfected VR existing in Watchmen where the line between real and fake is too opaque for the brain to delineate; that's how Bernard would injest the Black Freighter story. WB could also release a VR game of Black Freighter to tie-in to the series. This would work as a commentary on the relevance we place on fictional stories or the unclear moralities of characters like Veidt, the Comedian, and Rorschach. By having the player commit the violent and desperate acts of the protagonist sea captain, it would indict us as knowing accessories. We’re committing the same actions that the villains do because it’s what the program would have us do. Or, in Veidt’s mind, he’s doing this because it’s the right thing to do. For the player, the line between right and wrong is then as difficult to see as it is for the characters in Watchmen itself.

Alan Moore’s Watchmen repeatedly made use of Bob Dylan’s “The Times They are a-Changin’.” Even if a segment of fans decry the modernization of Watchmen, an update has the potential to flow poetically from the heart of the text.

NEXT: Leftovers’ Damon Lindelof Developing Watchmen TV Series at HBO