Widely considered to be the greatest comic book ever created, director Zack Snyder had a lot of expectations to live up to when taking the reigns on the ill-fated project, and in the most part he has succeeded.

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The film begins with the murder of a retired superhero, The Comedian, one of the members of a now defunct group of superheroes known as Watchmen.

Suspecting the murder signals an attack on all of the superheroes, fellow Watchmen member and all-round vigilante fruitcake Rorshach sets about attempting to uncover the truth behind the murder, leading to a more sinister conclusion than he could have imagined.

Watchmen is a film of epic proportions, taking on an enormous three hour running time to meander its way across a wealth of different narratives and sub-plots which encompass all six of its lead characters.

In doing this Snyder separates himself from previous directors Terry Gilliam and Darren Aronofsky – who both tried, and failed, to cut back the original material.

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But narratively Watchmen still feels slightly muddled, with a central narrative following The Comedian's death which fails to ever feel truly engaging and often feels confusing and undeveloped.

The result is a film which could have delved deeper into any number of interesting themes ranging from the nature of humanity to world politics, which are touched on, but not explored, throughout the duration.

That said, Watchmen is very much the sum of its parts, and each individual foray into a specific character's back history proves the depth and magnitude of the source material.

Snyder's real success is the way in which he has translated the comic book to the big screen with painstaking accuracy.

Using the same technique as he did with his first big screen outing, 300, Snyder used the comic as a story board to bring Moore's original to life, and fans of the book will inevitably be impressed by the faithfulness on display.

Performances throughout the film are sturdy and well balanced despite the casting of very few big names.

Watchmen takes the lead comic book lead from last year's smash The Dark Knight, taking Nolan's dark seedy tone and turning out any lights that may have been accidentally left on with brutal violence and some seriously adult themes.

The film is a dark delight for comic book fans, and will certainly please followers of Moore's book – although some purists will inevitably disagree – even if it isn't entirely accessible for the unconverted.

4/5