Local media prep readers for The Watchmen

Nebraska’s two largest newspapers have both run Watchmen primers to prepare their readers for the film’s release Friday.

• The Omaha World-Herald posted an interactive graphic called “Know Your Watchmen,” allowing readers to get a quick sense of each of the main characters in the book. The trivia feature makes this especially cool for comic nerds, as it explains how each Watchmen character was based on a then-unused Charlton Comics character.

• The Lincoln Journal Star ran a story that mentions Watchmen but serves more as a sweeping explanation of the world of graphic novels. I’m not crazy about stories like this, which seem to come around every time another big comic book movie does, because they seem to exude a kind of insecurity from the industry, as if comics should always be on the defensive about being legitimate. That said, there’s a big story about comic books in the local newspaper. It’s hard to complain about that.