Nicole Kassell to Direct Damon Lindelof’s ‘Watchmen’ Pilot for HBO

HBO’s series based on the iconic Watchmen graphic novel by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons is getting closer to seeing the light of day. The television version was officially greenlit with a pilot order back in September, with news coming today of a director attached to helm the pilot. Nicole Kassell has been tapped to direct the pilot episode, written by Damon Lindelof of LOST fame/infamy. This won’t be her first pilot rodeo, as Nicole directed the premiere of TNT’s Claws.

Kassell previously worked with HBO, directing two episodes of the cable network’s The Leftovers, as well as Westworld and Vinyl. She also has FX’s The Americans, AMC’s Better Call Saul, and Sundance TV’s Rectify under her belt as well as ABC’s American Crime and Hulu’s upcoming Castle Rock.  She co-wrote and directed the 2004 film The Woodsman, based on the play of the same name by Steven Fechter, which starred Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick.

This is a nice change for a high profile HBO show, after the unfortunate mostly female-free directors list of Game of Thrones. Lindelof posted to his Instagram today after the Kassell announcement was made public: “If y’all are into lion sex boats, then you’re gonna LOVE what Nicole’s got cooking on our beloved WATCHMEN.” We don’t know much about what story the pilot may follow as far as Watchmen characters go, but we do know HBO ordered “backup scripts”, but it’s unclear if these were alternate pilot scripts or just additional scripts for future episodes.

Watchmen was created by writer Alan Moore, illustrator Dave Gibbons, and colorist John Higgins. It was released on a monthly basis by DC Comics during 1986 and 1987, later compiled into a single volume in 1987. The series emerged from a concept Moore had initially proposed to DC, which involved using superheroes from Charlton Comics, a company DC had recently acquired. However, because Moore’s original idea would have rendered these characters unusable in the future, Dick Giordano, the managing editor, suggested Moore come up with new characters for the story.