I arrived a few minutes late to my local screening of The Dark Knight, which was just enough to miss the trailer for Zack Snyder’s adaptation of Watchmen. Even though both films are produced by Warner Bros/DC Comics, it seemed odd to me that the trailer was attached to the IMAX print of The Dark Knight. I thought only IMAX presentations are advertised before IMAX films? Was I wrong?

Now Cinematical is reporting a rumor that Watchmen will be also released in IMAX. This isn’t unlikely as Warner Bros has been doing IMAX up-conversions of their big films for a while now. I understand why moviegoers might want to see a big event film on a huge screen, but after seeing The Dark Knight, which featured 20+ minutes of footage shot with IMAX cameras, it’s starting to make less and less sense to me. The truth is these unconverted IMAX presentations aren’t worth the expanded ticket price. They are a fad, which no doubt will eventually be replaced with feature length movies filmed with IMAX cameras. And I can’t wait.

After The Dark Knight is released, a bunch of filmmakers and studios will rush to film their entire feature films with the 70mm IMAX cameras. I’ve heard the 35mm downconversion even looks more vivid than footage shot with traditional 35mm cameras. Sure, there is documented technical issues due to the size and weight of the IMAX cameras and short film load, but Nolan has proven that it doesn’t add much to a time schedule or budget.

That said, I’ll probably still see Watchmen on the huge IMAX screen just because it’s there. I just can’t wait until this fad evolves.