I knew this was going to happen. I just freaking knew it.

During Wondercon last weekend, director Zack Snyder (pictured right) appeared on a panel for his upcoming movie "300," along with stars Gerard Butler and Len Headey (that's a whole different story, which I'll get to later). After the packed ballroom at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco got done oooing and ahhhing at the amazing footage of "300" and its incredibly good- looking stars, one audience member asked Snyder about the "Watchmen" movie, which is currently being developed for Warner Bros.

For those that don't know, Alan Moore and David Gibbons' masterwork comic book series "Watchmen" has been rolling around Hollywood for nearly two decades. But because of the dark nature and mature, deconstructionist themes of "Watchmen," efforts to film a movie version always seemed to fail. A few years ago, Paramount, which owned the rights to the graphic novel, tapped director Paul Greengrass ("United 93," "The Bourne Supremacy") to film the movie, which had already been attempted by Terry Gilliam in the later 80s.

Well, the "Watchmen" project was revived once again recently when Paramount sold the rights to Warner Bros., which turned the film over to Snyder, who was coming off of the successful "Dawn of the Dead" remake and the buzz worthy "300." Snyder and crew are in the preliminary stages of getting the project together and have even talked casting with some major stars, including Tom Cruise (click here for a previous post about that subject).

Back to the audience member: he asked Snyder for an update regarding "Watchmen." Here's what Snyder said: "I want to make it into a movie. The studio wants me to make into a movie. We're talking about shooting it at the end of the summer." But hold on, he's not finished. Snyder alluded to some issues with production, specifically the rating of the film. "The studio might say, 'An R- rated superhero movie. What the hell is that? It doesn't exist.'"

Earth to Warner Bros.: you just made a rated R comic book movie. It's called "300"!

So the "Watchmen" movie once again appears to be on shaky ground. And I'm making the call right now: if "300" makes good on its buzz and becomes a blockbuster hit, then Warner Bros. will give Snyder the budget he needs to make a two and a half hour R-rated epic. But if "300" somehow disappoints, which seems to be a remote but plausible possibility, then I believe the doors may close on this "Watchmen" project. The studio won't give Snyder a $150 million budget for a rated-R comic book movie that it believes has little chance of becoming a hit, let along breaking even.

And there's just no way that you can make "Watchmen" into a happy-ending, good triumphs over evil PG-13 comic book movie. It's a dark comic book with disturbing themes and even more disturbing truths. Condensing the graphic novel, which was originally published as a 12-part series, into one feature film is hard enough to do without trying to tone it down for a PG-13 rating.

Now I know why Alan Moore has consistently disowned Hollywood.