According to those pictures, some of the secondary characters might appear in the movie. As much as I like Watchmen, I think it would be a mistake to try and include some of the parts which are less important for the main story.
I'm hoping the pictures are just indications of Snyder and crew trying to get the look and feel of
Watchmen right, complete with familiar sights and settings. He put a lot of energy into getting
300 to look like the graphic novel, so it's conceivable that he's just as motivated on this. I agree, much of the newsstand stuff should be omitted, as well as the "shipwrecked man" subplot altogether. Let's hope it has been.
Zach Snyder is directing it (I’d have preferred Gilliam or Greengrass), my guess is, it’s going to be a by-the-numbers superhero movie, with a lot of gore.
I'm apprehensive about Snyder directing, but if he's as big a fan of
Watchmen as he says he is, he'll recognize the need for substance over sensation, and everything will be fine. I would have preferred Greengrass also, but at the time when he was slated to direct, the buzz was that he was updating the story to modern times and putting a "terrorism" slant on it, which would have had me picketing his home in London.