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I guess Dickens didn't write many novels, then?

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The term "graphic novel" describes FORMAT, not CONTENT. Just as "comic book" describes FORM and not FORMAT. WATCHMEN, in whatever FORMAT it is published, is a comic book. A graphic novel is also a comic book, but a comic book is not necessarily a graphic novel.

At the time Dickens was writing, it was common practice to serialize chapters, and later collect them into single volumes. This was also how Jules Verne worked, for instance. At the time WATCHMEN was done, it was not yet common practice to collect such works, and at such time as such collections were created, they were not called "graphic novels".

By all means, call WATCHMEN a "graphic novel" if you are so inclined. Nothing I can do to stop you -- no more than I can stop you calling a banana an apple.

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There was nothing remotely "innovative" about WATCHMEN. Most people who used that term were unfamiliar with comics in general, and the twenty years prior to WATCHMEN in particular. WATCHMEN was more in the nature of an accumulation than an innovation.

Jim Muir wrote: And you know what? I never did actually ever see Citizen Kane until this year, and when I did I found it good but very highly overrated. Dunno what all the fuss was about.

Context.  What you see as "overrated" with regard to CITIZEN KANE was a monumental breakthrough in nearly everything that was movies at the time.  From story to characters to, most important, the way it was shot and edited, nothing else like it had ever been seen before.  That it has influenced the way movies are made and told in the 70 years since it's release is testament to the fact that it is not overrated at all.

Contrast that with WATCHMEN.  Pastiches are nothing new.  Moore tweaked convention, but when you get down to brass tax nothing in the story was anything that hadn't been done before.  Even deconstructing the genre of superheroes was not unique and original to Moore, as if it had never been done before he set pen to paper.  You may find value in the way in which he told the tale, which is valid, but it's equally as valid to say that it's importance is highly overrated given everything we saw before it's publication and everything we've seen since.

But that's 'just OK'

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Oh come on. WATCHMEN isn't an "entry point" for anyone. No one picking up WATCHMEN as their first foray into superhero comics, of which it is, comes away wanting to read Spider-Man or Batman. Most people I know, anecdotal to be sure, whose first experience with comics was reading it, started and ended with WATCHMEN. It didn't encourage them to seek out more comics and become regular readers/purchasers of the genre. That's like saying BONE was an "entry point". It wasn't. It was a comic that appealed to a certain reader, specific to that story and those characters, and not a gateway to other comics in general.

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Exactly right. I know several people who read WATCHMEN and were inspired to seek out more material like WATCHMEN. There is little of that to be found, resulting in their "entry" going only a few short steps past the doorway.

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"Shakespeare was an okay writer, but he used too many quotes."

Watchmen, the movie, was *promoted* as being based on "The Most Celebrated Graphic Novel of All Time"

I think comic book is a dirty word in Hollywood.

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Even now, say "comic book" to most civilians, and they will expect something FUNNY.

Many terms, mostly pretentious and no more "user friendly" drifted by. Alas, "graphic novel" seems to have been the one that has captured the public's imagination -- tho, of course, they are not novels, and "graphic" carries a whole satchel full of alternate and undesirable meanings.

Thus, I have found myself turning a full 180°. I now embrace "comic book" as the only term that describes ALL the formats, and see the task now being educating the public to understand that, as there is no ham in hamburger, and that freelancers don't generally carry long pointy sticks, there is not necessarily anything "comic" about comic books.