Ok, so I read it, and I thought it was lame. I’m kind of mad I spent $20 on a graphic novel instead of $10 on a movie. Disucss.
Why didn’t you like it?
I never liked Watchmen, but then, I like my heroes triumphant, not depressive. Still, I can see why so many people liked it, because it was SO radically different from the rest of the stuff published at the time. Also, it had some clever storytelling and artistic gimmicks. Whether any of that will translate in a live action movie -especially featuring characters most people have never even heard of- remains to be seen.
On related news, Warner Brothers and Fox have resolved their dispute over the movie, meaning that the movie WILL come out on March 6. But WB is going to have to pay Fox quite some $$, so they’d better hope the movie IS a hit.
I’m reading it now for the first time ($20? I got it for about $15). I’m about half-way through, I’m liking it.
I’ve seen faaaaaaar too much of Doc Manhattan’s radioactive blue wang, but still, I’m liking it. Looking forward to the movie to see how it holds up.
Got a paperback copy off Half.com for about $11-12. Gonna start reading it soon hopefully, since I just got it a couple of days ago.
I havent read the graphic novel quite yet, but plan on picking it up soon. And I cannot wait for this movie too come out. The few trailers that I have seen look sweet. 
I definitely liked it a lot, really. I don’t know much of what else to say.
It’s pretty rad.
It’s unbelievable. I’m usually a fan of happy endings, but this story is a very refreshing difference to the average superhero story.
I’m definitely going to see the movie. Hope it’s good, too.
Rad? More like pretty-fucking-terrible. To start with, I figured the story out - how unobvious is it that the super smart, super rich guy is behind it when he doesnt appear for really most of the novel. How was it different from usual superhero fare? After all the hooplah I was expecting some original plot lines - instead we get the same old convoluted, maniacal “I’m gonna save the world by destroying it” nonsense. To top it off, perhaps the most annoying thing in the whole book was the pirate thing. I understand its supposed to parallel Veidt’s turn towards insanity, but the way it was integrated into the story line was completely unacceptable. It was confusing and very difficult to follow - not to mention mostly irrelevent considering the mysterious author that’s disappeared appears on like two pages then dies on a ship that you’ve seen once and have no clue what its relevenc is. The way you would cut to a pirate scene while maintaining conversation on the street was extremely annoying and confused the shit out of me for a good while. Then theres the interludes between chapters, the novel-like stuff that was fun at first, when it was the Under the Hood, but I ended up skipping maybe half of them because they were boring. Throw this together with a pretty sub-par cast of characters and you have one completely disappointed reader.
I loved Watchmen, but I can completely understand why you didn’t like the pirate stuff. Quite honestly, that pissed me off, too. Sometimes Alan Moore likes smelling his own farts, that’s the only explanation I can give.
I may be too uneducated to really comment on this, since I didn’t read a lot of comics in my day, nor have I read The Watchmen…but, I’d imagine that if you consider the time when The Watchmen was first published, it was pretty original back then. Maybe I’m completely wrong. I dunno.
I think the whole idea was a somewhat deconstructionist, and certainly far more analytical, approach to such a prototypical story; the reactions of Rorshach to the attitude of the “saving the world by destroying it” paradigm are one of the primary attributes of the story. Consider his opinion on President Truman, his own personal actions, and his opinions on what Veidt is doing, and it sheds a lot of light on his character. I think it also introduced the idea that the real world doesn’t exactly have supervillains, in the archetypal place they largely occupied prior to Watchmen. It, rather, has people doing unspeakable things for what they believe is a good cause. Finally, Veidt makes a convincing argument for his actions of saving the world by destroying it; most villains with similar attitudes have some sort of existential malaise where existance is pain and shouldn’t go on, while Veidt is murdering to save lives in the long run and prevent a nuclear war, at which he would certainly succeed without intervention. Which brings up the questions of ends and means, and which is to justify which.
Metaficiton seems to be a “love it or hate it” sort of thing. I, personally, loved the interludes and the way he intertwined them with dialogue to the main story.
I enjoyed it as well, at first (as I said, when it appeared to coincide with the Under the Hood book) however several of them (the one about Max Shea, the interview with Lauries mother and a few others that elude me) added nothing to the story and did little for the characters. The whole “The Comedian is my father!” thing was the only thing that surprised me, however the characters revelation seemed sudden and without any build up or real clues leaving the revelation itself and the confrontation between mother and daughter somewhat shallow. These events added nothing to the overall story arc and leave me wondering why they were included.
I dunno, I’ve seen hundreds of movies that I’ve waited years for that have been really awful, but none of that compares to the let down of this comic book, which is frankly the last one I imagine myself ever reading.
Screw Watchmen, I’m watching MONSTERS VERSUS ALIENS!! :hyperven:
I dunno, I saw Gran Torino last night (that Eastwood flick) and there was a Watchmen trailer… it still looked cool. I wish they had put “But Who Watches the Watchmen?” instead of “Who Watches Them?”
Alright, I finished reading it today. Kinda disappointed that it took me just two days to read the whole thing, but it can’t be helped I guess. Overall, I thought it was pretty good, though I thought it may have left us hanging a little bit towards the end (Veidt’s last conversation with Doc Manhattan).
I really didn’t mind the interludes, as it usually shed some light on some backstory or other elements that appear later on. (Only one I didn’t read was about the Egyptian stuff.) And though I understood the pirate story, I thought it was stupid how it was implemented.
Though I can see how Veidt’s plan makes a pretty convincing argument. Would you rather the world die in a nuclear winter or unite them under false pretenses resulting in mass casualties elsewhere? You could question the morality of it and ask whether the ends justify the means, but not much would come of it. I’m just gonna go with what Arac was saying about a lot of this stuff.
I will say it wasn’t what I was expecting as far as an ending was concerned, but I suppose it works all the same. Definately different from typical happy ending. Heh.
An original story to be sure, but ground breaking? I really don’t think so.
Bear in mind that it came out in 1986. I don’t think there was anything like it at the time.
O_O
SOMEONE ELSE SPENT MORE THAN FIVE BUCKS ON A COMIC (Oh, I’m sorry, graphic novel)? I’M NOT ALONE IN THIS WORLD!
Ahem
I still haven’t had a single look into The Watchmen, mainly because I’ve noticed I get overly obsessed about anything new (especially if I like it) so this time, I’ll work it out by watching the movie first and the comparing it to the source material, instead of ranting how they did this wrong and that wrong. I’ve had a few looks into character biographies, but most of those have faded away. We’ll see how The Watchmen will work out.
Out of context: I had some problems with Green Lantern (Quote TD: “HE WIELDS THE POWER OF GREEN”), before I watched the early 2k Justice League… after that, the concept seemed much more plausible. So maybe this will repeat with the Watchmen?