Finally. And you know what? I liked everything -- right up until the freakin' ending.
If you haven't see the movie or read the graphic novel, stop reading this right now -- 'cuz I'm going to talk about things that contain SPOILERS, natch!
The movie stayed remarkably true to Moore's and Gibbons' phenomenal work of comic art. In fact, in my estimation, I'd say at least 50% of the dialogue (if my memory serves me) came directly from the comics. As such, I thought the movie worked perfectly ... right up until the ending.
The "villain" of the story is Adrian Veidt, aka Ozymandias, who through various machinations has implemented a plan to thwart impending nuclear war and bring the nations of the world together. In the comics, Veidt enlists the aid of artists and geneticists (among others) to construct a ghastly "alien" creature with a brain cloned from a psychic sensitive. Just as his fellow Watchmen happen upon Veidt's lair in Antarctica, Adrian's already set his plan in motion. What he does is monstrous: He teleports the behemoth creature to New York City where it materializes inside and around various buildings and infrastructure. The resultant "shock" of this obviously brutally painful action causes the creature to send out a massive psychic "shockwave," killing about three million New Yorkers.
Up until this point, the United States and the USSR were on the brink of nuclear war. But now, this "alien attack" upon the human race serves to unite humanity against a common foe! It was precisely what Veidt had intended! Fellow Watchmen Silk Spectre, Night Owl and Dr. Manhattan can only accept the cold logic that Veidt has forced upon them.
The movie misses this very important point. The film has Veidt conjuring up a scenario whereby he frames Dr. Manhattan for destroying large portions of not only New York City, but numerous other metropolises around the world. The "attack" by the "mad" Dr. Manhattan supposedly serves to unite humanity in place of the original graphic novel plot. But it doesn't make sense.
Here's why: For his entire career, Dr. Manhattan was an operative of the United States government. In both the comic and film, we see Manhattan annihilating Vietnamese troops in that war, as well as serving as a huge intimidation factor against the Soviets. As such, why would the Soviets, not to mention other unfriendly world powers in particular, suddenly "unite" with the US against Manhattan after Veidt's orchestrated plot? Why wouldn't they be suspicious that it was all just some sort of dastardly plan by the United States? In addition, at the film's conclusion we hear Dan Drieberg (Night Owl) tell Laurie Juspeczyk (Silk Spectre) that the new, imposed world peace will hold "as long as they all believe Jon (Dr. Manhattan) is watching." However, unless I missed something, there was nothing in Veidt's plan that alluded to Dr. Manhattan destroying those cities as a "warning" to the nations of the world to stop all war.
So, I sat for over two and a half hours of glorious attribution to the only comic in Time magazine's best 100 books of the 20th century, only to have it ruined by a non-sensical ending! And here's another thing: after including so much of the comic in the film -- stuff that could have been left out -- why couldn't they have kept true to the original Veidt plot? In my opinion, they could have easily done so.
As a result of this big let-down, I give "Watchmen" 3 out of 5 stars. It's comics film gold ... right up until the last 20 minutes or so.
Female and/or robot trouble
23 hours ago
