Watchmen (comics)/WMG: Difference between revisions

The Russians will eventually find out that {{spoiler|the attack on New York was faked}}, and they'll panic once they realize that the Americans have the power to {{spoiler|genetically engineer [[Eldritch Abomination|Eldritch Abominations]]s like Veidt's creature}}. The sheer paranoia from this will end up sparking the nuclear war that will lead to Norsefire taking over the British government. Later, they'll discover one of Dr. Manhattan's synthesized chemicals and test it on the prisoners at Larkhill Concentration Camp...

* There could be more to it than that, actually. It should be noted that in Watchmen, gay characters have a 100% mortality rate - Hooded Justice, the Silhouette, Moth Man, the Lesbian couple in New York. No gay character gets out of Watchmen alive and Rorschach is the only one of the active modern costumed heroes who dies. In addition to this, he is particularly fond of the Veidt perfume 'Nostalgia', which Veidt himself in one of the [[Easter Egg|Easter Eggs]]s says is deliberately marketed to homosexuals.

** Here's an idea: Dr. Manhattan could only stop 50% of the nukes launched because that's all he saw himself intercepting in a hypothetical nuclear future. He could stop all of them hypothetically--buthypothetically—but he didn't see himself stopping all of them, so he can't. He really is a slave to time, regardless of his godlike abilities, not unlike the Tralfamadorians of Slaughterhouse Five.

** Or, running with the "Veidt is gay" theory below--Veidtbelow—Veidt's hardly ''hiding'' it-- theit—the pervasive use of "gay" became more common regardless of gender with Adrian's influence. Having the world's smartest man be physically formidable, making a focused effort to come across as powerful and all-American as well as ridiculously rich, and very, very gay has to do something for the GLBT community, for good or ill. Probably horribly enrage people like the folks at the New Frontiersman (more) but if there was never so much of a distinction in the first place...

After all, in the real-life cold war there were times when the general feeling was that escalation was inevitable -- butinevitable—but despite all the doomsaying and "The Soviets aren't like us, they're desperate and ruthless and capable of ''anything''", the threat of mutually assured destruction did in fact keep hostilities at bay. Consider then how Veidt's nightmare ("I'm swimming towards a hideous...never mind") highlights the parallels between Veidt's story and ''Marooned''. In ''Marooned'', the protagonist commits horrible deeds, repulsive to himself and increasingly evil, finally hurting his own loved ones, leaving him alone in the world and damned forever -- allforever—all on account of an attack on his homeland which never happened, and never would have happened.

*** Not always, it varies by degree-- somedegree—some cases of Aspergers' are worse than others.

*** [[User:Mac Phisto]] has Asperger Syndrome. He does not like the term "Aspie". Not that he feels victimized -- hevictimized—he just thinks it sounds stupid. That being said, while he does believe that Rorshach fell somewhere between Autism and Anti Social Personality Disorder, he did not have A.S. Doctor Manhattan, on the other hand, did not have A.S -- but Alan Moore certainly gave him the personality traits of someone who did.

** He speaks in a really creepy monotone at all times, and without his real face he seems to be expressionless-- butexpressionless—but with it on, who can tell? He might not raise his eyebrows a lot, or let his mouth fall open, but it has to be reacting to something.

Let's look at the facts, the man decides to name himself after Ramses II--fineII—fine, he happens to admire the man. Pity that Ramses II ended up losing to God... Also, interesting choice to pick the version of the name that's explicitly and famously tied to hubris and futility. And his choice of password?

World's Smartest Man is a publicity based nickname, one that Adrian didn't even choose. Sure, he's probably got above average intelligence. He's a successful man who made a fortune through clever use of his image, and he's able to work out a lot of complicated factors for his [[Gambit Roulette]]. But his roulette comes together mostly because he's predicting the behavior of people he knows well, because he's flexible as long as he's moving towards his goal, and he has a lot of money and power to cover his tracks. And as has been pointed out many times, his plan is flawed for many reasons--hereasons—he can't contain every possible security leak, even if he could he wouldn't be able to maintain a lasting peace, in the long run he's probably as clueless about people as Dr. Manhattan. If I had to guess, I'd say he has an IQ of around 140. Notably above average, but nothing incredible.

*** "Technically genius" may look good on a business card or get you into [[Mensa]], but it ain't "incredible" by any stretch-- itstretch—it's the bare minimum on an arbitrary number scale. And he did none of those things by himself except predicting public disillusionment with vigilantes (not a fantastic accomplishment, just [[Genre Savvy]]), he had a huge research company and Manhattan himself helping out. None of that makes him anything close to "The World's Smartest Man".

Ozymandias thought there was going to be a war because he was insane. He was a delusional, psychopathic man with a messiah complex who believed that only HE could "save" mankind from itself. He was clearly bonkers. More so, he saw the "normal" saber rattlings of the Cold War and believed that humanity, known for it's tendency to survive, would do something so utterly, instantly suicidal. This is entirely unlikely, even more unlikely being that if Dr. Manhattan is even half as powerful as he seems (multiplying, size changing, matter control) then stopping 40,000 or 400,000 nuclear weapons should be well within his capacity...really, it's simply not possible to overwhelm someone that powerful, so the only real logical conclusion is Manhattan was either lying or those were rumors or propaganda. Ozy saw this as "real" for some reason. The comic itself seems to imply this: the Black Freighter. The story of the Black Freighter parallels the story of Ozymandias in almost every respect: a man goes mad and thinks he has to "save" his village from pirates, but when he tries to he ends up just killing some people for no reason. It even has the guy fretting over a strawman...as in, ''strawman fallacy''. The symbolism is actually made rather hamfisted when even Ozymandias, at the end, actually hints he's been dreaming of himself in the role of the sailor from the Black Freighter comic. Basically Ozymandias went crazy and killed millions of people because he started to believe his own hype, he started to think he was really "the smartest man in the world" and that only he could see these patterns around him, and only he could save the world and stop a nuclear war. In the end, he saved no one, stopped nothing, and killed half of New York for a pipe dream. It becomes somewhat obvious his plan wouldn't work for real--unlessreal—unless one allows for writer's fiat as an explanation--becauseexplanation—because the monster was genetically engineered from human DNA...meaning it would still have human DNA in it, or at the very least similar enough that someone would notice. And that is before people begin to question where the rest of this "alien invasion" is years later and why the alien died instantly when it appeared, a pretty piss poor invasion isn't it? Sooner or later people would figure out what happened, and that's assuming no one looks at The Question...er, Rorschach's notes and figues it out. Or that no one in the group breaks ranks, like Laurie.

The exposÃexposé "Under the Hood" is an opportunity for Hollis to cover his past to the public by inventing much of his early life and his associates that we never see, while misdirecting the identity of Hooded Justice. His claim that he saw Hooded Justice and was inspired by him is his way to publicly deny knowledge of who Hooded Justice is, with the wrestler speculation as a further alibi. Nite Owl had a close partnership with Hooded Justice and wanted to keep his identity hidden, mirroring the modern relationship of Nite Owl and Rorschach (as a professional partnership, or a different kind altogether). Hooded Justice's vigilante fighting style was the inspiration for Rorschach, as Rorschach's trainer, or his father, who sees Rorschach's mother when she's working as a whore, and calls himself Charlie. Rorschach respects his father enough to follow in his crimefighting footsteps, haunted by his human side which he blames on sin and all the wrongs of the world, projected onto his mother, a product of the world he has no control over.

Hollis Mason is a pseudonym given by Mason's father to him. We don't know Hollis' real name or his dad's. Hollis is 23 in 1939, is blonde, and has a face shot that looks surprisingly like Adrian Veidt, born in 1939. Hollis may have escaped Germany after anti-Nazi sentiment, seeking to prove his loyalty to the US by battling Nazi villain Captain Axis as Nite Owl, while keeping his German heritage hidden. His son Adrian disowns him and makes up stories about his parents immigrating to the US with tons of wealth and dying when he's 17, and continues his life alone, perfecting his skills to live up to his ÃœbermenschÃœbermensch ideal. Hollis meets Dan Drieberg and trains him, treating him like a son, letting him avoid prejudice by doing good deeds as Nite Owl. Dan uses the name Hollis to stay anonymous, just as the name has always been used.

*** Manly =/= heterosexual. Perhaps even Ozymandias doesn't know what he is vis-Ãá-vis sexual attraction, or doesn't think it's consequential enough to waste time on.

* The two aren't completely mutually exclusive -- someoneexclusive—someone who wanted to kill Silhouette for other reasons (most likely revenge, as suggested above) might be spurred into acting on that impulse by the outing, In addition to the "lost the protection of the group" opportunity noted above, the killer could be both vengeful ''and'' homophobic, or perhaps he killer could be vengeful and clever enough to figure that the risk of being caught afterward was less (because the authorities would jump to the wrong conclusion about the motive, and would be less motivated about investigating a crime against a lesbian).

* See, I'm thinking this was a case of Zach Snyder deconstructing ''himself''. Notice that, when the slo-mo effects kick in, it slows at all the wrong parts -- ratherparts—rather than slowing down the moves and impacts, making the violence look like ballet, it slows down on shots of bones piercing skin and the like -- thelike—the parts that are just plain gruesome.

If it does well, it's going to be just like when the comic came out. The producers are going to see that people liked ''The Dark Knight'' and ''Watchmen'' and go "Hmm. I guess we need to start making this shit [[Darker and Edgier|Darker and Edgier.]]." Ignoring, of course, that the damn ''plot'' was why people liked them. Effectively, the history of comic movies is going to echo the history of comics after the sixties done in fast-forward. Wont' THAT be fun.

* River and Simon are the direct descendants of Laurie and Dan-- theyDan—they have the looks, the intelligence, and wealth inherited from Dan's inventions. River is also a descendant of Ozymandias, resulting in prodigy-level intellect and physical ability, unusual thinking patterns, and potential mental instability-- sheinstability—she must be Simon's half-sister, as Simon shows no signs. Either Doctor Manhattan has chosen her to test his theory of creating superhumans, by granting her a small amount of his omniscience, or she is also a descendant of the psychic sacrificed by Ozymandias to create his monster in the comic.

It's mentioned that Ozy made a lot of money by licensing his likeness, and the others, having secret identities, wouldn't be in a good position to sue, so can't you just see him putting together a Saturday morning cartoon? Especially one that appears to have [[Anvilicious]] [[Aesop|Aesops]]s about environmentalism and [[The Power of Friendship]]?

Rorschach is very childish. He's very naïnaïve. Sounds farfetched? Not really. There are plenty evidence that Rorschach is, in fact, stuck at a very childish mindset, and therefore thinks nothing of sex.

* Rorschach conception of "truth or nothing", thinking that telling the truth is always the good thing to do, is also quite childish and naïnaïve.

* He seems to be fond of…¦ sugar cubes.

Like...[[Its Walky|Mike Warner]] levels of [[Jerkass|jerkasseryjerkass]]ery. Everything ascribed to his detached inhumanity, is actually just him being a tremendous douche.

Under the mask, he shouldn't be able to breathe-- notbreathe—not a problem if you don't really need to. (Somebody else gets to explain how he talks.) This is also why he didn't need any obvious protection setting off on foot towards an Antarctic moon base. Injuries take longer to heal, and he still has to eat, but this does explain to some degree his utter disregard for personal comfort. And when he gets a-sploded at the end? How else to dispose of someone who's already dead?

* "(Somebody else gets to explain how he talks.)" --Sentence—Sentence fragments. No grammar.

And then one day he got a tainted batch, or just mixed up one white powder for another, and had a really bad trip in which he hallucinated a little girl's corpse torn apart by dogs, and what followed. It was on that day that Rorshach was truly born. And that's really why he keeps going after criminals; to hide his addiction (even from himself) under a storm of dead serial killers and rapists, when his real targets all along are those who-- inadvertantlywho—inadvertantly and involuntarily-- keepinvoluntarily—keep him supplied. At one time, he was with-it and together enough to be invited to join a superteam, and spoke in complete sentences; now he hardly feels pain, neglects his hygeine, attacks with the strength of a madman, and believes his face was being torn off by police. And as the prison scene shows, he's [[Berserk Button|even worse]] when he's in withdrawal...

== [[Justice League (animation)|Rorschach is the Question]] ==