The weekly WATCHMEN episode sum-up

[Turtletrekker]

Oh please. The main character is MARRIED to Dr. Manhattan, whio in the end decided to fake the world out because he suddenly wanted to 'play human'?...Hahahaha...That's JAWS level jumping there.

Sounds completely in character to me. Women he loves have always been DM's weakness, both Laurie and Janey. The last we saw him, he decided that he wanted to create life, the thermodynamic miracle. How else is he to do that, other than to have children? And he didn't "decide" to fake out the world, from his perspective, it's simply what he always did.

 

[Professor Zoom]

Great reveal.

It was funny, during the episode I was thinking, "Oh, it's interesting they haven't shown Dr. Manhattan's face yet, well, it's because they haven't cast him yet..."

OH, how wrong I was.

This show is great. Great characters, great plotting, great storytelling.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Oh please. The main character is MARRIED to Dr. Manhattan, whio in the end decided to fake the world out because he suddenly wanted to 'play human'?...Hahahaha...That's JAWS level jumping there.

Nope.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Doc experienced the future already and knew that he would love Angela intensely, but not until after a memory wipe, which would lead to his total and unavoidable death at the hands of Joe K... Joe Keene (Joking) is the Comedians son or grandson (I don't come into this thread a lot, you all probably figured that out weeks ago.).

Caliber is also a pretty bad pun.

 

[Skipper]

Oh please. The main character is MARRIED to Dr. Manhattan, whio in the end decided to fake the world out because he suddenly wanted to 'play human'?...Hahahaha...That's JAWS level jumping there.

So... She Is some kind of... Mary Sue..?

 

[KennyB]

So... She Is some kind of... Mary Sue..?

Stop...........does someone have to say every female character is a Mary Sue? She definitely has flaws.

 

[Skipper]

Stop...........does someone have to say every female character is a Mary Sue? She definitely has flaws.

I was ironic?

 

[gblews]

https://www.reddit.com/r/Watchmen/comments/dusjjh/what_do_we_think_is_going_on_with_cal/

There are some seriously smart people out there. Smart at least about figuring out story plots. I had no clue. I noted Will saying that Dr. Manhattan could mimic people, but thought it was just a bit of info about the character. Laurie's attraction to Cal, I thought, might be a prelude to an affair with him or her using him to get info on Angela. The other thing is that LOTS of women like Ya Ya Mateen.

Cal's "accident", his interaction with the kids, all stood out, but didn't give me even a hint of a clue.

So now, I'm wondering if Madame Trieu and Will's plan, which Will said Angela wouldn't like, involves killing Cal (or kidnapping him maybe), themselves to keep Manhattan's powers away from the 7th Calvary.

Man, Jud's wife was a piece of work. The matter of fact way she asked if she would kill Laurie.

Madame Trieu, is a great character. I love her voice, her manner of speaking and the way she expresses herself.

Gonna be interesting seeing or hearing about Cal and Angela's backstory in Viet Nam. I am so here for it.

Sadly, and I hate to mention this, I don't think we've heard that it's been officially renewed yet. Though I would imagine that there's some pretty serious discussions going on about how to make the second season as compelling as the first. It'll be a high standard to live up to.

I heard on a podcast, The Watch on the Ringer network, that the show may be a one off or that if there is a second season, Lindeloff might not do it. In other words, the show's future seems to be up in the air.

Hard to see them topping this season (at least so far). It has been a revelation in so an ways.

 

[Skipper]

Full disclosure: I love the original comic (I actually have two edition of it) and I'm loving this series.
There is just one detail that has always bothered me, common to both mediums. At the end of the day these are just common people in bright color costumes who fight armed criminals. How the heck is it possible that they didn't die after, I don't know, 5 minutes? I know it is a common trope in the comics medium, but this is supposed to be a "realistic" approach to superheroes (and well, even Batman has a kevlar or whatever magic anti-bullets costume). Well, I believe that the only realistic not-powered superhero is a dead one.

Yes, I know there is a canonical dead-in-action superhero (Dollar Bill), but really, how the heck this guy wasn't shot dead at the first public debut?!?

 

[The Old Mixer]

Dan can’t get a boner without beating people up.

As I recall, he got a boner saving people from a fire.

OK, I haven't actually read Watchmen

Change that.

 

[Professor Zoom]

As I recall, he got a boner saving people from a fire.

Oh, yeah.
Not much better.

On another subject, here in LA, at the Writers Guild Foundation on Dec 10th, Lindelof is gonna be talking about Watchman. Get yer tickets while you can.

Whoops. Sold out.

Well. I already got mine.

 

[gblews]

Oh, yeah.
Not much better.

On another subject, here in LA, at the Writers Guild Foundation on Dec 10th, Lindelof is gonna be talking about Watchman. Get yer tickets while you can.

Whoops. Sold out.

Well. I already got mine.

We'll be waiting for your report.

 

[Professor Zoom]

We'll be waiting for your report.

I’ll post my paypal link. Somebody’s gonna cover my ticket if they want some low down.

 

[Reverend]

Anyone else low key impressed by the casting of the younger and older versions of the various characters in these flashbacks? Some of them I swear are real world blood relations or something.

I think you're right. This was kind of proven in the American Hero scenes as we see HJ depicted as a really big hulking guy who is very strong. This is the way he is seen in the comic as well as the movie, but I don't mind this kind of retcon.

Is it really a retcon though? Most of the information presented in the GN seems to be deliberately subjective. Third-hand accounts, hearsay and ephemera. Hooded Justice was always kind of off to one side, hence the long running mystery surrounding the character.

I'll admit I'm more willing to go with it since when I first read the comics, I just assumed he was a black man. I mean the hood and the noose had "lynching" all over it, and given the period in history it seemed about right. I remember being a little surprised when he was a white guy in the Snyder movie, but just assumed I'd missed something.

Yes, these are the recollections of Hollis Mason and maybe the reality was different, but why should he lie or be wrong about something like that?

Memories can be tricky. Sometimes a thing is said but is misunderstood by the listener, sometimes context is lost over time and sometimes it's possible to legit invent a memory.
Or maybe Hollis knew who he was and was covering for him? That's the thing with the concept of an unreliable narrator; not everything is necessarily accurate or even true.

This is only page in the original comic where H.J. expresses something similar to an opinion. It is slightly bizarre to call the war in Europe a "political situation".

It may seem bizarre in hindsight, but that's more or less how many Americans referred to what was going on over here prior to Pearl Harbour.
Also, in the context of the psyche-warfare pamphlet HJ's father brought home with him from WWI, that's a totally plausible opinion for him to have.

 

[The Old Mixer]

My only issue with HJ's origin is it seems like they borrowed a lot of beats from Hollis Mason's--moved from a plains state to NYC, became a cop, saw a copy of Action Comics #1...

 

[gblews]

I’ll post my paypal link. Somebody’s gonna cover my ticket if they want some low down.

Screw it, it's not that important to me.

 

[Awesome Possum]

My only issue with HJ's origin is it seems like they borrowed a lot of beats from Hollis Mason's--moved from a plains state to NYC, became a cop, saw a copy of Action Comics #1...

That's based on his memoirs though, he could be taking stories from HJ and claiming them as his own since HJ was assumed to be dead. It wouldn't be the first or last time someone wasn't entirely truthful when it comes to their memoirs.

 

[The Old Mixer]

Clearly not the intent of the original story; it's doubtful one could get away with claiming to have been a cop without somebody fact-checking it; IIRC, Mason had a photo of himself as a rookie officer; and most importantly, I'm not talking about in-universe retconning, I'm talking creative unoriginality...the origin played a few too many of the same beats as Mason's, which was laid down in writing in the original source material over 30 years ago.

 

[Awesome Possum]

The point is showing his similarity to his granddaughter Angela. Both are cops, both lost their parents in explosions, both have rage issues, both became masked heroes and fought white supremacists. It ties into the greater theme of trauma being passed to future generations. Despite not knowing him, Angela's life was deeply affected by his experience and ended up mirroring his. Much like the original comic, the show is more about the themes than the actual plot.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I like the visual contrast, Angela wears black makeup around her eyes in the same pattern her grandfather wore white makeup.

The implication of the chief being related to Cyclops seems to be that the differences between then and now are superficial, and racism has only changed in that it learned to be sneaky enough to satisfy politics.

In the 1940s you explicitly tell a black person they are inferior. In the 2010s you tell them they are an equal, but set things up in the background to still not have any real power.