Watchmen Reviews

• Quis custodiet ipsos custodes (Who watches the watchmen?)

  
  By A2NJO6YE954DBH on 2000-10-07
  Comic books superheroes are basically fascist vigilantes, with Superman and his dedication to truth, justice and the American way being the exception that proves the rule. Both "Watchmen" and "The Dark Knight Returns," the two greatest examples of graphic storytelling, deal explicitly with the underlying fear the ordinary citizenry have of the demi-gods they worship. The one inherent advantage that "Watchman" has over Frank Miller's classic tale is that it requires no knowledge of the existing mythos of its characters because Dr. Manhattan, Ozymandias, Rorschach, Nite Owl, Silk Spectre, the Comedian and the rest of the former members of the Crimebusters.

  The brainchild of writer Alan Moore ("Swamp Thing," "V for Vendetta," "From Hell") and artist Dave Gibbons ("Rogue Trooper," "Doctor Who," "Green Lantern"), "Watchmen" was originally published by DC Comics in twelve issues in 1986-87. Moore and Gibbons won the Best Writer/Artist combination award at the 1987 Jack Kirby Comics Industry Awards ceremony. The central story in "Watchmen" is quite simple: apparently someone is killing off or discrediting the former Crimebusters. The remaining members end up coming together to discover the who and the why behind it all, and the payoff to the mystery is most satisfactory. But what makes "Watchmen" so special is the breadth and depth of both the characters and their respective subplots: Dr. Manhattan dealing with his responsibility to humanity given his god-like powers; Nite Owl having trouble leaving his secret identity behind; Rorschach being examined by a psychiatrist. Each chapter offers a specific focus on one of the characters, yet advances the overall narrative.

  Beyond that the intricate narrative, Moore and Gibbons offer two additional levels to the story. First, each chapter is followed by a "non-comic" section that develops more of the backstories, such as numerous excerpts from Hollis Mason's autobiography "Under the Hood" or Professor Mitlon Glass' "Dr. Manhattan: Super-Powers and the Superpowers," an interview with Adrian Veidt, or reports from the police files of Walter Joseph Kovacs. Second, almost every issue has scenes from "Tales of the Black Freighter," a comic-book being read by a kid near a newsstand, which offers an allegorical perspective on the main plot line.

  "Watchmen" certainly nudged the comics industry in the right direction towards greater sophistication and intelligence, although a full appreciation of its significance is always going to be lost on the bean counters. The Book Club Edition of "Watchmen" offers the teaser: "He's America's ultimate weapon . . . and he's about to desert to Mars." As a representation of the work as a whole that description is simply stupid, especially since it is followed by a glowing recommendation by Harlan Ellison that concludes "anyone who misses this milestone event in the genre of the fantastic is a myopic dope." If you ever spent time reading and enjoying any superhero comic book, you will appreciate what you find in "Watchmen."
  
  

• A deserved classic

  
  By A2YC5Y2ABK0MJZ on 2002-07-03
  If you've ever read anything with the title "Comics aren't just for kids anymore", you've probably heard about Watchmen. So, is it really that good?

  Oh god, yes.

  It's hard to review the collection without resorting to cliches -- and I'll employ one now. It gets better everytime I read it. I see new layers and depth.

  "God exists. And he's an American." Most superhero comics take place in a world almost the same as our own. But surely, people running around in tights, people with god-like powers would make an impact. In Watchmen, they do. America won Vietnam -- thanks to a god-like hero. Electric cars exist. Classic comic books got cancelled when the real superheroes came along. Oh, and Richard Nixon is still president into the 1980s. (Too bad about those dead reporters, isn't it?)
  This is series a big ideas, human characters and personal moments. It looks at retired heroes (thanks to 1970s anti-superhero legislation) who investigate the death of one of their own. The book also features flashbacks, autobiography excerpts, comic book interludes and more.

  Truly engrossing writing by Alan Moore and art by Dave Gibbons.
  Oh, and comics aren't just for kids anymore. (g)
  
  

• P E R F E C T !

  
  By A1AS6GSKDJALE6 on 2005-10-08
  I first read Watchmen issue by issue when it came out back in the mid 80s. In the past 20 years, I have read it more times than I can count and have purchased the trade paperback numerous times. I have lent it out, given it as a gift, and just plain worn it out.
  
  So why buy the Absolute Edition?
  
  Because it is the most gorgeous presentation of the story to date. First off, it's BIG. This edition reminds me of the sheer pleasure I once had as a kid reading oversized editions. Remember the giant-sized reprints of first editions or that humongous "Superman vs. Spider-Man?" It isn't quite that big and unwieldy, but it's big and Dave Gibbons' beautiful artwork and genious panel to panel drama is so much more enjoyable in this format. The panel backgrounds, as any fan knows, are filled with clues and details that are richer than has ever been done before or since in the medium. The backgrounds are so much more enjoyable at this size.
  
  But the real star of this new edition is the amazing John Higgins. John Higgins is the colorist. The comic book medium has always placed the most limitations on the colorist who has had to deal with the realities of the printing process, sacrificing in every panel, trying to make dramatic and reproducible choices.
  
  With this edition, Higgins has been able to do what was not possible when the original series was presented. The colors here are absolutely beautiful to behold. The original color schemes and the drama they invoked are here, but far smoother and more intense.
  
  One of the most popular aspects of the story is the internal comic drama "Tales of the Black Freighter," a pirate comic that comments on the larger story. John Higgins colors these panels in the old school process of the golden age, using those old printing limitations to his advantage and making the Black Freighter panels a nostalgic delight while advancing the story in a new way. Bravo, Mr. Higgins! You have proven your worth and demonstrated why Watchmen is a graphic novel by Alan Moore, Dave Gibbons, and John Higgins. It was a delight to see your name on the spine where it has belonged all along.
  
  This Absolute Edition of Watchmen is the most glorious version of this brilliant work. This is the ultimate proof that sequential art stories can be legitimate literature.
  
  The book also offers wonderful material illustrating the fleshing out of the story all those years ago and how the storytellers began with the old Charleton characters only to evolve them into new characters with more depth and dimension than their inspirations.
  
  There are also several pages of script. Anyone who has ever seen a comic book script will be amazed by the density of Alan Moore describing a single panel. One feels like quite the insider to read these pages. Each panel description reads as if an impossibly picky art collector were writing a detailed letter to Dave Gibbons to commission a painting and told him everything he wanted in a great empassioned gush. And Mr. Gibbons delivered time after time, giving far more than even Moore had asked. Wow! This is how it's done, ladies and gentlemen.
  
  This is the greatest version of the greatest story ever told in the history of this beautiful, yet underrated medium. A must for any collector. A must for any lover of great art. A must for any lover of great storytelling.
  
  

• simply about this edition

  
  By A1869ZGF3M9W8V on 2005-10-14
  If you don't already know, the other reviews will fill you in on the Watchmen's story and it's significance to the comic medium. I'm here to tell you about this edition of the book, which is basically an oversized version of the long out of print Graphitti Designs hardcover version complete with all of that edition's exclusive extras (which is fantastic since that out of print volume goes for major bucks on Ebay when it does rarely surface). Until now, that Graphitti Designs edition was the one to own...This tops it due to it's oversized pages and superior quality printing.
  
  Want to see how this story was originally about about Captain Atom, Blue Beetle, and the Question (along with other Charlton characters) and how it changed to what it is? There is a very indepth look at the original proposal included here.
  
  Want to see early Gibbon's art? it's here. How about rarely seen teaser strips published long before the first issue? Again included. Alan Moore's script samples? You got it.
  
  Bottom line, I can't think of anything that could possibly be done or included that would make a superior edition to this.
  
  

• Love, love will tear Us apart, Again

  
  By A2HII4U9WQ0XUV on 2005-10-01
  "Whoever fights Monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a Monster."---Friedrich Nietzsche
  
  "Quis Custodiet ipsos Custodes?"---Ancient Roman phrase, translates to "Who Watches the Watchmen?"
  
  Hobbes, centuries ago, wrote that a life lived among Men "in the State of Nature is nasty, brutish, and short".
  
  Hobbes was optimistic.
  
  Man is a beast, born red in tooth and claw in the bosom of blood-soaked Nature, and as a beast he is bound to slaughter his fellow. In the forest primeval, that meant with teeth and claws; then spear and sword, catapult and blackpowder rifle.
  
  And so we tread fearfully upon the stage of the Present: the Curtain is raised, the stagelights turned up, the audience restless, shifting and murming and coughing out in the Dark. The first act of this play---"Watchmen"---will literally be a highdive to the pavement, performed, most appropriately, by a player known as The Comedian.
  
  It's a real showstopper.
  
  It is the Present: October 12th, 1985. Nixon is still in the White House, a white-hot popular four-termer and still as paranoid crazy as a hungry sewer rat; Man is still red in tooth and claw. And he still hungers for the blood of his fellow; but this time, he fights with nuclear-tipped ICBMs. The Doomsday clock stands at 5 to Midnight, and the Hour is far later than we think.
  
  At its core, it is a very simple tale, as the best tales usually are: it is a murder mystery.
  
  The calculating subversive brilliance of Alan Moore's legendary "Watchmen" is that it takes the notion of the superhero---masked avenger of Justice and the American Way---and inverts it.
  
  Case in point here: what is the use of a costumed crime-fighter, dedicated to protecting Man against thugs and robbers and supervillains, when Mankind itself is on the chopping block? What's the good of a cape, a mask, and a stealthy Owlship---or all the money and acumen in the world---when the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are about to ride out, led by nuclear missiles arcing up over the poles?
  
  And to make things a little stranger: why now, after all these years, and when Humanity is on the verge of extinction, is someone murdering the old crimefighters?
  
  And so we begin, with an entry from Rorschach's diary as that most troubled and cannily paranoid of crimefighters puzzles his way into he mystery of who would have beaten the life out of the Comedian, then flung him through his plate glass apartment window to do a belly flop on the hardtop hundreds of feet below. That thread weaves its way through the lives of Watchmen's heroes, old and new, flitting back and forth between the seemingly more innocent Golden Age and back again into the Darker present.
  
  And maybe that's why "Watchmen" serves up such a shock: it delivers us into a mythology and a world already created. There is a backstory here, just as established and confident by its lights as that of Batman, Superman, or Spider-Man, yet seamier, more rueful, more flawed. Infinitely human.
  
  Initially we are on the outside looking in: into a world where the elderly crimefighters and their young successors have lost their government sanction and move into early retirement, where the brutal, anarchic knot-tops rule the streets while pundits chatter nervously about Nuclear Brinksmanship, a twilight world of regret and loss and nostalgia, where the old Night-Owl rents a pre-war apartment over his auto-garage while his former arch-nemesis Moloch the Magician rots from cancer a few blocks away.
  
  We don't stay outside long. Moore is a genius when it comes to pacing: we arc in deep and long on Watchmen's central characters as they come to terms with their own demons and the central mystery of the story. Rorschach, mind whirling behind its living mask; the new Night-Owl Dan Dreiberg, awash in a paunchy middle-age but compelled by events to something more.
  
  Or Laurie Juspeczyk, the new Silk Spectre, increasingly unhappy with her lover Dr. Manhattan (less human by the day and reeling from a vicious PR attack) and fearful of turning into her vain and lonely mother. And finally Adrian Veidt, the vaunted superhero Ozymandias and now globe-trotting billionaire and business tycoon, the "smartest man in the world".
  
  "Watchmen" is a wry concoction of its times, insanely idiosyncratic, though it is not hard to imagine it conjured up today in our own troubled age: there is the looming threat of nuclear annihilation, mankind poised on the brink of apocalypse, menaced by the two tribes of the USA and the USSR, each on the verge.
  
  There is the notion of superhero as plaything of his times, with the exception of the 'freak' Doctor Manhattan, girded for war by an eager Pentagon, more superweapon than superhero.
  
  And there is the omnipresent question central to those who man the lonely ramparts of civilization against savagery, illustrated by the juxtaposition of the pulpily gory "Tales of the Black Freighter", with its desperate, inventive, deeply moral hero transformed into a beast by the hellscape through which he must venture to save his imperiled family---an echo of the "Quis Custodiet" implied by the title.
  
  This is rich, heady, deliciously vorpal stuff, beautifully mounted with rich trappings and sumptuous depth of plot and character. Though I guessed the author behind the mystery early on---it's really a question of asking 'who gains?'---the question Moore is fascinated with---that of, what will save us from ourselves?---and the answer he comes up with, and the means by which he illustrates this little dilemma, are so mesmerizing, so gorgeous, such a feast of malice and high adventure and nostalgia and regret, that "Watchmen" deserves its rightful place in the pantheon of great art.
  
  JSG
  
  
• Sagging Under the Burden of Time
  By A2HXBU3EI0MZH1 on 2002-12-22
  Yes, I know I'm going to get a lot of "unhelpfuls" for the two stars.

  I feel it's important to bring Watchmen up from more of a recent viewpoint, though. Many of the people who gave it five stars either read it 20 years ago and have let it accumulate a rosy glow ever since, or else simply aren't familiar with the state of modern comics.
  I spent the first ten years of my life reading hundreds or thousands of comics (and books too, thank you very much), and there's little about Watchmen that distinguishes it from the current crop. The art is subpar, the cliches glaring, and the "mature humor" nearly as subtle as Roseanne. The integration of contemporary issues such as nuclear tension and sexism lends it more weight as a snapshot of an age without actually contributing to its longevity.
  The attempts at sophistication- the subcomic "Tales of the Black Freighter", the repetitive wordplay- fail miserably, and do more to make the book an embarassing showcase of pretension than comic innovation. As my father is fond of saying, "If you can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bulls**t."
  If you're a comic fan, Watchmen is a harmless waste of a few hours. If you want a real introduction to the comic medium, though, stick to Maus or Hepcats.
  
  

• Nauseatingly overrated
  By A2WX2X4QNQQCT on 2001-02-11
  Let me just start by saying that I think I can appreciate why this book was so groundbreaking when it came out in the mid-eighties: the innovative moral ambiguity of its heroes, the epic scope, the highbrow epigraphs (Ooo, Nietzsche! Dylan! This must be some of that real art!), the looming menace of nuclear apocalypse endowing the story with a sort of anxious fever-dream quality, and so on. But I have to admit that I found it a singularly annoying read in 2001. I think Alan Moore's most irritating and overused device throughout this series is the heavyhanded juxtaposition between caption and image. If your idea of great and subtle artistry is one homicide detective saying to another, "Well, what say we let this one drop out of sight?" in a panel depicting a flashback of a murder victim plunging to his death, this book is for you--there is panel after panel of this sort of obvious layering straining for cleverness. But if you're someone who gets annoyed at having your face repeatedly rubbed into the writer's overwrought stabs at significance, look elsewhere. The melodramatic plot was interesting enough that I made it all the way through, but I have to say I'm happy it's over. Check out "From Hell" for a more mature example of Moore's work.
  
  
• Corny, melodramatic writing
  By A1ON2VSNDAVCNS on 2004-11-18
  Moore's original burst of inspiration was to take a form of children's literature - the super-hero comic book - and fuse it with the Hemingway-derived melodrama of the hard-boiled school of crime and detective fiction. Teenagers, poorly-read and possessing malnourished tastes in prose, were predictably awestruck by the results. They thought it was 'realistic'; they thought this was 'great literature'.
  
  
• Truly Great, But Missed Opportunity with the New Coloring
  By A3LP89QQSS5IXZ on 2005-10-20
  This review should be helpful to anyone interested in purchasing a copy of this book, but it's mostly intended for those who already have a copy of Watchmen who are deciding whether to purchase this newest edition as well. I know a review like this would have been helpful to me when making my decision whether or not to buy, considering I already had two copies of the previous edition. If you don't have a copy of Watchmen already, all you really need to know is that you should get a copy, and this is the best version available.
  
  As to the book itself, Watchmen is one of the best stories/mysteries/character studies I've ever read. It's been considered a classic for years, has won tremendous aclaim, was recently selected by Time Magazine as one of the one hundred best novels of the past one hundred years, and is very well illustrated. There's no question that Watchman is a book that deserves five stars, and I recommend it to everyone who hasn't read it yet. This volume is also the best edition released to date, so if you don't have a previous volume and you have the funds, you can't go wrong getting this.
  
  That said, I must admit I was expecting much more from the new coloring that I kept hearing and reading about (Wizard magazine and various websites had articles about how the whole book was being recolored, and the insert attached to the slipcase also mentions that the whole book has been digitally recolored.) The book originally came out several years ago when coloring in comics was much more restricted, and while the coloring in Watchman was done very well for it's time, coloring in general has come a long way and has improved greatly since. The coloring in modern comics uses gradients to add depth and shadows, uses light sourcing for the same, has a much larger pallete of colors that can blend smoothly one into the other, and uses computers to essentially add special effects to the page. The result (when combined with good line art) is much more realistic, believable, solid, three dimensional worlds. The coloring now a days can really add depth and nuance. Some prime examples would be books like Phoenix Endsong, Green Lantern Rebirth, Absolute Batman Hush, or Absolute Panetary, but pretty much every monthly comic today benefits from improved coloring.
  
  Each time I read that Watchmen was being completely recolored, I couldn't wait to see how great the world was going to look, so when I finally got my copy and opened it up, I must admit to being quite a bit dissapointed. At first the coloring looked exactly the same to me as it always had, and very dated -- it didn't look any where on the level of most modern comics. I actually had to go and get one of my two trade paperback versions of Watchman to compare the coloring to assure myself the coloring had in fact been updated in the new version. In a side by side (quick) comparison it was obvious that the new coloring was crisper, more controlled, and did have a few more details added, but it was far more true to it's original, dated coloring than to modern coloring. When I opened the book I expected to see a new realism and depth, I expected Doctor Manhatten to practically glow like the power of the Green Lanterns in Green Lantern Rebirth (which is colored so well it really does look like a special effect.) I expected to see a Rorschach like the one Wizard had in it's article about the new edition and the new coloring -- that Rorshach was colored as if he were a fully three dimensional figure in a world with a fixed light source, with shadows and gradients and depth -- he looked real. By not coloring this book to the full extent of modern capabilities, I think DC really missed an opportunity. I absolutely love Watchmen, so I don't mean to harp, but the new coloring isn't on a level with the coloring in most monthly books being released right now -- certainly not on a level with monthy books like New Avengers, Infinite Crisis, etc. It isn't bad, and it is better than the original, but it isn't nearly what modern coloring can be -- and if DC was going to go through the trouble of recoloring the book, then advertise the fact that the book had been recolored (which was one of my big incentives for getting this version since I already had two copies of the original version,) then why not do the coloring to the best of modern abilities, which they definitely did not do.
  
  Anyway, this book still gets five stars easy. It's heroic, tragic, touching, suspenseful, very well illustrated, and truly thought provoking. Some of the other reviews have really broken down why people should read this better than I ever could, so I won't even try, but again I do recomend it highly to everyone, and this very nice version is the best version available. If you don't already have a copy, you can't go wrong with this. If you do already have a copy (I had two paperbacks) it's probably still worth it for the extras, the nice hardcover, and the somewhat improved coloring. Like I said, it is the best version available. But if you already have a copy and you're only interested in getting this new one for the promise of the new coloring, you might want to see if you can find a copy you can look through before you make a purchase.
  
  
  
• Graphic literature at its best
  By A1LVZOK9F7K4CN on 2001-09-19
  I'd written in my review of Marvels that it was my favorite graphic novel of all time...I guess I hadn't read enough graphic novels. The Watchmen is easily as good as Marvels, The Dark Knight Returns, or what have you. This is a super-hero epic designed for adults who have a serious interest as comic books as an art form. The term "graphic novel" is sometimes misapplied to over-blown comic books...that is not the case here. Alan Moore is a great writer (arguably the best in the field) and, in The Watchmen, he has created a story of great depth, scope, and meaning. I have discovered internet sites dedicated to pointing out the hidden subtexts and motifs of this book...they are not reading too much into it. The task Moore sets for himself (as he often does) is to ask the question, "What would the world be like if super-heroes really existed?" That question is more far-reaching than the average comic book implies. The plot unfolds, not in a comic book way, but the way it might really happen. The ending is completely original and totally unexpected.

  On a personal note, this book will forever be entwined in my mind with the events of September 11, 2001. Some of the issues in the book cut a little too close to home. But for me specifically, I'll remember staying up late the night before reading this book, and then being awakened by my roommates early the next morning to the scene of the World Trade Center in flames...and thinking that I'd read the comic for too long. Things this terrible don't happen in the real world, only in comic books...right?
  
  

• "I leave it entirely in your hands."
  By A3NXFFS4L2J6U1 on 2003-09-15
  This is one of the greatest books to come out of the last half of the century. For those who don't know, Watchmen is a fairly postmodern take on the idea of the super hero, incorporating him into Cold War politics and involving literal super powers in the arms race. Which is not to say that this is some kind of Tom Clancyish techno-thriller; far from it. The book is an intense, character-driven drama about the little people who put on the costumes and how they face the horrors that the world leaves at their doorsteps. It's great, sweeping, human epic stuff, one part political thriller, one part whodunit, three parts character study, and I'd recommend it to nearly anyone. The story starts with the murder of an old costume hero, and his former comrades, long since retired, who may be next on the murderer's list.

  The writing: Moore's writing transcends the limitations on the medium and pushes it into a strange, beautiful, multi-faceted territory where the complexity of the characters' motivations put the reader in the same kind of "moral checkmate" that plagues the protagonists at the end of the book. The parallel structure of the book's multiple overlapping plotlines is remeniscent of Thomas Pynchon or J.G. Ballard, and the sureness and consistency of his style keep the story flowing. Since the plot is so complex, Moore reveals it in pieces by setting up individual chapters as studies for the individual characters, with key events seen from their unique perspectives. As their different experiences of the same events yield more clues to the book's initial mystery, Moore uncovers something larger about the characters themselves, and maybe even people in general.

  The artwork: Dave Gibbons's stated philosophy is that the art should get in the way of story as little as possible, and it's a philosophy which is clearly visible here. Gibbons avoids obviously flashy layouts and silly-looking splash panels and merely tells the story. There are no full-page panels until the final chapter of the book, which is extremely appropriate and helps the story and art blend into a single, unique creature. His renderings are clean and balanced, and his anatomy is perfect. The art is barely noticable the first time through, but it grows on you like fungus.

  Overall: If there were ten stars on this list, this book would get them all. It's a fantastic reading experience and a great introduction to a form that most people don't think twice about. Try it out, and if you like it, try From Hell and A Small Killing.
  
  

• Why?
  By A2AJT8PWAV22LC on 2005-11-08
  I like Alan Moore. League of Extraordinary Gentlemen? Awesome! Top 10? Great stuf! Watchmen? Blah!
  
  Esoteric and artificially deep. I could not finish it. I did not care about the characters at all. Who cares! Oh boo hoo I am a brooding super hero. Feel my pain?
  
  Don't waste your time.
  
  
  
  
• Quite disappointed.
  By A224GH5Q9OT80O on 2004-01-16
  I was quite disappointed with Watchmen. I had heard so many great things about it and was expecting a memorable read. Now that I have read it I'm left with a feeling of "What was the big deal?". The story was incredibly average. The art was mediocre at best. Alan Moore's writing is eloquent but an eloquently written boring story is still boring. I was expecting a lot more.

  Three GREAT examples of graphic novels at their best are: Kingdom Come by Alex Ross, the Rising Stars series by J.Michael Straczynski, and The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller.
  
  

• OTBE
  By A3ICDLUQ3V2QY2 on 2004-05-17
  Science fiction is a chancy field to write in. You speculate on how things are going to develop in the near future, and you gamble on factors beyond comprehension. And sometimes your story is OTBE--OverTaken By Events. That's exactly what happened to this deserved classic. And now it's become old hat.

  When it was new, it provided a new view of costumed superheroes. With their reliance on law and order, but their willingness to disregard the legitimate establishment in pursuit of their goals, they are deeply conflicted people. But Superman and Spider-Man had disregarded this reality up to that point. Alan Moore was the first person to investigate the flawed identities of comic-book heroes in light of how human beings relate in the real world.

  Superheroes are seen as rapists, serial killers, men and women with vendettas. Or they're would-be actors looking to boost their profile. Old grudges and doubts fester under the surface for decades, unable to find release and healing. They suffer sexual dysfunction which affects their crime-fighting techniques. And their defense of the old order against reformers and non-conformists leads to the stifling of honest forward growth.

  Now that Wolverine and Wonder Woman have to deal with existential dramas growing out of their vocations, this attitude isn't groundbreaking. A reader coming to this story from contemporary comic books will find the points, which had to be examined in detail when they were new and revolutionary, to be belabored now that they're commonplace.

  There is supplementary prose material at the back of each chapter. Some of this is interesting, such as the attempted overview of the history of organized superhero behavior. Others, such as the lengthy history of comic books (supplementing a rather ho-hum pirate comic subplot), are easy to skip.

  This comic series was groundbreaking when it came out, and it's worth reading for that. If you want to know how comics shifted from the flat-colored hero worship of the past to the dark, conflicted material of today, this is the turning point. No other work has been as influential in the art of comics. But if you're looking for timeless art or new insights into human nature, this book is no longer your starting point.
  
  

• "...a multilayered epic sporting a fantastic script..."
  By on 2002-07-12
  I just recently got into graphic novels, but so far have read books from the SANDMAN series, The MAUS books, and of course, THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS. Needless to say, I've been sucked into the genre by these amazing stories, and I'm simply going down the list of highly acclaimed cult classics. Of course, when I got to WATCHMEN, I was skeptical. I'd heard of Batman and Sandman, but who the Watchmen? Sounded kind of obscure, and fraknly, a bit phony. Of course, after reading countless positive reviews claiming this book to be one of the absolute best in the history of comic literature, I had to pick it up. Right off the bat, I could tell there was something special about this one, which maybe wasn't so noticeable in the others I'd read.

  The story starts out simple enough, with the murder of a "superhero," called The Comedian. He was evidently a member of a team, but only one of his former comrades, Rorschach seems to care about his death in the slightest. The others all remember him as a bad, immoral man, and therefore, a terrible hero. At first, you'll be wondering why the others don't grieve for him as Rorschach does, but as you see what foul deeds he committed, you'll start arguing the other way. Why is it that Rorschach is scouring the streets, searching for clues as to who may have killed The Comedian? Why is Rorschach the only one who cares about the ex-superhero's falling?

  In this book, much like in THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS, superheroes are not seen simply as idols and virtual gods through the eyes of the public. They're seen as a rebellious vigilante who disregard the police and take matters into their own hands. This is the story of an alternate 1985 where the world is rapidly turning into a hell which humans are creating for themselves, where superheroes struggling for internal-order are hated and ridiculed for their valiant actions. The superheroes themselves aren't all that important here--they simply represent the steriotypical masked figures in tights; a group of "normal" citizens fighting to change matters which may very well be out of their control. Alan Moore masterfully creates a multilayered epic sporting a fantastic script, filled with controversial dialogue and an interesting plot which changes the way people think about superheroes and comic books in general.

  Rorschach's search for truth, along with the reader's search for explanation is explored through a series of flashbacks, side-stories and subplots. The 417 page graphic novel is split into 12 chapters, each with little tidbits in-between, providing some interesting background information on the characters. WATCHMEN is kind of a mini-series of comic-books, and was entirely original. The characters had never appeared in any other comic before, and never appeared in another again. When compared to THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS, I say that WATCHMEN is slightly superior. While THE DARK KNIGHT was an exciting and moving tale of Batman's aging and eventual returning to the superhero life, where he was needed most, it was very short (about half the length of WATCHMEN) and left open ends, which were covered in some not-as-good sequels. WATCHMEN is simply a great solo-story which requires no background information or further reading, and boasts a strong, recurring theme: "Who watches the watchmen?" Compared to other graphic novels, ranging mainly from 100-200 pages, WATCHMEN is significantly longer, not only giving you more of a bang for your buck, but increasing the amount of pleasure you'll experience from reading this book.

  My only real gripe about this book is to do with the art. Don't get me wrong--It's amazing stuff, filled with vivid colors that you wouldn't expect to see in such a dark story--but the action sequences leave something to be desired. Compared to THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS, filled with tons of cool blurs, lines and other cinematic goodies you'd expect to make a comic book feel more animated, WATCHMEN is severely lacking in that department. If you try to see the book as a cartoon, like many of us do, it will look like a poorly animated one. Or, simply a series of stills, which is what a comic book is, but almost all comics successfully create the illusion of animation and movement within their pages. Nevertheless, the art is still amazing to look at, it will just require more imagination to see the characters moving.

  If I were you, I wouldn't read any other reviews or check any futher into this great graphic novel. If you do, you might back out, thinking that it sounds too corny or not your type of book. Some people are turned off by the whole superhero idea, but Watchmen basically handles it in the most intimate and unconventional manner, bringing a whole new light to those imaginary masked-defenders of the Earth. If you enjoyed THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS, this should be right up your alley, delivering more of what the former excelled in. If you aren't into comic books, then you should probably just head over to your nearest book store and read the first 10 pages or whatever. Chances are, you'll find that you love this and then you can buy it on the spot.
  
  

• Wow, It Really is THAT Good...
  By A3OI841P5R6FCH on 2003-02-15
  Although I've been a comic-shop hanger-onner for a number of years now, it was only recently that I finally decided to take a look at Watchmen™. Part of the reason I put off checking it out was due to my disappointment in another comic series that is often hailed by many as the "hallmark" of the four-color format alongside Watchmen™: Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns © series. If I didn't consider Dark Knight all that impressive, my biased and jaded sensibilities told me, why should Watchmen™ be any better? Another off-putting factor was the pompous statements from more than a few pretentious comic geeks about how Watchmen™ "requires multiple readings for one to really understand all the nuances and hidden meanings in the story." Whenever I hear something like this, I usually blow it off as the ramblings of intellectual wannabes who try to make their favorite reading material seem more profound than it actually is. That, and they're likely suffering from attention-deficit disorder to boot. But finally the time came when I could relax and give this bad-boy a read, and see if it could rise above my less-than-stellar expectations...

  My first run-through put to bed any comparisons I would've made between Watchmen™ and Mr. Miller's Batman™ tale, `cuz there really is no comparison-the former funnybook is far more enjoyable than the latter! It was one of the few TPBs longer than eight issues that I've ever read from cover to cover in one sitting! As for that whole "requires a second reading" deal: I'll be dipped if the people making such statements aren't right on the money! I went through Watchmen™ a second time, and picked up on all sorts'a stuff I hadn't paid attention to the first time `round! Of course, having already read it once, it's easier to follow the second time through, which in turn makes it easier to sift through the subtle foreshadowing events, flashbacks, backstory, and subplots. So maybe those "intellectual-wannabes" are on to something after all! Or maybe I'M the one with A.D.D., who knows. All I know is, every time I give Watchmen™ a read, I'm unbelievably obsessed with finding out every little snippet of `hidden meanings' and `subtle nuances'... it's become a sickness with me. I find myself trying to come to grips with the book's alternate-reality setting (Nixon serving his fifth term as prez in 1985; the U.S. won the Vietnam War; electric-powered cars are the standard mode of transportation; etc.). I become fixated on seeing the foreshadowing elements contained in the end-of-chapter articles "written by" or related to the book's characters. I try to get into the minds of the core characters and make efforts to understand what motivates them, especially Rorschach's cold, mentally-unbalanced and uncompromising approach to solving crime, and the nigh-godlike Dr. Manhattan's gradual severance from his human side. To make a long story short, I read and processed Watchmen™ in a way that I'd never done with any other four-color tale (or any other form of literature for that matter), and found it to be an unusual and enlightening experience. Yeah, enlightenment from a comic book... who'da thunk it?

  All right, time for me to top this all off with my assessment of the recurring face-with-blood-covering-the-right-eye dealie. I'm aware that there's been some discussion regarding the symbolism of this image-- what it means, why it keeps popping up the way it does, and so forth. After processing all the info and other peoples' thoughts about it, I finally arrived at my own conclusion: there is no actual significance to the `stained face'- Moore & Gibbons intentionally placed this `sign' in various parts of the book to make people believe there's some deeper meaning behind it when there really isn't any at all. Simply put, they're goofing on the readers, testing them to see if they, like the late Comedian™, "get" the gag. It's sortuva Andy Kaufman kinda thing, you know? Hey, wait a minute... dear lord, I'm startin' to sound like one of those stereotypical pompous academic types who deconstruct every piece of literature they read to show everybody how scary-intellectual they are, aren't I? Never thought I'd see the day when something like that would happen! But I suppose there's a first time for everything...

  `Late
  
  

• Didn't expect to like it, but it deserves its reputation
  By AAUXV0AZVGLIA on 2004-03-09
  Having long heard Watchmen's praises, I resisted reading it because I dislike the late 80's and 90's ultraviolent comics, and I assumed Watchmen to be the quintessential comic of this type. I've finally read it, and I was wrong. It deserves its reputation. Violence serves theme and plot without being exploitative.

  SPOILER: I'll discuss the story's ending. I'll also compare Watchmen to other works, such as Kingdom Come.

  I think Watchmen is basically a condemnation of ubermensch theory (Nietzsche's idea that "supermen" are entitled to violate society's moral laws, imposing their will on those "inferior" to themselves. Hitler infamously used the theory to justify Nazism. I concede I am no expert on Nietzsche.), and an accusation that superhero stories endorse this philosophy by lionizing vigilantes. Watchmen also attacks the genre's simplistic good vs. evil morality.

  Only one character has "superpowers" to justify claims of superiority, yet Dr. Manhattan takes too little interest in human affairs to want to control others. On the contrary, he lets himself be used as a tool, hoping to retain his humanity by pleasing people. Yet he's now too detached to morally judge his orders, becoming a living military weapon. Apparently, desire for power over others is for mortals living among mortals--like Ozymandias, the archetypal Aryan "superman": a blonde, blue-eyed, physically perfect, supremely brilliant, self-made billionaire.

  Achieving peace through slaughter, Ozymandias, like his hero Alexander, embodies Nietzsche's belief that ends justify means. If paradise is attainable through atrocities, as Nazi and Soviet propaganda claimed, is it worth it? And, once the eggs are broken, should one reap the benefits of the sin? (I ask this sitting comfortably in California, stolen first from Native Americans, then from Mexico.)

  Rorschach--Watchmen's brutal, uncompromising conscience--says no, and his journal seems to give him the last word. Yet Rorschach tortures for information, sometimes needlessly. Besides, his winning may mean Armageddon.

  In keeping with a thought experiment in Nietzsche's worldview, Watchmen's universe is an apparently godless one, as stated by several characters. Crime and Punishment's Raskolnikov justifies murder through Neitzschean arguments, but then feels remorse and, through this reluctant acceptance of higher morality, comes to believe in God. C.S. Lewis's arguments in favor of God's existence hinge on morality's independence of human preference. Watchmen's ending is too ambiguous for any divinely transcendent morality or providence to be clear to the characters or reader. As a Christian, I acknowledge the realism of this ambiguity, for even assuming that God exists and His will constitutes absolute morality, His moral intent is rarely as discernable in real life as in melodramas (the classic example of divine inscrutibility being Job's sufferings in the Bible). As Hollis Mason says in chapter 3, "Real life is messy, inconsistent, and it's seldom when anything really gets resolved."

  I like Watchmen--but fear I now better understand why the genre degenerated following its publication. It's a damning attack on superheroes, yet publishers couldn't stop printing their bread and butter, so self-indictment pervaded superhero books of the following years as they struggled with Moore's accusations. Also, as Neil Gaiman observes in his introduction to Busiek's "Astro City: Confessions," the easiest "riff" of both Watchmen and Miller's "Dark Knight Returns" for hacks to steal was darkness, not depth.

  There are other reasons for the so-called "Iron Age's" violent nihilism besides Watchmen and DKR's influence. Such trends were already growing in early 80's comics. DC had ravaged almost its entire stock of characters in 1985's "Crisis on Infinite Earths." There was also the need to satisfy reader bloodlust once the maligned Comics Code, for better or for worse, became a rubber stamp. Universally recognized characters synonymous with virtue in the public imagination became brutal, wrathful, petty--and if heroes became jerks, villains became the most lurid sadists imaginable. This culminated in the near-plotless splatterpunk and exploitative sadism of the early Image Comics. "Good vs. evil" became "merely evil vs. nauseatingly evil." Moore expressed dismay that things took the direction they did in those years.

  Watchmen's theme is: if Nietzsche were right, as superhero comics claim, that would be terrible. It took a decade for superhero writers to rebut this accusation. Their answer came in Waid and Ross's "Kingdom Come" and was: We never claimed Nietzsche was right--the essence of superheroes is that the stronger someone is, the LESS excuse he has to abuse the weak, and the greater his obligation to them. (As Stan Lee wrote years earlier: "With great power there must also come--great responsibility!" Or, as Moore himself has Superman say in Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?, "Nobody has the right to kill... not [even] Superman. Especially not Superman!") KC portrays a higher morality--indeed, a God-given one, delivered through the mortal Norman McCay. Perhaps it requires divine perspective to see that an ant who can shatter mountains is no better or worse than his fellow ants. Unlike Watchmen, but like most superhero comics, most of KC's characters have "powers"--flight, invulnerability, etc.--differentiating them from general humanity in a way that even bullet-catching Ozymandias is not. Yet they're not blessed/burdened with near godhood like Dr. Manhattan (staggeringly powerful even by superhero standards, Manhattan perceives all moments simultaneously, and creates and destroys life at will. He has no common reference with humans.). Powerful, yet mortal, they have no more free license to sin than anyone. Probably less. KC portrays a world which needs to relearn this, just as the comics industry needed to relearn it. (One shortcoming: unlike Watchmen, KC isn't self-contained. It assumes reader familiarity with Superman, Batman, etc. and with ultraviolent comics. )

  KC and Watchmen bookend the Iron Age. Watchmen unintentionally (I say unintentionally because Moore apparently laments the fact) helped begin it, and KC helped end it.

  Yet despite spawning these trends, Watchmen itself is breathtaking, complex literature which takes masterful advantage of comics' visual medium.

  Warning: This is not an acceptable comic for children. An R-rated story with lots of sex and violence, Watchmen is a story for grown-ups.
  
  

• Higly Overrated
  By A3736ZI5T0P6GH on 2003-12-15
  Okay, first of all, I'm not a huge fan of superhero comics. I do however like comics that have a certain depth to it, so when I read al the praizing i became interested. This one was supposed to be different. It supposed to be more than just a comic, more than just a bunch of superheroes.
  It starts of okay, but pretty soon I had to admit i wasn't all that impressed. Actually, I found it all a bit tedious. The wrtinig became less and less impressive, the story less and less challanging and by the time I was at the middle of the book, I was totally bored.
  There are people around who insist on comparing this stuff to great works of literature. I wonder if they ever read any.
  
  
• The Comedian is Dead, but not Forgotten
  By A307LZV1TBCJJO on 2002-05-06
  Long before "Kingdom Come" meditated on a world without heroes, around the same time as Frank Miller's "Dark Knight" returned, and executed more forcefully than the "X-Men"'s story of Sentinels and Mutant Registration Acts, Alan Moore & company asked "Who watches the Watchmen?"

  Set in a world where heroes and vigilante justice have run their course, and the last era of superheroes are living out their days quietly with their own ghosts, "Watchmen" is an amazing piece of literature and comic book artistry. The series itself, twelve issues now commonly packaged in one booklet, is sprung from the golden age of graphic novels - the 1980's, where graphic novels told stories and presented images where normal comics, movies, and televison shows feared to tread. Perhaps most importantly, the themes of the story ring as true today as they did then, and the emotionally-invested reader will perhaps see themselves in the everyday characters talking sports and entertainment as the newspaper headlines blare klaxons of war and pending doom. Society entrusts its safety to a greater body politic, but who watches the watchmen and what is the price paid for handing over the responsibilities of self-defense and indulging in a comfortable apathy?

  These are the driving themes behind "Watchmen", a graphic novel so stunningly well-written and well-drawn that I do not hesitate to recommend it to even the most ardant skeptics who look upon comics with disdain, never thinking to read anything remotely associated with them. "Watchmen" represents the perfect synergy between the use of pictures, the potency of the written word, and the sublime power of symolism that drives artists wielding either brush or pen to record their art permanently on canvas or paper. A worthy investment that stands tall amongst the great literary works of the latter part of the 20th century.
  
  

• Bad Dialog, Empty Characters and Terrible Artwork make a Potentially Amazing Plot Inaccessible
  By A2C2W6BC0GUER3 on 2007-05-04
  *Disclaimer: I only read a small portion of this graphic novel*
  
  Since I'm hating on a widely acclaimed graphic novel, I feel like I first need to give some taste credentials. Sandman was awesome, Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men is a trip and Moonshadow was phenomenal. For a graphic novel to be good, it should have a good story, good art, good characters, witty dialog, and humor. I'm willing to believe that the story behind the Watchman is amazing because why else would people like it so much, but everything else is just terrible.
  
  The artwork is gross and uninteresting, the characters, at least in the first 60 pages, are completely boring, uninteresting and hollow. And there's not a moment of comic relief. Here are some minor, but representative examples to support my claims.
  
  The dialog and characters are completely inane. The novel begins with the death of "The Comedian," and old super hero, and we then see the reactions of his former colleagues. Everyone flashes back to days of old and I don't know how many times they made retarded comments like "We'd always thought he'd get the laugh last." It's not even funny in an over the top sort of way, it's just lame. I skipped to the middle to learn a little about the antihero's origins, and you find that he's being analyzed by a psychologist who, we are told by the author, is a really nice guy and one of the best in his field. But he's just dumb. He fully believes the crazy antihero is becoming more sane when he claims to see butterflies and daisies in a Rorschach test. And then, later, the psychologist appears wounded to the core when the antihero makes fun of him and calls him out. How is this at all believable. What kind of psychologist goes through his career never encountering a moment of adversity. It just makes no sense. I know these sound minor, but every page is filled with stupid stuff like this. It's all like the idiotic scene in V for Vendetta, when the main villain is broken because his computer has an affair with V.
  
  I know that it's arrogant and mean to come down hard on a graphic novel so many people know and love without even reading enough to get into the story. But, there are so many glowing reviews of this piece or literature that Alan Moore can deal with a little bit of criticism. The whole story just felt so hollow and empty that it seems pointless to continue reading to find out more.
  
  
• Perfection.
  By AIOA42KV1R8IN on 2000-12-11
  I'm not a long-time fan of comics- I got into the medium when a friend loaned me some _Sandman_ books. So I can't say whether it's true that Watchmen redefined the industry when it came out. I can say that it changed my expectation of what can be done in a comic book.

  Unlike every other superhero book I've read, this one starts from the highly logical premise that it's not *normal* to be a costumed crimefighter. These people must have issues. Then we throw in the stunned reactions of the costumed heros when the first SUPERheroes show up, an interpretation of how they could have changed history, and one of the most morally ambiguous endings ever, and you have one excellent plot.

  There's more than plot to look at, though. The art is quite well done, and the writing is richly textured. Moore obviously had the entire story well planned before he started writing it, as bits at the beginning that seem inconsequential become resonant with the broader themes of the story when the punch line hits issues later. No other comic does so well upon repeated readings.

  Not everyone will like the bleak tone of _Watchmen_, but if you're a fan of comics, you owe it to yourself to read it.
  
  

• A great epic story
  By A3QZCA4LTTVGAD on 2002-08-27
  Is Alan Moore's "Watchmen" the greatest comic book ever written? Quite possibly so. "Watchmen" is a self-contained story that follows two generations of costumed superheroes over several decades of their history (the story spans from the 1930s to the 1980s). Moore's characters are truly unforgettable: the violent Comedian, the Batman-like Nite Owl, the disturbed Rorschach, the dazzling Ozymandias (known as "the world's smartest man"), the sexy female crimefighter known as the Silk Spectre, the godlike Dr. Manhattan, and more. Much of these characters' lives are lived in the shadow of the Cold War and possible nuclear armageddon (a particularly resonant theme for those of us who remember that era).

  Moore's complex story moves back and forth in time, and shifts in perspective among the main characters. As he skillfully deconstructs the concept of the costumed superhero, Moore deals with a host of potentially explosive issues: sexual violence, politics, mental illness, etc. This is very much an adult story.

  One of the book's most intelligent devices is the alternation of the comic book format with excerpts of the story told in other media: a newspaper clipping, personal correspondence, a psychiatric report, chapters from one character's autobiography, etc. This gives the book as a whole a richer texture and a powerful satiric thrust. Along the way Moore also riffs on classic superhero story elements: the origin story, the superhero teamup story, etc.

  The visuals in "Watchmen" are amazing: some scenes are graphically violent and horrific; some magical and hauntingly beautiful. This world is populated with rich, fully developed characters who have complex emotional and moral lives. To sum up, "Watchmen" is a truly epic story that is told with consummate skill and power. It's a book that should, I believe, be read by both comic book fans and by those who don't normally read that medium.
  
  

• An Intelligent and Fun Comic
  By A3LMIQMHFVEI1N on 2003-09-08
  Many people have tried to convince me that the best the comics world has to offer is as good as the best that literature has to offer. I haven't seen it yet. I checked out some of this comic literature, fascinated with the form as I am, to see if this was true. Watchmen (along with the dark knight returns) is the best that the super-hero comic ever gets (so the critics say) and if this is it, then no, it's not equal to literature. The complexity seen in a Joyce novel, or Dostoyevsky, deals with more than Alan Moore has ever done in a single work (and yes I'm including From Hell and A Small Killing, even combined if you like!).
  
  Most of what this comic has to say depends upon your experience with comics in general. If you know the formula behind super-hero comics, understand some comic history (the types of heroes found in older comics of the twentieth century), and what had become of comics by 1985 (when moore was working out this graphic epic), then you will probably enjoy this a great deal. It is a good read, for a super-hero comic.

  The art, however, is weak, even considering the time period. It is functional though and does not take away from the story, the inks do that! Comics of this time period (Dark Knight Returns and before that Ronin), had access to painted panels and were not limited to the old "four colour" format, which is how this is coloured. So the comic looks only mediocre, I guess it's the story that everyone is so keen on.

  The story, on it's own, is pretty good, if a little far reaching.
  What we have here is the world is doomed and only our cynicism can save us. This may be true. We also have a pirate comic in this comic, that very cleverly, tells almost the same story as the central comic. The pirate story imitates arcs that have happened, and that will happen while the story is carrying on outside of this realm. Reasonably clever, for a comic writer. Best of all we have a tough to figure out "whodunnit", in classic pulp form. All these elements tie in together and the final volume of the story closes up all the stories quite nicely, yet I still have problems....why is that?

  If someone had told me that this was the best comic ever, I might have given it five stars, however, what I have been told is that this is equal to literature of the highest order. On that level I give this only three stars. It is not great literature. I finished reading it in one afternoon and had completely digested it, and read it a second time by the evening. It wasn't hard to tie it all together. I still can't figure out what happened in The Grand Inquisitor (one chapter in The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoyevsky), on anything other that a basic level. That basic level is more profound and potent than anything in Watchmen, which although good, doesn't even come close to living up to the hype as literature with super-heroes.

  What this comic talks about more than anything is that man needs to be saved from himself, more than anything else. Heroes aren't there to save us from monsters, they're there to save us from our fellow man. The Comedian even mentions this quite explicitly. Watchmen is a good time if you know what you are getting into. It's a fun and intelligent comic that is worth reading if you like comics already.

  Lastly, it is worth mentioning that I do believe in an objective principle in art. I believe that there is some objective force that decides once and for all that Shakespeare is better than Septembers Cosmopolitan magazine. There has to be an objective force in art or it means nothing at all (except to you alone, which is the same thing as meaning nothing at all!). And from the comparisons I have Alan Moore is no Dostoyevsky and Dave Gibbons is no Rembrandt. That said, it is still a fun read.
  
  

• Smarter than the average comic
  By A2HTBO0TBEPTIO on 2000-07-25
  This book was thoughtful and reflects the major issues of its time. Some of those issues have since gone away (who's afraid of the big bad nuke anymore? Not the majority of Americans, so the polls say), but the book still provides food for thought.

  Watchmen came out a little after Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. Both are pioneers in a new genre -- the graphic novel that targets adults. Dark Knight, however, simply tells a story. Watchmen went further. Watchmen includes a tremendous amount of social commentary packed in symbolism, while still telling a fantastic science fiction story.

  Yes, you can enjoy the story even if you have no idea what the symbolism is for.

  Yes, the drawing is extremely good. Very cinematic. (Seen the "making of" feature on The Matrix DVD? Remember the drawings of the scenes that the directors used to market the movie to producers? That's the cinematic style of comic drawing I'm talking about.)

  And yes, many then-current issues have since gone away. The issue of vigilante prompted by Bernie Goetz is gone. Most people don't pay attention to arms control any more. The novelty of an actor becoming the President has worn off. The Tower Commission Report's quote from the Bible ("Who watches the watchmen?") is featured in the overleaf; who remembers the commission or its report?

  None of this, however, takes away from the fact that Watchmen is a masterpiece.
  
  

• Who Watches?
  By on 1999-03-04
  Me for one. I've pushed this on every person I know, from teachers to family to friends, and most have turned it away because it has pictures in it. Their loss. This is a dark story, obviously, but it also has moments of unbridled humanity. It dissects everything. Life, love, death, war, comic books as a medium (name any novel that did such a great job of exploring its own medium), the superhero as a romantic/mythologic figure for the century... so much more. Every reading will reveal something else to you. I haven't read enough books to rightly judge it as the 'greatest book ever written'. However, I'm happy to call it the best book _I've_ ever read, and in its rich, meaty representation of an alternate 20th century, it gives us a painting of our world, and all the things that have made our century the most turbulent, dangerous, mind-numbing, and exciting ever. Vietnam, movies, Watergate, JFK, comics... nothing is left untouched. I've read it eight times. I'll read it again. So will you.
  
  
• One to read and reread and reread
  By A3075RVSKC27HU on 2001-06-02
  Watchmen is often considered the comic book series which brought literary elements such as symbolism, heavy characterization and a basis drawn as much from the author's imagination as the last decade's issues of Time to what is thought as a kid's genre. I have not read comics since I was a kid and I loved the gritty series. Masked vigilantes have guarded high crime areas since the 1930s. Banned in 1977, they withered away or submitted to government supervision with the exception of the violent terror of the underworld, the outlawed Rorschach. It is 1985, the Comedian has been thrown from a building, nuclear superman Dr. Manhattan has been publicly disgraced inspiringm him to leave the planet, Ozzymandias has been shot at and only Rorschach sees an important pattern. But the main plot is just a vehicle to link the individual, flashback filled portrayals of masked heroes in the real world. They interact with actual occurrences as the notorious murder of Kitty Genovese inspired Rorschach to leave his menial job for vigilantism and the appearance of Dr. Manhattan put America in the lead of its nuclear arms race against Russia. They do not always do what is right as the madness of Vietnam inspired the Comedian to gun down a pregnant woman and anyone whose political believes include due process and anti-capital punishment sentiments despises the infamous Rorschach. They symbolize different things as the crime fighter, Ozzymandias turned philanthropist and renaissance man, Adrian Veidt spews Peale-style philosophy and the cold, withdrawn, omnipotent Dr. Manhattan considers if he is to help mankind of loom over it, symbolizing science in the nuclear age. I enjoyed the sharp differences between the characters' philosophies despite being compelled to do the same strange thing for the same goals. Rorschach beats a lowlife criminal timid, thinking "New York is dying of rabies. All I can do is wipe random flakes of foam from its lips." Veidt, in turn quit crime fighting because crime is "a symptom of the overall sickness of the human spirit. I don't believe you can cure a disease by suppressing its symptoms." Moore's sharp writing and ability to create atmosphere are at best as strong personalities filled with underlining clash. In one scene Veidt, the world's strongest Maslow-believer is turned against Dr. Manhattan, "the walking H-bomb." "I've walked across the sun. I've seen events so small they can barely se said to have occurred at all but you are a man and the world's smartest man means nothing more to me than the world's smartest termite," Manhattan sneers. It is confrontations like this that make this one of Moore's many masterpieces. The book features personalities and circumstance as colorful as the names and costumes of its characters.
  
  
• Great, but hasn't aged as well as I thought it would.
  By on 2002-03-27
  I read Watchmen back when it first came out, and have been an avid fan ever since. However, I hadn't read the graphic novel in years, and upon re-reading it recently, I was struck by how dated it seems.

  Yes, it's still fundamentally excellent graphically and in terms of characterization, but it no longer seems as mind-blowing as it did back in 1986. Super-hero comics are still full of the same Good-Guy-Beats-Up-Bad-Guy stuff that they've always had, just with different artists and costumes. The depth of super-hero comics certainly hasn't increased; if anything, it may have regressed since the late '80s.

  In retrospect, one reason why Watchmen provided such exhilaration back in the day was because of the comic book's physical appearance. For the most part, comics before the mid-80s didn't look like Watchmen, with the then-fancy paper, the high production values, the ancillary material in the back of each issue, and the covers that looked like someone actually put thought into the design, rather than just slapping together something that looked, well, like a comic book.

  Sad to say, as with the plots, the graphic designs and layouts of comics have retreated to their garish days.

  On a broader scale, Watchmen's plot really reeks of the kind of Cold War thinking that turned out to be wildly wrong. And Alan Moore's black-and-white political speculation seems naive at best and laughable at worst, although there's still a good deal of validity to his overall views of the kind of sociological impact that a Dr. Manhattan would have.

  Perhaps the most regrettable part of Watchmen is the ending. Several observers (including Sam Hamm, who wrote the screenplay for Tim Burton's Batman and the original Hollywood treatment for a Watchmen movie that never got beyond the planning stages) have pointed out that the only way the Bad Guy's plan would actually work is if he redid it in a different city every six months.

  If you think otherwise, look no further than the World Trade Center attack--the world was gushing with Unity And The Fight Against Terrorism for about, oh, two months or so. Now the world is back to criticizing almost every move America makes.

  Granted, Watchmen's climax is on a much larger scale than the WTC (which was terrible enough, don't get me wrong), but ultimately, you'd still have the same reaction. Yes, the world would tremble for maybe a year, but then people would get back to their old ways; it's too implausible to expect people and nations of the world to abandon their ways almost overnight. Even the destruction of a major city, in and of itself, could not possibly overthrow all of human history preceding it.

  Perhaps the best example would be the biggest catastrophe in human history, World War II. You would think that a conflict that ruined two continents and a significant chunk of a third might cause people to think about world peace and unity. And they tried, which is why we have the United Nations. Unfortunately, the good feeling didn't last long, did it? The world is as conflict-ridden now as it was in 1939, perhaps moreso. And if World War II couldn't do it, it seems highly unlikely that Our Villain's "masterstroke" would be any more effective.
  
  

• Maybe historically interesting, but....
  By A1HRGLI8GG7AWZ on 2003-05-13
  I recently read "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" and enjoyed it quite a bit, so I decided to read "Watchmen" after all the rave comments I had been reading.

  What a disappointment.

  My biggest complaint is that the story was just plain boring. There are 12 issues, and I couldn't get into it until issue 10. It made some interesting points at times, but all the material is covered better somewhere else (like Claremont/Byrne X-Men, or Marvels, or any of the Busiek/Perez Avengers).

  I also had a very hard time getting past the humourlessness and lack of any heroic/inspiring material. And sadly, the moral conclusion is WAAAAY off. Great violence leads to more violence - not universal peace. The whole thing left a very bad taste in mouth since the World Trade Center attack.
  
  

• Meandering plot, uninteresting characters, dumb science
  By A24F1UX8ZT5IXY on 2003-05-03
  I have wrestled with this "serious" comic book for about 8 months and I am finally giving up. It is the kind of thing that is trying sooo hard to be deep and witty, but fails miserably because of a lack of ANY REAL STORY. What we have here is the loose frame of a story, which is totally dated and uninteresting. The graphic novel to read for good criminology subtext is "The Dark Knight Returns." Moore seems to want to remind you on every frickin' page how clever his "real super heroes" idea is. First of all it ain't and secondly WE GET IT ALREADY NOW DO SOMETHING WITH IT. When I really lost interest however was with the whole Mars thing. I mean it was insipid beyond belief but attempting to be the ultimate in metaphysical insight. The art also stinks. It's embarassingly bad at times. Plus sides - some good one liners and the Pirate story has some great moments. But this does not alleviate a tiresome, tedious read.
  
  
• Yes, entertaining, but hardly elevates the comic format to real lit.
  By A1OB5L3WMHJAD9 on 2006-03-14
  WATCHMEN, a comic book limited run written by Alan Moore and drawn by Dave Gibbons, takes place in the world of 1985 much like our own was, but with striking differences. Here, superheros, or "masked adventurers" are real, Nixon has been elected to a fourth term (after winning the war in Vietnam), cars run on electric power, and the US and the USSR come within a hair's breadth of nuclear war. Its basic plot is a detective story, when various superheroes, retired after a 1977 act made their work illegal, band together to face a threat, while looking back to their days of glory.
  
  The superheros of WATCHMEN are ordinary men skilled in brawling or able to come up with clever technological solutions. The only character with true super-human powers is one Dr Manhattan, a former physicist who after a research accident has become nearly omnipotent and omniscient. Exploring the consequences of a human being elevated to knowing the future and able to do anything he desires is one of the truly original concepts in WATCHMEN, and Moore deserves praise.
  
  With all the entertaining aspects of the storytelling, it's a pity that the writing has several serious failings. Moore's plot wraps up far too quickly. I suppose that in order to hit with maximum impact, Moore wanted it all explained within one issue instead of leaving the reader to wait another month. Furthermore, the ending involves the trope of the super-villian explaining his whole scheme to the heroes before doing them in. And while one can expect some amount of psedoscience with a character like Dr Manhattan, there are some shoddy mistakes here, such as claiming Mars' surface is made of "silicone", and unrealistically mild weather in Antarctica. While WATCHMEN has been lauded for elevating the comic format to legitimate literature, writing like this shows that regrettably it still has some way to go.
  
  I felt that WATCHMEN was entertaining, and the character of Dr Manhattan quite interesting, but the work is nowhere near the perfection that many fans claim it to be.
  
  

• Batman: The Dark Knight Returns
• Batman: The Killing Joke
• Batman: Year One
• V for Vendetta
• Batman: Arkham Asylum (15th Anniversary Edition)