Watchmen: Aaronus

Watchmen is a good movie. Let me start with that.

When word began to spread that Zach Snyder, the man behind 300 was helming a movie adaptation of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons highly acclaimed graphic novel, sentiments were mixed. Many fans of the tome were downcast; surely Snyder would turn this into a slow-mo action fest, butcher the story, and rob this astounding accomplishment of its soul. Others were ecstatic. Snyder is a comic nerd, after all. No true nerd, in good conscience, would ever lay an uncanonical hand on Rorschach his compatriots. Right?

It is my opinion that both groups were mistaken. What we got was a mixture of a faithful retelling and a Hollywood rework, which I have to admit, works rather well.

I'll get the negatives out of the way first.

My most immediate, and the greatest of my complaints lies with the soundtrack. Songs like The Sound of Silence and Flight of The Valkyries might seem to fit with the movie as a whole, but their placement within the film reduces what should have been some of its more dramatic, epic moments to cheesy cliches. Edward Blake’s funeral in particular lost it's morose and dark atmosphere, a fact not lessened by it's taking place in broad daylight. I had to ask myself what exactly they were thinking, and even slumped forward in my seat and said, “You’ve gotta be kidding me” when Dr. Manhattan crested over the hill in the Vietnam flashback to Die Walkure’s most recognizable piece.

There were also a lot of scenes which I was hoping I’d see, but which were predictably omitted. Pieces of Rorschach’s origin flashback are nowhere to be found, and characters like Hollis Mason aren’t given near as much screen time as you think they should. Relatively little time is spent explaining the history of the Minutemen/Watchmen, and the majority of the original masked adventurers are all but gone.

All of these complaints, however, come from a fan of the graphic novel. I went in the theater hoping (but, admittedly, not expecting) to re-experience the novel through a different medium. I wanted that same feeling that I got the first time I watched Rorschach break fingers and the discovered Adrian’s master plan. I wanted Watchmen. And in a few ways, that’s what I got.
Additionally, when viewed through the eyes of a movie goer and not a hardcore comic nerd, the film looks a little better.

The characters are all well preserved, and the actors do a competent (and in some cases excellent) job of portraying them. Rorschach is almost perfect, Nite Owl isn’t far behind, and visually, Dr. Manhattan was just plain amazing. The Comedian’s overall character is there, but some wooden acting lightens his impact. Silk Spectre is… well, Laurie; largely a support character with no real, substantial effect on the film as a whole. The only character which I feel could have been done better is Ozymandias, but he fills his niche in the story and does a few really cool things besides.

And yes, of course, the ending has been changed. Everybody knows that by now. You’ll have to draw your own conclusions as to whether or not you like the plot alterations, but in my opinion it works well, and is accessible to fans of both the novel, and people being introduced to the Watchmen for the first time.

All in all, I got what I came for. I got to see my favorite characters in motion, I was wowed by some of the visuals, and I enjoyed myself. There are other things I could say, but they’ve been covered in the other reviews. At the end of the day Snyder’s Watchmen is a great movie, a decent adaptation, and a worth watching at least once.



*Rorschach’s dialogue at the beginning is perfect, lifted straight from the graphic novel.

*As we left the theater, my friends joked that the sequel would be called, “The Revenge of Rorschach”, and that he would be endowed with Dr. Manhattan like powers.

*And yeah I know you see Manhattan’s junk. Next.