Watchmen

I can appreciate that this novel is one of the best of its genre, but I knew I wouldn't like it. I only read it for my literary exploration reading challenge, and I was pretty sure that I wouldn't like graphic novels. I have never been a fan of comic books, and this novel does not change that despite the adult (and rather depressing) content. It was sometimes hard to follow with a few overlapping stories. I did enjoy the fact that the costumed crusaders, if you will, are not superheroes in the traditional sense. None of them actually have superpowers except Dr. Manhattan. And he's no longer actually human, so he doesn't really count. All of the others are just regular people who decided to act as vigilantes and donned costumes to do so. I was never a fan of Spiderman or Superman, so I liked the regular people aspect. Basically I am seriously happy to be done with this book and that's why I read it now to get it out of the way. Good decision for me.

I don't have any idea if the movie version of Watchmen is anything like the book, but I won't watch it and find out. Alan Moore doesn't like the movie versions of any of his books, and I'll trust his judgment on that.
( )

What a well-curated graphic novel! The flow of the story captivated me, and the multi-layered story-telling was complicated in just the right way. The political context in this world mimicing ours but with heros and super heros grown old is somehow absurd yet realistic and disturbing. A lot of work was put into crafting such an involved story and it's much more brutal than the movie. ( )

This is one of those books that I can appreciate, respect the authors and illustrators, and understand its importance and appeal, but it is simply not something that I would choose to read for pleasure or enrichment. ( )

review to follow, need a moment to let it sink in...

Okay, so it took me about 50 pages to 'get into' the story, and I must admit, the pirate story thrown in kept throwing me off. But then I got hooked.
The 'what ifs' in this story were relevant in the '80s and are pretty relevant today. Apart from the social commentary, the morality questions raised and all the deeper stuff, at it's core is a good story. Tragic and chilling, yes, but good.
Evil triumphs when good men do nothing, but what if it's the good men that are misguided... ( )

This was my first graphic novel, possibly ever? I'll always remember the pirate subplot for its shameless pungency of the art and the violence. It really felt maximally brutal, without going (too much) over the top with it. This may be because for these subplots, it was spliced in with some kid sitting on a stump next to a newspaper salesman, so one didn't feel the full brunt of the evil displayed in the subplot. There may have been a metaphor here, something related to the everyday evil alongside the everyday normality? Not really sure.

One thing which perplexes me is that contrasted to the pirate subplot, Rorschach's violence completely paled. The child killer was glossed over almost completely, the dead dog was not displayed with the same sort of ugliness as the dead men made into a raft. I'm not really sure why the author made this choice.

I guess another aspect which the novel did well, but not enough to completely set itself apart in this regard, is how the author captured the consciousness of cold-war USA, with the always-on fear of MAD in people's minds. This was done well, the world felt sticky and anxious at all times, I may say even uniquely well. Each character's fights were contextualized to themselves and to us within this fear. The superhero's couldn't focus on the small time crime with the existential threat above them, the newspaper salesman let the fear provoke him into anger, but also found cause in it to display kindness. For Nite Owl, it sort of was the reason he was a superhero in the first place.

One concept which I have no idea how to set in with the rest of the plot is the evil giant monster towards the end. The monster seems to be the idea of some ultimately evil force, meant to set the world's mind straight about its bickering, but this doesn't feel like a big enough conceptual finish to such a nicely refined book. The ending, despite its beautiful graphics, felt very anti-climactic, and didn't tie the concepts from the rest of the book together in my opinion.
( )