WATCHMEN on HBO

[Kirby101]

Did they ever explain how Trieu let the 7th Calvary know Cal was Manhattan?

[the illustrious mr. kenway]

Did they ever explain how Trieu let the 7th Calvary know Cal was Manhattan?

I think they figured it out on their own after Cal transported that dude during the white night.

Trieu just adapted after she figured out they knew.

[Immortal Weapon]

Did they ever explain how Trieu let the 7th Calvary know Cal was Manhattan?

Keene figured it out himself. Manhattan teleported the attacker who was gonna kill Angela in the white knight to his hometown in New Mexico. He was easy for him to connect the dots.

[Surf]

Regardless of how Dr M was characterized (which I could buy into - as detached as he was or claimed to be, he was never not driven by emotions, especially when a woman was involved), for me personally, the last few episodes steered the show into a bit more of a traditional superhero/sci-fi film. It became about the bad guys' plans to steal Dr M's power and we get two grandstanding Bond villain speeches in a row.(complete with killer lasers) Then the 7th K and Cyclops are just wiped out, then Trieu's plans fall apart. Done. It was still entertaining and I could never have predicted "squid bullets" or Veidt actually saving the day. (did he? What if Trieu was actually able to make things better? Veidt of course thinks he's the only one who can save the world)

For a show that had set such a high bar for complex characterizations and challenging stories, it all wrapped up a little too neatly. It lacked the moral ambiguity of the graphic novel where peace was paid for with 3 million lives and all the heroes did was fail to prevent Veidt from saving the world. If there was some sense that the heroes here actually stopped the world from being saved, or acknowledged that they might have made race relations worse or .... something a little more challenging of an ending which the show had been doing all along rather than focus on who gets Dr M's power. (I was hoping Angela would just break that last egg and realize nobody should have that power - and that she wouldn't want it, knowing what it did to Jon)

Agreed. The mustache twirling at the end was a bit predictable, the second I saw Frances Fisher In episode 1 I knew- she is a plot twist staple going back for years in movies. That said the trap door bit was one of the funniest things I've seen in a while, I'll always have that to recall.

I often wonder how much does the general audience get out of this? This entire show was pretty heavy fan service, more than anything I've seen on TV I can remember. I imagine the enjoyment of this might be more if you are not shackled to the GN.

After how Trieu went out, I now have a bit more respect for the actresses performance, she sold that **** until the end lol. Also why were there not more casualties on the cops side due to the frozen squid attack?

Lindelof clearly wants the world to be better. He is pointing to a more positive future where a female black successor can carry forward the legacy of both Hooded Justice and Doctor Manhattan. Lots of work was put into making them two sides of a coin, and the story was clearly about dealing with legacy both functionally and dysfunctionally. This is not an on-rails tragedy doomed to repeat itself while commenting upon the mediumÂ’s inadequacy, this is an aspirational dream of a less tragic future.

I agree with this but there is also an inherent racial disparity in this thinking. I don't have any real evidence it came from a malicious place on Lindelof's behalf, at the same time it harkens back to the harmful stereotype of the... ultra human black woman. That's as nice as I can put it. Regina King's character could have and was the star of the show but was it necessary in putting so much of the narrative on her physically (being shot, shot at several times), emotionally (she's still a caregiver to her partner's children, the betrayal of Sheriff Crawford and then the memory pills) up to and including the implications effecting the future coming off of what injustices shaped the past, it was way too much. That's a level of burden that doesn't effect white women in fiction.

There was a part to a healthcare campaign years ago on Tom Joyner's radio show where it came out that often physicians who treated numbers of African American patients, all over the country, often under-diagnosed pain symptoms. There is a line of course where patient care crosses into over-diagnosis (see the opioid crisis) but some of the thinking was that their black patients pain tolerance, as baseline, was much higher than their white counter parts. Jean Smart got praised cause she made a few jokes but she didn't do anything but warn Angela about the squid's over the 9 episodes. If she didn't say she was FBI outside of her clothes and badge flashing you wouldn't have known it. She had a closer lineage to cape **** than Abar did but you wouldn't even have known that. She didn't even provide as much of the emotional arc as her character did in the graphic novel. Even if you are a bonehead who recoils at even the vaguest mention of racial disparity... and this is me probably giving people too much credit, (and to this threads credit 95% has been pretty damn insightful, cheers) but a part of them, even they know that was a lot for a character to go through. I can't fathom King would purport such and even if it's just marked as an 'over correction', doesn't quite jive with me and again I don't feel this was an intentionally harmful as was presented, it's still tied to some of the same roots of disparity that the show tried to bring out.

[BroHomo]

That one scene with Dr. Manhattan kneeling.....
UmpF !!

[JKtheMac]

Then create a new character instead of changing one to fit their stories narrative.

Also yes I would have wanted a HBO or Netflix miniseries of the original graphic novel given I don't think we have ever gotten a proper one on screen.

Well in that last part I was joking. But personally I wouldn’t want it even if I know many would. Nostalgic is exactly the opposite of this production and that is why it works IMO. It is certainly not irreverent but it is not slavish either.

As to “same character” that’s entirely subjective to the point of not being a meaningful concept as far as I am concerned. I mean we have this argument over and over again in the Marvel threads and I am sure every thread dealing with intellectual property written by other people tackles it at some point. Serial fiction is illusion and to some extent it is up to us to buy into the illusion or what’s the point? I bought into this, sometimes I don’t buy into things. I certainly don’t buy into Lindelof’s perspective on Alien for example, but I have no special objective perspective to render it valueless.

When everyone’s milage varies there is no valid measurement. This is not Alan Moore’s Watchmen and makes no pretence of being so. The way Lindelof talks about it is hoping he can justify the name. He has used the characters for his story but I am sure even he doesn’t consider his story “definitive” he just hopes it is worthy of his time and efforts. That’s all he can do. Sequels of any kind are entirely separate to the original even when written by the same person. No character inhabiting a different story can truly be the same character because the idea of character has very little meaning outside of the context of the story. They can only strive to suggest an illusion of continuity, but identifying the illusory element is as obvious as saying ‘this is all made up!’

[JKtheMac]

[font=georgia]
[font=georgia]I agree with this but there is also an inherent racial disparity in this thinking. I don't have any real evidence it came from a malicious place on Lindelof's behalf, at the same time it harkens back to the harmful stereotype of the... ultra human black woman. That's as nice as I can put it.

And you certainly don’t put it very nicely if I am getting your inference. Don’t you think we can handle just a few narratives that are not all about special white men? Or is Superman harmful because of some supposed public health concern too?

This is a superhero mystery story in which a black woman is the main investigator. Nobody says she is somehow representative of all black women. Nobody says she is perfect or archetypical. Your “concerns” fall very flat to me. You may be extrapolating the story to a chapter that doesn’t exist and at present shows no sign of being commissioned.

[Ozymandias]

He also did The Leftovers more recently and that was an amazing series.

This is a clear step down from his previous work, even Lost was better. I was expecting it to fall short of Moore's original, but not by that much.

[Amadeus Arkham]

Regardless of how Dr M was characterized (which I could buy into - as detached as he was or claimed to be, he was never not driven by emotions, especially when a woman was involved), for me personally, the last few episodes steered the show into a bit more of a traditional superhero/sci-fi film. It became about the bad guys' plans to steal Dr M's power and we get two grandstanding Bond villain speeches in a row.(complete with killer lasers) Then the 7th K and Cyclops are just wiped out, then Trieu's plans fall apart. Done. It was still entertaining and I could never have predicted "squid bullets" or Veidt actually saving the day. (did he? What if Trieu was actually able to make things better? Veidt of course thinks he's the only one who can save the world)

For a show that had set such a high bar for complex characterizations and challenging stories, it all wrapped up a little too neatly. It lacked the moral ambiguity of the graphic novel where peace was paid for with 3 million lives and all the heroes did was fail to prevent Veidt from saving the world. If there was some sense that the heroes here actually stopped the world from being saved, or acknowledged that they might have made race relations worse or .... something a little more challenging of an ending which the show had been doing all along rather than focus on who gets Dr M's power. (I was hoping Angela would just break that last egg and realize nobody should have that power - and that she wouldn't want it, knowing what it did to Jon)

Although if they do a season 2, maybe she'll use that Plan A device - which she had put in her pocket.

This was entirely my gripe too. The way the show was until this point it would felt like that kind of bombastic finale seem be something that would be beneath this show and it wouldn’t give us such a neat and tidy ending. The resolution with Trieu felt way too generic for something trying to be as high-brow as this, imo. It was just way too simplistic for such a ambitious and complex show.

[Ozymandias]

The resolution with Trieu felt way too generic for something trying to high-brow as this, imo. It just too simplistic for such a ambitious show.

More than simple, it was unbeliavable. I'm not talking about the way to capture, imprison and "assimilate" Dr. M (which felt Ex Machina to me), I'm talking about the effect hail of the size shown, had on flesh and metal.

[Farealmer]

It ended like I was worried it was going to. Such a good start to end up like published fan fiction.

[Ntnon]

Not going to lie, I thought the finale felt rushed and underwhelming. This isn't to say I haven't enjoyed the series. Episodes 5 and 6 were some of the best hours of television this year. That being said, Damon Lindelof ending up doing what he always ends up doing, in that he created so much build up with his "mysteries" that, in the end, they end up collapsing like that pod thing did in the episode itself.

I tend to agree, though I'd frame it slightly differently - the lead up was so good and the intrigue so well layered that any solution would invariably be less than we hope for.

That the twists and answers were relatively well telegraphed (Veidt's message and return; Looking Glass' appearances, successes and failures) is always going to seem mildly unsatisfying, even as they're thematically and inevitably necessary.

[Ntnon]

I think this is very much a philosophical outlook issue. Moore was writing a much more nihilistic book... but Lindelof is more optimistic.

..Lindelof creates a world where a rival narrative was created. A fictional black analog of Birth of a Nation, that features a real black hero who fights for the rule of law. A predating of the incidents that made Moore’s alt history divergent, back to the very era when this heroic prototype was being born.

Lindelof clearly wants the world to be better.

It's no coincidence that in the grey morality of the comic, the only uncompromising voice dies. On the show, the voices that win out are those standing up for the rule of law. While those who punish evil as vigilantes (Veidt, Trieu and Hooded Justice) are dealt with in turn legally, finally and with compassion.

Of the four complicit in Veidt's plot, we now have two dead, one turned and one imprisoned. The architect is heading to jail. But... nothing ever ends, so whether this is the smart move remains unanswerable.

[Ntnon]

SPOILERS FOR THE FINALE
The whole thing was great, etc. and I will post more later, but this post is the stuff that bothered me:
-- My only big complaint is Angela's plan to run into the mall and reason with Keane and the 7th K/Cyclops - in what world did she think they'd listen to her? She managed to get in there after taking out the guards, she could have sabotaged the equipment in some other way.

That was odd. Although Laurie allowing herself to be kidnapped without an obvious endgame was odder - Angela wanted to save Manhattan, while knowing she wouldn't. So her (in)actions have a certain fear-logic..

-- It was less than satisfying that Keane sent Laurie to Tulsa just to witness the event and there was no practical reason for it. For a show with such a complicated plot that was pretty masterful at tying things together, it just makes no sense. What if she'd taken the whole team with her as she was assigned? They could have screwed up the whole plan.

Hubris married to an intrinsic anti-"hero" fervour passed from father to son..? The series - and particularly the last two episodes - were brimful of arrogance, hubris and inevitability: Veidt, Trieu, 7K, Dr. M... all of them were adamant they "knew" what would happen, and how and how they'd end up.

-- I thought maybe there'd be more to Judd's story. What did he mean when he told Will "I'm trying to help you people?" Even from what I think is his perspective, I'm not sure how he could think that.

Judd seemed like the mouthpiece for... I guess the status quo. A sort of quiet superior viewpoint that walks a fine line between realism and bigotry, where the data points are pre-screened and skewed to form a narrative wherein the individual isn't "Racist," just reacting to how 'those people' always... [whatever]. It's true enough that it becomes normalised, but biased enough to be almost more insidiois than the hardline evil of the blatant supremacists.

It seemed odd that the show had to have LG pilot Archie - Laurie's right there and she was partners with Dan, working together for at least some time after the Keane Act. Surely, she knew how to pilot Archie.

Maybe.. maybe not. But even if so, that would have been years in the past. It was perhaps an example of Exposition, but it wasn't too awkward for me - Veidt was noting that LG would know how to work it.

I was wary that plot armour seemed to keep the NAMED police masks safe while many yellow-masks died. Found it odd that Angela was advised to run regardless of where she was - the booth kept Bian safe, after all - and wasn't sure why Keane Jr. had to be a conduit for Dr. M's teleportation.

Inexorable is a good word.

[j9ac9k]

That was odd. Although Laurie allowing herself to be kidnapped without an obvious endgame was odder .... and wasn't sure why Keane Jr. had to be a conduit for Dr. M's teleportation.

Just to address two of your points:
-- I don't think Laurie allowed herself to be captured at all. The couch falling gag was hilarious, partly for how surprised she was at what was happening.
-- I think it's like you said, Jr was a "conduit" - Jon needed something biological to connect his powers to something outside the cage.