![]() ![]() ![]() So director Zack Snyder is still doling out origin flashbacks two hours and seven minutes into his little epic. So the characters make do with the kind of complicated backstories that are just riveting in graphic novels.Īlas, backstories tend to clutter up a movie, especially when there are six of them to get through. The moviemakers, though, are too busy digitizing ice castles on Mars to bother with much in the way of meta. And in Alan Moore's graphic novel, they're intriguing as a sort of collective deconstruction of the very notion of superherodom. Manhattan and his less "super" super-buddies - their powers otherwise seem to start and end with martial arts prowess - were once known as Watchmen. Manhattan (Billy Crudup), a onetime physicist who's been demolecularized in a lab accident, which both gave him superpowers and turned him blue.Īs he lacks a spandex suit - or for the most part a suit of any sort - full-frontal shots of him also qualify as blue, come to think of it.Ĭollectively, Dr. There's a fellow named Rorschach (Jackie Earle Haley), whose mask has constantly moving blotches Nite Owl II (Patrick Wilson), a nebbishy gadget nut Ozymandias (Matthew Goode), allegedly the smartest guy in the world Silk Spectre II (Malin Akerman), a raven-haired beauty who looks like a walking shampoo ad and Dr. The Comedian's death prompts a reunion of five vigilant vigilantes who were his buds back when costumes were legal. I'd give him about a 3 for execution, but it's flashy in that digitally unreal way you expect in superhero epics. His door gets kicked in, and a sort of aerial fisticuffs ballet ensues - a battle that sends him crashing around his high-rise apartment, through walls and cabinets and finally out the window in a fatal 40-story back-dive. Richard Nixon has begun his fifth term as president, and partly because he's outlawed costumed superheroes, the world is a messy place on the verge of nuclear war.Īs the titles end, one thoroughly unpleasant guy who once wore the spandex - he called himself The Comedian, and he still sports a signature smiley-face button - gets a late-night knock at the door. The title sequence in Watchmen, arguably the film's smartest four minutes, welcomes us to an alternate 1985. Rumors have swirled about story changes for more than a year then, just before the movie's scheduled release, a rights dispute threatened to land Watchmen in court rather than in theaters. This week's big movie - Watchmen, a 12-part DC Comics series turned graphic novel, and now turned film - opens with a nervous but hopeful fan base preparing to turn out in droves. On Set With The Watchmen: Character Portraits ![]()
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