THE WATCHMEN

The Watchmen Written by Alan Moore. Art by Dave Gibbons.

Noui consilia et ueteres quaecumque monetis amici,
"Pone seram, cohibe".
Sed quis custodiet ipsos custodes
Cauta est et ab illis incipit uxor

"I hear always the admonishment of my friends:
Bolt her in, and constrain her!
But who will watch the watchmen?
The wife arranges accordingly, and begins with them."

Alan Moore is a genius. He wanted to create something lasting, something that would take comics beyond funny books for kids, and elevate them to something greater; to create graphic literature. He started with the above poem by Juvenal as a base. There was a thought to use the recently acquired Charleton Comics pantheon, but there were problems with that idea, and Moore decided to start with a whole bolt of cloth.

First, he created the Golden Age; a period of time in the 1930’s and 1940’s when masked vigilantes had patrolled the streets of their neighborhoods and fought organized crime. The heroes of that era were Captain Metropolis, Hooded Justice, the Silhouette, Mothman, Dollar Bill, Nite Owl, the Comedian and the Silk Spectre. Collectively, they were the Minute Men. These were not super powered people; they were men and women in costumes, who fought men in costumes, until it sort of faded, as fads do. Some let go. Sally Jupiter, the Silk Spectre, married her manager. Nite Owl retired and opened a garage. Dollar Bill was shot and killed, the Mothman went insane. Hooded Justice vanished.

Then the Silver age Dawned, sort of. Captain Metropolis, unable to let go, tried to create a second group, the Crime Busters, from the super heroes of the day. The Comedian, no longer the brash young kid of the group, was a seasoned combat veteran, and agent of the government. Two Legacies applied, the new Silk Spectre, Laurie Juspeczyk, daughter of Sally Jupiter, and the new Nite Owl, Dan Dreiberg, and three new heroes, Ozymandius, aka Adrian Veidt, the worlds smartest man, and Rorschach, a mysterious figure with a mask like an ink blot test, constantly changing. And the last hero, is something different. Dr. Manhattan, once upon a time was Jon Osterman, nuclear physicist. Now, through a freak accident, he is for all intents and purposes, a god.

Here is the real story. All the heroes are just men and women. Silk Spectre is a take on the Black Canary and Phantom Lady, before both of those heroines gained superpowers. Nite Owl is the Batman, in the mold of Adam West’s role. Rorschach, the Question, all heroes without powers. But Dr. Manhattan is something else. After his little accident, he came back, a piece at a time, until he could figure out how his body was put together. He came back as a nervous system, then the circulatory system, finally skeletal muscular system, until he could rebuild himself. And he came back different. Of course, he is bald and blue, but he also displays powers of telekinesis, psychoportation, matter manipulation on the atomic scale, powers of bilocation…limitless power on a cosmic scale. And he is American.

Since 1959, when he had his accident, he has redefined the world. First, and simplest, when he was unveiled to the world, he wore his old double breasted suit. Now, all suits are double breasted. He synthesized enough lithium to make electrical cars practical, and he shifted the balance of power in such a way that no one has dared consider the use of nuclear arms since he arrived on the scene. He is a stabilizing force in the world, and now, in 1985, in Richard Nixon’s fifth term in office, Dr. Manhattan is…slipping away.

When he was unveiled in 1960, he wore a full suit. His costume covered him as completely. But as time progressed, the suit became simpler. It lost its sleeves, then the legs, then the shirt, then, it was little more than a thong. Finally, he dispensed with it all together. Now, he is just a naked blue guy with the symbol of a hydrogen atom on his forehead. What does a man who can teleport you to the moon without a space suit wear? Any thing he wants.

The problem is the clothes are a metaphor for his humanity. As his condition progresses, he looses touch with the common man. How can he not? He can walk through walls. He can see neutrinos with his naked eyes. He remembers tomorrow. His anchor on humanity is Laurie, the second Silk Spectre. Their relationship keeps him from drifting too far away from his human roots. As someone says to Laurie about her role in the grand scheme of things, she is only important because he is important; no one has to go out and get the atom bomb laid.

This is the world we enter in 1985. Masked Vigilantes were outlawed in 㥕 by the Keene act. They must register with the government, like Dr. Manhattan and the Comedian, or they are rogues. The only rogue is Rorschach.

Then someone kills The Comedian. Rorschach, who admired his lack of hypocrisy, (the Comedian was an insightful monster without illusions about his fellow man, or himself. He knew he was a monster, and embraced it.) decides to investigate. What he finds leads him to suspect there may be a mask killer out there.

Worse, his investigation reveals more; Jon Osterman’s ex-wife, his best friend, and his worst enemy, all have cancer. Now there is a concern that Dr. Manhattan may be the cause. This attack, combined with Laurie’s increasing inability to relate to him as he becomes inhuman have the net effect of liberating him. Dr. Manhattan takes a vacation. To Mars.

And with America’s unassailable tactical advantage sulking on the red planet, Russia invades Afghanistan. The Comedian is dead, Dr. Manhattan is in exile, and the world is coming apart at the seams.

It is our world, seen through a mirror, darkly.

And Moore tells the story with a mechanical precision. Jon Osterman’s father was a watchmaker. Jon expected to follow him in his trade, gears and ratios, tensions carefully calibrated, all pieces working together to form a whole that is greater than the sum of the parts. That is the kind of mind Jon had. It is the kind of mind Dr. Manhattan has, but on an infinitely larger scale. And it is the kind of story Moore tells. Each cog moves, and its movements affect the other cogs, to greater or lesser degrees.

And there are other parallels. The Atomic clock, counting down to doomsday. It is depicted at the end of each chapter, one minute closer, with an appropriate quote. For instance, Chapter Six, The Abyss Gazes Also, a chapter about how Rorschach became Rorschach, ends thus: ”Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you. Friedrich William Nietzche. The hands are six minutes to midnight.

Further, the quote is very symmetrical. Battle monsters, become monster. Gaze into abyss, abyss gazes into you. And Rorschach’s face is a symmetrical ink blot, ever changing, but always black and white. No commingling. No shades of grey. That is how Rorschach sees the world.

This chapter also has further hidden symmetry; the first page is constructed very like the last page, with the same ink blot tests, the second page is very like the next to last page, with people seated at tables really getting to know one another, for good or ill. And it carries on, third and third from last, fourth, and fourth from last. Very precise, premeditated, very clockwork.

His segues are also intriguing; with super heroes roaming the streets, there are no hero comics. Pirates are the big thing, and one particular story, Marooned, from the title, The Black Freighter, mirrors events in the real world. As the hero captures and eats a raw gull, Dan (the Nite Owl) takes a bite from his drumstick, and the conversation switches over. The theme as well, a man marooned must find a way to reach his home before the Black Freighter makes port to kill his wife and children, mirrors the theme of ordinary men and women using what ever they can to battle events vastly more powerful than they to try to preserve the things they love.

There are other meanings to the term Watchmen as well, as in the original meaning a guardian. The Comedian was a Watchman. He became a tool of the government, and threw himself into the war in Viet Nam with total abandon. He was there to preserve the freedoms of democracy, and he was quite willing to kill, maim and rape to do it. Nor did it bother him. As I said, no hypocrisy, no self delusion. Yet he is one of the Watchmen, and who, precisely, watches over him?

This is one of the central problems of the masked vigilante. No oversight. Through out the book, there is graffiti asking that question, ‘who watches the watchmen?’ but we never see the entire phrase. It is cropped, or obscured. There, but only partially so.

And the themes just mount. The Comedian’s symbol is a smiley button. When he is killed, it is found in the gutter, a splatter of blood in the 1155 position. The button is mirrored in many forms; craters on Mars, cigarette burned eyes, a balloon and cord, the list goes on. The yellow and black smiley face also evokes the yellow and black fallout shelter signs that go up, first on Dr. Manhattan’s door, prompting his immigration to Mars, then all around town as the world braces itself for the nuclear stand off that the world never faced in Cuba, because Dr. Manhattan trumped the entire arsenal. That theme of history was not erased, merely delayed. And the yellow background and black wedges mirror the sails of the Black Freighter as it sails against the sunset, the Flying Dutchman of the Damned, sailing on a mission of destruction and horror. You can see the way the simplest things attain greater significance. The book becomes a “Where’s Waldo of allusion and hidden meaning.”

And the same care is taken tying the story threads binding the Minutemen to the Watchmen. The story arcs and continuity threads are like the gears and cogs, wound up in the past, those tensions still turning the gears today. Sally Jupiter is a Stage Mother, trying to live through her daughter. That tinged and tainted the entire Silk Spectre experience for Laurie. Hollis is Nite Owl’s inspiration, The Comedian, one of the few men Rorschach respects.

And more is revealed between the chapters. Excerpts from Hollis’ book about being the first Nite Owl, Rorschach’s arrest record, juvenile files and psychological notes make for interesting reading. Even the article on the Comic Book Phenomena and the Black Freighter in particular, give us a feeling of living in this world.

There has never been a comic book like it. It is the only Graphic Novel to be awarded the Hugo Award, the highest award for Science Fiction. Time Magazine listed it among the 100 Best English Language Novels, the only Graphic Novel to make the list since its inception in 1923.

Of course, part of being a graphic novel is being…graphic. Dave Gibbon’s art is realistic, but recognizably comic book derived. It is delightfully detailed, and he is skilled in anatomy, portraiture (everyone’s face is recognizable if that is all you can see) and perspective. It is a masterpiece in its own right, some what dated, particularly in the matter of colour, which has seen vast improvements due to computerized colouring techniques. That said, a graphic novel is only as strong as its weakest component, and they are all masterpieces.

The themes in this novel are not intended for children. They deal with issues of violence, morality, sexuality and other similarly adult themes. Dr. Manhattan does not wear pants. There is full frontal nudity. That said, I think it is up to each parent to decide if this is something they would like their kid to read. It is no more disturbing than say Lord of the Flies and The Scarlet Letter. Have a little faith in them.

The Watchmen is one of the best novels ever written. It is certainly the supreme example of the Graphic Novel. You have never seen anything like this. But you will.

There is a movie scheduled for 2009. There is an interesting question here; do you want to read the book first, and then see the movie, or see the movie and then read the book? The decision was made for me, but let me say this, if this movie does the book any kind of justice, we will be looking at a fist full of Oscars. Yes, it is that good.

I leave now with something not in the book at all, not mentioned in the slightest. Call it foreshadowing…

I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert... Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal these words appear:
My name is Ozymandius, King of Kings,
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away. Percy Bysshe Shelley