The Mime and Marionette loose in Gotham City! Rorschach is locked in the bowels of Arkham Asylum! Secrets will be revealed as the Doomsday Clock ticks on The critically acclaimed series by master storytellers Geoff Johns and Gary Frank reaches its most shocking chapter yet when the DC Universe collides with its greatest threat: Dr.
Community See All. Jan 4. Dec It does not refer to any group of characters within the Watchmen universe. The maxi-series Watchmen is composed of twelve chapters. These chapters were originally separate issues of the limited series, which were released sequentially starting in Each chapter begins with a close-up of the first panel, originally the cover to each issue. Each chapter has an epigraph from classical or pop literature, which appears in abbreviated form early on, and acts as the chapter's heading or title.
The quote is given in its entirety at the end of the chapter, summarizing the events that have just occurred. Symmetry is a frequent structural theme in Watchmen , especially between each half of the twelve chapters. The most overarching example is the balance between the plot-driven chapters and the character studies. Chapters 2, 4, and 6 each focus on one of the six primary characters, and then 7, 9, and 11 on the remaining three.
Chapter 2 elaborates on the life of the Comedian, the mystery surrounding his death, and his descent into nihilism, whereas Chapter 11 explains that his death resulted from another character's commitment to saving the world. Chapters 4 and 9 both reflect on past events from the surface of Mars , and culminate in opposite attitudes toward determinism.
Furthermore, by Chapter 6, all of the heroes seem inactive, but some begin returning to public activity in Chapter 7. Most famously, the first and last panels of the entire novel feature the "blood over the eye of the smiley face" motif, more plainly than its variously oblique appearances throughout the book.
Watchmen also contains many fictional primary documents, which are appended to the end of every chapter except the final one , and are represented as being a part of the Watchmen universe's media.
Biographies of retired costumed adventurers, such as the retrospective Under the Hood by the retired first Nite Owl , are used to help the reader understand the chronology of events, and also the changes in public opinion and representation of costumed adventurers through the decades. These documents are also used to reveal personal details of the costumed adventurers' private lives, such as Walter Kovacs' arrest file and psychiatric report. Other documents used in this way include military reports and newspaper and magazine articles.
Watchmen' s structure has been analyzed by many reviewers, with The Friday Review calling Watchmen " a complex, multi-layered narrative, populated with well-realized characters and set against a background that is simultaneously believable and unfamiliar. When reading Watchmen , the reader is mostly presented with only an objective point of view, able to see all the characters' actions, facial expressions, and body language; but, in a move unusual for comic books of its time, Moore did not use any thought balloons to clarify his characters' thoughts, although several sections consist of long episodes that replay the characters' memories or include entries from diaries.
The documents that are appended to the end of each chapter except the last, as well as media such as Rorschach's journal , help to elucidate characters' thoughts and feelings throughout the novel without mentioning them explicitly. First person perspective is also used, albeit less frequently. Flashbacks are employed to help facilitate the reader's understanding of events occurring in the present, but also as a means of chronicling the differences in history between the Watchmen universe and our own.
Thus, Dr. Manhattan's flashback to the Vietnam War highlights how both his and the Comedian's existence altered their world's history in comparison to our own. In the comic, they refer to themselves as "costumed adventurers" or less frequently, considering its comparatively negative connotations, "masked vigilantes".
The Comedian Edward Blake is based on the Peacemaker. A do the same for Rorschach Walter Kovacs. Finally, the first and second Silk Spectres Sally Jupiter and Laurie Juspeczyk are roughly analogous to Nightshade , but only in that they are female. An introductory narrative and investigation by a pair of police detectives named Joe Bourquin and Steven Fine yields nothing conclusive: Blake, formerly affiliated with the United States government, might have been murdered by Communist Russians , but this could be suicidal considering America 's current superiority in the arms race; also, Blake kept himself in excellent physical shape, raising the question of who could have overpowered him in the first place.
The detectives conclude that, above all, they want to keep the murder quiet, for fear of attracting the attention of the last " costumed adventurer ", the vigilante Rorschach.
Rorschach does investigate, however, and discovers that Blake was also a costumed hero known as the Comedian, one of only two costumed adventurers who accepted government patronage under the Keene Act , which otherwise forbade costumed adventuring from onward hence Rorschach's status as a vigilante.
Believing that Blake's murder is part of a greater plot to eliminate "masks", as Rorschach calls them, he warns others: Jon Osterman , also known as Doctor Manhattan the other government-sponsored hero and the linchpin of American nuclear superiority ; Dr.
Manhattan's lover, Laurie Juspeczyk the second Silk Spectre ; Daniel Dreiberg the second Nite Owl and Rorschach's former partner ; and Adrian Veidt Ozymandias, reputedly the smartest man in the world, who retired in and built his commercial empire, Veidt Enterprises. Within the fictional context of the story, the United States and the Soviet Union have been edging toward a nuclear war since the nuclear accident that transformed Osterman into the super-powered Doctor Manhattan.
Manhattan had disrupted the mutually assured destruction doctrine by possessing the power to neutralize most of the Russian nukes in mid-air. With this trump card in hand, America has enjoyed a distinct strategic advantage, allowing it to defeat the Soviet Union in a series of proxy wars, including victory in the Vietnam War.
Richard Nixon used this success and, unmarred by Watergate in a flashback, the Comedian alludes to having assassinated Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein , encouraged a repeal of the 22nd Amendment, removing presidential term limits, allowing him to serve an unprecedented fifth term in office during the events of Watchmen.
Manhattan's existence has accelerated the nuclear arms race and dramatically increased global tension. In seeming anticipation of global war, American society has assumed a general sense of fatalism about the future. Signs of this in daily life range from " Mmeltdowns " candy to graffiti inspired by the Hiroshima bombing to the designation of many buildings in New York as fallout shelters.
As Rorschach continues his investigation, he is framed, captured by the police, jailed and subjected to psychiatric examination. Meanwhile, Adrian Veidt is attacked by a gunman in a public assassination attempt that he survives. Manhattan, though supremely powerful, suffers from a decreasing ability to relate to normal humans.
He accidentally upsets his lover, Laurie, and she leaves him. Soon afterwards, evidence comes to light that a number of his co-workers, including his former girlfriend Janey Slater , have come down with terminal cancer.
Manhattan feels that he poses a threat to others and exiles himself to Mars , in a chapter revealing that he experiences time in a non-linear fashion. His break with the U. These events are colored by commentary from a bevy of secondary characters, such as a teenage reader of the Tales of the Black Freighter comic-within-a-comic, the newsstand vendor from whom he purchases said comics, the psychiatrist evaluating Rorschach, the police officers from the first chapter and others.
Dreiberg, who harbors an initially unrequited attraction to Laurie, offers her room and board. When a tenement building catches fire, the two resume their costumed adventuring ways to save its residents.
Dan has begun to believe in Rorschach's theory that an unidentified assassin is attacking former costumed adventurers and he insists they break Rorschach out of Sing Sing. Unfortunately, the news that formerly retired adventurers have gone rogue leads to the hate-crime killing of the retired first Nite Owl, Hollis Mason. Manhattan briefly returns to Earth to bring Laurie to Mars, as a discussion between them which he has foreseen is scheduled to take place at this time. In this conversation, she begs him to return to Earth and save humanity, an effort in which she is successful.
This discussion also turns Laurie's life inside-out: She realizes that the Comedian, whom she hated for attempting to rape her mother , was later her mother's consensual lover and, in fact, Laurie's own biological father. Meanwhile, the reunited duo of Rorschach and Nite Owl prowl the New York underworld, searching for hints on who commissioned the hit on Veidt.
The trail leads to none other than Veidt himself, who has been orchestrating events all along. The company which commissioned the hit, owned by Veidt, also employed every associate of Dr. Manhattan's that had developed cancer. In a lengthy monologue, Adrian explains his early worship of Alexander the Great , which later turned to admiration of Ramesses II whose Greek name was Ozymandias ; his realization that the current arms race and disregard for the environment would lead to cataclysm by the s ; his belief that someone must save the world, and that only he could do so; and finally, that the crux of his plan is to teleport a genetically engineered telepathic monstrosity into New York City, a process that will kill the monster and cause it to emit a massive psychic shockwave that will kill half the city and drive many of the survivors insane.
Adrian believes that America and Russia, perceiving an extraterrestrial threat, will abandon their arms race and unite in defense of their planet. The Comedian, Veidt also reveals, was killed because he happened to stumble upon the island where the creature was being bred; the murderer is revealed to be Veidt himself. Finally, Ozymandias establishes that he is not prey to one major weakness of arch-villains: the tendency to ramble about their plans before they are executed.
At the end of his explanation he reveals that the monster has already been teleported as intended. At PM Eastern Standard Time, the monster arrives in New York, creating a cataclysmic shockwave which kills millions, among them most of the secondary characters.
Laurie and Dr. Manhattan arrive in the devastated city and then teleport to Karnak, where Veidt watches the news and exults as his plan comes to fruition. Only these five former costumed adventurers know the truth of the matter, as Veidt has killed everyone else who knew anything incriminating about the project.
Dan, Laurie and Jon agree to keep silent, sickened by the deaths of millions of New Yorkers but willing to countenance it for the sake of averting nuclear holocaust.
Only Rorschach, who does not believe that the ends justify the means, refuses to comply, and he prepares to return to America. The most celebrated graphic novel of all time continues to break new ground with this digital version of graphic novel that adds limited motion.
When one of his former colleagues is murdered, the outlawed but no less determined masked vigilante Rorschach sets out to uncover a plot to kill and discredit all past and present superheroes. As he reconnects with his former crime-fighting legion--a disbanded group of retired superheroes, only one of whom has true powers--Rorschach glimpses a wide-ranging and disturbing conspiracy with links to their shared past and catastrophic consequences for the future.
A murder takes place in New York City. This event triggers an investigation that rounds up many of The Comedian's former superhero allies, who are now banned from carrying out any acts of "justice. Watchmen is considered an instant classic, and a standard-bearer in the world of comics and graphics novels. Watchmen Motion Comic may contain mature material some viewers might not find suitable. Against the backdrop of The Comedian's funeral, Silk Spectre recalls her horrific assault at the hands of the Comedian, while Nite Owl and Doctor Manhattan recall their own experiences that reveal him to have been a larger-than-life enigma: a hero and a villain in one costume.
As the world braces for what could be a doomsday scenario between the United States and Russia, Laurie leaves Dr. Manhattan and goes to Dan for consoling. Meanwhile, the national media puts Dr. Manhattan under scrutiny, linking him to a rash of cancer deaths, and forcing him to escape to the planet Mars. During his self-exile on Mars, Dr. Meanwhile, police investigators trace clues of their own as another former costumed hero, Ozymandias, is attacked and almost killed.
Rorschach is further convinced someone is out to kill them all. As he tries to prove his point, he is caught by the police during a stake out and has his face revealed for the first time. Laurie and Dan grow closer together as evidence mounts that their former colleagues are being targeted for murder. Frustrated by the unchecked threats, Dan becomes Nite Owl again and flies the Owl Ship for the first time in decades, with Laurie at his side, and winds up rescuing hundreds from an out-of-control tenement fire.
Invigorated by this act of heroism, Dan professes his love for Laurie.
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