It takes a caboodle of guts to endeavor to follow up an iconic piece of superhero storytelling , and even more to do so in service of exploring some of the most troubling facet of the genre ’s past . luckily , if there ’s one thing Damon Lindelof and HBO’sWatchmenhave plenty of , it ’s guts .
The superhero series , which premier five old age ago this calendar month on HBO , is essentially a sequel to Alan Moore , Dave Gibbons , and John Higgins ’ original , seminalWatchmencomic bookthat picks up 34 years after its ending . The show abandons the Cold War scope and tensions of its root material in favor of turningWatchmen‘s uniquely unsentimental heart on America ’s on-going , age - sometime exit with racialism and snowy supremacy . In doing so , the series also take to focus its scornful regard on the chronicle of the superhero genre itself .
When it aired in 2019 , the HBO show rightly received far-flung decisive plaudit , but it feels like it has mostly been forgotten in recent years . That ’s a shame , deliberate it happens to be one of the boldest and most thought - provoking New superhero projects that Hollywood has produced .
A Watchmen for a new era
go down mostly in Tulsa , Oklahoma , HBO’sWatchmenfinds America in another peak of tense ferment . Recent attack by a white supremacist group sleep with as the Seventh Kavalry , which uses Rorschach - inspire masks as one of their calling calling card , have impel members of Tulsa ’s Police Department to don costumes and masks of their own to protect their indistinguishability . At the center of this conflict is Angela Abar ( Regina King ) , a police detective who masquerades professionally as a rugged , relentless vigilante named Sister Night . Watchmenfollows Angela as her investigation into the Seventh Kavalry leave in her reveal line of subversion running within her own police section , as well as details of her family ’s untold vigilante past .
Along the fashion , multiple eccentric from Moore and company ’s originalWatchmencomic book are re-introduce , admit Adrian Veidt ( Jeremy Irons ) , Laurie Blake ( Jean Smart ) , and Doctor Manhattan ( Yahya Abdul - Mateen II ) . Despite this , Lindelof’sWatchmennever becomes too treasured with its source material . On the contrary , the serial in reality treat its characters and their vigilante lives with the same acidic tone and uncompromisingly tight grasp as originalWatchmenwriter Alan Moore . It even shares the same disgust for the troubling , sometimes fascistic power fantasy face of many superhero floor as its reservoir fabric — and which Moore himself has onlydoubled down onover the years . It is a superhero serial that expose once again , in quite expressed terms , the easy venal nature of most powerful institution , whether they be police force section , superhero teams , or billion - dollar corporations .
The show tackled a thorny subject with fresh perspective
Across its nine episodes , Watchmenalso finds often fittingly disconcerting ways of exploring the upshot of systemic racialism that have chivy America for centuries . It does this perhaps most flat out in its opening sequence , which horrifyingly depicts the Black Wall Street slaughter of 1921 , and in its unforgettable sixth episode , which reimagines the origin story of the mysterious vigilance man known as Hooded Justice in social club to foreground in tragic and stylish fashion the form of generational trauma and centuries - spanning unfairness that Black Americans have been forced to endure . Watchmenadditionally builds off these theme and idea through Angela ’s surprising connections to Hooded Justice and Doctor Manhattan , both of which allow it to investigate the superhero genre ’s problematic history of excluding people of coloring from its stories and its most formidable position of power .
HBO’sWatchmenis the rarified resilient - action superhero title of respect that does n’t experience constrained by fear or nostalgia . It ’s a take - no - captive kind of legacy sequel — one that is neither afraid of anger longtime comical book fans . nor unwilling to rewrite and reinterpret its author fabric in ways that are sometimes jarring and unexpected , but always undeniably bluff . Like the originalWatchmencomic , it ’s unforced to take itself to task for engaging in the very same costumed power fantasies that it is designed to critique .
An open door, and a leap of faith
The HBO series travel further than that , too . It takes both America and the superhero genre to task — highlighting how the former has reject to do anything to truly address or extinguish its cock-a-hoop exit and how the latter tends to celebrate the very American innovation that have continually bomb to protect all of their land ’s citizens . Rather than arrive at a likewise lose - lose , almost irresistibly nihilistic ending as its informant material , though , HBO’sWatchmenleaves the room access open for something — if not necessarily bright — then at least new . The show ’s climactic installments ask whether or not America ’s established power structures really ca n’t be left behind or exchange , and it eventually arrive at a terminal simulacrum charged with immense , provocative promise .
Is there still time for our notions of king and , specifically , who is allowed to maintain it , to be changed and reevaluated?Watchmendoesn’t demo a concrete resolution to that question , but it goes out of its way to enquire it . That alone earns the series a unparalleled position in modern superhero medium story . It is n’t often these days that funny book fans get a show so daring and occupy with so much clear purpose , but that only makes watchingWatchmenan all - the - rare and more special experience . It ’s the rarefied bequest sequel that really manage to not only live up to its iconic seed cloth , but also copy its queer spirit and appeal .
HBO’sWatchmenis streaming now onMax .
