S01.E01: It's Summer and We're Running Out of Ice

[TiffanyNichelle]

16 hours ago, meep.meep said:

There was also a photo of the white people from the movie in a frame on the sheriff's desk.

Thanks for that clarification because I watched the episode twice and every time they lingered on the photo I knew it was important but I didn't know how.

[FemmyV]

On 10/20/2019 at 9:14 PM, AimingforYoko said:

I wasn't expecting that. Interesting how they're reversing the racial politics on policing.

It's an interesting assertion, isn't it, that a police force comprised mostly of black people (and that seems to be the way we're going in many cities) would need authorization to use their guns.

I watched the movie ages ago and found it difficult to follow, but loved the visuals. So here I am. It's interesting. And it would suck if Judd turned out to be Cavalry, but circumstances do kind of point that way.

Edited October 22, 2019 by FemmyV

[GustavMahler]

I was wondering if Judd was lynched, not because he was a member of Cavalry, but because he was paying for the sins of his father? I have to rewatch the episode, but there was a moment during the Tula massacre where the young boy stared at the face of one the the White Supremists, while he was hunkered down behind a car. Could that have been Judd’s Father?

[Cardie]

4 hours ago, mac123x said:

Counterpoint to the theory that Bass Reeves inspired the Lone Ranger:

Burton's exact quote is  "Bass Reeves is the closest real person to resemble the Lone Ranger."  That's an analogy.  Burton has since claimed that he was only theorizing and not stating a fact.

It’s fine not to find the argument persuasive. I just wanted to counter the assertion that it was a mere “internet myth.”

[MyPeopleAreNordic]

21 hours ago, meep.meep said:

There was also a photo of the white people from the movie in a frame on the sheriff's desk.

Thanks. I totally didn't catch that and I even paused my DVR on it to see if I could place them. I couldn't tell who it was in the picture - it wasn't clear enough to me (maybe I need glasses). 

[clack]

5 hours ago, mac123x said:

Counterpoint to the theory that Bass Reeves inspired the Lone Ranger:

Burton's exact quote is  "Bass Reeves is the closest real person to resemble the Lone Ranger."  That's an analogy.  Burton has since claimed that he was only theorizing and not stating a fact.

Masked vigilante family tree:

Scarlet Pimpernel > Zorro > Lone Ranger > Batman

Really, I don't know how someone could look at the Lone Ranger and not see how he was inspired by Zorro.

[MyPeopleAreNordic]

On 10/21/2019 at 8:59 AM, DearEvette said:

Regina King was EVERYTHING.  I mean... her duster alone gave me life.

YES!!!! Regina King is badass and her character here is badass. 

This show (judging by the pilot) is weird AF.

And....I AM HERE FOR IT.

21 hours ago, mac123x said:

When I saw Jeremy Irons roll up on a horse at a castle, I wondered if they filmed it at his real life actual castle, but it doesn't look like the pictures here.  Could have saved on production costs.

Of course he owns a castle. That's the most Jeremy Irons thing I've ever heard.

[polyhymnia]

I'm in it for Regina King (she was amazing) but will stay for Jean Smart, Jeremy Irons, and the dude that played Delmar in Oh Brother Where Art Thou. 

[mac123x]

32 minutes ago, polyhymnia said:

I'm in it for Regina King (she was amazing) but will stay for Jean Smart, Jeremy Irons, and the dude that played Delmar in Oh Brother Where Art Thou. 

I'm really looking forward to Jean Smart.  From the previews her character seems just perfect.

[sadie]

Why was Judd the only police person that didn't try to hide his identity? Did I miss it?
 

Oh and Regina King owns me! Loved the costume, the the attitude, loved the badassery. Love love love. I’m all in! 

[Dev F]

On 10/21/2019 at 12:06 PM, Deanie87 said:

Also, is there some significance to the title of this episode other than the song at the end?

I think it's also a more figurative statement about the tense sociopolitical situation: as things heat up, there's a rot that can no longer be forestalled.

18 minutes ago, sadie said:

Why was Judd the only police person that didn't try to hide his identity? Did I miss it?

I don't recall an on-screen explanation, but I assumed that it was because he was the one ultimately responsible for the conduct of the police department, and if he were anonymous it would mean no one could possibly be held accountable to the public. Considering all the other regulations that seem designed to ensure that the police are monitored and regulated, it doesn't seem like folks in this society would stand for completely unaccountable leadership.

(Indeed, it would be pretty well in keeping with the broader themes of the Watchmen universe for the public to have invested all accountability in one larger-than-life figure of authority and allow the rest of the cops to go around anonymously, assuming the one known and trusted authority has got things under control.)

Edited October 22, 2019 by Dev F

[Danielg342]

Hard to believe it's been ten years since the movie came out but, here we are.

I never read the comics, so when the movie came out I went into it with a clean slate. I saw it when it first came out, and I was struck by the visuals, the depth of the story and its overall concept. I thought it was a great movie, but I also remember being bummed about the ending.

Then someone who had read the comics told me afterward "it's not supposed to have a happy ending". The comics weren't a happy place, as I understand, so it made sense for the movie to have a downer ending too.

Which brings me to the TV show. I understand that it's not a direct sequel to the movies- it's tied more to the comics. So, while this episode was- quite clearly- a downer with a very sad world, it made sense.

I'm just not convinced it really worked.

Make no mistake- this show did a great job with the tone, creating a world that not only looks drab and dreary but made me feel just how drab and dreary it was. Not just with the overarching visuals but also the tiny details, like old, racist ad with a "Captain America" type (who looked a lot like Kurt Angle), or the fact that gun control is so entrenched that cops need to have their guns activated at a command centre before they can draw them.

...and raining squids. Because nothing says "depressing" like raining seafood.

...but...in the end, though, this is a TV show and not a painting. If there's nothing more than just the look, then there's no reason to come back.

My first reaction was to say, "where's the light amidst all this darkness?". Usually, when there's a dark world, there's at least someone there who provides hope, with the hook to the story being "can hope win over darkness?" This was the route the movie went- Rorschach tried to make the world a better place but failed- and while it was a downer ending, it only worked because of the crushing loss I felt because of it, as the "light" failed.

In this show...you have an outright evil terrorist group that's bent on nothing but destruction against an equally evil, corrupt police organization that couldn't spell "honour" let alone know what it is.

Oh, with a shadowy billionaire thrown in who is content to let all this happen because...reasons. I'm not sure what he stands to gain from destroying the world, especially one that's already destroyed, but OK.

So...where's the engaging conflict? Where's that person trying to make things better? Was I supposed to sympathize with the cops because "they're cops"?

Sorry, but the instant the blood flowed out of that cell where the supposedly "good" detective savagely beat an admittedly uncooperative but ultimately non-resistant, nonthreatening perp, especially after scenes of cops too eager to get their guns and another detective who labelled the perp a bad guy without a shred of evidence, meant there was no way I could ever get behind the police in this one.

Doesn't matter that the perp was a white supremacist (which is, in itself, overdone in Hollywood these days)...police brutality is nothing to sneeze at, and the police can't claim any kind of "moral authority" over their enemies if they stoop to their level.

Of course, I realize that may still be the point- this show definitely wants to portray that, "in this world, there are no 'good guys'- they're all bad".

Which is OK...but it then leads to the other issue I have with this show:

Why else should I care about these characters?

First of all, though this may not have been a direct sequel to the movie, it sure felt like it- we're brought to a world that's already been destroyed, if only mentally but not physically. There may not be a technical anarchy, but it sure felt like there already was.

So...what exactly people are battling for, I don't know. There's not really much of a "prize" in the end.

Secondly, and more importantly, there really was nothing to these characters. I've already spilled enough about how there's no sympathetic characters, but even there, none of the characters really had well-defined or even somewhat interesting motivations or goals. Everyone is the same- they're all dark, they're all corrupt, they all hate each other and they all want to destroy each other. Why, I don't know, but, more importantly, what they stand to gain? I haven't a clue.

This feels like it's just going to be an endless tedium of bloody, ruthless war that's just going to lead to more bloody, ruthless wars with no tangible benefit for anyone except pride, I guess.

So, why bother? It's a pointless struggle...you sure don't need a TV series to establish that.

You know what was missing through all this?

The original comic was about how superheroes and vigilantism was banned because it destroyed society. It was supposed to be about the darker side of superheroes, and, really, heroism in general.

Aside from a few allusions...there really were no heroes in this story. There was no one that wanted to tell the government they were wrong for outlawing superheroes, or to tell the police that "masked vigilantism" doesn't always mean "7th Cavalry".

I mean, this was a show about a society that was screaming for a hero, someone to come in and give them hope. Where was any of that? Why didn't we get a character or three musing about whether or not heroism really was all that bad?

We didn't necessarily have to have that hero show up today, but the show could have laid the groundwork for it. The characters here by and large lacked honour and morality- qualities you want in a hero- so if we had a character that stood by those principles and sought to establish that- and struggling to do so- things would have been infinitely better.

Instead, we've got a pointless war. Count me out.

[Chicago Redshirt]

13 hours ago, Danielg342 said:

Hard to believe it's been ten years since the movie came out but, here we are.

I never read the comics, so when the movie came out I went into it with a clean slate. I saw it when it first came out, and I was struck by the visuals, the depth of the story and its overall concept. I thought it was a great movie, but I also remember being bummed about the ending.

Then someone who had read the comics told me afterward "it's not supposed to have a happy ending". The comics weren't a happy place, as I understand, so it made sense for the movie to have a downer ending too.

Which brings me to the TV show. I understand that it's not a direct sequel to the movies- it's tied more to the comics. So, while this episode was- quite clearly- a downer with a very sad world, it made sense.

I'm just not convinced it really worked.

Make no mistake- this show did a great job with the tone, creating a world that not only looks drab and dreary but made me feel just how drab and dreary it was. Not just with the overarching visuals but also the tiny details, like old, racist ad with a "Captain America" type (who looked a lot like Kurt Angle), or the fact that gun control is so entrenched that cops need to have their guns activated at a command centre before they can draw them.

...and raining squids. Because nothing says "depressing" like raining seafood.

...but...in the end, though, this is a TV show and not a painting. If there's nothing more than just the look, then there's no reason to come back.

My first reaction was to say, "where's the light amidst all this darkness?". Usually, when there's a dark world, there's at least someone there who provides hope, with the hook to the story being "can hope win over darkness?" This was the route the movie went- Rorschach tried to make the world a better place but failed- and while it was a downer ending, it only worked because of the crushing loss I felt because of it, as the "light" failed.

In this show...you have an outright evil terrorist group that's bent on nothing but destruction against an equally evil, corrupt police organization that couldn't spell "honour" let alone know what it is.

Oh, with a shadowy billionaire thrown in who is content to let all this happen because...reasons. I'm not sure what he stands to gain from destroying the world, especially one that's already destroyed, but OK.

So...where's the engaging conflict? Where's that person trying to make things better? Was I supposed to sympathize with the cops because "they're cops"?

Sorry, but the instant the blood flowed out of that cell where the supposedly "good" detective savagely beat an admittedly uncooperative but ultimately non-resistant, nonthreatening perp, especially after scenes of cops too eager to get their guns and another detective who labelled the perp a bad guy without a shred of evidence, meant there was no way I could ever get behind the police in this one.

Doesn't matter that the perp was a white supremacist (which is, in itself, overdone in Hollywood these days)...police brutality is nothing to sneeze at, and the police can't claim any kind of "moral authority" over their enemies if they stoop to their level.

Of course, I realize that may still be the point- this show definitely wants to portray that, "in this world, there are no 'good guys'- they're all bad".

Which is OK...but it then leads to the other issue I have with this show:

Why else should I care about these characters?

First of all, though this may not have been a direct sequel to the movie, it sure felt like it- we're brought to a world that's already been destroyed, if only mentally but not physically. There may not be a technical anarchy, but it sure felt like there already was.

So...what exactly people are battling for, I don't know. There's not really much of a "prize" in the end.

Secondly, and more importantly, there really was nothing to these characters. I've already spilled enough about how there's no sympathetic characters, but even there, none of the characters really had well-defined or even somewhat interesting motivations or goals. Everyone is the same- they're all dark, they're all corrupt, they all hate each other and they all want to destroy each other. Why, I don't know, but, more importantly, what they stand to gain? I haven't a clue.

This feels like it's just going to be an endless tedium of bloody, ruthless war that's just going to lead to more bloody, ruthless wars with no tangible benefit for anyone except pride, I guess.

So, why bother? It's a pointless struggle...you sure don't need a TV series to establish that.

You know what was missing through all this?

The original comic was about how superheroes and vigilantism was banned because it destroyed society. It was supposed to be about the darker side of superheroes, and, really, heroism in general.

Aside from a few allusions...there really were no heroes in this story. There was no one that wanted to tell the government they were wrong for outlawing superheroes, or to tell the police that "masked vigilantism" doesn't always mean "7th Cavalry".

I mean, this was a show about a society that was screaming for a hero, someone to come in and give them hope. Where was any of that? Why didn't we get a character or three musing about whether or not heroism really was all that bad?

We didn't necessarily have to have that hero show up today, but the show could have laid the groundwork for it. The characters here by and large lacked honour and morality- qualities you want in a hero- so if we had a character that stood by those principles and sought to establish that- and struggling to do so- things would have been infinitely better.

Instead, we've got a pointless war. Count me out.

I'm sorry that you are going to be bowing out, because your commentary here and in the Orville threads has always been interesting. 

To quickly respond to some of your points:

The movie version of "Watchmen" is not dissimilar to the comic book in terms of plot, characters, etc. In both, Adrian "Ozymandias" Veidt, hyped as the smartest man in the world, comes up with way to trick the world into uniting against an imaginary threat, and it seemingly works, at least for a while. One major point where they differ is the mechanics of the "trick." In the movie, Dr. Manhattan is framed as the potential threat. In the comics, Ozymandias creates a giant squid monster with a cloned psychic brain that kills half of New York and is billed as an invasion from another dimension.

So the squid rain in this is apparently a sequel from the comic threat. Someone -- presumably Ozy -- is engineering these squid rains to make it seem as though the threat of invasion is ongoing. There was in the episode a reference to the belief that the squid rain was a government hoax.

One of the things that made Watchmen the comics (and to a lesser extent, the movie) resonate with me was how it blurred lines. Even though he was a mass murderer on an unimaginable scale, was Ozy truly a villain? Even though he only focused his violence on bad guys, was Rorshach really a hero?  

I respectfully disagree as to Rorshach being a point of light in the movie. Both figuratively and literally, he is a mix of light and darkness. His methods were far more brutal than any employed by Sister Night (the detective who interrogated the white supremacist in the TV show). (Grappling gun to the chest of a cop, frying fat to a convict). How can Rorshach claim moral authority when he commits acts of violence beyond his enemies?

I suspect that the battle lines in Watchmen TV are going to be similarly blurred to the comic/movie. Jeremy Irons's character seemingly is Ozy, decades removed from having brought about world peace. How has that panned out for him? Will that peace hold?

Are we going to get a more nuanced picture of the 7th Calvary people? I find it interesting that you find the cops as honorless, given that one of their own was murdered and the 7th Calvary are up to something. 

People might disagree about who or what is sympathetic, but I think it is fairly clear what the goals of Sister Night are: to keep herself and her family safe in a world where some would (and already have tried) to kill her for being a black policewoman.

[rmontro]

I'm almost thinking everyone else watched a different show than I did, because I was not impressed.  Watching ugly race relations is not really my idea of entertainment.  I'm a big fan of the original Watchmen book though, so I will likely stick around for at least a season.  Maybe it will grow on me.  Like a fungus.

[Chicago Redshirt]

People's mileage will vary, but one of the things that I find most interesting about HBO Watchmen vs. its predecessors is the focus on race. In the comic/movie, there were no main characters of color, two supporting black characters (Rorshach's psychiatrist and a kid who hung out reading comics at a newsstand), one or so supporting Asian character (Ozy had a few Asian servants, but I think only one was named and/or had dialogue.). It had brief allusions to race relations (off the top of my head, at a Minutemen meeting in the 60s, one of the problems the country was facing was "black unrest" in the South). But all in all, it was a product of a Brit writing in the 80s, where diversity issues and how Americans tangle with race was not going to be central.

If the pilot is setting up the premise of the series well, that's quite the reverse. At least judging by Tulsa, police are mostly black and concerns about police brutality have gotten to the point that a cop needs pre-authorization to have a gun available. A white supremacist movement's on the rise. Blacks have apparently been awarded some form of reparations by President Robert Redford that get slammed as "Redfordations" by whites. Sister Night is apparently supposed to be our point-of-view character. Or maybe it will be Lou Gossett Jr's character, who was apparently a survivor of a race riot in the 20s. The main sympathetic white man depicted in the show has been murdered. "Oklahoma" has an all-black production. 

I'm looking forward to where things go.

[UNOSEZ]

2 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Oklahoma" has an all-black production. 

Well that was just "black Oklahoma" which is what sister night called it.. Then said only she could call it that.. Not font Johnson's character.  So I guess the original is still out there.. 

[Danielg342]

@Chicago Redshirt. Thanks. I appreciate the kind words. Maybe I'll come back for Episode 2. We'll see.

A few things I'll touch on:

• I meant to bring this up in my review but left it out because it was already long, but the best comparable for me to this series is Gotham, especially in its first season before it went off the rails. That show similarly had a very bleak, depressed setting with characters who were arguably also unsympathetic. However, Gotham succeeded where this show didn't because:
  • There still were stakes. Gotham was about a city that was desperately clinging to law and order, with its last threads separating it from complete anarchy threatened to be severed. The intrigue came from watching the city essentially defend itself, all while waiting with anticipation for the moment the well actually does break. For Watchmen, the world seemed to have already suffered its major catastrophe, having already been decimated with society in practical anarchy, if not actually there.  There doesn't feel like anything worth saving and, worse, I don't get the sense that the characters are truly interested in making anything better- just about "winning the war".
  • Gotham did a far better job detailing the human struggles that came with dealing with a city on its edge. Yeah, Oswald Cobblepott was a deranged psychopath who'd murder you for just looking at him funny but the show still painted him as a man who lashes out because of his own internal feelings of vulnerability and alienation, as well as the lack of connection with just about anyone since his family was brutally taken from him. Jim Gordon became so obsessed with being "the hero" that he eventually decided to throw away his moral compass, without realizing that he evolved into the villains he's trying to put away. So on and so forth. Mileage will vary on this, but I don't think Watchmen did a very good job humanizing anyone. There was no exploration into why people were the way they were- the show just displayed a lot of things and expected us to dig deeper. That's not how I roll. I'm not saying I need the show to explain everything right away, but it should at least give me something that intrigues me enough to want to dig deeper.
• I should say I used "light" in the metaphorical sense- not in the quasi-literal sense that "this guy is actually a good guy". Rorschach may have made morally questionable decisions but you at least got the sense that he was trying to make the world a better place. I don't see that at all with Sister Knight (whose name I had forgotten because that's how much the character resonated with me). One, because I don't see exactly what she's improving and two because I'm not sure she's much of an improvement over her enemies. Both are practically interchangeable- it doesn't matter that the 7th Cavalry killed a cop, both sides still act and think the same way.
• This isn't necessarily bad but if Sister Knight is our point of view character the show did a poor job showing it. Even if she's no better than her enemies, we never really saw how this affected her or even if she agrees with how things are shaking out. Regina King did a lot of brooding but her character didn't do a lot of explaining. How she struggles with how this world works could have done the character- and the episode- a world of good.
• As far as the race thing goes, I think it would make a great story. I think the idea of President Robert Redford engaging in a form of "white guilt" is a great one worthy of exploring. The problem is, like much of this episode, nothing was really explored. Aside from the angry kid, did we really get a sense that there was much to the anger of "Redfordations"? There was no one to provide the "white" point of view (or the "black" one for that matter), something that could give a personal touch to the race struggles. This could have been a more interesting story if it was, say, about a white man falsely accused of being a part of the 7th Cavalry putting the Tulsa police in a bad place. Flipping the race issue on its head to make whites the oppressed race would be a fun topic to explore- they just have to explore it.

[Chicago Redshirt]

To compare/contrast with Gotham, the creators of Gotham have things relatively easy. Most anyone who would watch Gotham has a basic sense of what pre-Batman Gotham, Gordon, Penguin, Riddler, etc. might be like. 

Even people familiar with movie/comic Watchmen wouldn't necessarily be able to extrapolate what life was like for ordinary people in the 80s since they focused on the masks, let alone what life would be like now. Trying to present a number of original characters in a newish setting in a single episode is tough -- it requires a balance between plot, exposition, background visuals and on and on. 

For my money, I don't think what we were presented was particularly bleak, and the powers that be did a reasonable job juggling the different aspects to introduce us to their world.

[MrWhyt]

21 hours ago, Danielg342 said:

Rorschach may have made morally questionable decisions but you at least got the sense that he was trying to make the world a better place.

so was Ozymandias

[DearEvette]

22 hours ago, Danielg342 said:

As far as the race thing goes, I think it would make a great story. I think the idea of President Robert Redford engaging in a form of "white guilt" is a great one worthy of exploring. The problem is, like much of this episode, nothing was really explored. Aside from the angry kid, did we really get a sense that there was much to the anger of "Redfordations"? There was no one to provide the "white" point of view (or the "black" one for that matter), something that could give a personal touch to the race struggles. This could have been a more interesting story if it was, say, about a white man falsely accused of being a part of the 7th Cavalry putting the Tulsa police in a bad place. Flipping the race issue on its head to make whites the oppressed race would be a fun topic to explore- they just have to explore it.

Centering white people oppression is absolutely counter to what I think the show is trying to say. 

In the original comic the villain wasn't just a generic scenery chewing villain like the Joker or Lex Luthor it was a lingering sense of doom and unease with an impending nuclear crisis.  Nixon had declared himself a president for life and had served five terms, things were tipping over into fascism and the big fear that lingered like a miasma over the country was rooted in cold war.  Superheroes couldn't defeat something so nebulous.  I went to grammar school in the late 70s and I remember we had nuclear shelters in the schools and did 'duck and cover' drills.  so I know that some of that unease was very real. 

The episode starts with the very real historical destruction of Black Wall Street.  A massacre of a prosperous and wealthy black business enclave that, by today's calculations,  the concentrated wealth would be in the billions.  And the episode did not exaggerate, white folks  actually got planes to drop bombs on a black business district.  Had it been allowed to thrive, it could have been a model for black generational wealth that was unprecedented.  As it is, the results of the destruction are incalculable,

My take is that Robert Redford was a complete pendulum swing from the Nixon and got a reparations bills passed based on that destruction.  To bring the story to the present day and make it immediate for the current audience, this all ties in with the new villain that a masked superhero simply can't defeat with a kapow!.  The nuclear threat has been replaced by another ephemeral threat - white supremacy.  This is a real miasma, like the unease of the cold war, that kinda hangs over everything and is difficult to defeat.

The show really is a extrapolation, and I think a smart one just for one viewing, of how that alternate universe could have unfolded to become what we saw on screen. The original was an AU rooted in real life anxiety and I this is too.

Edited October 25, 2019 by DearEvette

[Dev F]

2 hours ago, DearEvette said:

The episode starts with the very real historical destruction of Black Wall Street.  A massacre of a prosperous and wealthy black business enclave that, by today's calculations,  the concentrated wealth would be in the billions.  And the episode did not exaggerate, white folks  actually got planes to drop bombs on a black business district.  Had it been allowed to thrive, it could have been a model for black generational wealth that was unprecedented.  As it is, the results of the destruction are incalculable,

My take is that Robert Redford was a complete pendulum swing from the Nixon and got a reparations bills passed based on that destruction.  To bring the story to the present day and make it immediate for the current audience, this all ties in with the new villain that a masked superhero simply can't defeat with a kapow!.  The nuclear threat has been replaced by another ephemeral threat - white supremacy.  This is a real miasma, like the unease of the cold war, that kinda hangs over everything and is difficult to defeat.

Exactly. And in that sense I absolutely see Sister Night as someone who may resort to horrifying actions but is nonetheless trying to make the world a better place, just like Rorschach (and Ozy!). She's protecting a social order that from her perspective is oriented toward equal justice and prosperity for the first time in a century. She's fighting the sort of people who murdered her forebears in the streets to overthrow that order the last time -- and the actual people who nearly killed her in an attempt to overthrow it again. "If we don't have walls, it all comes tumblin' down."

[Danielg342]

7 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

To compare/contrast with Gotham, the creators of Gotham have things relatively easy. Most anyone who would watch Gotham has a basic sense of what pre-Batman Gotham, Gordon, Penguin, Riddler, etc. might be like. 

I don't think it has anything to do with familiarity. Gotham doesn't last five seasons without at least some of their version of the characters connecting- chief among them being Robin Lord Taylor's Penguin. Familiarity is a draw, but unless something keeps you interested, you're not coming back.

Heck, many of my all-time favourite characters were blank slates to me before I got to know them. Furthermore, this series isn't a blank slate for me- I may not have read the comics but I know about them and I was interested in this series because of the movie.

The series just didn't connect with me. At least in the first episode.

(Arguably you don't have this TV series if the movie wasn't recent or as successful as it was. This may not be based on the movie but I'm sure there are people- like me- who wanted to check it out because of the movie)

Anyway...I'm not going to go into why it didn't connect with me. I think I've discussed that to the ground and it'll just keep going in circles.

What I will say is this: On the Game of Thrones forum, I came across an article concerning psychological vs. sociological storytelling that I think could apply to this series.

Long story short, psychological stories are ones that are about a character or a group of characters, detailing what they do, how they react to things and how they feel about them. In essence, if you don't have the central characters in a psychological story, you don't have a story at all.

A sociological work is more about the events that happen and how they shape the world rather than being about one or two or ten characters. The characters are essentially peripheral figures and could even be expendable because, in these stories, what's more important are the sequence of events. You still need characters, obviously, to create these events, but a sociological story only asks its characters to contribute when they're needed- there's no "main character" throughout, or at least there doesn't have to be.

I think about this because, very clearly, The Watchmen at least intends to be a sociological series. The pilot sure suggested to me that this series isn't going to be about one particular character or one group of characters- rather, it's going to be about the events that take place in this world and how those shape future events in the story. Sister Knight, the 7th Cavalry, Ozymandias, etc.- neither of them will be the sole creator or even "reactor" to the events of the story. Sometimes they'll be front and centre, and sometimes they'll just be in the periphery.

It's not a bad idea. In fact, I have nothing but nice things to say about The Watchmen's setting.

...and sociological stories can be great stories. A well-written history book is a great sociological story.

I just wonder if it's going to work. The only way a sociological story works is if the writer remembers that the "universe" is now a character in its own right, where it eventually develops, progressing or regressing and changing as events affect it. Mileage will vary, but I'm hard pressed to see how any of this will be actually different by the end of the series. This world is essentially an anarchy- whether or not it gets there is just a technicality.

A silver lining- perhaps this is one of those shows where you read about how it ended and you see how all these things from previous episodes wind up making sense when they didn't before. When the season's done, I could watch it in one go and by the end it will enamour me.

Of course, then I ask- why not just make another movie? Or, if the setting is not supposed to change, why not just make this firmly a story about Sister Knight? Being "different" by telling a story in a different way doesn't always make it better.

...but that's just me. Your mileage will vary.

[Tachi Rocinante]

Didn't care for the comic (Moore is waayy overrated) and the movie was average, but this was pretty good.

Unfortunately Lindelhof is the king of great setup/shitty payoff, so I'm not holding my breath. 

I'm in for now.

[rmontro]

I just don't even get a strong "Watchmen" vibe from this, even with the Owl ship, the newspaper referring to Veidt, the Rorschach masks, and the squid rains.  And like I said, I don't find bad race relations entertaining, so I'm not very enthusiastic.

[ihartcoffee]

Did anyone else think the guy who took the cyanide pill was the same one who shot the cop in the beginning?  I thought it looked like him, but wasn't sure.  

[Ubiquitous]

On ‎9‎/‎23‎/‎2019 at 8:07 PM, saoirse said:

"It's Summer and We're Running Out of Ice".

Police conceal their identities behind masks in an alternate America to protect themselves from a terrorist organization, but Detective Angela Abar investigates the attempted murder of a fellow officer under the guidance of her friend an Chief, Judd Crawford. Meanwhile, the Lord of a Country Estate receives an anniversary gift from his loyal servants.

I wasn't particularly impressed by this ep, but with that guy from Lost involved, the bar has not been set very high. There seemed to be a lot of setting things up, and judging by what I've seen, I'd guess it's going to be yet another Hollywood "discussion" on racism. I might check the next ep and see if it gets any better...

[grawlix]

On 10/26/2019 at 5:40 AM, ihartcoffee said:

Did anyone else think the guy who took the cyanide pill was the same one who shot the cop in the beginning?  I thought it looked like him, but wasn't sure.  

It was the same guy who shot the cop.  The 7th kalvary guy who Sister Night (Regina King) had put into her trunk gave up his location.  The police chief (Don Johnson) later confirmed it was the shooter during his phone call with the governor.

[BooBear]

On 10/25/2019 at 10:21 PM, rmontro said:

I just don't even get a strong "Watchmen" vibe from this, even with the Owl ship, the newspaper referring to Veidt, the Rorschach masks, and the squid rains.  And like I said, I don't find bad race relations entertaining, so I'm not very enthusiastic.

Another example of Hollywood taking a popular property and grafting the story they want to tell on it. I thought it was horrible. 

[rmontro]

5 hours ago, BooBear said:

Another example of Hollywood taking a popular property and grafting the story they want to tell on it. I thought it was horrible. 

Yeah, you hit the nail on the head there, that's exactly what it seems like.  Lindelof has a story he wants to tell, so they set it in this world and call it Watchmen.

[Chicago Redshirt]

On 10/25/2019 at 9:21 PM, rmontro said:

I just don't even get a strong "Watchmen" vibe from this, even with the Owl ship, the newspaper referring to Veidt, the Rorschach masks, and the squid rains.  And like I said, I don't find bad race relations entertaining, so I'm not very enthusiastic.

We also had what is almost certainly Veidt himself, references to Doctor Manhattan, Sen. Keene, Redford as a politician, someone carrying a sign "The Future is Bright" that is a flipside to Rorshach's carrying a sign that "The End is Nigh," and probably other things that I missed on first viewing.

[ihartcoffee]

On 10/27/2019 at 12:53 PM, grawlix said:

It was the same guy who shot the cop.  The 7th kalvary guy who Sister Night (Regina King) had put into her trunk gave up his location.  The police chief (Don Johnson) later confirmed it was the shooter during his phone call with the governor.

I didn't think the guy brought into the station was the same one.  The shooter had very blue eyes,  you see it when he has the flashlight in his face.  Maybe I'm just mixing all the white guys up,  lol

[grawlix]

4 hours ago, ihartcoffee said:

I didn't think the guy brought into the station was the same one.  The shooter had very blue eyes,  you see it when he has the flashlight in his face.  Maybe I'm just mixing all the white guys up,  lol

My apologies for not being clearer.  The cop shooter was the one who was killed at the cattle ranch.  The interrogated one was a different 7th kalvary guy targeted by Sister Night because she suspected he knew the cop shooter's location.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I have no exposure to the previous Watchmen stuff but I still found the first episode interesting enough to keep watching.

Don Johnson looks really good for his age. In fact, he looked so unchanged that I had to consult the internet to confirm his age - he's turning 70 in a few weeks! I knew it was too much to hope that a musical loving cop would stick around so I knew he would die. He sealed his fate when he told Panda Man, "It's my funeral."

I am totally here for Regina King kicking ass and looking fine as hell.

[Lifesabeach]

Arriving a little late.  And like some others upthread I have no previous exposure  to this story.  But I do like dystopian scenarios (Purge, AHS, Midnight Meat Wagon..). I find the violence cathartic.  Imagining other people’s faces....     😈            I quickly dropped from Lost because of the continuous new questions without giving or even hinting at some answers.  Tiresome.     Recognized Tim Blake Nelson right away.  Love him.  When they were fighting in the field of cattle I half way expected to hear ‘Oh no, not the livestock!’.

[Morrigan2575]

On 11/3/2019 at 7:42 AM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Don Johnson looks really good for his age. In fact, he looked so unchanged that I had to consult the internet to confirm his age - he's turning 70 in a few weeks!

I had the same thought while watching him. Damn! He must of had one hell of a plastic surgeon or he just got the best genes in the pool.

Edited November 10, 2019 by Morrigan2575

[Lifesabeach]

17 hours ago, Lifesabeach said:

Arriving a little late.  And like some others upthread I have no previous exposure  to this story.  But I do like dystopian scenarios (Purge, AHS, Midnight Meat Train....). I find the violence cathartic.  Imagining other people’s faces....     😈            I quickly dropped from Lost because of the continuous new questions without giving or even hinting at some answers.  Tiresome.     Recognized Tim Blake Nelson right away.  Love him.  When they were fighting in the field of cattle I half way expected to hear ‘Oh no, not the livestock!’.

Train not wagon 

[Colorado David]

I started watching this, and am enjoying it. I am not liking the music tho, it sounds very 'Knightrider'ish.

[Adgirl]

I'm surprised this episode wasn't revisited considering the significance is better known now.

[Quickbeam]

Just watching this now, no knowledge of the source material.

—Don Johnson looks great. I will miss him but yeah, knew where that was going.

—Black Oklahoma was everything. Stage actor enthusiasm cranked to 11.

—Regina King was amazing.

—had no idea what was going on with world building but I’m game. 

[CigarDoug]

On 10/20/2019 at 10:48 PM, mjc570 said:

I thought it was great, I was absolutely mesmerized. 

You aren’t the only one who is mesmerized. #OnlyASpoilerBecauseIJustSaidItWas

[Kel Varnsen]

Watched the first episode last night since my cable company gave me HBO/showtime on demand for a nice discount for the next 4 months. As someone who has read the comic several times it definitely has me interesting. The fact that Alan Moore, a guy who got famous writing Superman, Batman and Swamp Thing stories (and then went on to write stories about Captain Nemo, Wendy from Peter Pan and Harry Potter) but does not like when people adapt his works, probably hates it has me even more interested.

[Anela]

I can barely remember the movie, and I haven't read the comics. I just know that friends of mine thought this series was excellent, so I'm watching.

I couldn't remember Don Johnson's name. I swear my brain must have room for only so much information - people here always remember, or know, so much more than I do. Or I've just forgotten a lot.

Regina King is amazing.

I'm going to have to look up the comic and movie, and read the history, just so I know what people here are talking about. 

[Mr. Sparkle]

22 minutes ago, Anela said:

I'm going to have to look up the comic and movie, and read the history, just so I know what people here are talking about. 

Read the comic and skip the movie.