Watchmen Discussion Thread

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

Ozy has wisdom and breath of knowledge, and in addition he has human feeling. Only a few of the characters in the story are powerful enough to change the course of events at the necessary level. Of those, they all seem less desireable to me than Ozy for various reasons.

The movie also undersold Ozy's "rockstar" or "JFK" appeal from the novel. In the movie he's a little more 2dimensional as "the smartest man in the world." In the novel I think he functions a little more as questioning how the people we choose to lead us actually decide things. It feels a little more like he's perceived to be the smartest man in the world, but that doesn't mean has all the answers.

[Puzz3D]

The movie also undersold Ozy's "rockstar" or "JFK" appeal from the novel. In the movie he's a little more 2dimensional as "the smartest man in the world." In the novel I think he functions a little more as questioning how the people we choose to lead us actually decide things. It feels a little more like he's perceived to be the smartest man in the world, but that doesn't mean has all the answers.

I thought the pretty boy image came across quite well in the movie. I'm still only 1/3 of the way into the novel so far, and Ozy's character is not very well developed at this point. Interesting point about Ozy being perceived to be the smartest man while he may not actually be so. This would elevate his social, political, and/or business status higher than it should be. People do this quite often with public figures, and the point is made how Ozy is a high profile public figure. I wrote off some of his characteristics as portrayed in the movie as red herrings, but perhaps they are actual flaws. I haven't been seeing him to be as flawed as he may actually be. Laurie is another character who I hope is more fully developed in the novel.

I mean, Ozy decided to change the world after eating a ball of hash and having a vision in the desert.

I guess that ties in with this idea:

In the novel I think he functions a little more as questioning how the people we choose to lead us actually decide things.

Even smart people may rely on or be influenced by irrational factors when making decisions. I hope that higher intelligence in a person results in less irrationality in their decision making. Irrationality might seem to be a flaw, but it does allow humans to make decisions when confronted with paradoxical situations. I have this perception that each individual decides how much weight to give irrationality in their decision making, and this of course fluctuates over time. I like to keep irrationality relatively low in my decision making, but I don't always succeed in doing so. If you are faced with a situation where intelligence can't decide better than fifty-fifty then irrationality will decide unless you postpone making the decision perhaps to get more information later, but the postponement could also be a symptom of paralysis. I think this is why it's important to understand the world and how things work as best you can. Knowledge is valuable, and the more you have of it the better.

Lecture over.

[Ramses II CP]

Here's an entertaining Watchmen review from the Escapist's MovieBob:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/vide...views-Watchmen

Some questionable language so not safe for work.

I still see Ozymandias as a repudiation of raw intelligence (And charisma, i.e. what we choose in our leaders) as the ultimate problem solver in world affairs. Remember that this was written in a world which still stood on the actual brink of nuclear annihilation. A world where the greatest minds of a generation had bent all their efforts to the creation of weapons that could wipe out mankind a thousand times over. In that time if we were counting on genius to bail us out we seemed likely to see the world burned down and millions of the innocent butchered.

Let's pause to remember, as well, that it wasn't genius or dramatic action which broke the cold war dynamic in the real world either. It was peasant bread lines and unpaid state functionaries that destroyed the Soviet Union. The intelligent need not apply.

We've all read our Shelley, yes? The book and the movie both quote his poem in which we are invited to look on Ozymandias' great works and find only empty desert stretching into the distance. Not a ringing endorsement.

IMHO none of the characters in the book are genuinely to be admired. They are all broken, all red handed destroyers in one sense or another, just as we all are in the real world. Watchmen deconstructs the very idea of heroism right down to the flawed presumption that some grand, noble, single action or actor can have dramatic positive impact in the world. In truth I find that the reverse is the case; we as men are truly gifted at destruction such that a single act can often wreak great havoc and terror on the world, but it takes many hands and a lot of willingness to fight through failure to make things better.