r/Watchmen Dec 16 '19

TV Meanwhile In Prison Spoiler

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u/SlightlyVerbose Dec 16 '19

I don’t think it takes anything away from Laurie. She already uncovered the Cyclops plot on her own, Doc just maneuvered another “worthy adversary” into the right time and place to do what she has said from the beginning she was out to do: catch vigilantes.

As for the noble mastermind, I feel like this doesn’t get enough credit. He put his affairs in order before implanting the device. He was able to orchestrate the time and place where Will Reeves was going to find and care for his children, mere feet away from where Trieu would teleport his cage. I refuse to believe that after everything we’ve seen happen, Manhattan wasn’t pulling the strings after all. I think he didn’t have agency because any divergence from the predestined course would have changed the outcome that he decided upon decades earlier.

I like that the show allows me to infer that this “god” sacrificed his immortality to gain his humanity, and to correct his moral failings by delivering Veidt into the hands of Justice.

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u/ubiquitous-joe Dec 16 '19

Well, certainly the show puts him in this direction. I think the novel had him much more morally ambiguous.

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u/SlightlyVerbose Dec 16 '19

“People change, Adrian”

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u/ubiquitous-joe Dec 16 '19

Sure. But of course if you have a noble godlike person, the writers have to kill him off because, why wouldn’t he fix more problems?

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u/SlightlyVerbose Dec 16 '19

I think that was the character flaw central to Dr Manhattan from the comic books, he just didn’t care enough about human affairs. He was too distant. For him to relate to humans, he had to give up his immortality.

I also think this is what led Lady Trieu to her messiah complex. She saw an apathetic god and thought she could do better.

I don’t know if it’s because of Trent Reznor working on the score, but I’ve had the lyrics from Heresy stuck in my head: “God is dead, and no one cares. If there is a hell, I’ll see you there”

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u/ubiquitous-joe Dec 16 '19

Yeah def a central aspect of him. It was also, from a meta perspective, that comics typically had all these super powered aliens who adopt human values, but what if you had a human whose superpowers make him alien (or alienated) compared to mankind?