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Snyder seems to have an excellent sense of style in his films, but this critique is mostly about the writing. (FWIW, I haven't seen 300, but enjoyed Watchmen.)

I actually liked 300 and Watchmen; his other stuff, not so much.

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Who watches the watchmen? We all do, just now. =)

I feel like the current crop of superhero flicks are sacrificing too much in the way of character development for spectacle and more characters. I was honestly surprised by the reception to The Avengers as it felt like it could have been directed by Michael Bay. I suppose it's too much to wish for more superhero movies in the style of Watchmen, particularly given how badly it did.

I thought CA:TWS had some good set piece scenes, but ultimately fell into the same camp (threadbare plot! more under-developed characters! more explosions!). The deeper themes I saw some reviewers vouch for (surveillance vs. security) seemed horribly superficial.

Yeah, so halfway through and he's just finished the bit about Sucker Punch. Gonna have to stop you there, buddy. I *have* seen Sucker Punch along with all of Snyders other movies (except the owl thing).

He's a technically gifted director, but he's at his best when he's adapting material (300, Dawn of the Dead). His Watchmen was a solid adaptation of the source material, but it completely missed the point of the original (which was to highlight the strengths of comics as a medium). Stripped of all it's little nuances, Watchmen is a decent if unremarkable superhero movie, whereas the comic is a work of genuine literary innovation.

As for the rest of the video, if you have to make a video like this is explain why the movie is not bad, then clearly the movie failed to connect with it's intended audience. Even if there is an explanation for each of those story points (and his dads death is still retarded), it doesn't matter. Taken as a whole the movie just feels wrong. And frankly, by the end, I was bored. I had no investment in any of the characters.

And the final comment is utter bollocks. Yeah, Superman's been an asshole in the comics. Hell, I've never even really been a fan of Superman (stories involving an indestructible being with near god like strength aren't that interesting). But you've just spent 15 minutes explaining why it's a good movie despite those previous attributes, so I can't respond with my (equally subjective) opinion?

This is a pretty good summary

*quality

Who watches the Watchmen?

Well, I don't think the Ultimate Cut will do much to fix the shortcomings of the Fearful Symmetry adaptation in your eyes. It's still sparse and misses a lot of detail. But, maybe Watchmen was better suited for a miniseries than a movie to begin with?

Oh man, that is way cool!

Yeah, the Watchmen movie is a point of contention with fans. But I'm of the mind that a rendition of any property doesn't ruin it. If I loved the original trilogy of Star Wars, for instance, then the new trilogy doesn't change that, you know?

I really liked the Watchmen movie because I never thought it would live up to the integrity of the original comic miniseries. But then after watching the Ultimate Cut, it's a fairly accurate cut. It's pretty great, actually. In my opinion, at least.

I thought the Watchmen movie was competent rather than inspired. In fact, I thought the most original clever part of the movie was the opening credits.

It wasn't bad, but there was just no way it could handle the sheer depth of the comic. To be fair, I haven't seen the ultimate cut though, but well... I went with a few friends who hadn't read the comic, and they came out wondering why I had made such a big deal of going to see it. Then I loaned them the comic and they understood....

I really think the only way the movie could have been truly great would be to get someone with their own vision and go at it from a different angle. Terry Gilliam would have been interesting. It probably would have failed, but it'd have failed gloriously.

BTW, have to share this..my signed Rorschach portrait by John Higgins

@ChaosEngine, I'm a big Moore fan, too. He's pretty great, isn't he? Curious what you thought of the Watchmen movie. And if you watched the Ultimate Cut or not. Now on to the more unpleasant stuff...


You wrote: "The problems I'd like to see addressed are what happens when this idyllic utopia breaks down. What happens in the absence of a leviathan when someone robs or steals from you using force? How is that righted? What happens when a crime is perpetrated and there is no single victim, but the act is still damaging? Pollution, for instance."

First off, I'm not sure small "l" libertarianism creates a utopia, idyllic or otherwise, It makes very little promises in that area, because the pragmatic argument is: freedom is dangerous. And libertarianism doesn't seek to create a perfect socially engineered society. It knows human problems are messy and complex, and there's no way to solve them from a monolithic, and often clumsy, top-down approach.

As for redressable damages (wrongs being righted), well, most small "l" libertarians still believe in civil courts and even administrative roles for government, believe it or not. Even Moore thought the government would work best in an administrative role, and he was a bonafide anarchist. This video is about the more extreme anarchist perspective of voluntaryism, which is a political philosophy of non-aggression, and couldn't be leapt into overnight. So, if someone pollutes your air, you have a grievance even in a libertarian society.


You wrote: "The biggest gang was chosen by it's people. And if they start acting like dicks, then we choose another gang. Now whether one gang is as bad as the previous one is another debate..."

Really? I could argue that the two party system holds our electorate system hostage, but let's just assume that's not true. Bush ran on a platform in 2001 that completely contradicted his policies while in office. So has Obama.


You wrote: "It actually describes a potential problem with anarchy, but it doesn't say how the problem would be solved..."

Right. Because anarchist aren't utopians. And small "l" libertarians don't want to replace a bad socially engineered political system with a new socially engineered political system. They really just want to leave it up to the people.

^^ Thanks for sharing your Dimty reflections, nothing quite like standing in that temple-Did you ever talk to the entities that reside in that space? There's an intelligence there that's not an wholly subjective, associative conjuring of the mind-I know it's a consciousness outside of oneself, maybe a higher self-It's sentient and outside of the realm of any other psychoactive subs I have ever taken.

My first DMT trip I flew through a huge, smiley-face grid (I think I had just seen the Watchmen) before I reached something I did not recognize from all my flight time till then.......Great stuff...Life-affirming and purgative and, you can do it on your LUNCH HOUR!!

I would love to see that. I think most writers/directors had no clue what the philosophical/ethical questions are that a character with the power of superman has to confront. It's basically not the bad guy/ Kryptonite / magic which could destroy superman, that makes superman interesting. What the hell, NO superhero movie should be interesting because of the part where the hero could get hurt. In the end there is one thing we all know when we go to a superhero movie, the hero survives in the end, maybe we're cheering for the bad guy or hope the world will get what it deserves but deep down we know that the hero will find a way to stop the crisis. It's just the way these movies work. On the other hand what I find interesting, is to see what the hero has to sacrifice in order to save the world. Sure Superman will still be super tomorrow, but what about the rest of the world?

Did you see Watchmen? Great movie (ok against what i said earlier, in the end one of the heroes dies) but besides that, it shows brilliantly how to work with a unstoppable superhuman being and how to create a crisis that doesn't need something like Kryptonite/Magic to work as a movie. You don't even know/see the bad guy until the last quarter of the movie. And one of the Heroes (Dr. Manhatten) is literally unstoppable, I mean he can change reality with his will as far as I know. But even he is of no help at all in the given circumstances. You can say the biggest enemy of Dr. Manhatten is himself, I would also say this applies to superman. And I think that is what makes it great.

On the other side you can make a movie like "The Avengers" which is great as a action movie but I don't think it's a good superhero movie. I mean when i watched this movie, all i did was waiting for the grand finale. The final super fight where the avengers fight together. And what was it? Just a group of super dudes/dudesses killing one exchangeable alien thingy after another... wow great tension you achieved there... I mean in the end what is the great crisis they fight? That their own Bosses try to nuke them, because everything else was under control at that moment.

It does make great action material, but what I want to see (and sadly that doesn't seem what "the people" want to see) is a superhero movie (especially speaking of superman) where the hero has to fight more than just interchangeable aliens in a big CGI fuckfest.