Watchmen Review

The media is a fickle fiend, most of the media we consume throughout the course of our lives is either depressingly average, or utter crap. However, on occasion, a media product so spectacular, meaningful and life affirming restores our faith as consumers and continues to fuel the media machine that we all know, hate and love. Watchmen is one of these products.

The comic's plot line centralises on a world in which superheroes, or “masked vigilantes”, have had their time in the limelight and become both inadequate to fight crime and criminals themselves. The story starts with the murder of The Comedian, a government controlled superhero and, through a combination of traditional comic book story-telling and lengthy text sections, advances through an expertly woven and uncompromising narrative, with a steady and unrelenting pace.

Everything about the comic's plot is absurdly well written, from the introduction of the characters, to the comics conclusion (which is such a shocking reflection upon the futility of humanity's actions that it had me thinking for weeks after I had finished reading the comic) Moore's writing is so complete and perfectly realised that I actually can't fault it at all. Watchmen has the depth of the greatest novels and the scope of the greatest films.

The artwork accompanying Moore's skilled writing captures the ethos and atmosphere of the comic perfectly and whilst there are a few issues with the consistency of certain character's appearances, it's rather difficult to care when the world of a comic is so expertly crafted.

The only flaw I can find in Watchmen is that it's ideas are exceptionally elevated and weighty for the genre, and those new to the comic book format will struggle with it's content. Indeed the comic makes it very clear for the beginning of the narrative that this is not a comic for weak readers with an up front, brutal murder.

All in all, Watchmen is the best comic book ever written and like all great pieces of literature, art or film, it is exceptionally dark, and sometimes difficult to cope with. I recommend becoming familiar with the comic book genre before embarking upon the reading of Watchmen, simply so you can finish this marvel of modern entertainment.

10/10