Hitler finds out about new Watchmen ending (yet another DOWNFALL remix - SPOILER ALERT)

Anonymous

I thought the watchmen movie was better than the graphic novel, ending included. Although I must say the graphic novel is excellent, and hopefully the director’s cut will be better than both.

But on the subject of this video: it is made-of-win and hilarious. Watchmen fanboys are ingrates and Hitler here, with all the rhetoric but little substance, perfectly captures that.

Definitely the best Hitler-subtitle alteration I’ve EVER SEEN!!!

Tenn

Nite Owl didn’t have a beer gut Right! Nite Owl was almost hardcore. I didn’t much like the new ending- it makes ‘more sense’ if you’re just following the story in a… regular sort of way. But I agree with the squid/foil absurd fear of the unknown etc. I loved the man they chose for Rorshach- when he unmasked I was stunned by how close they got him to the novel version. Except, of course, he’s not nearly as reprehensible in the movie as he is in the book- in the book he’s got piss-poor hygeine and he’s just… more gritty.

It was a good movie. Not utterly fantastic, not a disappointment. I was satisfied.

Really weird music choices, though.

winstonian

The loss of the squid is huge.

I know that things need to be cut or streamlined in movie adaptations. I was willing to let underdeveloped characterization and the black freighter go. I had hoped, however, that the director would stick to the main friggin plot of the book.

The squid is much more believable than this manhattan plot – just because it looks weird and is slimy doesn’t make it a ridiculous plot development.

The reason the squid thing works is that humanity needed something completely otherwordly and unfamiliar to organize against – Dr. Manhattan is more or less a known quantity, even if he goes batshit. And since he and American military power are synonymous in the Watchmen universe, I fail to see how the Russians wouldn’t assume some funny business on the part of the US military.

The squid is patently unbelievable – but the whole point of the squid was that it was unbelievable and so completely beyond human understanding. People believed it though, because when it died it invaded the mind of everyone on Earth and dumped the nightmare depiction of its world directly into their brain.

Why the hell should they believe the Dr. Manhattan ploy?

Anonymous

#19-

that was B R I L L I A N T !

thank you!

Teufelaffe

There’s no way that Ozymandias that would be stupid enough to frame Dr. Manhattan. Why? Because Dr. Manhattan would just say “Screw you all, I’m leaving”, leave the Earth again, and the “threat” he represented would be gone…leaving the world in exactly the same place it was before his supposed attack.

But let’s say, for the sake of argument, that he doesn’t leave Earth again. Where would that leave us? The rest of the world would not care that Dr. Manhattan decided to vaporise his namesake…there would be no threat to the rest of the world. Even if there was a perceived threat, since Dr. Manhattan was irrevocably associated with the United States at that point, the United States would become the new threat to the world. You’d likely end up with the whole world against the US. No matter how you look at it, it’s a monumentally stupid plan.

That being said, I’m still holding out hope that the didn’t do a Dr. Manhattan frame-up, and this whole thing is someone jumping to conclusions from seeing a blue-colored explosion in the trailer. *crosses fingers*

Anonymous

@ WINSTONIAN

I agree on the connected with America part. Doc is however something that humans don’t understand, and vice versa. I would say as far as the story goes, that’s a bigger plot point than ending the cold war. NYC got blown up so no other country can really be upset, that destroys the link between Doc and the USA.

Maybe it even inadvertently has a deeper meaning, if all the nations get together to hate on a distant and unloving God. AND… if Doc goes along with it and takes the blame, doesn’t that mean more than just keeping a secret. It makes the mother F’er Jesus. Glowing Blue Jesus.

anyways, like I said before. I don’t mind not hearing about how stupid the giant squid is from my dad.

Enochrewt

#45 Winstonian has it exactly right, it’s not because it’s a giant squid, it’s because it’s an absolutely ridiculous and inconceivable threat that was previously not thought of.

I’d be fine with no squid if they came up with something ridiculous or outlandish that was easier for Hollywood to explain, but they didn’t. Dr. M being the fall guy just doesn’t have the same effect when framed within the graphic novel’s story. You can’t tell me that a think tank somewhere in the Watchmen universe hasn’t thought about what happens if Dr. Manhattan goes rogue or turns communist and developed plans to counteract it.

I’ll reserve full judgment until I see the movie, but it’s really a huge strike against the movie going in.

YokoYoko

Haven’t “Downfall” remixes jumped the shark yet?

Anonymous

With all due respect to the fans, if you really don’t like Hollywood cornholing Moore’s work, why not read the comics? After all, if you see Moore’s work of such quality that to change it is a blasphemy, why not opt for Moore’s own preferred medium? He wrote Watchmen as a graphic novel, no? Read it that way ~ honor the writer/artist/genius for the love of all that is holy.

As for being surprised by Hollywood’s hubris, remember these are the people who rewrote the ending of “A Scarlet Letter”… yeah. Only one of the great novels by a great novelist, but sure some word-cruncher on a budget and timeline, in a crappy WeHo apartment is going to one up Hawthorne. Sheesh.

Read the graphic novel. Boycott Hollywood. Reward brilliance and punish stupidity.

grimatongueworm

I WILL use the line “like paying a hooker for housecleaning” in some conversation tomorrow!

nemryn

So are these spoilers for the movie, the book, or WWII?

allen

The reason that the squid mattered is that the hero is defined by his enemy- and that enemy needs to be chosen with care.

The squid was selected as a foil for mankind, and whether it worked or not is (maybe) debatable. Replacing the squid with one of the main characters wasn’t an artistic decision, it was a cheap shortcut. It was as criminal for irreverently redefining Dr Manhattan and for failing to thinking critically about the psychology of man and who the most effective “other” is. Whatever you put in that squid slot is a powerful statement, and this was just lazy and disrespectful to the material.

Trent Hawkins

So, did Watchmen suck or not suck? Cuz I got a choice of watching that or Krull on the weekend.

iveexa

You gotta admit, to the uninitiated the squid does sound really ridiculous. They could’ve really jazzed it up, made it into some horrific, much more menacing thing – a combination of Aliens(tm) and cloverfield with dark blue on black scales, something really menacing, and only vaguely squid-ish.

But they’re trying to shoe-horn all this into a 2- 3-hour movie, so what are you gonna do. You have to change things. But couldn’t they have found a way to keep the squid in?

chris7crows

The squid was not removed because it was unfilmable, or because it would have been too hard to explain, or because Zack Snyder and company came up with a “better” ending: it was changed due to political sensitivity after 9/11.

http://io9.com/5160960/how-911-changed-watchmen

And I have no idea where this contingent of people who claim to love the graphic novel but always thought the squid was silly have come from. The murder that sets the plot in motion, the disappearing artists and scientists, in ways big and small the entire story builds to that climax. Assuming that you can just cut and paste a new ending ignores many of the themes of the work.

I’d highly recommend reading the review of the movie by Brian Hibbs as I think it does an excellent job of reflecting the feelings of people who understand the process of film adaptation, but disagree with some of Snyder’s creative choices:

http://savagecritic.com/2009/02/quis-custodiet-ipsos-custodes-hibbs-on.html

dimmer

Well, it may not be house work, but when I pay a hooker I do expect to get my pipes cleaned…

Daemon

#15: Krull!

certron

Like another commenter, I also finished the novel this morning, and was told about the changes made in the movie later in the day. I am not sure how to feel about it, but even after some contemplation, I’m still not liking the idea much. I can definitely see how some would say the novel was unfilmable, though.

For one, there is now no need to have any mysterious disappearances, no need for the building that appears opposite the news stand (will it be a center for basketweaving research now?) and no need for Ozy to have to deal with what he has done. Will Dr. Manhattan retire to Florida? Does Rorschach have a change of heart about his principles and take up interpretive dance? Will there be any need for the balancing powers of the two publications, or can we just lump them into the same undufferentiated media stew?

They can do Tales of the Black Freighter as a stand-alone feature, but they can’t keep the ending? I thought creating a monster was sort of the point, and having to deal with the consequences, all of them.

The story is about America and its place in the world as a superpower, and the interplay between the characters. To change the roles like this seems almost like building a bicycle with the seat on backwards.

Was planning to go see film as Rorschach, but easily-removed marker-stained t-shirt approach that was fine for Halloween at work and its ‘no masks’ policy may not work optimally for an extended period of wear. Hurm.

“Never compromise.”

CGI_Joe

Winstonian and Annonymous – NO.

Doc is as external of a threat as you can get in the reality of the Watchmen universe. He is no longer human, and people fear him, and his power.

The squid was unbelievable purely because it was “WTF, there’s a dead squid that telepathically killed everyone in NY.” It was random. There was a buildup to it, and a plan, of course, but the actual concept Alan Moore executed was WTF random and didn’t tie in with the rest of the story as well as Dr. Manhattan does.

Preventing the nuclear holocaust and uniting the nations of the world is still accomplished, and with a plot device that doesn’t look and sound ridiculous.

It did not work because it was ridiculous. If you have spent any time at all thinking about the realistic next steps the nations in this alternate 1985 would take, peace would not be one of them. As I said in my earlier post, nothing happens to the Russians at all, they have no reason to believe the Americans. The Americans have no reason to suspect the Russians. It’s unbalanced, and illogical. Demanding this squid be present is ridiculous. You sound like the people complaining on io9 because “Burgers n’ Borscht” wasn’t featured and no one said “These people just stepped out for Tandoori.” When you realize that you are that fixated details like that, you’re missing all the things that are right, and all the places where it excels. To be honest, it’s whiny.

Ito Kagehisa

Trent Hawkins, if you’re looking for teh suck, Krull is definitely a solid choice.

Also, “The Wild Wild World of Batwoman” is beyond suck.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061191

Rampant

@13, Nothing in A Scarlet Letter comes close to having the vision of Watchmen. A Scarlet Letter’s change would be ‘shocking’ or whatever because of the time since it was written; the change to Watchmen infuriates people because of the incredible vision of Watchmen. It is not really analagous beyond them both having altered endings.

@4, this actually syncs up and makes sense; the downfall of HD-DVD does not, and is thus not witty nor enjoyable at all.

Also, the squid really, really was too corny and unworkable (as someone up above essentially said, I forget who), so I am not against the change at all despite being a Watchmen fanboy.

Teriyaki

The very idea of changing the ending of Watchmen in any way is reprehensible. I still get attacks of rage when I remember what they did to I Am Legend – if I were any more paranoid I’d say that that movie was intentionally made to destroy the novel and its deeply subversive message.

The sad thing is that the popular view of these works is now forever changed. The new kids will see I am Legend as “that zombie flick where Will Smith saves the world” while the original ending and the message of the thing is a direct opposite. And I mean DIRECT. Now the chance of this novel being read by new generations of thinking people (the original target audience) is right about zero. It is almost as if someone in Hollywood is looking for the best subversive works of the last century and intentionally picking them for Hollywoodization and therefore oblivion of trash consumer culture.

Antinous / Moderator

I still get attacks of rage when I remember what they did to I Am Legend

Yeah, but can you go outside between dawn and dusk?

fxq

And I see the posters here pitch back in forth over the loss of the squid and the purpose of Ozzy’s plan.

But where are the supporters and detractors of eight pages of bloody broken human beings? Erase the squid and you erase those eight pages. Our millennial desensitization to violence and a new, tidy ending abstract the lesson about the cost of grandiose plans into a shadowy cartoon. As it was said in a review I read; it is a shame the movie couldn’t have been made in 1985 where it would have shocked and dismayed us.

“Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

Anonymous

@ Teufelaffe

It is a frame up. Sorry. I love saying I worked it on it so I will say it again, that and I saw it last night so there it is.

Doc’s “signature” is all over it.

A few million people die in NYC and Doc’s ties to the USA are broken. The fear of “God” keeps everyone in line from then on…. or does it….DUN DUN DUN

Brainspore

And one of the most important plot points of Robert Louis Stevenson’s novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is that the main character transforms into a small angry man (not a supernatural beast) who dies in the course of the story.

But Alan Moore didn’t have any problem playing with that source material (among dozens of others) to pen League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

winstonian

@ brainspore

the difference is that moore made his own original work using the source material.

shakespeare stole the king lear myths and transmuted them as well.

the difference between shax and moore on one end and hollywood on the other is that shax/moore both had the creative genius to ensure their changes would be alchemy, not butchery. moore’s mr. hyde is based on stevenson’s, but he is powerfully his own character, and in my opinion the best one in the league.

i don’t trust hollywood to be able to pull off the same stuff, and would appreciate it if they wouldn’t try. and fail.

the real problem though, is i doubt they’re even trying. if you make a significant change to a work, you better have a better reason than “it was more audience-friendly.”

djdole

They incorrectly translated the line:
“its ok, we’ll just sneak out for the film”.
It was actually “It’s okay, you do a GOOD job cleaning his house.”

Takuan

“just lazy and disrespectful to the material.”

it’s Hollywood, Jake.

Anonymous

An EXCELLENT movie adaptation! Thank god the stupid squid-ending is GONE. I get a kick reading comments about how Zack Snyder “ruined” Watchmen by changing MINOR things (to work better for the film medium) or omitting things (in order for the movie to NOT have a 6-hour running time). Are you people kidding??? This is incredibly faithful to the source material. The most important rule in an adaptation is keeping true to the thematic elements and basic plot of the story. Snyder did this with amazing aplomb! The second most important thing in an adaptation is keeping the “key” moments/scenes/dialog intact. He did this too. If Snyder failed with anything on this movie, it was with the casting of Ackerman as Silk Spectre (she was awful!) and with some of the song/soundtrack choices which ranged from misguided to out and out terrible. Parts of the dialog were groan-inducing too, but more than half of these “bad dialog” moments were taken directly from the comic. The Watchmen by Alan Moore is one of, perhaps THE, greatest comic book stories of all time. No doubt about it. And I do prefer the comic to the film. But not by that wide a margin! Zack Snyder’s Watchmen film is also brilliant, and more that that, it is an AMAZINGLY TRUE adaptation of what many have called the “impossible to film” comic book story. Why can’t fans be happy with BOTH being good stories? I can.

Original comic book story: A+
Snyder’s EXCELLENT film adaptation: B+/A-

LB

And Zach Snyder said the only reason they didn’t keep the squid in was that it would have taken 15 extra minutes to explain.

Now that, good sirs, is BULLSHIT.

pecoto

Teriyaki is on the right track. It’s not like the Watchmen is some holy writ that must never be altered, but the ending is so key to the themes and meaning that I do not see how it could be altered and still be the same story. Hollywood murdered V for Vendetta in the same manner..they changed the whole thrust of the meaning, and in a most heinous manner. Moore was talking about Anarchy vs. Order and they turned it into Right Winger vs. Left Winger…. It’s repugnant to my sensibilities that someone’s work could be so slaughtered and bereft of meaning without the creator being allowed to have any input. Oh, and I know Moore got paid…but he was screwed over by the fine print in a way that would make the Devil himself blush.
Kudos to Moore for not accepting a penny from these hyenas that have slaughtered his stories. He signs any royalties over to the other artists that worked on his comics and graphic novels.

Brainspore

@ #58 posted by winkingskunk:

The only thing that would have made that image better is if the hydrogen atom on Manhattan’s forehead had been replaced by the circular Obama logo.

PalookaJoe

I don’t think I’ll miss the giant squid too much, although I won’t say until I see it.

What I will miss though (assuming they cut it out along with the squid) are all of the ordinary people we got to see milling around New York. They were vibrant, interesting characters, who were very graphically eliminated by a ridiculous supervillian plan. “They died for THAT!?!?!?” was my reaction the first time I read the Watchmen, and it made the rest of the story very challenging. Hopefully, even without the squid, I can come out of the movie with the same queasy feeling.

winstonian

@ CGI Joe

i think a pan-dimensional squidbeast is a bit more external than a glowing dude from brooklyn that can see neutrinos.

you might look at it out of context and say “that’s ridiculous,” but within the graphic novel every aspect of the squidliness was explained. why did the world believe it? because when the squid died, it dumped all kinds of nightmare visions into the heads of each and every person on earth. everyone on earth believed it because it was forced into their brain, bypassing critical and reasoned absorption. dr. manhattan? 1. he is tied to america. 2. if he wanted to destroy the world, he would. simple. he’s already here. the point of the squid is that it was an accident, and the world didn’t know how long it had until the next one came.

i think my biggest problem is that any schmuck with a lot of money could frame dr. manhattan with this energy signature bullshit, but it takes the smartest friggin’ man in the world to pull of squid.

i didn’t expect it to be a perfect adaptation, but for the director to whip up zeal for the faithfulness of his creation to the source material and then rip out the iconic ending…come on. it’s like making a film version of anna karenina and deciding that her throwing herself under a train isn’t audience friendly, and that she should just shoot herself with vronsky’s pistol. hey, she’s dead either way, right? it’s the exact same ending, right?

kaosmonkey

The first five times I read Watchmen, I could not get past the squid. Admittedly, I was 16 and much more critical, but whenever I would recommend the series, I would never fail to warn them that a little more suspension of disbelief may be necessary towards the end. Eventually I learned to love the tentacled goofiness while secretly wishing that he had gone with something else.

That said, I’m not at all troubled that part was changed. I may have issues after I see it, but for now I have no plans to sell my ticket.

Takuan

it’s not nice to mess with the squid.

Brainspore

I like Moore’s work, but as far as I’m concerned he forfeited his right to complain about adaptations of his work when he built a career out of adapting other people’s source material.

Leaving out the squid streamlines the movie in one big way: it means that the viewer only has to make one major suspension of belief (a nuclear accident creates an omnipotent blue guy) instead of many (Big alien squid? Telepathy? Teleportation? No surviving witnesses?)

Considering that this is supposed to be a more “realistic” superhero film than most, I’m willing to at least give Snyder the benefit of the doubt on this.

TerribleClockman

I’m going to see Watchmen tomorrow night, and finished reading the graphic novel earlier today.

I can see that the whole giant squid thing can be changed with Ozymandias’ intentions still intact if they ignore pretty much all of the Max Shea stuff, as BRAINSPORE says, it could streamline the movie alot more.

Mentioning it with “I am Legend” is jumping ship a bit too early tho. I read the other day (in my morning copy of the Metro on the train) that original scripts Snyder got were for much much more toned down and edited versions of the Novel that people would have raged about even more.

Atleast Rorschach and Nite Owl arn’t singing and dancing in a Jazz club.

I suppose we have ourselves a Marmite situation.

skatanic

I am going to piss off every other Watchmen fan here by saying this, but i don’t think the loss of the squid is that important. The whole idea of the squid was to have some mysterious force cause enormous destruction and loss of life, bringing the world together. Sure the squid is iconic and i would rather they had kept it in the movie, but its not being there hardly effects the plot of the story. I don’t know if it would have taken an entire 15 minutes to explain the squid, but when converting such a massive story into theatrical movie, time is at a premium. I am more upset they left out the whole Black Freighter saga (although it’s being released with the DVD i believe). Obviously people are upset at the idea that Moore’s masterpiece has been altered in any way and the lack of a squid is something easy to latch on to.

I for one am looking forward to the movie, its deviations from the graphic novel and all. Honestly, i don’t want an exact recreation of the novel. If the movie was exactly the same as the novel what would be the point of reading/viewing both of them. I think Douglas Adams had the right idea when it came to adapting the Hitchhiker’s Guide to different mediums. None of the adaptations follow the novel exactly and each adds its own bit to the story.

Seedouble

Look, I haven’t read the graphic novels, so I didn’t know there was even a squid to begin with, but as a fan of the giant squid â€“Â it’s one of the last true monsters! â€“ I’m pretty disappointed already. When will there be an epic monster movie with one of these real-life beasts of the deep? I think I would have loved this movie solely for it’s inclusion of a giant squid.

GeekMan

1) This meme has been beat to death and then beat some more. If I wanted to see screaming Nazis every time I logged onto the internet, I’d bookmark some white supremacy sites.

2) If you want more squid, visit your local supermarket’s seafood section.

dw_funk

In order to include the squid, you have to allow Ozzy to explain it in the end, and add any number of foreshadowing elements or visual clues which take up screen time. And you have to allow the aftermath shots, where the squid hangs out in NYC, and visually identify it and what it does. Lots of screen time in order to suspend disbelief.

Using the alternate ending, you can pin all of the damage on a character you have already spent time developing. It uses visual and textual vocabulary you already understand, and “accomplishes” the same goals. Less screen time, still suspends disbelief. Also, as a poster above said, more people would find the squid stupid regardless of how many contrivances were tilted in its direction.

I would imagine that was Synder’s reasoning, in part. But I think the ending change will be a relatively minor thing for everyone that doesn’t get their panties in a bunch over things like that. More important is how the movie as a whole works, and I’ve read too many disparate reviews to figure out how I’m going to feel about that until I see it. I am confident, however, that the loss of the squid won’t bother me that much.

CGI_Joe

Thanks to the other like-minded people in this thread for understanding why the squid is an acceptable loss.

To the people that demand the squid:
You are being silly.

The squid was not the heart of Watchmen. The squid was a plot device. A psychedelic-looking, plot device that doesn’t make any sense. How is a giant, genetically engineered, telepathic, tentacled monster teleporting in to Manhattan going to end The Cold War? Nothing happened to the Russians, why would they believe this dead thing was really an agent of an alien society bent on invading Earth? Wouldn’t the eventual autopsy and investigation reveal it to be made out of bits and pieces of Earth-based fauna?

Takuan

dissing the Untergang AND the squid? wooooo,,,,

Teriyaki

at #28
READ the graphic novel.

You just about epitomize what I’m talking about. One of the reasons why Moore’s Watchmen was so revolutionary is because it is an anti-superhero superhero graphic novel. It is ANTI pretty much everything superhero comics stood for, including the tentacled monsters that have to be explained away and taken care of with some good american balls and know-how.

The tentacled thing is the OPPOSITE of the mythical 4-tone monster from the comics (and cold war / war against terror or whatever propaganda it exemplifies)- its particularities remain unexplained (apart from some dark hints) and that’s why this “15 minute explanation” from execs sound so ominous… Ffs they failed to grasp the essence of the squid, that it is unexplained and undefeatable – in the comic its existence is revealed as a fait accompli, one of the mos poignant moments EVER – then god knows what else they screwed up…

Seedouble

Geekman:

1) Adjust your browsing habits.

2) They are dead and do not inspire terror or make me think of epic sea battles.

jimbuck

Same vid, but this time hitler is upset that the dallas cowboys lost.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_9UTvESBIc

doktor tchock

my issue is that while, yes, the point is for something otherworldly to appear and be the source of the destruction, Dr. Manhattan isn’t different enough. the squid is so foreign, that it helps sell the end of the story. the reason everyone gets into a pants wet, group hug is that…”fuck, aliens done come to took our jobs, etc. etc.” i feel that using something human, however strange as Dr. Manhattan may be, is an easy out that lessens the impact of the end.

(i always heard a story that moore’s editor didn’t like the squid ending cause it was just a recycled hook from some older sci-fi story. moore’s response “well, i haven’t fucking done it yet”)

anyway, maybe i just always really felt the depiction of the destruction was just really well done and drove the point home.

success or failure, i’ll still go see it. it’s interesting to see people try. for all that we may bitch about what Snyder hasn’t done…he’s gotten some pretty amazing leeway for what he’s doing.

GregLondon

Seriously? No squid? Damn.

Like hiring a hooker for housecleaning.

:)

Seedouble

@32

I do READ, if you mean it in that sense. I’m gutted the Ennis & Dillon’s Preacher series project is shelved for on-screen interpretation, for example.

Chris Tucker

As long as the ORIGINAL ENDING, as in the last two-three PAGES of the comic that take place in the offices of The New Frontiersman, is left intact, then that’ll be fine with me.

Honestly, people, the squid is not the be all and end all of WATCHMEN, it’s just the climax of a plan. It’s the climax of another hero’s actions that makes the ending so satisfying.

Tdawwg

“Tentacular glory,” rather.

Good to see I’m not the only fanboy who thought then, and thinks now, that the squid was teh suck. I wonder what they’ve done with those wonderful scenes of carnage from the last issue-chapter? Does everyone get vaporized? Will Jon give his cryptic “Nothing ends.” line to Veidt? O the humanity!

t3hmadhatter

I love the watchmen series, and them taking the squid out of the movie was only the beginning. They lost the POINT of the novel, and turned it into another action flick. It’s ridiculous.

but the video was the best. it was as if that was actually what the scene was about. I loved it :D.

bitphonic

This would be much better if they didn’t fail so tremendously on their font choice for the subs.

senorglory

it’s almost as if the whole hitler-nazi thing happened just to be useful to the internet, some 60 years later.

Billy Blight

“Their” gonna use? Hm.

coaxial

I read the Watchmen for the first time recently. For all the talk about how the graphic novel was wonderful, it was… disappointing.

The pacing of the book made it seem like that Nightowl, Rorschach, and the rest was going to unravel some grand conspiracy, but instead the big bad guy was obvious at the end of issue one. “Surprise! It’s the character we introduce but don’t do anything with!” The only question was why, and that wasn’t even hinted at until the final pages. Super scienced giant telepathic squid bomb? Now I remember why I never got into comic books.

What really pissed me off was when Doc Manhattan takes Silk Specter II to Mars saying how he cares nothing of humanity because ultimately they’re petty and irrelevant to the universe. He’s spent the entire book to this point disconnected from humanity, and just getting further and further alienated, but then “Wait! I suddenly give a damn again! Let’s save the big wide wonderful world!” That was more unbelievable than the super science telepathic squid bomb.

Anonymous

The ending of Watchmen sucks. Zack Snyder doesn’t get Watchmen.

Anonymous

I worked on the movie. I’ve had a year plus to come to terms with it. In the long run I really do think that it makes the movie more…..less…it opens it up to a wider audience and makes it all a little less out there. It seemed like a natural solution too. Doc, in my opinion, is the focus of the movie, so it ties it up movie wise pretty nice. I haven’t seen the full on all together movie as a whole but as long as the world comes together to hate on something, squid, octopus, god like being, it still is sorta the same.

I’m not saying my personal life is more important than maintaining someone’s vision, but F me if I had to sit there while my friends and family went on about how weird and stupid the octopus was.

Anonymous

The squid is the climax of Ozzy’s whole plot. It is the culmination of all of his plots. In order for man to tear away it’s murderous gaze from itself, he created a false, alien threat. The disaster pulls people together to mourn, and the alien points man’s hatred outwards twoard an invisible enemy. Oz spent so much time covering his tracks to prevent a backslide into the old way of thinking. And he intentionally ostracized Doc M. so that humans could not fall back on him to protect us. To then blame him instead makes the threat internal and, well, fails.

Bloodboiler

If you haven’t already seen the Downfall of HD-DVD, watch it. It is even better than this.

kaosmonkey

Oh… they’re going to blame Doc Manhattan for the disaster? That just might fail…

Brainspore

I saw the movie last night, and I think they actually did a pretty good job. The new ending makes more sense and kept the story’s logic internally consistent.

The one change that DID bother me wasn’t that they ditched the squid, it was that Nite Owl didn’t have a beer gut. But they hit pretty much all the other story elements dead on.

Auto Parts for Brains

This is just amazing captioning. I swear, I would have believed this clip was actually saying what was on the subs. The makers of this one gets my thumbs up.

Anonymous

As long as Hitler can bitch about the ending, here is another way to look. The point of the ending is to deliver a sudden and sharp slap to the face of a populous utterly intent on it’s plan. Without a target, a focus for anger, shots are fired in the “wrong” direction. Hitler knew this when he set the Reichstag fire. And look at the result of flying a couple planes into the WTC. Disaster + perceived perp = focus and motivation of the people. Blow up a building and leave a turban, we invade Afghanistan and Iraq. Blow up Manhattan and leave a squid… and forget the Russkies, we must stop the Martians.

fxq

In the future every person on earth will be issued a free copy of Downfall at birth and we will only need to trade subtitle files.

chris7crows

@ #63

“In order to include the squid, you have to allow Ozzy to explain it in the end, and add any number of foreshadowing elements or visual clues which take up screen time. And you have to allow the aftermath shots, where the squid hangs out in NYC, and visually identify it and what it does.”

Yes, that’s called _the story_.

@ #64

“Architects of Fear,” an original Outer Limits episode written by Meyer Dolinsky. Supposedly Moore came across a synopsis of the episode after he was already well into “Watchmen” and was surprised by the similarity.

Xeni Jardin

@#1, @#2, the dumb typos and horrible font (italicized comic sans???) make it flawed, but it’s still hilarious. They had me at watchmen + hitler!

serfer0

@BITPHONIC
agreed.
looks like my great aunt rose had something to do with it.
but she swears a lot more than hitler so i know she didn’t.

Zergonapal

@ Pecoto;

Actually I rather liked V for Vendetta: the Movie.
I liked it so much I went out and brought the graphic novel and I like that too.
Sure the movie is quite different from the novel, but it doesn’t make it a bad movie.
Then again I have done the opposite now and brought the graphic novel of the Watchmen and like Hitler I can’t but help feel disappoint that we won’t get the alien squid in the end.
I was gonna go to the cinema to watch this, but I think I might just get the video instead.

winkingskunk

Some awesome subway art for you. Obama as Dr. Manhattan.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/winkingskunk/3326844647/

TroofSeeker

Geeze, Hollywood people,

Sure, he tried to annihilate the Jews, the gays, and even the Rom (gypsies), yeah, he did some bad stuff…
But give him back the squid ending! Really. I thought the book needed a giant squid, in all it’s tentacular glory.
Give that poor man back his squid ending. Have a little pity on an old man. Give him his dream.

Brainspore

@ Anonymous #40:

No, a major disaster that would ultimately unite humanity and avert a nuclear holocaust was Ozzy’s whole plot. The squid was just a means to that end, and frankly a rather cheesy and implausible one.

Since Dr. M becomes less and less connected to humanity during the course of the story, using him as a substitute for the “external” threat actually follows a certain logic.

On a side note, I the only one that thought the squid’s face was reminiscent of “vagina dentata?”

Slicklines

Typos aside (and I agree italics was a bad choice) this thing was freaking brilliant.

Enochrewt

It’s official, Rorschach is the best Watchmen, because even Hitler says so.

I think this clip might have pushed me over the edge, I will have to watch the original Downfall tonight.

And yes, not having the squid in the movie is reprehensible.

Hitler finds out about new Watchmen ending (yet another DOWNFALL remix - SPOILER ALERT)

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