Complex, gripping, and beautiful.
This is the second comic book I’ve read - or should we just call it a novel?
Moore’s story manages to tread by now well-known anti-hero tropes while still providing something fresh and insightful. I think the base question asked is simple: ‘Is there such a thing as a lesser evil?’. Of course, like any great piece of literature, Watchmen probes the nuances of this, and forces us to question our assumptions and beliefs.
Watchmen traces the stories of tragic people bound together by a desire to do right, and failing to do so. Our heroes are at times racist, anti-semitic, sexually motivated, and insane. Amidst it all there’s a God-figure and a character described as ‘the smartest man in the world’. Somehow the God-figure doesn’t ruin anything and it all comes together to something incredibly thought-provoking.
Read it for the story, read it for the art, either way it’s something worth experiencing.