Episode 82: Watchmen

a pop pop culture critic, amazing, very thoughtful writer. It is our friend Joel Monique. Hey, I'm so excited. Hey, how's it gone? I see you came prepared. You you have readings, dramatic readings for you guys, especially as we start to talk about the differences and similarities between the show and comic book. Well, speaking of the show, we normally talk about what we're geeking out about, but this week we're geeking out about the Watchman show. Yes, Regina King,

and yeah, yeah, it's a lot. There's a lot happening to show. Our good friend Cheyenne took me she was working for HBO at New York Comic Con and so they had the Watchman premier party there and Regina King. Listen, famous people in public, they just stand out in a way that we don't understand. Like she like, even when I'm done up, like she was just glowing, Like they're just on a different level than the rest of us. That's that's true. That's true. But it's just like she

was wearing regular clothes. I feel like, but she Oh my gosh, it was just radiant. Um, I feel that way. Yeah, when I run into I don't know, like Chris Hemsworth or something. Yeah, yeah, it's Regina. I feel like, specifically as a post Oscar glow, like the women have babies and they're glowing. She had an Oscar and she was like, I have arrived finally, Holly would like, notice isn't recognizes. She also talked about how she feels like she's really

coming to her own now. I mean, she's obviously been around for a while. One of my earliest memories of her, and this just goes for when I was growing up, is um, she was in a Cinderella story. Do you remember that? That was so long ago? Um, that was like my Lizzie McGuire days. Um, but yeah, she she's been a phenomenal actress for so long. But she said, like having kids like that, really being a mother like

changed her acting style. Testing. I cannot speak to um post children, pre children or Gina King performances, but I do think that there's a level of comfort in this performance, level of like inherent talent and badass three and sort of like how did it take us this long to realize she should be a superhero. She's just so false, being like dark and brooding but also like really on her detective stuff. Um, it's it's incredible. She had better

go all the nominations. That would be very upset about it. We'll see, we've been we've been uh burned before. Alright, let's just jump into the nitty gritty and start with the comics. So Watchman is a comic book MAXI series by the British creative team of that of writer Alan Moore and artist David Gibbons, and colors John Higgins. It was published by d C Comics in nine eighty six in seven, and collected in a single volume edition in

nineteen eight seven. Watchman originated from a story proposal More submitted to d C featuring superhero characters uh that the company had acquired from Charlton Comics. As Moore's proposed story would have left many of the characters unusable for future stories, Managing editor Dick Giordano convinced Moore to create original characters instead.

See why he kind of blows out the world at the end of Yeah, he actually originally so More wanted comics from MLJ and he couldn't use those, So then they recommended Charlton Comics would had which had just been acquired by d C, but then he couldn't use those either, So then you just ended up kind of creating characters

based off of their characters. This actually becomes like an extreme blessing for the comic book because I think if you're taking those original characters that come with all of that backstory, which you know, it can be fun to to see alternative universes, um. But to get this straightforward look at superheroes, he was able to take multiple heroes and make a Rory Shack and comment on what kind of comics are you reading, our kind of stories are we telling our kids, and who do we view as heroes?

I think it works much better as a metaphor and using the characters a symbolism as opposed to taking those direct characters and using them in that way. Yeah. So Watchman depicts an alternate history where superheroes are real in real life. What it would be like where superheroes emerged in the nineteen forties in nineteen sixties sounds a lot

like The Incredible It is a little a little bit. Yeah, that's what I thought of whenever Bradbird had that, because it's like set in that fifties style and it's a world in which what would happen with superheroes, Well you would probably sue them. There would be you know, like it's not as pretty as we think it is. It's like Superman coming to save the day and we all love him. It's like, no, they like, actually, this is what it would be like in real life. I often

think of that with Batman. It's like, would we really be okay with a billionaire dressing up in rubber? Definitely

not beating up people. I mean that was the one like good takeaway I did have for The Joker where it really did uh kind of addresses that like income disparity and got them and like how they viewed it, and I was like, that would be I mean, I don't think people are ready if we truly do like view that, if we got more than just that surface layer of like there's poverty here, Yeah, because that that would be cool to see how Batman deals with that.

I feel like the cartoons actually did try and lightweight tackle it by making Bruce Wayne so much of a lanthropist and it's like, uh so, I think we can go beyond that and like see you like you know, something like the Court of Vials but real life, like you go in and trying to like break down this structure. But that's another DC comic. Here we're talking about Watchman, which has that if you wanted that insight on the world, then uh you go, then Watchman is going to go

even deeper. Alan Moore very better and I mean that in a good way. He has he's better or awake if he see Well. What's also funny is like you know, um, but he's like like British right, and it's so like a lot of these quote unquote takes that he has a Watchman have to do with you know, overseas, and I think that's which you know, we're talking about Stephen King not liking the Shining Uh. Alan Moore did not like the uh Watchman. He didn't like V for Vendetta either,

doesn't this series either? Yeah, well, I mean and he could. I could care less about the series because mostly because I think we did better with this series what we're supposed to do. Because yeah, you're you're a Londoner. You that's your world. This is America. So if we're really like, I like that he's a Londoner coming to like make a comment on America. I like the the idea of going to another place and examining it with fresh eyes.

And I feel like he's not so to me, it doesn't necessarily feel like he's taking the pits out of America. You know. It doesn't seem like it's it's degrading to America more. It's just like a this is sort of the all consuming fear that we all have. And I think for a lot of pop culture things, you can distill it to America because most of the pop the world's pop culture, you know, originates here, like the big stuff,

the stuff that goes global. I think what I was going to say to your point to both of y'all's point is that he said it's not anti Americanism, but anti Reaganism. So he did want to specify and and it definitely that breathes through and I think that's fine too. But when you have like a British why London or come in, you always have oversight because the one thing that Brits love to like try and like harp on is like America's racism, totally trying to sidestep the fact

that they went ahead Africa. As a Nigerian, I always have to point that out. But you know, but I you know, I will pat them on the back that you know, Uh, they still do put more interracial couples on TV than we have in ever period. I remember when I first watched Doctor Who. My first tweet after it was like there was more interracial couples on TV in one season than we've had in the history of Americans.

I feel that way about Black Mirror. I'm like, I've never seen this many black and brown people period on any shows, live in their lives, hanging out and being tortured by internet. Um So, Joel, can you walk us through some of the iconic characters from The Watchman and what they're personalities are, their history. Sure, let's start with the Minutemen. This is the original batch of Watchman characters. That's you're still expector is your um night Owls? Who

else is on that team? Oh, my gosh, Billy Banks or something like that. He's like basically a mascot for the Bank, um, which is amazing. Um. The Minutemen are an interesting team. They're started by Hooded Justice. Um kind of. He's sort of the Hooded Justice is the first superhero period. He stops robbery at a like local Delhi. People are like, what is going on? They read the Superman comic. Comic comic comes out. He's like, Yo, heroes are dope. I'm

gonna do that. I don't like defend people. But Hooded Justice is sort of like their take on Batman kind of in that he's like, I will never reveal my identity. Nobody don't talk to me about anything. I have very specific missions. He doesn't really get along with the rest of the team. He's gay. Um, he's with another member of the team. They fight a lot. It's messy. That's really cool because I didn't know that about him. So this was from the eighties. It's when he or the

Minute Man and come out like goodness testamentality here. Okay, So nineteen thirty something we have the original Superman. The Minutemen are like just a few years after that, so we're talking late, I think is when he was really queer. Okay, so that was part of the reason. I think he was not taking off the mask um. And it's like they would push him and Silk Specter together in photos to make it look like he wasn't. There would be like, oh, rumors they're dating Um, and that's how they tried to

pull that off. But eventually I was founded in nineteen thirty nine during the Golden Age, being he does he started to night The Minute Men are started in thirty nine. Yes, there's a Keen Act of seventy seven. And then in the fifties when Carthier is happening, all the superheroes get called in and they're like, yo, you guys need to tell us who you are. We don't like that you're out here fighting crime. That's not really due process of law.

It's problematic. He was like, listen, not doing it disappears um Stil Expector was the first one to kind of realize that you could make money off of this, and she was like, listen, I can market myself. People like it will sell dolls. She tried to make a movie. It bombed horribly, and after the disbanding of Superhero, she didn't do really well. Her daughter later takes over her

mantle to varying degrees of effect. Um Night all former police officers second Superhero, inspired by Hooded Justice a story. He reads it in the paper. He's like, wow, you see Superman. He's like, he has to want to do this. He writes a book that tells all of them that it men's dirty secrets, including the fact that the comedian tried to rape Silk specter, so that really hurts the team. Um. He's like, yeo, I'm done, I'm out, I'm coming clean.

They're coming after us anyway, what's the point um, And then I'll just finish up with comedian. There's others, but we can you guys can read up on this. Comedian is like basically a soldier for hire. He starts by being this kind of like wears a black mask, very like leathery sort of vibes going on. Um, and then once the government is like listen, no more superheroes. You can come work for us, though, because you're pretty good

at your job. They dropped him in Vietnam. He is having so much fun killing women and children, very disturbing until Dr Manhattan is created on accident, joins him and now he's a human walking bomb and he is a god. He ends the war, and that is sort of what starts the retro direction of the history in Watchman. It's basically like a parallel universe. But if people became heroes and Dr Manhattan en did the war, so America wins

in Vietnam. It's like a rousing victory. We pick up Vietnam as a state and then from there we're like booming with technology. Dr Manhattan introduced us this holy world of like text. We have electric cars. Now computers are faster. It's like a glorious kind of Golden Age with heroes back on control. Everyone feels pretty good. Then in the seventies you have the next round of superheroes, so you have a new night Owl. So it comes back Dr

Manhattan's fighting. It doesn't last very long. Governments like you can't do this. We have actual people to uphold the law, and that's what we enter here. Rorshack is like, listen, I'll give an e foot any of you say, I'm going to still go out here where my weird changing mask and uh be a hero? Um, And the book kind of takes a really sharp look at again who we call a hero? Oh yeah, I forgot to say so. The Watchman term comes from a Latin phrase that essentially

translates as who watches the Watchman? Yes? Right, and it's and it it is like that general. I think the mythos of the book is just basically Lex Luthor's like initial mythos against you know, against Superman, which is like, what, we shouldn't trust this powerful alien like in in a normal world, Lex Luthor isn't really that much of a

bad guy. He's just someone with sense where it's like, no, we shouldn't let this superpowered alien just do whatever he wants and then that drives him mad, uh and money and all that. But it is funny how like Lex, Yeah he isn't. No, he has a point and yeah

it is an insight. So the just to talk about all the information that went down, is that just sprinkled throughout the book or is that all supplemental stuff as well, or so if you get I've only ever read Watchman as the completed novel, so I know some people who have read it separately. I think they still had all this little bit of information in the back of each comic. There's like either a big magazine or a book that's between that gives you all this like very rich history.

Phil for example, the first night Owl he wrote, The parts of the book he wrote are in the first two comics, and then there's um, there's a secondary pirate comic they write that sort of parallels all of the things happening inside of the story. It's about um, a big ship that souls basically is that's the one that's

kind of like popping up throughout the throughout the story. Right. Yeah, the kid at the newsstand, he's always listen to the news stand treat it which if you're poor and do you every went to a comic bookstore just to read the comics, he could relate. That was my story. Um, and the floor of borders putting bookstores out of business. That's what millennials did. Listen, you would have liked to have read those. It wasn't just you, it was all

of us. I don't know why Borders never stopped us from reading all those manga on the floorboards, like just droves of kids just sitting in the Walden's books, Borders, Barnes and Nobles. Really not a single employee said anyway. The employees were not paid enough to care in the same way that my saw pomping movies at the AM sales, like God, bless you have fun kids, I don't have

the time. Always that one though, there's always that one who just feels it's going to get them employee of the try it, and then they don't get employee of the month. And then they they realize everyone has to learn. Everyone does one extra thing at there, like part time job and get no recognition for it. And that's when you learn, oh, this is useless. I remember, I think about mine every Halloween. At Halloween horn nights. I was so trying to like I was like trying to stand

out and be like the good one. And like if I knew, I knew if I stood out, you know, they would they would keep me. And there was a guy all he was he was just trying to bring in a pipe with some weed. You don't have a good night. I don't know why you would try and be high in a scary place. That is my worst nightmare. But he was. He was doing it, and I caught him and he was like he was a young brother too.

We looked and he tried to keep gave him the bro like come on, bro, and I was like, I need a job, bro, And I poured him and they patted me on the back and then they let me go at the end of the season. And that's when I learned, never would never show out, never break color lines, always employee lines. We have to take a really quick break. And they were going to hop back into more of The Watchman right after this, and we're back. Was there any other characters that we okay, okay, so let's just

to wrap. There are so many characters, guys, so I apologize. So just to recap in our current day, we have a version of night Owl. He's new. We're younger, frashure. This is all he's ever wanted to do. We have Silk Specter. She dresses in the yellow and black. She's the daughter of the old Silk Specter. She doesn't really want to be here, but she's doing it anyway. When she was sixteen, she started looking up with Doctor Manhattan, who was like late thirties early forties when she was sixteen?

Is this from the text the original text very clearly she was sixteen free. I was sired to read it twice like wait what, um so that happened? Um, but they're together for twenty years. It's still weird, but context I don't know. Um So. Then Dr Manhattan, big blue guy likes to walk around naked and basically a bomb. Um. Then you have Rorschach. He has the as iconic. He's got the trench coat, the hat, he's sort of designed

out of off the question, which is a character from DC. UM. He had his face changes and uh, he was abused as a child, he had a horrible life, and he thinks of the mask as his face. Uh. Then you have Azzymandias, who it sort of becomes a bad guy. Spoiler alert. If you're like liking everything we're talking about, like maybe I'll go read this comic, stop like don't listen. Um okay, okay, alright, we're good. We just want to

make sure maybe sometimes you change mind way okay. Um. This guy basically thinks he's the next coming of Alexander the Great. Um. He is a narcissist of the highest order. Um is born wealthy, gives all of that up, tracks through the desert, follows like Alexander's path, regains all of his money, becomes like this marketing genius basically, so he's a billionaire. He owns a huge company. He predicts trends.

At the end of this story, Oh and a year before the Keen Act, which outlawed superheroes forever, he revealed his identity, which is really important to note because this is sort of what makes people trust him. They're like, oh, well, he was honest with us, and he told us who he is, and he's a good guy's a philanthropist, and he's in good shape, and he's white and he's blond. He's the best. Also, want to say, the privilege of like giving all your money away and still being able

to get it all back. It was wild. It's a wild journey. And so and he's kind of like a suave ladies like you, women would want to be with him, but we don't see him with a lot of ladies. Like that's heard of the persona that he has. Uh. In the end, he decides that what the world needs UM the whole book is based off the fears of an atomic bomb an atomic attack again. Um, and what

do we do when we're afraid? So his solution is, if we're all afraid of different countries and borderlines, what if a giant space squid fell from the sky, landed on New York killed half the population, start talking about three million, three and a half people. Uh, and then we would be afraid of space and so we would like band together and it picking worked. People were like, yo, screw that space alien. We're john with technology, Like, we don't want none of that anymore. We need a new

cowboy in office. Um. So Robert Redford runs for president at the end. Um And basically yeah, then he sort of gets to get away with it. So so gets away with it, right, So here's the thing in the text. The final scene is Rorschach, who's been keeping a journal of everything, discovers, Oh, this is what he's gonna do, writes all of that downtown to into a conservative newspaper. Now that's all you know. So it's a very much

a cliffhanger at the end of the book. If you choose to follow the stories Cannon as it travels to television. We have answers about how that ends now if you want to transition, but I want to talk about too. I'm just for some reason, I'm forgetting Dr Manhattan's arc. What what ends up happening with? Oh yeah, okay. So Dr Manhattan basically decides to leave because he doesn't understand

humanity anymore. He's become just like higher thought. Basically, he's like a dead body has the same atoms as an alive body, so there's literally no difference to me. Yeah, he's a galaxy brain like the version I'm thinking so much further beyond humanity. So he goes to Mars and he builds himself little palace. He's having good time there, but there is one person he cares about. That's Laurie,

oksal expector. So he comes back down, grabs her, whisked her off to Mars, and it's like, you know, if you can convince me to care about these humans, maybe I'll come back. Now. Dr Manhattan sees in multiple times, so basically anything that's happening to him, it's all happening to him at once. If that makes sense. What happened eight now it all he can see it all at the same time happening to him because in the future and the past. Um. But he convinced me, basically convinced me.

So just as a note on what you just said. Visually, it's really cool because you're having these multiple animals showing like these different time frames and it's translated within that way instead of just outright saying it. As you're watching these different moments happen. Listen, I'll read you three panels real quick. And this this is Dr Manhattan talking. He's on Mars. He's looking at a photograph of him and his first wife Janie. He says, the photograph is in

my hand. It is the photograph of a man and a woman. They are an amusement park in nine nine. In twelve seconds time, I dropped the photograph to the sand at my feet walking away. It's already lying there twelve seconds into the future. Ten seconds now. The photograph is in my hand. I found it in a derelict bar at the Gilla Flatts test based twenty seven hours ago. This is how he sees all of time. It's either

happening now and it's all at the same time. So basically, Lori's like, listen, if you love me and the plausibility of all of time that I came into being, Like, you have to see the miracle that is humanity and want to protect that. And he's like, okay, kinda yeah. He pops back down to Earth, but he lands like two seconds after the squid has already done its job. The squid lives for like six seconds, three seconds and

then dies immediately. Um. It turns out Azzy's head like these Basically he said up a bunch of different satellites and stuff that would block his ability to see in the future, and what he what specifically Ozzy was doing.

I want to say that I am so floored by the fact that he's so inhuman and he still gets a ton of booty, Like I mean, I'm listening to this and I'm like, this man is a human calculator and then he's just like scoring hot, Like we just want someone to hold us and respect us, Like, truly, how many of of your friends are chasing emotionally unavailable men? Mean,

I mean, listen, you know what he does. Though he probably keeps all his appointments, he doesn't go like he probably basicle, if you're super emotional, I prefer a practical partner who's like, let's just look at the He's probably very time oriented. He can also be multiple places at once, so he didn't have as many hands as you would

need to get the job. He's not going to send you ah y w y d text like you know, he's going to be considerate anyways, I'm sorry, I'm just looking at the pictures of the women that he's that makes you feel any better. Lorie leaves him at the end of the comic and is off with her owl guy um, and they have like a very domestic ending. It's cute, um, but to your point, he comes back, um Rorschach cannot take the injustice of Azzi Mandius winning.

So uh, Manhattan snaps him dead basically, and his like, listen, you can't be here ruining our plans. We're trying to achieved piece at a horrible cost, but it's achieved. Let's not because that's what happened. Is Manhattan's kind of like, oh, I get what you did, and yeah, He's like, I wouldn't have done it, but we're here now, so what about yeah, and is losing his mind crying in the snow and he's like all right, by Yeah, begs him for death. He's like, just do it because this world

this freaking nuts. Uh. And that is what document. Then he goes back to Marks, He's like, yeah, I really don't care about anything. Happy to hear Pete out. So we have to talk about just a couple of other comic stuff before we hop into the movie, which I know if he wants to talk about. Um. So there were nine prequel mini series in so if you do love the comedian I don't know for some reason, and you want to read I mean his prequel, um, there's

an entire comic devoted to him. There's also Doomsday Clock, which I heavily, I actually really enjoyed, although it's not over like they were dealing with a lot of delays, So now you know, okay. So essentially Doomsday Clock is was written by Jeff John's and uh art by Gary Frank and Color Sprad Anderson. So it was essentially a world where what if Dr Manhattan like left this universe? Uh. And but what happened with it is that it was

supposed to affect the rest of d C comics. However the rest of d C comics has kind of like moved on, So it's like, what are we doing with this storyline? Uh. Something cool that happened when the original Watchman came out was that it kind of made the other DC comics a little bit darker. Uh. This was a super dark comic and it kind of influenced Superman

and Wonder Woman and Batman at the time. So they ended up doing a one shot It's called DC Universe Rebirth, and that was too essentially essentially explained that Dr Manhattan was the reason why that was happening. Yeah, so um, and I know this because I talked to our friend Hector Navarro, who is like encyclopedic knowledge, and I'm like,

explain this universe rebirth. It's a fun It's a fun rebirth because if you think about the theme of time and how the importance of it throughout Watchman and the idea that all Moore did fundamentally change the face of comics, not yes the Watchman, because now on a literary scale, it's comics are now considered, uh being cosidered period, where before they were like child's play and I was like, no,

look great art. Um. So, between this series and Swapman, not only did things get darker, but we also started taking comic books more seriously. We started looking at artists more seriously, and I think that there's something kind of fun, especially with the difficult relationship Alan Moore And do you see that out of them being like, well, well we'll pay homage like many many years too late and after making very terrible deals with you, but well we'll try to,

you know, honor you in in this way. Um. I kind of wish I had stuck around and it would have been interesting to put that whole layer up. But I think there's also a lot of pressure for writers to constantly considering this cornerstone work that is constantly making, you know, maybe not the greatest statements about superheroes in general. To try to work under that umbrella all of the time on something you genuinely love might be challenging. Definitely.

Do you both also know about the button them Facebook? No, the comic, Oh yeah, but please explain that to to people, Smily is buch is like iconic. I didn't know what it was for like the first twelve years of my life. The lore of it, to the best of my understanding, is this, The smiley face is one of the most recognizable symbols. Uh in the United States at the time, and because he's a comedian, they were sort of looking

for like a badge or a symbol for him. Every different hero got a badge or a symbol because, um, they're trying to god to market them to the larger public. So he became the Smiley Face. But if you know anything about the comedian, you know that he's laughing at literally everything, and that gets very disturbing up to a point. Um, and so the opening image for the comic sort of that smiley face flattered with blood. It's on the cover. Um, it kind of just represents both the comedy and the

gore that you're about to get into. Yeah. So there was a comic that came out called The Button. It was comic book crossover. It was actually a storyline where Batman in the Flash worked together to uncover the truth behind the mysterious button that they found, or that Batman found in the bat Cave. Uh So, there's so much are honestly behind the Watchman. But we also had a film that had a lot of It was released in two thousand nine and directed by Zack Snyder, and it

was based off the comics. I mean, really, there's only one thing to really talk about because it is like a pretty faithful adaptation. Uh, and you know it has it's one of those one uh one of the it's the one uh broken clocks being right twice where his Zack Snyder's dark vision, you know, totally fits this comic. And and this was two thousand nine, so we haven't seen in a million times. It was very fresh, you know,

we're very ready for it. So it's great. Yeah, there's, like I said, really nothing to say because it falls it. There was only one change and that's why I had to bring it up because I have to talk about how much I dislike this change. And change was they removed the squid that we talked about and everything that we explained and changed it to Dr Manhattan exploding in New York. And this is what was supposed to, uh make you know, all the states that were at odds

come together. And you know because Doctor Manhattan quote unquote went rogue, which which if you know anything about just the way politics and the blame game that comes with disasters go, that would that just wouldn't happen. And that's just a complete lack of like if that happened, no one would assume that doctor Man hadn't went wrong rogue, it would be looked at as the us at fault. It would probably be speculized that maybe they were testing it to use on one or the other one, maybe

even furthering this arms arms race. So the squid was perfect as is. And the reason I disliked it is because it felt like that very early early two thousand nine comic book movie thing of being of thinking, oh, this was too silly and it only works in a comic. It was exactly that. I remember reading a lot of interviews with that kinding like it we can't really do that, Like who would a believe it? Or be like I

think it we came about. I mean, I'm trying to thou nine graphics and like what that would physically look like. But if you look in the comic, I think it's like only two or three panels and all you're seeing our tentacles. You have a big eye and a couple of tentacles on a building. You have my attention. You know, it's been a long day. I have to make our all right. Well that and that's pretty much the movie. Okay, So the budget was one thirty hundred thirty eight million.

It actually did make a hundred one five point three million of box office, so it did make its money back and more. Nice. I mean, it's funny because I I've have a strong film opinion about superhero movies, and it's funny to think back in those days when you were making only like eighty million more when you make

a superhero movie. Uh you know. I believe superhero movies are guaranteed hits now because we they've been so consistent for so long that it's trusted that people will at least see it, even if it's a spectacle, which is why movies like Joker and Venom still do really well, even though like everyone's like this, even people online are

like this can't be that great. Uh so. And my my pitch before we move on is that instead of trying to hire these like big time you know directors who like do it, I think you should pilot newer directors on movies and let them. Here's my pitch to to double down on that and give them a smaller budget, makes small budget, intimate stories with superheroes. We do not need an apocalypse at the end of every superhero movie. I'm so tired of I mean that's why Aunt Man

was so refreshing. Yea, you went from these big thing to like a small heist and a guy who loves his daughter. Same with Homecoming felt so good. Jason Aaron, who did that really good run of Hawkeye? I think so yeah, do that. I don't understand why that is not a movie we've been got yeah yet or even like how we don't have a really good like Kamala khan As, like you know, a young girl just in high school fighting a local bag guy with a killer soundtrack,

like done, wrap it up. I'm ready. I'm waiting for because I think whatever Kamalakan movie comes out, it needs to be shot like a teen movie. That's what I'm saying. Like, I don't understand how doesn't have an entire line of teen movies. I'm so sorry this is really off tracked, but just like really quick between her and America Javas and both Spider Man, like you've got an entire and then you have uh, oh my gosh, what are their

Young Justice version? Oh you're talking about the New Avengers have a Hawkeye and I mean technically Captain Marvel yes, in the Little Queer babies give them to me. Um, well, yeah, I think that. I think what they're doing though, is they want to make sure that everyone goes to Disney Plus.

So that's why a lot of those and I think to their meredit, I mean, for the Mandalorian, they're giving them a movie budget, and it's yeah, it's it's really cool seeing the stuff that they that they have planned for Marvel and taking these like side stories that won't be these huge movies, but can explore these stories which will hopefully, yes, we'll lead to New Avengers and me being cast as cap uh you know, just you know, I was you know, I was running out of black

heroes and then now we're getting so deep in there that we can go like new powerman Young Uh. I feel bad for forgetting his name, Well it was was it Justice? I don't know, Uh, are you talking about Aquel? No, I'm talking about even though he were like no, no, it's the leader of Young Justice and he's the Isaiah Bradley. That Isaiah Bradley, his grandson Elijah Bradley, patriot of the Young Avengers. So I was super doubling that they Avengers

and and Justice have black leads. Were still off tract, but it's Young Avengers, not New Avengers. I misspoke and Young Justice. I see why. We're okay anyway, Yeah, we digress. We have to take a really quick break and then we're going to hop into the show. Now if you haven't seen it, We're not going to give any huge spoilers away. We're just going to kind of talk about we're gonna set it up and kind of talk about some of the issues that it tackles. Right after this

and we're back. So Joel, who you are actually doing recap for if you have watched the show, or once you do watch the show, if this makes you want to watch it. Where can people catch your recap? A V Club TV club about nine oh five every day after the episode airs. Um, we get into heavy spoilers, so you know, it's a recap com prepared, but also trying my best to try to give you guys enough history from the original comic and talk about what's being

laid over and it makes some wild predictions at the end. Um. The message boards on avy Club are amazing, so if you guys want to join the conversation, they're giving me so much new information. Damon Lindelof. He loves this story so much. She's got a quote actually on the back of my comic. Uh, the greatest piece of popular fiction ever produced. So does a direct quote from Damon about Watchman. Uh. This comes out two thousand five, I think so, almost

twenty years ago. Um. It's amazing to me that he's been able to produce such a high quality, such a thought provoking, thoughtful, loving like homage to the original comic, and still make it polished and updated four viewers today, like even just two episodes in. It's it's quite an accomplishment. I'm loving the TV series. Yeah, so can you set it up for us? What are we walking into thirty five years into the future? Roughly? It' um, yeah, from

the future of watch From the future of Watchman. So the Watchman d nineteen eighty five, that's when the squid drops. Eleven two is the date they used to describe the event, much like our nine eleven. Um. You enter in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The cops have just faced what it's called the White Night, which is a night where a local white supremacist terrorist organization invades all the cops homes and does their best to assassinate, murder, remove all of them in a single night. Uh.

They don't fully succeed, but they get pretty close. The governor, along with the police, decide that the best option is for them to be masked. So they're essentially a police force of superheroes. So they don't view themselves like that at all. They're like, we wear the mask for our own protection because people try to assassinate us. Um, some stuff you can get off of. There's a thing called pd PDA which is run by Dale pet of the FBI.

UM the Operation against Mass Heroes something I can't remember the acronym, but basically, the FBI runs an organization that helps make sure any vigilantes are immediately snuffed out before they take charge. Um. And there you get a bunch

of like really great information mostly. Uh, what I want to focus on today here is that after Doctor Manhattan goes back to Mars, there's in the middle of Watchman there's a theory that he's causing cancer to those closest to He invented a lot of technology that helped move them up. The world's up technology technologically, and now people

are afraid of technology. So in the show, there are beepers and still a phone book, and mostly people use landlines because they've become terrified of technology and the damage that it can do, so much so that companies have to be like, listen, we have a new computer and you need to use it. It's not dangerous, we promise you, like please, please, please, don't be afraid of the technology. We need to move forward. It's also the reason cops

are kind of stuck in the past. Not enough crimes are getting solved because we haven't updated to a computer system, which means we're still doing everything by hand with old giant binders. It's messy, old school police work, which makes for a cool, gritty like crime drama because it gives you that old school feel and it doesn't feel forced. I'm sorry because I review these. I've seen some of head and I want to make sure and I give

you guys, any kind of spoilers or anything. Well, I can talk about a side thing that isn't necessarily a spoiler, because it wouldn't be an episode of Nerdificent if we didn't ruin some Nerds stuff with our s J you crap like this takes place in Tulsa, which is known for the bombings of Black Wall Street. And I heard that they actually do some like some homages akin to that to kind of, you know, actually like bring this because I think a lot of people don't know that

that happened. I mean, I definitely was late in life when I found it. I spoke about it as if I've already died. Uh, But like it's it's it's a it's it's funny because it just kind of is a such a response to theo why won't the black community pull themselves up by their bootstraps? And it's like, WHOA we were? And every time we do it, white people are there to, you know, come along and just burn it to the ground. And and so sorry I didn't

Well no, let's let's talk about that if you. Because this show Watchman has a ninety eight percent certified fresh on the Tomato meter, that is by critic. Almost a hundred eighty nine reviews have gotten it to audience score forty three percent. Um. When you look at WHOA, why do we think that critics have Yeah, And it's because it is, um, this is what we're talking about. I am so upset. I don't know people who vote it thumbs down because it's because here's the thing. I am

patting DC on the back for tackling this. And on Immigrant Day I retweeted it they said, immigrants make the multiverse better hashtag immigrants. Yes they did. I am so happy that they are, like, f y'all, we can't say the real thing. Um, you know, they're telling these stories. But one thing I kind of want to Sorry, I

didn't mean to cut you off. I want to touch on because something you were saying and with the tomato meter that made me think is like the thing that that gets me is like, I think, like the people who are like dumbing it down and saying as forced s j W. They aren't even people I think are fully on the right. It really are is this group of people who are quote unquote apathetic, who are quote unquote in the middle, who are quote unquote And then every time I see that sentiment, it always comes. It

seems to come from that group more than anything. And it's very funny because it goes back to that thing of like when they say when you don't uh, it's the Martin Luther King quote where everyone uses where like if you if you don't pick a side, you have chosen the side of white supremacy. But it's like, but it really does feel that way where it's like you're the like cool, you don't want to pick a side, but if someone wants to speak out against the you know, oppressor,

then then you have a problem. I've definitely had some of these comments and you know chatter, I mean, like I just don't understand. And a lot of times it's so funny because their critiques are so very vague. They're like something's just like I just feel it's very contrived. Yeah, thought was put into it. It is contrived. So I'm sorry, but did you read the original comics by a man

who literally people were saying was anti American. But there's also the thing that people walked away thinking Rorschack was the hero of this story. So a lot of people are not getting and so let's let me wrap. Okay. So Nicole Cassell, who was the director of the pilot and episode two, the way she shot that opening scene was like you felt history come alive in a way that I don't think we often get, especially for like black people. Like it's sort of it reminded me of

um Spielberg's saving Private Ryan. Those which are just very intimate portrayals of what chaos and catastrophe looks like. Um and I think that what the show was giving us. In we saw Night Sister, that's Regina King's character, visit a museum recently and like learn you could basically just look up family history in there, which is I'm like, if you know your family history, if you can trace

it back, that's incredible. So many Black Americans cannot. UM my family we've gotten back to I want to say, my three grades, so we can track two decades back in two people into slavery, back to grandmother's past. That there's just not records. We just we were nameless on paper, being shifted around in different places. You can't track your history like that. So if there was a way to have a DNA database to sort of start examining, you know, who were your people and where do they come from

and what does that mean? Like, my god, it's amazing the idea of like I know, redfordations are rubbing people really the wrong way. That's Robert Redford gives black people

reparations in the show. And it's still beautiful. Now they live in like this thriving metropolis of black people so many black extras on this damn show just looking amazing living in this like stunning space, a space that I think typically would have been gentrified by white people is what it looks like, but it's got a whole one to like a thriving black community. And I think that for David, he was like, if you don't know David Lindloff is um creator of Lost, He did um and

having a brain fart y'all. Lost, Oh Leftovers, Um soosere are his two big shows. He does these really thoughtful examinations of what it means to basically exist, Like what does it mean to be a person, a good person? How do we handle ourselves in crisis? For him to turn his eye and be like, so, like, what have

black people been doing under crisis in America forever? Starting in but then also going back in the second episode to look at black people fighting for um America in World War One and what that was like when you could not get equal service in America but we're dying for your country. How does that like rek havoc on the soul? And then more importantly, what does that do to your children and their children? And how do we

carry that? He said very openly, like he was nervous about it, but that as a person in a position of power, he felt it important. And as a black person who loves comics, who's always, you know, very excited to go to these movies and see these TV shows or whatever, to feel that Lens specifically turned to my community in a way that is not looking down upon or feeling bad for but just simply examining the circumstances. My god, well, to me, it's so telling whenever, like

you said, examining the circumstances. And when people I literally I was reading reviews of it and one said preachy and another says forced. And I'm like, why is it that when we tell our stories it's forced. It's because they're not thinking about it, so it feels forced. It's like, oh, because never in your life do you think about this, because it doesn't feel forced when people when when you watch success and you're like, oh, they're not they're forcing

this idea that being rich is so bad. Also, don't say you have a hard time understanding black stories when you're watching all those rich people and you ain't never

been rich in your life. You know, like it's just like it's people that people are always reaching and making some sort of excuse or you know, b as to like to like try and like shoot down things that are trying to say something and to like like and we set this a few episodes back to like really try and like look at a medium that was really uplifted by two Jewish dudes from New York and try and be like, oh, it's s j W. Force. It's like now it's been literally creating Superman to go fight

like a monster that was attacking them directly. Like, Also, what do you think the Justice League or any of these are they are warriors fighting for social justice? Like like we get those comments sometimes too iffy and I I'm like, well, we're talking about superhero culture. What do you think superhero culture is. It's a team of of superheroes who are taking on who are trying to write

the injustice is done to marginalize groups. Well here's what what what it is and uh and then after this weekend close, But here's what it is is that the way every person who reads superhero, the way we the idea that we have of a superhero is someone who fights for what's important. The problem that that we have that. I think that is being lost in translation is the idea of what's important to people. If if if the if you know, if equality and freedom for all people

isn't important to you. Every time you see those heroes fight that it seems like they're doing something weird, but it's like, no, bro, you just never realize. You just never paid attention because you've only cared about yourself. You've only cared about the things affecting you, and you've let that be an excuse and let that make you into a whiney, shriveled up person who honestly can't be that good.

Because if you cannot care for the people who are surrounding you, if you cannot care for your fellow human being, you have no humanity and you are a villain. You're not a hero. Yeah, And I want to say to the people that are like, well, just don't change the source material. I would like you to go back in the time when the source material was made in the thirties and forties, and we were not allowed in those stories. We were not allowed to be on screen, we were

not allowed to be on the cover. So yeah, now it's going to be reflective. This we were always a part of the world, we just weren't allowed to be reflected in it. Now we are so sorry that they're infusing us into the story. We've always been here, we just weren't allowed to be on the cover. How do you want better? We'll do whatever we want to the source material. You go read the source material. You want to read that, go read that. It's there for you.

It's not getting deleted. I can't encourage you enough if you're enjoying this conversation to just keep watching Watchman, because the way they're examining the history of comic books and superheroes, especially in some of those later episodes, I just you guys, shaken, shaken. There's a moment I had to pause and write a review. I skipped four reviews to write a review. I was

so moved by an episode. I was like, you did that, Like, I just think it's so important that if you're not ready to or don't want to examine your white privilege, and or if it makes you uncomfortable to see black and brown people in heroic roles, or if it makes you uncomfortable to see the destruction and the devastation that they faced to take a second, and ask yourself, just why are you uncomfortable with that? And do that on your own without ruining or or trampling on other people's

excitement to just see themselves on a screen. You see yourself all the time. Take yourself out of it. I mean even I think I even want to, even though that is a very important message, and yes, clock that I even want to take like five steps back and just say, if you see someone enjoying something, let them have that. Why do you have to Why do you have to input the why you didn't like the thing they like to the conversation. That's never been fun, It's

never been cool. And people didn't do that back in the day because people wouldn't talk to you. But now you have a platform where you can just insert your voice and you know, and and and disappear into the

night behind your anime avatar. It's like if someone's enjoying something, and there's tons of things that people enjoy that I do not care for, or there are tons of people and music rappers, you know, artists that people love and I do not for the like of me half of a smidgeon, And you know what I do, I just keep scrolling pushing because I followed too many anime boobs to be wasting time. I'm going with some money on Twitter, I do want to say, um, one of these reviews

said that it was to woke. On that note, Joel too woke, Joel, where can everyone catch you? Yeah? Follow me over at Twitter at Joel Monique because we find all of the things A V club, TV club or I hopefully we're revealing a couple more shows coming up. I really love that community. So if you want a twin in the conversation, we'd love to have you. And finally, in the next magazine on Got Guys, uh Cultured Magazine, the cover issue it's gonna be um Lena Wait and

Melina Metsukas. I got to sit down with both of them and talk about their new movie, which we will be talking about for literally ever. It's so good. It's called Queen and Slim. It comes out November sixteenth. I think check your local listings by a ticket, be the first. Don't wait a second weekend or the ending will be spoiled for you. I'm at miss Danny Fernandez and just another heads up, I have that Fathom event. If you love the Twilight Zone I think they're showing four of

the original Twilight Zone episodes. It's November four at local theaters, so check it out. I think you can just google Fathom event twilight Zone and I pop up to talk a little bit about Rod Serlin before it starts and or in between the episodes. I don't know, you're one of those things and you know me, uh next, or you're listening to this. So this weekend, if you're in St. Louis, me and those guys and white women will be at the Flyover Comedy Fest doing some improv. And after that,

I'm probably gonna be eating some barbecue. So catch me at a barbecue spot munching down or on stage, whatever have you. I mean, look, we'll have to discuss because I'm back on ketos, no sauce on it. I gotta I gotta eat it dry. God, Like we always say, stay nerdy, stay too woke.