Wellington
BAAAALLLINNN'
I was kinda pissed when I finished it.
I began reading it during the flight back from E3 and finished it about an hour ago, which kind of describes my experience with it. Early on, the book was hellaciously boring. In fact I almost dropped it entirely it was that boring. Blake's death was an interesting way to start the book off, but it just trailed from there. It was a revolving door of characters with no real introduction to them or any reason to care for them at all. Why should I have cared about the two Nite Owls meeting? Why should I have cared if Dan and Laurie had been killed by that small gang of thugs early on? Why would I care about Dr. Manhattan giving others cancer and being subsequently exiled from the planet (even though he could just pretty much cure the cancer and vaporize whoever wanted him exiled...)? The first three chapters were extremely boring and so disjointed, they were a major turn off.
The story finally started to pick up a bit with the Dr. Manhattan chapter. His origin was at least interesting, and it made the reader feel a bit of sympathy for a character that would otherwise have been the all powerful naked blue guy. Seriously who gives a fuck about that? Then it continued into the Rorschach chapters which were even better and provided even more insight into these vigilantes. Still, immediately after that, Moore jumps into this forced relationship between Laurie and Dan, the two most boring characters in the book. It was a very very slow and annoying chapter, friends, and not only that, but it really didn't have much of an impact on anything. Though it can be argued that through Dan, Laurie was able to get back in touch with her humanity after being with Jon for so many years, and would ultimately lead up to her debate with Jon on Mars.
From then on it picked up and never really slowed down. The debate between the above mentioned characters, Nite Owl and Rorschach teaming up again, finding out that Viedt was behind it all, and then reading his (insanely) long monologue detailing his plans, damn near rivaling Dr. Doom's in Secret Wars. The end made me mad that it was over, and had so much to offer, but was dragged down by stupid and meandering characters that no one cared about nor did they even matter. I never gave a flying fuck about Laurie or Dan that pitiful wuss. Laurie's mom (can't even remember her name she was so unimportant) Blake, and even Viedt were pretty dull characters. (Up until the end for Viedt)
I didn't really understand the whole deal with that pirate dude, but eh, it's unimportant. Since we're all so interested in numerical scores, I'd give Watchmen an 86/100. When it was good, it was great, but it took a lot of will power to muscle throught the boring parts.
On the way to E3 I started and finished Marvels. I guess I should get into that too.
For one, the art was phenomenal. Alex Ross owns and I love his style but I thought Kingdom Come was better. It was a pretty interesting take on the Marvel universe. The world had just come into contact with superheroes for the first time and didn't even know how to react. I was totally enthralled by the style of writing pretty much right off the bat. The Namor/Human Torch sightings, fights, and damn near any movement from them was completely thrilling and involving. The world stopped whenever the marvels came out in public. Each of the four mini-retellings were pretty interestng and provided a fresh new take on old Marvel stories, particularly the first battle of the Fantastic Four and Galactus. That was fucking amazing. If I had to knock it for anything it'd be the pithy social commentary and the fact that... it is a retelling. I was quite bored with the Spider-Man/Green Goblin/Gwen Stacy chapter. Been there, done that, multiple times. Oh well. I'd recommend it though, I'd score it at an 89/100.
/me prepares to be burned at the stake.
I began reading it during the flight back from E3 and finished it about an hour ago, which kind of describes my experience with it. Early on, the book was hellaciously boring. In fact I almost dropped it entirely it was that boring. Blake's death was an interesting way to start the book off, but it just trailed from there. It was a revolving door of characters with no real introduction to them or any reason to care for them at all. Why should I have cared about the two Nite Owls meeting? Why should I have cared if Dan and Laurie had been killed by that small gang of thugs early on? Why would I care about Dr. Manhattan giving others cancer and being subsequently exiled from the planet (even though he could just pretty much cure the cancer and vaporize whoever wanted him exiled...)? The first three chapters were extremely boring and so disjointed, they were a major turn off.
The story finally started to pick up a bit with the Dr. Manhattan chapter. His origin was at least interesting, and it made the reader feel a bit of sympathy for a character that would otherwise have been the all powerful naked blue guy. Seriously who gives a fuck about that? Then it continued into the Rorschach chapters which were even better and provided even more insight into these vigilantes. Still, immediately after that, Moore jumps into this forced relationship between Laurie and Dan, the two most boring characters in the book. It was a very very slow and annoying chapter, friends, and not only that, but it really didn't have much of an impact on anything. Though it can be argued that through Dan, Laurie was able to get back in touch with her humanity after being with Jon for so many years, and would ultimately lead up to her debate with Jon on Mars.
From then on it picked up and never really slowed down. The debate between the above mentioned characters, Nite Owl and Rorschach teaming up again, finding out that Viedt was behind it all, and then reading his (insanely) long monologue detailing his plans, damn near rivaling Dr. Doom's in Secret Wars. The end made me mad that it was over, and had so much to offer, but was dragged down by stupid and meandering characters that no one cared about nor did they even matter. I never gave a flying fuck about Laurie or Dan that pitiful wuss. Laurie's mom (can't even remember her name she was so unimportant) Blake, and even Viedt were pretty dull characters. (Up until the end for Viedt)
I didn't really understand the whole deal with that pirate dude, but eh, it's unimportant. Since we're all so interested in numerical scores, I'd give Watchmen an 86/100. When it was good, it was great, but it took a lot of will power to muscle throught the boring parts.
On the way to E3 I started and finished Marvels. I guess I should get into that too.
For one, the art was phenomenal. Alex Ross owns and I love his style but I thought Kingdom Come was better. It was a pretty interesting take on the Marvel universe. The world had just come into contact with superheroes for the first time and didn't even know how to react. I was totally enthralled by the style of writing pretty much right off the bat. The Namor/Human Torch sightings, fights, and damn near any movement from them was completely thrilling and involving. The world stopped whenever the marvels came out in public. Each of the four mini-retellings were pretty interestng and provided a fresh new take on old Marvel stories, particularly the first battle of the Fantastic Four and Galactus. That was fucking amazing. If I had to knock it for anything it'd be the pithy social commentary and the fact that... it is a retelling. I was quite bored with the Spider-Man/Green Goblin/Gwen Stacy chapter. Been there, done that, multiple times. Oh well. I'd recommend it though, I'd score it at an 89/100.
/me prepares to be burned at the stake.
