Metal Reviews

I can't believe I've gotten myself into such a discussion. OK, in order:

Fine, people sympathise with a serial killer. Fine, the 'heroic' ones are weak. But comics are the only medium in which these would come as any surprise, surely? That kind of thing has been done in literature for a long time, and fanboys bandying this around as genius is annoying. It's only 'genius' because the comic style in general is the opposite thereof.

Superhero character with no empathy for humans: Apocalypse, bitch. And if he doesn't count, then most of the X-Men at one time or another expressed annoyance at people's hatred of them, even to the point of despising them.

Nah, not read it. Any good?

finished Grapes of Wrath. what an amazing and depressing book. gonna read Upton Sinclair's Oil! now. or maybe something else. getting kinda sick of the early 20th century.

I think you're all kind of missing the point, actually. The point isn't that Moore wants us to to side with anyone, be it Rorschach or Ozymandias, or that there are super heroes who are EVIL; there are no heroes or villains, and its impossible to say who is right in a situation like that- do you view morality as black and white, like Rorschach and therefore do nothing while the world is destroyed, or sacrifice a few million lives to save the entire world? The whole telepathic octopus thing is extremely silly, but the moral dilemma is what gives the ending so much punch. And that is really why Watchmen is so great- it takes all the cliched superheroes, throws out the black and white morality, and builds the characters realistically (and also shows how superheroes would affect the world).

But why do we need comic-book characters to set the moral standards? is my point. If you've only ever read Superman comics from the 50s, fine, Watchmen is a brave step sideways. Otherwise, for goodness' sake, what's the big deal? Moral/ethical choices: they're a part of life, not something only superheroes have to deal with.

The point isn't to set moral standards; its to pose an ethical question through a work of superhero fiction which challenges our sense of good and evil and traditional superhero (and non-superhero) morality- Maybe I'm confused about your question, but since literature writers have been doing this since Gilgamesh (ie, exploring some idea or other, many of which are moral ideas), by your logic, why bother reading anything?

But are you maybe saying that other books have already explored similar issues, so whats the point? You're right that Moore isn't exactly asking an original question, but who cares? The reason so many critics and people love Watchmen is because it asks those questions in an extremely well written story with well built characters and because it subverts the main ideals of the superhero genre to boot, and therefore puts its own mark on those questions. Similarly, lots of people and critics love George RR Martin because he subverts the idea of the medieval fantasy kingdom to make it historically realistic- by your logic, though, nobody should care because historically realistic medieval kingdoms have already been written about in the historical fiction genre- but hey, Martin puts his own small twists on it, writes it well, and has great characters, so people love him, and praise him specifically within the fantasy genre. Whats the difference between him and Moore?

The point is to cause debate, fine. But people talk about Watchmen as a work of genius, when nothing here is original or interesting if you've already fought past these ideas in literature form. What does Watchmen have that a novel dealing with the same issues written fifty years before doesn't? Pictures?

George RR Martin is a whole different kettle o'fish, I think. Subverting a genre by writing truthfully, according to the restrictions of that genre, yet adding such things as plot and character development... heck, if Watchmen managed that, I'd love it. Where's the character development? Nite Owl copping off with the chick? The serial killer all of a sudden developing moraliity? These aren't plot points, they're afterthoughts; neither was particularly believable, yet they're crowbarred in, and you guys expect us guys to worship it because of them. Come on! Where's the plot in Watchmen?

First things first, and a whole other debate: If you think that George RR Martin added things like "plot" and "character development" to the fantasy genre that weren't there before, then you simply haven't read a lot of fantasy. Not all fantasy before George RR Martin was farmboys rescuing princesses from dark lords on dragons; that's an extremely small subsection of the genre. Anyways.

The point for Watchmen isn't character development as much as characterization, which is fine; nothing says that characters need to have a complete turnaround in the space of any novel, though there is some minor character development. What critics and fans have praised is how Moore realistically depicts these would be superheroes, and the type of person who might become a superhero- similarly, it realistically explores how someone with real superpowers might interact with the world. The best example of this is the beautiful chapter with Rorschach in prison, and Jon on Mars, reviewing his whole life through the fact that he lives in all times at once.

The plot is simple: In a world where superheroes have existed and are now outlawed and where the the course of history has thus been changed, ex-superheroes are being killed or exiled or removed as nuclear tensions between the Soviet Union and America build. Some of the ex-vigilantes set out to find out who is responsible for those recent developments.

And by your logic, no work of fiction dealing with morality or any issue that is important to humanity can be original, because nearly everything idea has been explored in some way or other before. Yet you don't seem to understand that how an author explores and examines these ideas can be original. You might as well ask why Crime and Punishment is so highly regarded when Aeschylus already examined certain of its fundamental themes a few thousand years back in the Oresteia, or why Gene Wolfe is praised so highly for his treatment of the unreliable narrator when Ford Madox Ford used one effectively in The Good Soldier back in the 20s. In this case, Moore did something that nobody else had done before: He explored a number of themes, such as the utilitarian vs. absolutist moral debate, the appropriateness and dangers of vigilantism (Oh no! He ripped off Juvenal's line, so it can't be good!) and the nature of Cold war politics, and did it in the context of the superhero genre. Nobody else had ever explored these issues or had tried to apply realism to the genre before; the fact that both literary critics and comics fans at the time hailed this as revolutionary and important should tell you, Zad, that yes, Moore did do something original here.

And that fact, that literary critics and fans and the mainstream media have praised this comic book for the past twenty years for Moore's characterization, his story, his treatment of his themes, his use of symbolism and allegory, his political satire, and his use of imagination in staying true to be subverting the genre should be pretty telling, Zad. You may not like Watchmen, and thats fine; I don't like Charles Dickens much. But you might consider (like I do) that your likes and dislikes don't diminish the work itself: I can accept that A Tale of Two Cities is well written and a great work of art even if it bores the shit out of me, and I don't see why you can't do the same with Watchmen (though I think it might have something to do with a belief that comics can't be literary, which may be a wrong assumption).

And just in genera

Briefly: you're twisting my points. Obviously, just because it's been done before doesn't mean it's useless this time, but I'm attacking Watchmen directly; it's not as awesome as people give it credit for, and that's that. Mixing a pirate story with a superhero story that treats its subjects seriously = genius? Please. Answer my question: what has been done here that's so great? Superpowers in the cold war? FFS, Captain America went up against Hitler; why is this more incredible than that?

I'm not out to call all comic book fans complete faggots here, as my knowledge of X Men should prove. I just miss why Watchmen is such an improvement on everything else. I disagree that realism wasn't applied before, and I argue that critical fame is a good enough reason to praise it: critics have seized on this as The Artistic Comic Book! and it's nonsense, for if this is ART*, then many others are. But comics aren't art, in my view, and if someone tries to make ART out of them, why not glue a few children's toys together and call that ART as well?

* I hope you get the difference between ART and art

Me and Following have already presented many reasons. Read reviews to find out more. Acknowledge that even if you don't like it, there may be other valid viewpoints than your own as to what constitute art.



If you're going to take this position, then there's no point in me arguing with you anymore, because nothing I or critics will say will convince you that pictures and texts together can form ART, because you've made a decision arbitrarily that an entire genre is equal to gluing some toys together. You know, like people arbitrarily do to genres like metal and fantasy,

Oh, come on. Art is art, it's all personal, and if in my view a urinal isn't art, why should I accept someone else's view? It's all relative: Lord Of The Rings is art, Emperor is art, but Wheel of Time and Hammerfall aren't. That is not arbitrary, this is my opinion, as I thought was obvious. Fine, other people like urinals as art; it's not my place to criticise.

OBVIOUSLY, pictures and texts are art. But critics have seized upon Watchmen as art with no justification imho - it gets its praise more from the idea that comics deserve that label than anything else - what about Sandman, or Hellblazer, or Preacher? Comics in general, to my mind, IMHO, are more of a cultural movement than art a la expressionism, and whilst in fifty years that may change, at the moment I see nothing in Watchmen equal to Picasso or Shakespeare, you know, ART.

To Kill a Mockingbird. Awesome as I expected.

gave up on My Name is Red. the fucking book is going nowhere, every character just keeps blabbing on and on and on and on and on and on about blindess and style and other meaningless crap. so much stuff is written about all of that that less than halfway through i already had no idea who thought what about which topic.
the issues that seem to haunt the characters so much, especially Master Osman, just seem irrelevant to me and come off as forced.

specifically, i gave up a bit after Master Osman blinds himself and Black finds a horse with slit nostrils.

i could swear that every issue approached by Osman from the moment they entered the treasury had already been discussed before. the issues are pressed ad nauseum, and there were 989849284 mentions of the husrev/shirin painting too many.

YEAH I'M A FUCKING PHILISTINE. IF THIS IS "REAL" LITERATURE, I'LL STICK TO HARRY POTTER.

or maybe someone could tell me what it is that i'm missing here.

It just interests me that at the end of the book, most people do side with Rorschach, the character whose morals are black and white. Maybe I'm just dumb haha. I see most of the characters as trying to act in a moral way but really acting for selfish reasons. Sure, there's no right or wrong in what Ozymandias did, but in the end I think he did it for entirely selfish reasons. I think the characters in the book try to explain the octopus as a moral decision, but in the end they kind of sidestep that. I think Nite Owl just wanted some pussy and Ozymandias just wanted to feel like a God

Supreme: Story of the year is similar to Watchmen in that it plays with the form of comics, but in a much more 'meta' way. It's also a lot less serious than Watchmen.

Gomorrah.
Everybody needs to know, the world needs to know what kind of situation Italy is in. Read it, you all.

Seen the movie, wanted to read the book as well, but it's never in the library and I don't have the money to buy it now. Still on my list to read though.

You're not missing anything. Orhan Pamuk is way overrated. He just uses weird ways of telling things so that people can't realize that he isn't actually telling anything interesting. I can't imagine what it's like when it's translated.

Will do... What is it about? Mafia?

Ha, you're definitely not dumb. Thats a really interesting interpretation, and it actually makes a lot of sense. I'm not sure if I'd go all the way with it- I think you're right in that Ozymandias had a huge ego, but I also do think he was doing what he thought was necessary. Similarly, Nite Owl wanted to get that superhero feel again (getting pussy being a part of that) , but he also did want to help his friend Rorschach and in the end thought that the ends justified the means. Anyway, its not like there's a right interpretation or anything.

Gene Wolfe- Epiphany of the Long Sun (Books III and IV of the Book of the Long Sun)

Yea. Specifically about Camorra, Mafia is in Sicily.