SoulPancake

[SP EXCLUSIVE: FILM PHLEGM]

… and other spiritual quandaries posed by Watchmen.

[SPOILER ALERT: We assume you’ve read so freakin’ much about Watchmen at this point that we don’t have to worry about spoilers, but consider yourself warned.]

As a kid, I felt a strong connection to my Higher Power, Spider-Man. Related to Batman, too. I loved the family dynamic of the Fantastic Four; the rage and destruction of the Incredible Hulk; the mysticism of Dr. Strange; and the idealism of Superman and Captain America. Comic books were sacred texts, to be cherished and studied.

My childhood had its share of abuse and depression, and the characters I adored were power fantasies about abused, depressed characters granted the ability to save (or destroy) the world. In a sense, superheroes were my gods.

Alan Moore probably grew up feeling the same way I did about superheroes. That would explain why he and artist Dave Gibbons created the graphic novel Watchmen, an adult’s attempt to capture the childhood experience of reading comics. Here was a work of art with far too much information to be absorbed in one reading; with stories within stories; and with character mythologies that invoked awe, especially if you were high in your bedroom with the Pixies on.

However, there’s a crucial difference between Watchmen and the Marvel comics I worshiped as a kid (or the Ayn Rand-inspired Charlton comics by Steve Ditko—Blue Beetle, Captain Atom, and The Question—of which Watchmen is a specific parody). Watchmen’s superheroes use their powers to oppress humanity, in the name of keeping it safe. They are psychopaths, addicted to violence. As a result, they bring on mass destruction.

Watchmen has been criticized as a nihilistic work by an author who “hates heroes.” But the Watchmen are not heroes. They are fascists. Watchmen is Pasolini’s Salo in spandex. What’s truly being attacked is power, in all its permutations. By succumbing to the lure of power, we forsake our humanity. We declare ourselves God, righteous in our determination of who deserves prosperity or suffering. Moore’s radical statement is that Superman may have lofty ideals, but his use of violence to enforce them will inevitably result in insanity and even apocalypse.

Seeing is Not Believing

Having loved Watchmen for 20 years, I was pretty damn excited for the film version. I booked my opening day tickets (IMAX, baby) days in advance, leaving work several hours early to stand in line with the faithful (nerds and teenagers). And from what I’d heard, a near-perfect distillation of the book was to follow.

That did not turn out to be true.

The events portrayed in the Watchmen movie are almost identical to those in the graphic novel, and the points of deviation are inconsequential. What’s new is the violence. The brutality of Watchmen has been pumped up to mind-boggling levels, much as the character of Dr. Manhattan’s exposed penis has been inflated from what artist Dave Gibbons described as “understated” genitals to a computer-generated dangler of Ron Jeremy-esque proportions.

Director Zack Snyder is known for his fetishistic, over-stimulated portrayal of violence; only Snyder would feel the need to make the Zapruder Film “more awesome,” as he does in Watchmen’s opening credits. It’s like Watchmen being directed by one of the Watchmen. At times, viewing it feels like a psychotic hallucination; the notorious horror films of Brazil’s mentally unstable José Mojica Marins come to mind.

Watchmen is relentless, with beatings and dismemberment served up endlessly, deafeningly. This is a universe where the human body exists to be assaulted. As in the graphic novel, a rape scene occurs; here, it’s got added battery, preceded by softly lit close-ups of actress Carla Gugino’s breasts and thighs. Eroticism is abuse and vice versa. The only tender moment is a sex scene between two superheroes who are turned on by their own acts of violence. They engage in what I can only assume is a sarcastic take on soft-core sex, ending with a visual joke that equates ejaculation with a vehicle’s exhaust pipe.

God in None of His Glory

Contempt for humanity often suggests contempt for the spirit, and what’s most fascinating about Watchmen is its treatment of the God concept. The heart of the movie occurs when Rorschach (played by Jackie Earle Haley)—the vigilante who even the rest of the psychos consider a psycho—recounts the moment he became a murderer, upon discovering the abductor of a missing 6-year-old girl. (Her remains are rubbed in the audience’s face in slow-motion; more body-hatred.) Rorschach grabs a gleaming butcher knife and plunges it into his prey’s head repeatedly, with plenty of blood flying, then states, “If God saw what any of us did that night, he didn’t mind.”

:: create-ustrated by tommy hans

Rorschach views God as an absent interventionist who allows tragedies to occur. Therefore, morality does not exist, and murder can be justified. Outrage at violence becomes a rationale—an imperative, even—to propagate more violence. At the end of Watchmen, this logic will be used to defend the obliteration of 15 million people, and we’ll see that there is finally peace on earth. What was presented in the book as a fascist triumph is now presented, with little irony, as a pretty good idea.

Of course, in the midst of Watchmen's horror, there’s a God-like figure walking around. His name is Dr. Manhattan, as embodied by Billy Crudup, who is pretty much always awesome. Dr. Manhattan used to be a brilliant scientist, but he got trapped in one of those crazy chambers that are always locking people in just before all the lightning bolts start firing. Now he is a big blue muscleman who can rearrange matter with a wave of his hand and sees time in a nonlinear manner. If we miss the fact that Dr. Manhattan is our Divine surrogate, a commentator says of him, “God exists, and He’s American.”

Throughout Watchmen, Dr. Manhattan voices his spiritual malaise (“I don’t think there is a God, and if there is, I’m nothing like him”). Most tellingly, he snipes at his lover, the Silk Spectre (Malin Akerman), for constantly insisting he accept “life on life’s terms.”

And so we come to the most profound 21st century theological quandary within Watchmen: How are we, as Americans (the world’s greatest superpower), supposed to accept that “life on life’s terms” bullshit, anyhow? To put it bluntly, “life on life’s terms” is for pussies, and Dr. Manhattan ain’t buying it. Sure, he gives a flowery speech late in the film about learning to cherish the fragile mystery of life, but then he lets 15 million people die and blasts Rorschach so that his blood and innards are smeared all over the snow. I mean, I think the Dalai Lama is a dude who appreciates life’s beauty, but it's hard for me to imagine him ever blowing someone up with his mind.

Watchmen ends as Dr. Manhattan wanders off to “start some life of [his] own on another planet.” It’s a powerful summation of spiritual doubt, which all of us must face if we are truly searching. Because God does not do exactly what we want Him to do all of the time, He must not exist—and if He does, He must be an uncaring jerk who just left the building.

Watchmen is a scream of agony from creators who seem to despise their own humanity and therefore believe they are far from God. Watchmen sounds the call for self-destruction, a deeply ingrained impulse within all of mankind. But to deny that impulse is what truly makes a hero.

Well, at least in my book.

:: Super-quandaries posed by Aaron Lee