Contributed Notes for Chapter IIIIII.20.1: The military symbol for Rockefeller base is a squashed Superman logo, the "S" insignia -- significant, insofar as Osterman is the Superman of the Watchmen universe.
Manlio Loconte Just a comment/suggestion on the last thing you say about chapter three. I'm not sure if parallels can be drawn between Veidt and Manhattan, Rorshach and Blake, as strongly as pairs can be set between Veidt and Blake, and Rorshach and Nite owl. I think Veidt and Blake are the strongest pairing in the book. Veidt says it all himself in his story: "as intelligent men facing lunatic times, we were very much alike, despising each other instantly" Both are very powerful in a political and influential sense, but neither is anywhere near Dr. M, who I see as more of a neutral character without a clear partner. After all, how can you give a parallel to god? Rorshach and Nite Owl are less obvious, although there is the conservative versus liberal attitudes in small degrees. I see few parallels between Rorshach and Blake, I see them as more on the same side, but in different scales, with Blake tackling the problems of the world at large, while laughing at it, and Rorshach handling the smaller scale, all because he believes that it matters, and evil must be fought. Just some ideas.
Manlio Loconte I see no evidence of homosexual relations between Nite Owl and Rorshach, what leads you to that idea? Good question. I don't see Dan Dreiberg and Rorschach as lovers, but rather as two lonely guys who have a certain amount of trouble with women (R. far worse than D.) and share a penchant for dressing up and running around in the dark. Rorschach is a sadist; Dan has a certain history with (or at least fantasies of) "Midnight Lady," a dominatrix. Two halves of the same coin? Not really. Though Rorschach seems almost touchingly to need Dan's comradeship, he's too crude, nasty, and unwashed for Dan's upper-crusty tastes. They're an odd pair but certainly not a couple in a literal sense. Dan after all is Watchmen's closest approximation to white-bread heterosexuality. -- sam
Greg Bole III.28.2 Another close-up on a nuclear symbol. Bookends opening and closing the chapter adding an ominous threat of nuclear war. "Bookends" indeed! -- sam
Greg Bole III.25.3 Van has triangle on side, Pyramid Deliveries also in V.8.1. The true meaning of this is introduced in VIII.4.4. The triangle (and pyramid) is an important symbol throughout the story: the company owned by Veidt (X.21.3), his Egyptian obsession and their pyramids (XI.11.1), the pink triangle on the poster (V.21.8), the buddha poster (V.7.1), the pyramid of companies discovered by Dreiberg (V.8.1) -- All symbolize both death (Egyptian reference) and mass conspiracy (a symbol of the Masons, the same one on the one dollar bill, often seen as one of the first great secret society, the symbol of the Illuminati, etc.) The Illuminati are a fiction, like the Internet. -- fnord
Joshua Merrill III.6.6 Laurie's cabbie is Joey. Who, being an admirer of pretty women, does a certain amount of ogling. -- sam III.10.1 Laurie looks into her coffee, and the image is very similar to when she looks into the snow globe.
Alexx Kay III.1.1 An additional note on pirate comics, from back in I.4.3: one of the comics shown there is "X-Ships", obviously the best-selling pirate comic in this world, as X-Men was in ours :-) Every panel in this scene has the pirate comic and the newsvendor discussing a similar theme or image, starting with "War". III.1.2 "The signs" are what we are seeing. Not to mention reading (and in some cases transcribing) the headlines. This whole scene is in many ways an ironic comment on those readers who obsessively look for all the details in a work, although that level is only easily perceived *by* such readers! More on this later... "Face" helps support the connection between the yellow-and-black smiley-face and the yellow-and-black Radiation warning. III.1.3 The newsvendor is one of those crying out for "More blood!" Also note that New Frontiersman is blaming Castro (the Communist leader of Cuba for Shea's disappearance. III.1.4 We first see the Promethean Cab Co. across the street. We see that a *lot* of fallout shelter signs are going up. The back cover of the comic book advertises "The Veidt Method". This is a parody of Charles Atlas ads in the comics of our world, but, like almost everything else, turns out to have important thematic ties to the plot. One of the magazines is "Knot Top", again showing that the KT movement has been around long enough to get at least somewhat co-opted by the mainstream. This panel's joint theme would be resignation. Note that he has the same issue of Nova Express on sale that Sally Jupiter had in issue 2. The newer issue is overdue, see II.2.7. III.2.1 "final analysis" = death. III.2.2 Absorption of information. III.2.3 Profit from disaster. III.2.4 Retreat from reality. III.2.5 Bearing up under pressure. III.2.6 Survival. III.2.7-8 Acceptance. III.2.9 "It" can of course refer to "the end is nigh". In the background is the Utopia movie theatre, an art house. III.3.2-6 Wonderful irony: he thinks the world will end today, but still plans to buy tomorrow's paper. (Rorschach is probably just playing a part, but he's sufficiently unhinged that he *might* honestly believe in an imminent apocalypse.) III.3.6 Clinging to insignificant hopes. III.4.2-3 Just as an amusing aside, if you travel in friendly social circles where backrubs are common, this can be a fun trick to play on people. Walk quietly up to someone giving someone else a backrub, and then join in. See how long it takes them to figure out that there are now three or four hands :-) III.5.8 At the same time that Jon is expressing his willingness to discuss his attitude problem, his other self is continuing that same attitude by going back to work. III.6.2 "I have no illusions..." Except of course, those that Veidt has fostered within you. III.6.6 The cab driver is Josephine, whom we get to know better in Book XI. III.7.2 Poster for Mutiny on the Bounty, another issue of X-Ships in the window. III.7.4 Note the motto on the truck of the Gordian Knot lock company: "They'll never undo this sucker!" Which, of course, they won't... The dialogue says "Some things, once they're busted, they can't ever be fixed." This begins a running gag about how Dreiberg's Gordian Knot lock is repeatedly broken open by various parties. III.8.5 You *did* have more sugar, but Rorschach took most of it. Sugar... sweetness...? NAAAH! But see Alexx's note to III.10.4, below... -- sam III.9.3 Fog in the dialogue and the picture. III.9.5 Splashing in both dialogue and picture. III.9.7 Dropping in both dialogue and picture. III.9.8 Dressing in dialogue and picture. Note also that Laurie is wearing no more than a robe (if that) under that trenchcoat. III.10.1 Laurie reflected, a recurring image. III.10.2 Tangling in dialogue and picture. III.10.4 "too bitter" As are Laurie and Dr. M. III.10.6 Dr. M. Disappears, and goes from A to B instantaneously. Note that he hasn't finished putting on his cuff links, so they travel with him, hanging in mid-air. Sheesh! More of those SIGNIFICANT LINKS... -- sam III.10.7-8 Turning up out of the blue :-) III.11.2 Note also that This Island Earth has a plot concerning a society which destroyed itself with advanced weaponry, a thinly-veiled allegory to the dangers of atomic warfare. The "Monsters from Outer Space" in the film are mutants, accidental creations of the weapons; sort of like Dr. M. But nowhere near as debonair. -- sam III.11.4,6 Laurie and Dan enter a "dark," "tight corner". Also note graffiti: "castrato rapists". I read this as "CASTRATE RAPISTS" (a radical feminist slogan appearing under the vagina dentata symbol); but I could be wrong. -- sam The KTs are wearing jackets with Japanese lettering. Is the Knot Top movement somehow connected with the traditional Japanese samurai top-knot? Aligning them with both sides of the WWII fascist Axis...? Nice touch. -- sam III.12.6 Dan, putting away his glasses, is "prepared to enter hostilities". III.13.2 "snappy", as in breaking arm bones. III.14.2 "Am I starting to make you feel uncomfortable?" The author is asking this questiion of the reader. When you see comic-book violence up close like this, is it still so appealing? III.14.6 Graffiti: "K-Top Kings" III.15 Dan and Laurie find themselves "aroused" by their "intimate moments" of combat, but then decide that it's "safest not to pursue this"... III.16.5 "one good reason to stick around" is also what Jon is now looking for (and not yet finding). III.17.2 Also, Dan is thinking about his heart here... III.17.3 ...and feeling like an "obsolete model." III.17.9,18.1 Transition on "know". III.18.1 Surprise. III.18.2 Exile, alone. Note Dan and Laurie walking in the background; this panel is happening at the same time as III.11.2. III.18.3 Family, suspicion. III.18.4 God weeps, and rain falls upon the page. III.18.5 No help from higher powers. III.18.6-7 Alone. III.19.1 The worker is singing "Walkin' on the Moon". Shortly, Dr. M. will be walking on Mars. Moon, Mars... what's a few million miles between friends... -- specious sam :-) III.20.3 The bar at Gila Flats is named The Bestiary, after a fanciful name for the 'zoo' of elementary particles that physicists search for. See I.23.7. III.21.7 The pirate dialogue is again talking about the events of the main storyline. Has God departed? III.22.1 Headline from New Frontiersman "Our country's protector smeared by the Kremlin." We also see the motto of the Promethean Cab Co., "Bringing light to the world". The mythical Prometheus was punished by the gods for bringing fire to mankind. III.22.2 Gazette headline "Dr. Manhattan leaves earth." III.22.4 The newsvendor is imagining more dead people than he ever has. III.22.7 A nod to realism here, this is the second day he's been reading here. He's an inner-city kid, and probably not a fast reader. The kid (his name is Bernie, same as the newsvendor) explains why he reads so slowly. It has nothing to do with poverty or bad schooling: the comics are simply hard to follow (even if Tales of the Black Freighter is no Watchmen). Also see III.25 ("Superheroes are finished these days") for young Bernie's sense of an ending. -- sam III.22-23 Transition on "gone". III.24.2 This is the paper that Rorschach bought a few pages back. III.24.6-8 As Rorschach lectures Dan on being security-concious, he first uses, then just takes a bottle of Nostalgia cologne. III.25.9 The newsvendor's "final analysis" has turned out to be not quite so final after all. And then we segue on "analysis". III.26.2 Also note that the character saying the line is drawn the same as the General Jack D. Ripper character from that film. III.26-27 Again, we have one scene commenting on another: Mars is "devastation", Dr. M gets an "overview" and is "somewhere else", looking at "breathtaking" sights while he does "thinking about" "the big decision". He is a "force of nature" and "totally indifferent", a "higher authority". III.Doc.12 The stuff about Hooded Justice is mostly red herrings suggesting that he is still alive, and possibly killed Blake. In fact, it seems far more probable that Blake killed him, and dumped him off of a waterfront pier in Boston. III.Doc.13-14 Mason's description of his meetings with Dr. M. are depicted in IV.13-15.
Joshua Davis III.1.4 I'm fairly certain that the book that the younger Bernie is reading (I believe it's titled _Tales_Of_The_Black_Freighter_), is entirely an allegorical reference to Veidt's plot, with the comic's main character being Veidt's reflection, essentially forging forth on an inwardly valiant and well intentioned mission, but doing so on the backs of murdered innocents. The "pale, mottled shark" is no accident, it's Rorschach, or more precisely, Rorschach's mask-killer hunt, which the shipwrecked sailor (Veidt) puts a quick stop to. As a sidenote -- I'm not sure if it's too ambitious a connection to make, but perhaps even the sailor's method of dealing with the shark -- blinding it -- is a reference to Veidt's intentionally misguiding Rorschach. And if you're willing to take it even a step farther, Veidt profits from Rorschach's "demise" (or at least imprisonment) in a similar way that the shipwrecked sailor "profits" from his dead adversary -- Rorschach really _is_ "raw shark." But back to the initial point -- it is upon the backs of murdered innocents that both men achieve their inwardly valiant goal. However, unlike Veidt's story, the sailor's story is carried out until we see the awful mistake he's made. Is moore telling us something here about Adrian? Veidt seals the parallel verbally when he admits to Jon in chapter XII that he made himself "feel every death," and that at night, he dreams of "swimming toward a hideous... well never mind, itŐs not significant" (I'm paraphrasing here, forgive me). Swimming toward what, Adrian?
Lawrence King III.21.3-4 One note that I didn't see mentioned... When Dr. Manhattan leaves for Mars he is standing in the Arizona desert, gazing upward at Mars in the night sky. When Edgar Rice Burroughs' classic hero, John Carter, first travels to Mars in A Princess of Mars (first published in 1912) he is standing in the Arizona desert, gazing upward at Mars in the night sky. Just thought you might be interested... This editor remembers the Martian novels very fondly. Note the reference to John Carter of Mars in the second issue of Moore's League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (1999). Evidently Moore is a fan of Burroughs, too. -- sam
Arthur Knight III.9.9 While Conrad Veidt was not in Metropolis [as an earlier version of the Editor's Notes previously said] he was in the founding film of German Expressionism, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari--he played Cesare the somnambulist in this film all about competing perceptions (and narrations) of reality and also all about the (ab)use of power in the name of saving people. See also Duncan Shea's note for more on Conrad Veidt's film career. James HarveyApril 28, 1998 Have you read the text file "The Annotated Watchmen" you can get on the Internet? If not, seek it out--it's full of interesting titbits. Such as you know at the start of chapter 3 there is the close up of the Fallout Shelter sign? Notice how the F and the S are cut off, so it reads "Allout Helter." Helter meaning general panic, disturbance and confusion, obviously refering to the overall state the world at the time is in. Also, if you don't read the letters covered by the smoke, it reads "All Hel." Finally, the smoke forms the profile of a skull. Very symbolic isn't it? III.14.2 Someone said that the author is asking you the question "Am I starting to make you feel uncomfortable?" as in, "showing you all this graphic violence up close?" I think it's "Am I starting to make you feel uncomfortable," as in Laurie's just grabbed that Knot-Top by the 'nads, and that is the question she is asking him, in her head. |