"Joker", which shined at the Venice Film Festival, has undoubtedly become the most successful comic book adaptation in recent years.
The unexpected popularity of "Joker" actually reflects the psychology of the audience to a certain extent: maybe everyone is tired of the superhero movies coming out of the film industry assembly line, and the audience is more looking forward to seeing deeper, more critical and even The comic book adaptation of the antihero.
Before "Joker", there was such a masterpiece - "Watchmen" directed by Zack Snyder
And the spin-off drama "Watchmen" of the same name of this masterpiece has already been broadcast. With the super IP and the excellent production of HBO, it is the annual drama of the year.
Why is "Watchmen" a super IP?
First of all, its original comic book is a masterpiece that is enough to go down in history. Whether it is in the comics industry or the mainstream cultural circle, " Watchmen " is regarded as an unsurpassable monument. The ranks of the best English novels - you must know that this is a pure literature list that has serious discrimination against comics!
The name "Watchmen" comes from the poet Yuvenalis' famous sentence "Who will watch the Watchmen?" This comic, born in 1986, takes the Cold War as the background and creates a parallel world close to reality: nuclear weapons such as Darda The sword of Morcles hangs over the heads of mankind; the United States won the Vietnam War and made Vietnam a state of the United States; Nixon was successfully re-elected five terms of the United States President, becoming a de facto dictator... In the world shaped by this cartoon, the masked hero stands on the cusp of the times, and bears the disappointment of human beings in society under the haze of nuclear fear, the reflection on human nature and all the doubts about heroism, which makes the characters show all the same type before. Characters that comic book protagonists don’t have—they can be selfish, cowardly, struggling with fear and bewildered. It can be said that the emergence of "Watchmen" has changed the pattern of the American comics industry. It is also the first time that superheroes are no longer the guardians of tall human civilization. Heroes have been pulled down from the altar and become watchmen, illuminators who reflect on war and society.
With the great success of this comic, author Alan Moore is also sought after by many fans. Famous directors such as Nolan are his fans. Because this author is not only a cartoonist, but also a novelist and composer, and his other comic works are almost all masterpieces: "V for Vendetta", "Batman: The Deadly Joke"... Later They were all put on the screen and remade into film and television works that everyone is very familiar with.
The important reason why Zha Dao's "Watchmen" can be loved by fans is its high degree of restoration of the original comics, and the original comics are brought to the screen (the ending is slightly changed) .
The reason why the return of "Watchmen" has such a high popularity is not only the effect of the label and IP, but more importantly, the story this time is completely original by the production team, which inherits the spiritual core of the original work. The "Watchmen Aftermath".
The story continues the ending of the comic version: Dr. Manhattan, who was disappointed with human beings, left the earth and went to Mars; in order to save human beings from the dark clouds of nuclear war, the former member of the watchmen, the pharaoh, sent a giant octopus to the sky over New York, and the monsters fell from the sky. With millions of casualties, the Pharaoh also successfully created the illusion of an alien invasion of the earth based on this incident. The Cold War ended, and humans were no longer hostile to each other, and joined forces to fight against non-existent enemies. And Rorschach was brutally murdered because he opposed this practice of sacrificing millions of people to obtain the illusion of peace. The Rorschach record, which recorded all the truth, was left among the people...
The main stage of the story is Tulsa, the United States in 2019. We can see that after the "New York Incident", human beings have not come out of the haze - the Ku Klux Klan has made a comeback in a new form. They wear Rorschach masks and call themselves "The Seventh". The cavalry regiment is rampantly engaged in terrorist activities; the "octopus rain" that falls at any time is still reminding everyone of the terrible tragedy; even in the "land of freedom", political power is firmly in the hands of the capitalists; the police are afraid of The students who are familiar with the original work should be able to see that the world has really moved towards "peace" in the plan of the Pharaoh, but is this really a better world?
It seems not.
Humanity is still dominated by fear, children still look up to the sky for Dr. Manhattan, adults even set up phone booths that can send messages to Mars, and people call for omnipotent heroes to save the world
In this case, the hero becomes the only hope - a sufficient and necessary condition for the emergence of new masked vigilantes after the disintegration of the former members of the watchmen.
Continuing the traditional HBO narrative technique: multi-line narrative, the story focuses on the process of tracking down the "Seventh Cavalry Regiment" by masked heroes such as "Nun in the Night" and "Looking Glass", interspersed with real events in the United States: white people Suprematists slaughtered black people in Tulsa riots, black soldiers were used as cannon fodder to go to Europe to participate in World War I... The slow narrative rhythm slowly spreads the whole world in front of the audience, and the multi-line narrative is not only in the Shaping characters, creating suspense, and more importantly, laying the groundwork for emotions: despair, fear, confusion... These emotions gradually penetrated into the audience's body with the past.
Continuing the traditional HBO narrative technique: multi-line narrative, the story focuses on the process of tracking down the "Seventh Cavalry Regiment" by masked heroes such as "Nun in the Night" and "Looking Glass", interspersed with real events in the United States: white people Suprematists slaughtered black people in Tulsa riots, black soldiers were used as cannon fodder to go to Europe to participate in World War I... The slow narrative rhythm slowly spreads the whole world in front of the audience, and the multi-line narrative is not only in the Shaping characters, creating suspense, and more importantly, laying the groundwork for emotions: despair, fear, confusion... These emotions gradually penetrated into the audience's body with the past.
Yes, whether it was the mutual nuclear deterrence between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, or the fact that most of humanity was still in the dark after the Cold War, the fate of mankind seems to be held in fear and ignorance - and the real irony is that , it is human creation that brings about this fear and ignorance.
Humans always seem to be unable to escape this bizarre spiral of drinking poison to quench their thirst.
What kind of crisis will mankind face next? How do masked heroes lead mankind out of despair? We don't know yet, although the current drama version of "Watchmen" has been updated to the sixth episode, but many mysteries have not yet been solved.
It's no wonder, after all, it's HBO, and it likes to use a lot of slow narrative rhythm in the first half of the show, which is why some fans of the original book scored low.
But if nothing else, the second half of the episode will definitely reveal new mysteries in a swift and violent way, create new waves, and present a more exciting plot.
If you don't want to miss this annual drama, you might as well have a look.
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