A Dark Alternative to the regular Superhero Genre

I finally had the chance to check out the Watchmen this past weekend…what an awesome movie! I’d never really heard of the story before the movie came out but now that I have had a chance to look into this dark alternative to the regular superhero genre I want to know more.

The movie starts with a collage of clips starting in the 1940′s to their present time in the ’80s and really gives a good lead into the characters without spending a ton of time slowly telling each of their stories. The movie itself is set up in a parallel universe where the US had won the Vietnam war (with thanks to the Watchmen) and Nixon is running for his fourth term as president. It’s also a world where super heroes (and super villains) had once existed but now seem to be a dying breed. All in all it was a nice change of pace from what I normally see in a superhero movie…I recently watched Spiderman 3….It was horrible. The version I watched was the 3 hour directors cut and from what I have heard, that is the version you want to see. Apparently the theatrical version was cut in such a way you felt like there were holes in the story…I am not surpised people would feel this way as there was so much going on. I actually will probably watch it a second time just to pick up on all the small things I probably missed the first time around…

Final thoughts…a great story, a pretty good movie, and an awesome alternative to the regular superhero films.