02.11.07
Watchmen
I’ve never been a huge fan of comics. When I first started reading this comic book, I found myself suprisingly getting into it. It’s a very quick read and for the most part easy to understand; although I did get a little confused in Chapter 3. I have no idea why, but this comic book reminds me of the movie Fantastic Four. The characters in the movie get along better and don’t have as many issues towards each other, yet it still reminds me of The Watchmen. I don’t know, maybe because all of the characters are super heroes… well kind of. The characters in Fantastic Four are all super heroes and have their own powers, the characters in The Watchmen are all considered super heroes yet the only real super hero is Jon. I’m actually a little confused on Jon’s character, it seemed as though in the first two chapters his wife was not very happy with him, maybe even a little scared of him– but in chapter 3, she breaks down crying when she decides to leave him and in a way, “jumps” into another man’s arms.
Ok, so on to relating The Watchmen with a few of the past pieces we have read. When it comes to Saussure’s Speech/Language concept, it is easy to tie the two together with a comic book because ‘language needs more than speech.’ Saussure explains that language that is written down is valuable because you can see it (tangible = a book). This entire comic book not only has words, but pictures! How exciting. Language is a lot more than just sound which a comic book proves. You are able to get a visual understanding of what is going on throughout the reading, while comprehending the words that are written down.
Besides the whole biology relating to english metaphor (”body without organs..”), I think that Deleuze and Guattari may have made one valuable point that I actually understand. What I understood was that they believe society has a structure, but the world doesn’t. Throughout the comic book, it’s like the world is falling apart. People, such as the super heroes are all working together to save their society and piece together a murder, yet the world around them is just crumbling.
Throughout Jameson’s piece, he talks a lot about nostalgia. Even though I was able to understand a lot of his reading, I did get a little confused when it came to him discussing nostalgia. According to Wikipedia, “Nostalgia describes a longing for the past.” It was really interesting to see how on page 7 in chapter 3, there is a huge billboard that has a picture of a woman on it and in big letters it says “Nostalgia” and “Where is the essence that was so divine?” So apparently, people aren’t too pleased with how things are going in the near future, they miss the past? In chapter 1 on the first page it says “The accumulated filth of all their sex and murder will foam up about their waists and all the whores and politicians will look up and shout “save us!”… … and I’ll look down, and whisper “no.”" Back to the image that the world is falling apart.. it seems as though many people aren’t happy because there is so much crime and filth going on around them. Maybe that the world is taking a turn for the worse?
estherspace said,
February 11, 2007 at 11:23 pm
Hi Joei, I am really glad to see that I’m in good company with the whole ‘not really liking comics’ thing! I agree that The Watchmen has a strong postmodernist slant to it, though it is a bit depressing for my tastes. I think that within the graphic novel there is a great deal of nostalgia, with the Crimebusters wanting to be like the Minutemen, and a general sense of wishing things were like they were before the Cold War fears. However, it is important to note the Rorschach’s journal is dated 1985, which (if i’m not mistaken) is contemporary with the first publication of Moore’s work. So, in many ways, there is a sense of an alternate universe being created, though for us it is all part of the past. I hope this makes sense.
kelliem said,
February 12, 2007 at 1:48 am
I think you made a lot of good points here, and drew a lot of connections that I never would have thought of! When I remembered, oh yeah, I have to relate theory to a graphic novel, I floundered a little. All I could come up with the theory of chaos proposed by Deleuze and Guatarri. I wholly agree with you, though, when you point out that the citizens of trhe city, along with the former Minutemen, are caught up in Nostalgia. They want the world in which they’re living, which is spiraling out of control, to revert to the easily manageable city that they knew in the 60s. It makes a lot of sense now, because there are a lot of flashbacks, a lot of references to how things were then, and a lot of storytelling by the characters.
And Saussure’s theory that language needs more than speech–makes you wonder why he didn’t flat-out advise that literature be accompanied by images.
elizabeth0509 said,
February 12, 2007 at 3:33 am
hey Joei! I think you blog was really good and you brought up a lot of good points. I noticed that we both brought up Saussure and his idea of speech and language. That was the first example in the book that really stood out for me and im glad someone else thought the same thing. The other things you said about Deleuze and Guattari were really interesting. I never really thought about relating Watchmen to these two, but you brought up really good points. I probably didn’t want to relate it to them because I thought they were so crazy and couldn’t really understand anything they were saying haha.