The Smark Avengers - Does Watchmen Still Hold Up? (First-Time Reader Reaction)

Episode Date: May 29, 2026

For the first time ever, Dylan has finally read Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmen… and now it’s time to talk about it. In this episode, Corey, Dylan, and Jon revisit one of the most influential comics ever created as Dylan gives his fresh perspective on the legendary graphic novel while Corey and Jon reflect on their own past readings years later. Using the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund’s Watchmen discussion guide as a framework, the guys dive deep into the themes, characters, structure, and legacy of the series that changed comics forever. 🟡 Topics discussed include: Dylan’s first impressions of Watchmen Whether the comic still holds up in 2026 Rorschach, Dr. Manhattan, Ozymandias, and the Comedian The book’s political and social themes The storytelling techniques that made it revolutionary Whether the comic deserves its legendary reputation Does Watchmen remain a masterpiece decades later? Whether you’re a longtime fan or someone who’s never read Watchmen before, this episode is a deep dive into one of the most discussed comics of all time. 💬 Join the discussion: Does Watchmen still deserve its reputation as the greatest graphic novel ever written? 👍 Like the video if you enjoy comic deep dives and literary discussions 🔔 Subscribe for more comic book podcasts, retrospectives, and debates Click the link for Dylan's radio show!: http://www.bouncedigitalradio.co.uk Click the link for Dylan's Twitch stream: http://Twitch.tv/spookylaroux Click the link for Jon's Letterboxd: https://letterboxd.com/bigjonbowski/ Click the link for Corey's show "Large Old Cup": https://open.spotify.com/show/2YHMppnl9inQevwLIxR64f

Goodness gracious. The times. Hi, everybody. Welcome to Smart Avengers. My name is Corey. With me is Dylan and John. How's it going, guys? I like the other intro we're going to do better. We've had a couple of different tries.

There was the one that wasn't recording. There was the questionable one, and then there was some other questionable ones. The questionable one? I like the questionable one. Yeah, you were just too harsh in yourself, Corey. You go stick to your guns. I need to stick to my Madam Squeezies.

She made it into the episode. Hey, didn't want to leave her out in the cold. Hey, so yeah, Dylan, I have a very important question for you. Is. Who watches the watchman? A party, John. John did. Yep.

John, I watched it last night. John, did they behave themselves with those watchmen on their best behavior? I wouldn't necessarily say they're on their best behavior. But, you know, we've talked about this. Some stuff happened. a couple things happened. Some stuff would happen for sure. For sure.

Yeah. What a part of those watchmen, a minority group. Yeah, absolutely. So, of course, you know, the topic of today's discussion, everybody, is Alan Moore's Seminole 1980 Superhero Deconstruction Saga, the Watchman, which is, you know, it's a fun thing to talk about because normally, and this is not a slight,

on anyone in particular on the podcast. Most people who I know are into comic books have read Watchmen when they were in their late teens and early 20s. So to like find someone who's reading it for the first time with like a fully developed like frontal lobe is kind of cool in a way. Isn't that right, Dylan? Yeah. I am the person of question.

I have only Red Watchman the first time like last week. I bought the paper. I bought the book, like, last year probably, and just I read the first two chapters of it. I kind of, like, just got busy with life. So when I went back, read it again this year, like last week, I remember that I'd read the first two chapters, but I couldn't remember what happened in them. So I just skipped right to the third one and read it through to the end, and then went back and read the first two chapters. Which I thought was a really good idea on my part, because you guys know. in Watchman, there's a lot of

stuff that when you read it for the first time doesn't make sense at the end. You read it the second or third time. You go, oh, that's this bit? This is this bit? When I read the first two chapters, after having read the rest of the book, I'm like, okay, cool. With hindsight, I can see how a lot of this slots

into place. You know what you mean? So this is maybe an odd question to ask Dylan, but is there a particular reason that Watchman just never came up for you in your rotation? before this moment or was something you're always meaning to get around to you and just didn't you didn't care less

yeah I probably just didn't care honestly you know I know people are like oh it's the greatest comic ever whatever and I'm like well okay cool I got to read duck tails it's probably not and then spoiler with already wasn't in it wow so now was a disappointment

yeah should have given you a heads up on that one so yeah I guess the question is like Never got a rhyme to it I don't think There was never a point where I'm like I got a rewatchman And never like I just saw it

So what I have is like The DC have started doing these little Many books Small trades that are all like 99 or whatever I just saw watchman In Waterstones and I'm like Hey I've heard that's pretty good There it is and it's 99

That sounds like a good deal one you know that that'll be the time i want i decided to read it that was literally the thought process if that book wasn't there i would never have gone out of my way to go and get a lot man so so i i guess the question like the thing that you kind of bring up obviously is this book kind of exists because alan more had an idea for like wouldn't be an interesting way to start a story if a famous superhero was dead and then it's a mystery and you unravel it for from there. So when we come to the sort of discussion on Watchmen, like, we can go a half a dozen

different ways of how we want to go about this. We can take it by chapter by chapter. We can break down characters. We can talk about the general plot. We can talk about the behind the scene stuff. Is there a particular place that Dylan, as someone who newly read it or John as someone who read it multiple times previously and recently watched the Zach Snyder adaptation? Is there a starting point you would like to kind of just, you know,

tackle it from uh not really i'll just adapt to whatever narrative you have going and i'll insert my two cents as it were yeah i'm kind of thinking the same thing like there's a lot to cover but yeah i don't know but strictly go on chapter the chapter no there's a lot of chapters and there's a lot of stuff going on in them. Maybe just like a general kind of overview of bite the story. Yeah. Well, and what's kind of interesting about it is this one was kind of Alan Moore flexing his more, um, his literary muscles in a sense that he made great use of a, of the,

uh, I believe his style is called Pistolary where he was trying, he was telling a story through text, but he was using different types of text to tell the story. So you, you know, you had the actual issues of Watchmen and then you would have like the news reports and you would have tales from the Black freighter and all of the various different, you know, the big text sections that sometimes people skip over because that's a lot of words. But yeah, no, this was, have you ever seen the scripts that Alan was sending to Dave Gibbons to illustrate? No. I will tell you, Dylan, it is... Have you ever heard of the Marvel method? A part of it.

Where, like, Jack Kirby would just, like, he'd just draw a bunch of stuff, and then Stanley would take a look at it, and then figure out what the story was based off what Jack drew. It's interesting way to do things. Yeah. So that was kind of the Marvel method,

and it said that Jack Kirby told a story, and then it was up to stand to fill in the words. You know, he came up with the dialogue based off of what was happening in the comic. This was not the case. Alan Moore's scripts to Dave Givens were incredibly precise in very, very thorough and very, very detailed about where he wanted things. It was very meticulously put together. That nine grid system of almost every single page, you know, is very telling in that sense.

So I guess we'll start there. What were your takeaways from an art perspective on the book? Like, what did you like? What did you not like? What stood out to you? you know, we'll take it from there first, I suppose. I really like the art. I thought the art was really good, like, all the way through.

I really liked that a lot. I did like the different perspectives, like, issue to issue. So, like, you know, one issue is just, like, Rorschach's, like, journals or whatever or from his point of view. And then one of them's from, like, night oil and who's the girl?

Silk Specter. So expecter. Like one's from her point of view and it's all kind of like it's a very good kind of weavy tail that I like. You know, it all kind of does

very, very it ties up all together at the end very, very well. Which I like. I really, like the ending. I really like the ending. Like

a lot, like everything about the last issue, but like especially like the last page of the issue. I'm like that that I like. Okay. So yeah, I don't know if I should

you know, spoiler alert. I guess we'll say it like this. I feel like if you have not watched or if you've not read watch and you're watching our video discussing Watchmen, there might be something fundamentally wrong with you. So I feel like it's safe to discuss spoilers for a book that came out 30-ish, 40-ish years ago. Okay.

So that being said, do you want to try to take this from the discussion guide? We will do the homework piece. All right. Yeah, let's see what some of the other. All right. So this is a history question for you both. By the way, this is from the comic book Legal Defense Fund discussion guide on Watchman.

This is reasons challenged, unsuited to age group and nudity, by the way. This is why this book has been thrown out in the past. Themes are fascism, free will, moral relativism, ins justifying the means, superheroes, defining justice, questioning authority, and taking responsibility, and the suggested age rage, as we might have discussed high school and above. So I feel like we're okay. Yeah. Yeah.

So the very first question it asks, and this is to both of you, how does Watchmen reflect the era during which it was written in which it is set? So this was written in the 1980s in America. We were still in the midst of the Cold War. The Cold War was kind of crumbling, though, with the Soviet Union kind of getting a little more, I don't want to say desperate, but their grasp was certainly falling. and it you know there was still very major concerns about nuclear war well i think that the

the conflict does a very good job of describing itself in like an alternate history where like the cold war still is a thing but you know it's it's a little more heavily weighted towards a America because of Dr. Manhattan. So Dr. Manhattan's a big blue guy who gets his dick all the time. The Cold War is going more to America's way because Dr. Manhattan exists and is like a deterrent to nuclear war. Yeah. It's the notion of superhero as nuclear weapon because in the setting, Dr. Manhattan is the

only hero that has powers. Everyone else is just a guy in a costume. Right. But his powers are so, like, ridiculous. immense that he becomes that kind of like well if he attack america we're going to have the wrath of dr manhattan on us and that is also shown through the comic whenever in the comedian fight in vietnam and essentially win the vietnam war for america yeah based on way that dr manhattan is able to just like disintegrate tanks and stuff like this essentially

just so it means yeah so it means the world has already seen this happen And because of that, it's put people on edge to not delve any further. In one of the text chapters at the end of one of the issues, I think it's from the new statesman. The new frontier man, I don't know, that one. One of them, they talk about, maybe it's not that one, but one of them they talk about the idea of Dr. Manhattan as a deterrent for the Cold War and against the Soviets. And they suggest that it's not really a proper deterrent because Dr. Manhattan can like, you know, evaporate like 60 to 70% of nuclear warheads that Russia might send to America. But, you know, that's still an awful lot of nuclear warheads being sent to America. Yeah, exactly.

I think they say total destruction divided by 10 or 20 is still total destruction. Yeah. And they're like, at some point, it's a deterrent in that it slowed down things significantly. But like if Soviet Russia really did want to destroy everybody, they could do it. And, you know, it's still on the table. So I like that that's kind of rea's as an alternate viewpoint. Even though it's not in the main comic, it's kind of just in the text at the end of one of the issues. but it's an interesting point of view.

Yeah, so Watchman is a book about paranoia and fear and anxiety. And that is essentially what the mood was during the Cold War. You know, we don't know if something's going to happen, but we know that there's the potential for it to happen. And it's like, can we trust the people in charge not to pull the trigger? And we recently kind of had a mini one of those couple of weeks back, if you remember. But yes.

I feel like having read Watchmen now, it's actually quite timely because a lot of people, you know, obviously Watchmen was very popular when it came out, but it's always been very popular for a long time.

Since it came out, obviously the Cold War kind of ended or fizzled out, shall we say. Somewhere in the 90s, or the early 90s-ish. Yeah, you know what you mean? So like, people still read it after that.

I'm like, oh, this is nice. I've been read it this year. I'm really like, wow, this is pretty on the nose. A little bit too close for comfort. You know, it really seems to be a lot reading it now for the first time. Like, oh, boy. Yeah. How about that Richard Nixon as well? Yeah, great guy. Yeah. After what is he on his third or fourth term or something? How did he have been in his third term at that point in the timeline? well I'm sure I never see that in our lifetimes

one can hope John do you have any thoughts regarding watchmen and it's setting in comparison to Cold War America I mean you guys are pretty much covered it really is I think it's very smartly done on how it

kind of plays out the the Cold War tensions in a, you know, like, superhero-tinged kind of way with the out of Manhattan being that sort of deterrent. But then, yeah, like the whole doomsday clock aspect as well

is, you know, obviously it's still very much a real thing that, you know, there is still a doomsday clock, which is, sticking ever closer to midnight. So, you know, yeah, I just think it's a really smart kind of play on all those themes. Yeah, that's one thing that I did think about the whole book, is that it's incredibly smart. Just all the way through it, it's incredibly well written.

And just like the world building as well is really well done. like to come up with this sort of alternate timeline of events and like all the sort of knock-on effects of you know all the different things that happen like you know in in watchmen because of um dr manhattan basically winning the uh vietnam war single-handedly pretty much like that you know helps Nixon consolidate power and keep it in the White House. And then, you know, he can kind of shuffle under the carpet or the Watergate stuff as well. And so like all these little things. Like it's, yeah, it's just, it goes to show Alan Moore's imagination, really,

like how he managed to figure all this stuff out and make it make sense. Yeah, there's a lot of moving parts in that book anyway, naturally, just to tell that story. And for all of that, like, world building and different, like, historical stuff that he's been saying, talking about since, like, the 30s. Be able to, like, remember a lot and tie all together. Most difficult. Well, and then you also have, like you mentioned, there's a lot of moving parts, much like the gears of a watch. Yes. Mm-hmm.

Anyway, second question. So we'll do it kind of as a preface before we get to it. It's very widely known that the characters of Watchmen are based off of the characters of Charlton comics that had recently been acquired by DC Comics. I think that he was, Alan Moore originally was, I think he wanted to use characters from Miracle Man. But when he pitched the, I think when the idea was kicking around his head around with Marvel, regardless, when he went to DC with it, I think he was going to do Charlton, but then D.E. he was like, actually, we kind of want to take those characters and do something different with them. So he just based the characters off of the Charlton characters. So very famously, Night Owl is Blue Beetle, Roarshock is the question, peacemaker is the comedian,

Nightshade is Silk Specter, Ozzymandius, I believe, I can't remember his name. It might have been Thunderbolt, Daredevil, something, one of the two. I can't remember exactly. The character was so minor even in Charlton. but then of course the final piece of that question was Dr. Manhattan was Captain Adam who is still very big part of the DC continuity as well so that being said are there any true heroes in Watchmen are there any true villains explain your reasoning so this is a book of Shades of

gray do you think there are any true heroes or true villains Okay, I feel like for that you kind of have to define what true is supposed to mean in this context I feel like that's a little You know Is the guy that technically saved the world From impending destruction Kind of as a true hero?

Is the guy... Not when he kills millions of people Well, is that... Right, but then is he a true villain? He killed millions of people, but he saved millions of people at the same time. I mean, that sounds like a Thanos' Dr. Doom plot, though, as well.

I mean, that's what a lot of people came back with Avengers in-game and what have you. Was Thanos's plot, you know, while a very simplistic approach to it was for the quote, greater good. Dr. Doom also makes very similar claims of doing things for the greater good. Is there enough evidence? Is there, well, here's the thing. Is there enough evidence? in what Ozymandias did

that made a greater good situation. Like, you know, like, yes, people stopped fighting, but is it a temporary solution, much like Captain, you know, not Captain, but Dr. Manhattan winning the Vietnam War. Did you just kick the can down the road? Well, I don't know because I feel like this, I don't like this question,

because I feel like the true hero, or true villain is, like, leading towards something that doesn't exist. Like I said, he, you know, Asimandius doesn't really count as either. Technically, if you think about it, neither do any of them, really. Rorschach goes out and lives his own head

and is mentally deranged and, you know, does all that weird stuff and might be a Nazi. But he also, like, has done a lot of good stuff and has cleaned up the streets and does fight for what he believes is good. So you can't really call him a true pure or villain either.

I read a theory. by the way that so Rorschach and this actually might be a later question Rorschach is your traditional unreliable narrator you know he has his own agenda he has his own skewed view

of what he sees the world in and the scene which you know I the lot of people say like Rorschach broke where he found the girls remains after being fed to dogs and the bones chucked into furnace essentially

you can't trust that story at all because he's the person telling it. Like, there's nothing, nothing that Roershach says can be trusted because he is very mentally ill and very, very damaged. Yeah. I don't know. But I, I, I mean, I think that's the point of the question.

Because, I mean, if you're going to look at, like, if you see a true hero as would Superman have done that? Absolutely not. Superman lives in a different world with different rules, you know. Dr. Manhattan has all of the powers and abilities of a Superman, but he lacks the compassion because the process of becoming stripped him of his humanity. And I think that's what Alan Moore was kind of getting at is that the true Superman, if you're

going to look back at the Nietzsche version of it, is someone who's devoid of humanity. They've moved past it. And that's the issue you run into with him. Well, I think that Alan Moore, the school of thought for all of these characters was that they're all flawed and they also all have some sort of goodness in them. There's there's always a reason for whatever they're doing. Yeah. And it can be seen as a benefit to somebody at some point. They're also like very flawed jerky characters that have you know intentionally or not made a lot of mistakes. I don't think you could say that any of them are truly heroes or villains because

I think that of watchmen. It's to just be like, if this was the real, if superheroes were real, this is the shit you have to put up with. Humans are flawed and stupid, but kind of well-meaning as well. And that takes shape in a lot of different ways.

So you have to just be able to put up with that shit, especially if one of them is able to just move molecules with his head. I just have to put up. as well like you look at sort of night owl and Silk Specter as like probably the closest thing to traditional heroes in it like trying to

stop the bad guy but then when they you know confront him and find out that he's already sort of pulled the trigger um uh kind of just like yeah they should basically yeah just shrug their shoulders and go oh okay

well that was that then and but the irony he is like, Rawshack is the guy who is like violent and you know, is murdering people and obviously crazy but he is the one with the sort of moral compass to say

after that, no, we should tell people and like, you know, not let this guy get away with killing all these, you know, millions of people for his crazy plan, but then he can't do it because he gets stopped for the greater good.

But that's it. Like even the guys that you would say are the closest to the heroes are also like you know they did a lot of good things but at the end of it the thing they did was just kind of like do nothing and watch it all happen like well they're not really good or evil either

you know what you mean like there's I don't think you can say any of them are true heroes or true villains I think ultimately and that's the point of the story is Alan Moore is not as bad as a Gartha Innes in regards to turning a side eye at the superhero genre

but he is definitely not a fan of it. So our third question, how does more use multimedia text, news articles, comics, traditional text, static images, etc. to build the world of Watchmen.

We talked a little bit about this and the sort of like, I always thought the term was pistol area and I might be completely wrong. But the idea of you're telling a story using different formats of media in order to move it along. So,

yeah. So yeah. You like the Black Frater very famously, the comic strip that the kid's reading, you know, at the newsstand in Times Square throughout the multiple issues of the book. So in regards to world building, I think that is one of those things you're kind of, we mentioned previously about the whole, there's a lot of moving parts. You get introduced to characters chapters before they become important. So, you know, you get to see this, the people, the kid and the guy at the newsstand multiple times, the detectives working on. these cases, you see the psychiatrist that works for the prison. You know, you get to see little snippets of them throughout. You see like Silk Spector's mom, you know, who is this woman who kind of

was a bombshell back in the day and a bit damaged and kind of weirdly clinging onto her glory days despite the trauma that came with them. So there are obviously, like I said, like, you know, like implied, a lot going on and he uses different tools to kind of keep you abreast of it all. I think in terms of a lot of the multimedia aspect stuff, a lot of that is really just the extra tax that comes at the end of each chapter. Yeah. Mm-hmm. So in terms of like moving the story along, they don't have any impact because like I said,

I read the whole book without reading those first and then I went back and read them after it. You can understand the whole story without them. They are great for plot building. And once you've read the book, they're good at pulling the little holes and making stuff kind of a little bit more clearer. But a lot of the stuff that you need to know, in fact, everything you need to know is in the body of the book as it's, as it's, but those little incidental things are really fun because it does add to the world building in terms of not just the content of them, but also like what they are. This is a chapter of the guy's book or this is a newspaper clipping from the newspaper that's in. in Watchmen, or this is

Osmandius, like, looking into this toy line of stuff, which he would do and leaving notes and stuff. Create for, like, world building. It's not really essential for, like, the story of Watchmen. Yeah, but it's sort of what was missing from the movie, because, like,

I think all there's... Well, I know, but, like, those little people, in the book were they just add like a bit of subtext and layering to everything whereas a movie was missing that and it was all kind of very surface level like a lot of those characters that Corey would mentioned who kind of you know yeah they they have like significant roles in the book and kind of you come to you know care about them and then in the movie they're just like completely peripheral and

you know, like, you know, forgettable characters, really. So I think that goes to the, you know, strength of the book and what Alan Moore was trying to do by adding all those extra layers in there. It just kind of... Yeah. So this is, this is, I have two thoughts on this. Thought one, I think a really fun follow-up would be if Dylan you did watch Watchman, the Zach Snyder film. And then we have a kind of a, we touch base on it and see like, you know, what did you notice

as someone who freshly read it in comparison to like what was presented? Because I remember I saw in theaters twice. And I watched it the first time. I saw it. Yeah, I liked it the first time, but something felt weird about it the more I thought about it. And so I went and I saw it a second time and then kind of came away with more of my like, all right, this is actually how I feel about it. I had the same reaction to Man of Steel,

which I didn't see Man of Steel the second time, because I was like, I really liked it, but I'm like, I just like Superman, and I think I was just excited to see a Superman movie. Zach Snyder connection there. Yeah. Anyway, would that be a whole other episode? I think so.

I think we can make an episode out of it. Because I think like the marketing around the movie of Watchman, Dylan, is fascinating. After you read that, they put out action, figures. They made a video game where you play Roershock and Night Owl. That's like pre-movie stuff.

They, it was a whole to do. I think it would be a fascinating touch base to like go. Yeah, DC and Warrior Brothers really thought they were going to make something big out of this like dark kind of, um, kind of a psychological thriller mystery. Like they wanted to make this big action film out of it. And it was like, it's not what this is. I'll say there's like three different versions of the movie as well there's like the theatrical and there's the directus cut

and then there's the ultimate cut which I believe weaves in part of the Tales from the Black Frater as well that was a big criticism was that Tales from the Black Frater wasn't included I got to watch three films I don't watch the same film I watch I think I would say watch the theatrical cut because that's the one they sold us

Yes. Watch the aspect. It's also the shorter one. This shit happens all the time. They always sell you on the theater film. And then Zach Schneider goes, oh, it's not the film I wanted to make. Here's my film.

Like, you're the fucking director. Jared Lettow's in this way. He's got long hair. Anyway. Oh, fuck off. He's one of my weird on-site people. I have like two people I am a lot of rational hatreds of in my life. It's him and Lenny Kravitz.

Couldn't tell you why Lenny Kravitz. Just bad vibe. Bad vibe. regardless. Bad vibe. Yeah, bad vibe. Don't know what it is. I don't like fucking bohemium nepo babies.

On site. Anyway. Anyway. The point, the second point I was going to make was, um, I think all of that stuff is absolutely essential because it, it does build the world out. I think it's what separates Watchman from a superhero comic book because you read the excerpts of a retired hero. you see the reports from the newspaper.

Because when you're just reading a Superman monthly issue, you're getting Superman's perspective. And all of this other content built out the world. And you've got to a better feeling of that tension of either nostalgia that's, you know, the present painting the past in gold, as Robert Frost, to paraphrase him. Or it's to kind of build on the uneasiness in kind of, of general paranoia that's out there.

And I think if you don't have that, then, yeah, you're just reading a straight superhero comic and you're not getting the full extent of what Alan Moore's trying to say. Okay. All right. So the next question, I do think that this is going to be very interesting for the three of us, especially because two of you are a little more accustomed to this than I am. Watchman was intended to be read and absorbed over multiple readings. How does the graphic novel format encourage this and does it make it prohibit?

in any way, explain your reasoning. John is very famously a trade guy, and Dylan, you don't read a lot of monthlys yourself. So, I can't read. Anyway, did you find it? I looked at the pictures and then did the audio book, and then I'm like, oh, that's nice. There is the visual novel of this that was playing at the laundromat when I was there a couple weeks ago. You could watch it that way.

It was like voice acting and stuff. Yeah, see? You do the Marvel method. You'd look at the pictures and then make up your own story like Stanley would. Just like Stan Lee would. Yeah. Tell me. Anyway, yes.

The intention was that you would read an issue and then you would have a month or more to digest it before the next issue came out. Gave you really time to ponder over what it was. Do you find that that would have worked for you? Or are you a reader that's like if I go too long, I'm going to forget what the fuck happened? yes 100% especially with a book this kind of dance and complex like I needed to read it all kind of in one go or in like you know a day or a few days just to read it if I had to wait like a whole year I believe longer than a year this took longer than a year to come out because there was like delays and stuff um like I can't imagine waiting that long for this book I would get so confused and I would

what I would do is buy them all and then just read them all once I have them all. You know what you mean? I just I just remember half of the shit that went on here. Yeah. Interesting. I don't know. See, I can't. I won't have that experience unless I purposely like spend enough time that I forget about what happens in Watchman and then like break it up as I go through trades.

I won't have that experience. I only read it in a trade. but like I won't lie the first time I read it when I was like 16 years old I read through without reading any of the supplemental material because I was like oh this is why do I need to read what happened in the guy's autobiography like why do I need to read this like news report you know uh-huh cat cams all right well maybe that wasn't as good a question I thought it would be there's still 17 more questions ago so that's fine we'll find one we like. All right. At the end of Watchman, we see a conversation between Dr. Manhattan and Ozymandias, questioning if the latter's actions during the book were justified.

Were they? Explain your reasoning. We kind of touched on this a moment ago. I think we talked about that. Are you comfortable? Do you want to dive in any further than that, or are you satisfied with your answer? I'm pretty satisfied. I don't think that they are justified in terms of the evidence he's been given. Because again, this is a man.

who has taken a lot of stuff into his own hands to create this very specific solution to a problem he is kind of imagined that hasn't happened yet yeah really and it's a lot for one person to kind of go through as well as it's got to be a solution which doesn't involve murdering millions of people biogenetic creating a giant squid monster yes exactly it's got to be easy ways. Exactly. There's a lot of stuff going on here where you're like, oh, this is my idea and I've already done it. Like, okay, cool. You didn't think of like talking to somebody else with this because therapy might have been really helpful for you. Well, I think something else.

Just a bit of brainstorming. Yeah, I think something else to remember that I think gets passed up in. I definitely felt this. I can't remember the name of the actor who played the role in the Scott Snyder movie. Adrian is just a guy. He's a very smart guy, but he's just a guy. So, I mean, he's someone who decided to make this decision for the betterment of the whole world. And it's like based off of what?

You know, like, planning is a very fruitless endeavor at times because nothing that you can plan for. There's no guarantee that that's exactly what's going to happen. Right? Right. That does bring me up. That does bring me to one of my least favorite things that ever, like, about the Zach Snyder film, and that is he still includes Babastus in the movie

for no fucking reason. Aggravates the absolute hell out of me. Absolutely hell out of me. It's like he saw him, and he's like, well, I got to put him in. He's iconic. It's like, no, he served a purpose. I assume that purpose does not come to pass in the film.

No, it doesn't. No. Because it's a big, yeah, because it's a twist for the sake of a twist, I think. I understand why they did it, but I was like, I disagree. I think you could have, if you're still going to do it, hold your nuts and do it, you know? Yes. But yeah, Dylan, you know, are you aware of the, how they change the ending in the movie?

I know that the ending is different. I don't know what they did. Okay. So the whole point of, I'm not going to tell you that because I do want you to watch it because I wouldn't, I want to hear your opinion on it. Yeah. But the whole point of Babastus existing is to foreshadow the fact that, Adrian has been experimenting with bioengineering and creating these weird monsters, right? That's the point.

That's why he's there. And for them not to do that and still include him, he's fucking insane. Because all it does is it reinforces the idea that there's something special about Adrian and there's not. He's just a dude. He has money and he's smart. That's it. That's aggravating. that's really funny because this is a criticism we've had of

action out of before is that he seems to come at comics and the characters from a very surface level way he's not looking at like what makes these characters important or impactful or um like the characters that they are

he just sees somebody like Batman is like oh he's cool where he sees someone like Superman he goes oh he's got lasers like he doesn't he doesn't go any deeper than that and that that's I think is quite evident when you look at something like Batman versus Superman he's just in a sad

be like wouldn't it be cool if they fought but he doesn't like think about why he doesn't deconstruct he doesn't go any further than surface level and it amused me to no end to find out that Zach Snyder has missed every single plot point

and context and he hasn't missed a point that goes right over his head he is ignored and just completely missed everything that makes watchman

the fucking book that it is he's like why'd it be cool if you're a blue guy of your dick art oh now I kind of want to watch the film I can't wait this is amazing he's missed everything about it.

He's just missed all of the subtext and the... Yeah, no. I told you, I told you before we started recording, it's full of his, like, slow-mo, aura farming kind of bullshit.

So it is very much a part of it. Oh. Yeah. This is gonna be fun. Yeah, you'll enjoy it in that sense. If you go in knowing you're not gonna like it, you'll like it.

Well, I had the feeling I wouldn't like it anyway. I just had the, I just had the, but that's part. Probably why I didn't read the book is because I remember watchmen coming out and people reaving about it. I'm like, is it that good? Probably not.

I was pretty confident that a lot of the people that I knew that had watched the film had not read the book. So I'm like, I'm not taking your word on this at all. So I'm very, very intrigued right now. This is fun. I'm good to see that Snyder has not changed a bit. No, that's fun. You know. still batten a hundred best.

So. Good good. The next question is would it be possible for more to tell the story in Watchman using another medium why or why not? We've just discussed a movie. Yeah, this was a big

contentious point that Alamore wrote that specifically because he thought this would be a really good story to tell in a comic book kind of style the way he told it. and he specifically didn't think that it would work as a film because of the way he wrote it and portrayed it. And who won the pony?

A part, it was correct. When you know who won the pony on that one. Yeah. All right. I don't know if this is a question you guys want to get into, but throughout the book we see the graffiti tag. Who watches the Watchmen? What would you say are the Watchmen in our society

and what role might censorship play? for these watchmen. I don't know what that means. Yeah. We don't have watchmen in our society. Yeah. Yeah, right?

Like, no, well, the watchman in this is very specifically like superheroes. Like, if you're asking this broad question in terms of real life, are you saying the police of the watchman and who regulates the police?

Or maybe the media and like the way they kind of control narratives and stuff maybe to kind of point us in whatever direction they want to go sociopolitical conversation or not is that it was what I'm kind of getting at well that's really yeah it sounds quite heavy let's really blase and say that that comes across in watchman

the graphic novel in that the way the media box abide the characters is also quite important because it gives a lot of there's a whole these whole bits where like public opinion turns on the watchmen or the superheroes in general

and that's partly because of how the media talks about them. There's a whole bit where like Dr. Manhattan is accused of giving people cancer and that's reported heavily and never like retracted or confirmed or

fact checked. There's the reason he's haunted and leaves earth is because of the media. There's a lot of that kind of biased. But also, like, when you read the excerpts and stuff, there's, like, two different, you know, newspapers and you frontiermen or whatever. And whatever, what's the one? Nova Express.

And you're like, well, neither of these seem really reputable in terms of, they clearly have their own opinion of the agenda. Yes. Then you're like, well, that is also an important theme. And you sure you can say that about these days. you know, there are a lot of, uh, this happens a lot in both of our countries where politically some people will get a lot of media coverage that is kind of just reporting what people are saying and other people will get media coverage, which will be like, look at how crazy

and backwards these people are. And it, it seems a backwards. words like you're not doing that correctly and being biased in that you're reporting one guy's words as facts and you're reporting somebody else's actions as um more important and it's it's it's you can that that definitely comes across in the book I would say good I know it wasn't quite the answer to the question but I've no I mean I think that's accurate I mean we see like Even in just all of the, like we see how Dr. Manhattan is treated in the media. We see how Silk Spector is treated in the media as well. Like the different characters are treated differently based on who they are.

I mean, we see, you know, like how Rorschach is spoken of when he's arrested, for example, you know. Yes. Exactly. So, yeah, the media absolutely has an agenda and they are pushing what they're pushing because ultimately the end of the day they're selling newspapers. That's part of it too. Like say the newspapers

were pushing the agenda that Dr. Manhattan gives over to cancer and so he disappeared off to space. The end result was that it caused a big turn politically in the political climate where the Doomsday clock counted closer to...

Yeah, because now America didn't have its protector. Huge ramifications. But that didn't seem to be and again, I think that's a parallel to these days where like the news will report on stuff that, you know, is very one-sided and comes to an eventual consequence where you're like, this could have easily been avoided had this been freemned a little bit more sensibly. But it is, and then again, the news just runs with it. They're like, well, that's where we are now.

I shrugged shoulders. And you're like, well, we didn't have to be here, you know. So, yeah, I put that in there. Yeah, there you go. It's probably as diplomatic as possible, but, you know. Hopefully people are going to understand with context. What is I specifically am talking, or who specifically I am talking? Given the way I have, given my opinions on the show in the past.

So Watchman has been widely considered to be Alan Moore's commentary on the death of the superhero genre. and comics. Conversely, in this and his other works, more routinely introduces the idea of flawed, multifaceted characters who have superpowers creating an entirely new genre of greedy superhero stories. Apply each point of view to your favorite character from Watchman. Did more destroy the idea of the superhero, or did he create an even more compelling superhero archetype? So people said that a lot.

I don't think he, like, deconstructed superheroes or, like, did all this. like they're like oh he's what you know he's made like i i think what he did was tick he just had a viewpoint that nobody else really did i don't think he hates the superhero genre or really like wanted to destroy it around like that i think what he did was he had a really good idea as you told in a very good medium i don't think i think now he probably hit superhero genre because of what they've done to his characters yeah well i was gonna say like i mean deconstructed in the sense of that, like, you have some characters

who, you know, they don't really do it for the greater good, they do it for their own kind of weirdly selfish reasons or, like, Silkspector, she's the legacy character. Her mom was a hero and she got pushed into this role of doing it. You know, you have the

comedian who was a mercenary for all intents of purposes and, you know, got carte blanche for it and wealthy because of it. He got off on the power aspect of it. Because he was nihilist and, you know, was kind of weirdly enjoying the fact that nothing mattered.

So, I mean, there is a deconstruction in the sense of the character motivations. The thing about the comedian, I feel like that's just a natural progression of how superheroes go. Like, I think that's like service level stuff, really, where you think about

like, naturally, if you were given that, again, political climate, whatever, if you were given that amount of power, wouldn't you not necessarily us, I'm talking more hypothetically, would you potentially abuse that? If you were given that amount of freedom and the ability to just kill indiscriminately,

but for the good of your nation, and get paid for it, you know, it says a lot about the kind of person that would do that. I'll be happy about that, you know. Like superheroes, you know, in terms of the comic, I feel like that's a pretty, natural kind of

path to go down. I can see that. I can understand that style of logic there. It's easier to do that with a character who's like brand new like the comedian as well, whereas you couldn't really do it with Captain America say like he's

you know, he's enjoying killing people and the power goes to his head or whatever. They tried. They made him a Nazi. Well I mean, Peacemaker was the character that killed for peace, you know, like that was the, I mean, that was more than just the John scene of funny ha ha line, you know, it was the actual character motivation. The Charlton

characters for the most, for some of them were like kind of grim. I mean, Roershock's the way he is because Steve Ditko, who created the question, was an objectivist, who believed that basically humanity was people were responsible for saving themselves. And like, routinely, like, the question would like let people die because it's like, well, you know you're responsible for doing this you have to face the consequences of it so it was a very narrow mindset that Moore just kind of took and extrapolated on you know like he took the comedian you know who's based off peacemaker oh here's this character that's all his name is fucking peacemaker he has a dove on his chest but he's got a gun and he's shooting people you know right

I think he allowed it to amplify things you know yeah but that's what I mean like I feel like that's a kind of natural progression sure like he he he he made it like a big thing but like you said if that happened with a peacemaker who was a character that happened before dallimore stuff like i feel like that was i don't i don't think that that was a huge leap in logic i think that that's a pretty like you can get that conclusion at some point yeah yeah i mean you know all of like said all of the characters are based off of a charlton character which even funnier are the ones that like are still somewhat relevant like you know the question blue beetle and Peacemaker all are featured pretty routinely these days.

Yeah. And yet, you know, their Rorschach night owl and, you know, the comedian, Dr. Manhattan and Captain Adam. Captain Adam just had a miniseries called the Adam Project. And that's just weird to think that we'll get into it at some point. But DC did this whole thing called Doomsday Clock, a big storyline that was about folding Watchmen into the DC continuity in a weird sense that like Superman and Batman interacted with them. but I did not read it

and I don't know too many people who actually did so it's kind of one of those we're going to act like that didn't happen I've read it what'd you think of it good I mean I thought as an homage to the watchman it was pretty good like it they'd followed the same

sort of art structure the panels and stuff um and like if you're going to bring in those characters into the DC universe then I mean there's probably worse ways of doing it

but at the same time it wasn't like something which kind of felt important or felt as layered as you know watchmen did and like

yeah I can't even remember how it ends it was that sort of unmemorably Yeah, it was a sort of... I mean, if you want a sequel to Watchmen, watch the HBO series that came out like six years ago or something like that. It was a good bit ago. Because it was set about 20, 30 years after the events of Watchmen

and only had like a few characters who kind of carried over, but it felt very much of that world, but telling its own story. And again, like sort of very smart in the way it told it as well. So this is considered one of the all-time great graphic novels of all, that have ever been created from start to finish. Do you think there, is there any that you would put up against it?

Like, have you, is there one that you would say this is better than Watchmen? I don't know. I feel like Watchman kind of stands out on its own as a thing, which I really like. I don't know. Like off the top of my head, it's after having read it, it is very good. It really is an incredibly well-written story. So, you know, right off the bat, I don't know if I could properly think of anything that is. as good in terms of the kind of story it tells that you know i mean i might say another

alan more graphic novel uh from hell which uh is all about like his theory on the identity of jack the ripper and like the amount of detail it goes into in like you know his research into Alan Moore's research into all the murders that Jack the Ripper committed and all the people who were murdered as well and trying to bring that all to life is yeah it's incredible

and you know he puts his case out there for who he thinks is you know the person behind it all but kind of adds in this sort of I don't know like metaphysical kind of like stuff going on around it as well so it's

super interesting from like a historical point of view and just from like a good read point of view as well okay interesting so Alan Moore's competing with himself yeah basically good man

yeah I mean I can't think out of the top of mad really like I'm sure there is something that's pretty good but the clone side was pretty good yeah King's Conquest Conquest of Kane

whatever King Dynasty we only did two episodes about it we're gonna get one episode for Watchman a seminal like all time great and we spent two episodes talking about King Dynasty well I think I think in context you can see why we spent two episodes talking about

Kang Dynasty because what the fuck, right? Jesus Christ. I will say there's no black pyramids in this. So. No, but there's a glass, there's a glass fortress on Mars.

Yeah, I mean, you might, but depending on how long we talk about this, you could split the two. You know what you mean? Sure. You never know. We can make seven.

Well, we're going to make another episode where I watch the film, so we're going to have, we're going to get our money's worth from watchman, for sure. I can't, I hope that you find the ability to play Watchmen the End is Nye,

where you, it's like an Arkham Asylum-esque game of, you play Rorschach or Night Owl and go through the streets of wherever, and beat up people. Cool. Like I thought I'll be able to play up, but I'll give it a go. I think it was an Xbox game.

I want to say it was probably Xbox PlayStation 3 or 4. Probably not then. Well, I'll see what I can do. I want to ask you guys some questions about Watchmen. Mm-hmm. Okay, go for it. Well, I want to ask one specifically.

I'll come up with other ones later on as we discuss. Is there any, like, moments in the book that you really were like, that's good. Something that stands out to you a lot or something where you're like, like that you know um yeah you know what you mean like stand that little moments because there's a lot of little touches and stuff in the book um how about as i said i really like what does he about ozimandius faking an assassination attempt so that people wouldn't suspect that he was up to something yeah because again like later on in context you look back and then and go great that's the thing because what i was going to say the one bit that i really liked

is connected to that part because later on whenever night oil is talking to him in the ice forges or whatever they're like you staged this assassination attempt on yourself what if the assassin had shot you first instead of your assistant and he goes well i guess it would have just caught the bullet and they're like you're fucking insane and then later on um silk specter comes up behind him and shoots him with a gun and you can see the panel you can see the way his hands are and he's trying to catch the bullet

I but he does he catches a bullet that's great that to that to me that really stood out to me a lot so I'm like that's fucking he had the fucking balls and like I could catch a bullet

and then he fucking did that's great and again it says so much about that character Yeah, I I remember someone comparing the character to a certain political figure these days that you're not a fan of Dylan In the sense of a lot of

He has a lot of branding You know Doesn't matter doesn't mind putting people in harm's way If it means he gets what he wants Very inflated sense of self Yeah Yeah Nower it down

Yeah I think I can is in the midst of creating a weird squid tentacle monster. Yep. We don't know that he's not. He'll stage an assassination attempt for it and be like, this is why we got to have giant squid tentacle monsters. It's too safe around.

Only option. We've got no choice. Yep, only option. And taxpayers have to pay for it. Sorry. Anyway. LePam forever. John, is there any watchman moments for you?

I do actually have an honest answer. I mean, it's hard to narrow it down to just a moment, but I think like a whole tales of the Black Freighter like comic going on throughout it as well. Like I would happily buy a comic book of just that. Like I think it's like such a cool story and yeah, just like a nice little onus feature. to the book, which I really dug. It was fun. It was a fun little, like, aside.

Again, he went really, like, he went in on it, like, he gave one page thing, whatever, but it kind of comes up, like four or five issues, I think. Yeah, yeah. Makes it around. And what a great story it ended up being. Yeah.

Jesus. Yeah. A lot going on with that one. So, so my moment has to be the interactions between Rorschach and the prison therapist. The first initial interactions where it's apparent that Rorschach is lying to him, but the prison therapist is like wanting to believe

that he's doing a good job, not for the betterment of Rorschach, but what it could mean for his career if he's the guy that publishes the book about what's going on in this guy's head. And then Rorschach calling him out on it and then telling him like some really genuine fucked up stuff that like bled over into his personal life

where he's trying to have dinner with his wife and their friends and he's like completely fucked up the whole time because he's still processing the story that Rorschach told him. I like that because I liked like, I have a character flaw that a friend of mine told me about and Dylan, I feel like after, well, and John,

after months of hearing stories about what I've been up to in my personal life, I feel like you understand where I'm coming from. I like a character. I like strange, weird people. And I think they're fascinating. And I will put myself into business. our situations in order to like witness it essentially my friend told me one day i will die

because of this someone will murder me and they were very they were very matter-fact about it but but i liked it because like that is what happens sometimes when you are around people who are genuinely disturbed it fucks with you because it makes you question your own standpoint in Like, how can we exist on the same planet at the same time and yet have had such drastically different experiences that you are the way that you are and I am the way that I am? It really kind of like fucks with the idea of the human experience. Well, I think there's just a nice curiosity there. I think there is. But, you know, like I said, I have people who are legitimately concerned for me.

I mean, I'm more concerned with the freaks that you are constantly on the look out for. I think they are the ones that need monitoring. You know you mean? Sure. Did you have any other questions, though, Dylan? Who's your favorite character? Favorite character? I like Night Owl, too.

I think I just like a sad sack you know and that's kind of what he was like you can kind of get this weird vibe from him that he's someone who wants to do good but like he doesn't have enough of a he doesn't have enough conviction to actually follow through with it yes he's probably the most normal person there

and you can tell that like he go ahead well I was going to say like the suit and the gadgets was where he devised developed a sense of self and he became to rely upon it. That's the whole like being impotent, you know, outside of it. Yes. I think he's quite like contrast to Rorschach who, you know.

Yeah. Yeah, he's very like, you know, he's, you know, night all is like, I want to do good, but at the same time, has he's like, um, he'll have moments where he stops and thinks about he he's too not decisive enough was Rorschach is very on the ball in terms of what he thinks is correct and we'll go out and do that in whatever manner he has to um so he's much more he's much more proactive with it whereas night aisle's a bit more passive with it like it's a good contrast between the two of them we're like um one of them really like this is

this is what I got to do. And the other one's like, I don't know. Yeah. You know? I mean, and it's something that, like, you know, Rorschach even calls him out.

I mean, people call him out to his face all the time about it. Like, you know, Dan is, you know, weak in comparison to everyone else. You know, he's the one that feels like

being a hero was a hobby. Right. Like, with the stuff, he's all the inventions and stuff, it does seem a lot like, he's, you know, it's a reason for him to make all that stuff.

Yeah. Like, he's doing it because he likes making stuff. And as a consequence of that, he can use it as a superhero. Well, and then, you know, his like hero worship of Hollis, you know, as well being a big factor into it. You know, he's a fanboy. And this is his way of like trying to be, to live out that kind of childhood fantasy. Yeah. John, what about you?

I mean, I think the most relatable character to me is probably Dr. Manhattan's had enough of the human race and he wants to block off to Mars. I thought you were going to say because you're going to say it's because he's out right now. Oh, man, it's always out. And it's really blurred. You got to take those rubber bands off, but it's bad for your circulation. Makes it look bigger. Does it? It shrivels up and falls off.

I don't think it's going to look too big. Oh, wow. Yeah, no, I mean, Dr. Manhattan is a very compelling character in the sense of, like, you know, he's someone who's completely devoid of humanity. And it was a very gradual process for him at first where he kind of realized that he was pretending to still have it for a long time. And then eventually, it just all withered away. yeah i would have said i feel like a lot of them are very like captivating people to read do you mean so like i really like reading rorschach stuff because he does seem like a totally different character from like everybody else he's he's quite

extreme in that sense uh so i thought he was fun to read he also is quite a like um unique kind of way of talking where he doesn't say all the words in a sentence. It's interesting. I find him very fun to read. I also really like Dr. Manhattan in that there's something really fun about this insanely

logical a person who can't seem to understand like nuance. You know, he can see all the atoms in space and he can create you know, fortresses at a glass or whatever.

He can do all this stuff logically because he knows how the dots are connected. But he can't seem to understand like proper human emotion or nuance or stuff like that. I find that a really fun character. Like that, if you can get that character right, it's a great time.

And I think that they really got that character correct. That was a lot of fun. So I would say those two are the best because they're the most fun to read. You know? Right. Any other questions that you had? Oh, thanks.

so I liked it. It's a good book. John, did you have any thoughts or questions that we feel like me may not have covered? Not that I can think of. Cover a lot of stuff. Yeah. One more note on that, I suppose, is, you know, how do you feel like Alan Moore feels about his career that, you know, this is considered,

a lot of people say this is his best work. do you think he agrees that this is his best work do you think he like would rather you know not ever talk about watchman again because he does he did very uh publicly distance himself from dc comics well part of that's because they wouldn't give him the characters yeah he wasn't getting that neal he didn't i feel like he's still pretty proud of the work he did he's just disappointed that he doesn't get any kind of like financial benefits from that which is you know you can see where he's coming from if watchman is one of the most successful comics of all time has spawned all sorts of like you know spin off some media and all this other lucrative stuff that he doesn't really get a part of despite being the one that made it yeah you can see why that would be a little bitter you know i can understand that i don't think he's bitter about the comic that he wrote at all yeah

I think he probably imagines he's, like, written better stuff since then, though, because, you know, he wrote Watchman as a relatively young man. And he's still been, yeah, he's done loads of stuff since. And, like, you know, mostly concentrating on. Yeah, yeah. I mean, then he's sort of left behind comics as a genre anyway. And now he's just focusing on writing novels. and stuff.

And I think he's probably more proud of those. I agree with John that Alamoire probably, if you asked him, he probably thinks that there's, he's written better stuff than watching him. Even if the world doesn't. Even if the world doesn't. So that being said, we are going to have a follow-up episode,

maybe soonish depending on how quickly you get around watching Zach Snyder's Watchman. Again, don't watch the director's cut or the cut that puts, the Black Freighter am animated stuff in the middle of it. Just watch Theatrical release. That way you get the full experience that I got. Mm-hmm.

But speaking of movies, John, what's your movie count at for the year so far? I am now up to 497 movies for the year so far. So you're about to hit 500 movies, and we are not quite in the middle of the year yet. Well done. Yeah, it's going pretty well, I'd say. I'd say so. It seems like you're on pace. What was your most recent one?

Watchman. It was the Strangers chapter two. Oh, okay. Interesting. Yeah, so it was directed by Rennie Harlan, who did, I believe, the second diehard movie, and a bunch of others. But, yeah, like, he, filmed The Strangers chapter one and chapter two, like quite close together. And they're both

very much, like, incomplete movies in terms of, like, story. Like, the one is, the chapter one kind of finished on a bit of a cliffhanger and then so did this one. So it's like a bit of an unsatisfying watch experience because it doesn't feel like, you know, watching the full story. So, yeah, wasn't a huge fan of it. That's fair. I don't know. I'm not sure many people really cared for the first one, though.

No. I mean, it was basically just a rehash of the strangers from 20 years ago. Actually, John, if they want to get, if people want to see your review of the strangers or maybe get a head start on us and see your review for Zach Snyder's Watchman, where can they find that? They can head to Letterbox and find me at Big John Bowsky, Ornward. Dylan, what have you been up to you lately? I do a radio show on Monday nights from 9 o'clock to 11 o'clock UK time.

So if you're in the UK, you don't have to change your clocks. You can listen to it anywhere in the world if you have a web browser and access to the internet. so you just check whatever the UK time is and log on it that's great isn't it it's a hundred said it so that's good um play all sorts of cool music and I talk a lot about stuff in the middle of it and yeah it's every Monday nights the links in the description it stream sometimes on Twitch at Spooky Lou Root drop pictures and I animate those pictures and put them on YouTube at Team Crows and I, and they're on TikTok at Team Crow Studios moment. And that's it.

I have my other show, Large Old Cup, which is a sort of spoken word, stream of consciousness thing. You can find that in the description of this video. I also have on this very same channel, if you're watching on YouTube, new number ones, where every week I find a new upcoming or a new releasing number one of a new series, and I judge it on whether or not I think it makes a good number one issue and whether or not it's worth continuing the story for. You could find those at this very same channel. But if there's anything else you guys would like to say, speak now or forever hold your peace.

Until next time, of course. Yeah. Just go out on a whimper. Yeah, that's our show off. Yeah, we'll just end on a, you know, uh, yeah, nope. Oh, whatever. Well done. All right, bye, everybody.

Bye. Bye-bye.