What fantastic stress could make a person put on a superhero costume and ram justice down the throat of a crime-ridden and filthy world?

Watchmen tries to answer this question, and to examine the results. In an alternate 1985, one of the human superheroes is murdered, and the craziest of them goes on a crusade to find out why. This movie looks rather like Sin City or 300; not surprising since, like those, it’s a graphic novel turned into a film. But it’s much more driven by the people involved (if you can count the one person with true superpowers, Dr. Manhattan, as still being a person). The Comedian’s lust, Night Owl’s timidity, Manhattan’s divorce from humanity, Rorshach’s fury and obstinance, Silk Spectre II’s relationships make up the threads of this movie. (What’s a superhero love triangle like? Different. Especially when Dr. Manhattan can work in his lab and be two parts of a threesome at the same time.)

The first third of the movie is pretty dense as it introduces the characters, their histories and flaws, and the situation; almost every sentence is important. This movie is two hours and 43 minutes, about as long as The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, but unlike Button it did not make me want to rip out my own liver from boredom. Matt and I saw this at 8pm at the AMC; three others saw it at the IMAX at 9:45 and therefore went home the next day. The non-IMAX version is just fine.

I liked the soundtrack, very strong 1970s/1980s music. The acting is very good—the characters feel alive and true. And Malin Akerman is hot, in costume, in street clothes, and in nothing.

Watchmen has some very graphic violence in a few scenes, plus plenty of fighting. Probably any Friday the 13th movie has more violence, but I don’t watch those. There’s also Dr. Manhattan, who is often completely naked. But it’s a little different with a guy who can be eight feet tall when he wants and has a gentle blue glow, and to avoid offending the audience, he’s rather small.

The movie is full of clever little references to the 1980s (a young Ted Koppel, the Macintosh “1984” ad has a cameo) and some great quotes. When Rorshach is framed and goes to prison with dozens of the criminals he put away, one of them goes after him. Rorshach clobbers him, then warns the rest: “You still don’t understand. I’m not locked in here with you. You’re locked in here with me!”

And at the end, this movie poses a moral question (though it doesn’t examine it very closely). The world is on the brink of nuclear war. Perhaps a billion people will die. But a fake “alien invasion” of sorts, killing 15 million people, can avert the Last War.

Would you kill 15 million human beings to save a billion? Should you? Could you?