Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
Doesn't Manhattan specifically tell what's-her-face that he's going to kill someone? And we're meant to think it's her because he won't say who, but it's Rorschach?
Manhattan can only vaguely see him killing someone in the snow, or him standing over a blood(we are led to believe that it might be the Nite Owl). I can't remember that exactly without the book in front of me. But the reason is the tachyons that Oz released, it was keeping Manhattan from being fully, consciously connected throughout time. "I had almost forgotten the rush from the feeling of uncertainty!"
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augustwhere you come from is goneRegistered Userregular
Was there moral ambiguity to Batman's actions in DKR? I thought everything he did made sense in the world Miller constructed. It's been years since I read the book, though.
Was there moral ambiguity to Batman's actions in DKR? I thought everything he did made sense in the world Miller constructed. It's been years since I read the book, though.
It was kind of ambiguous at what point he should have realized that he's the best person who ever lived.
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Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
edited October 2008
It's worth it to not try and rationalize Manhattan's POV with regards to time. It doesn't fully work due to the break caused by the tachyons, and it's unclear if that just creates a momentary cloud in his stream of consciousness or if it severs his stream of consciousness to a large degree.
Considering how arrogant Manhattan is, either is possible. He is used to being a man among ants, used to seeing the strings. Veidt manages to beat him for a brief moment by taking away Manhattan's sight.
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Quoththe RavenMiami, FL FOR REALRegistered Userregular
edited October 2008
Is Manhattan really arrogant, or just aloof? Detached?
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
edited October 2008
Oh he's certainly aloof and detached. But having those factors does not exclude arrogance.
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Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
Is Manhattan really arrogant, or just aloof? Detached?
He's the exact opposite of arrogant. He has no preconceptions at all, except in the most literal sense: he is profoundly aware of the future and the present in a simultaneous way, and this exceedingly non-linear consciousness is forced to operate within our linear reality. He has nothing in common, really, with a normal human. He's a force of nature by the time we meet him, and his interactions with humanity are more vestigial than anything else.
Quoththe RavenMiami, FL FOR REALRegistered Userregular
edited October 2008
I'm not saying those are mutually exclusive qualities, just that I did not perceive any arrogance on his part, merely detachment. Arrogance carries with it a connotation, even a denotation, of pride, and I never felt like Manhattan was overly proud. Any assumption of self-worth or superiority was, in a way, justified because he was valuable and superior. Even so, it seemed more that other people were telling him how important he was; he wasn't going around proclaiming his worth.
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
edited October 2008
I rather disagree. His arrogance comes from his sense of time, his knowledge of the certainty of the future. I think that this is apparent when you compare the scenes of him looking to the future on Mars and then experiencing it in New York. The complete change of his demeanor is telling.
And while he certainly loses more and more of human notions and conventions, that doesn't mean he totally loses his humanity. He cares more about humanity at the end of Watchmen than the beginning, albeit not quite in the manner we would expect. I would argue that his murder of Rorschach is an act of compassion and his final conversation with Veidt is an act of whimsy. And the comparison of Veidt's actions as the acts of 'the world's smartest ant' show a personality that is not just a force of nature.
And then Manhattan leaves to go spread life in the universe.
He's basically like a godhead E.O. Wilson.
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no, he was always going to have been killed by jon. jon's known it since the day he became dr manhattan.
No, Jon couldn't see that far, remember? Something Veidt did.
i was under the impression that the tachyon field fuzzed out everything up to and around when jon was disintegrated again by veidt, but after that not so much. i would say it's probably unclear.
no, he was always going to have been killed by jon. jon's known it since the day he became dr manhattan.
No, Jon couldn't see that far, remember? Something Veidt did.
i was under the impression that the tachyon field fuzzed out everything up to and around when jon was disintegrated again by veidt, but after that not so much. i would say it's probably unclear.
I agree with this interpretation.
I've always pictured Jon's perception of reality as being analogous to looking from above down at a sheet of paper. The tachyon emitters created a blurred splotch on the page that Jon could see around - he could see what happened on all sides of the tachyon field, but not into it - and that field runs up to right about the end of the book.
By contrast, humans normally live in the page, progressing from one side to the other, unable to look back or forward but rather only able to see the exact point in the page they occupy.
Jon's ability to perceive the entire structure - seeing "cause and effect" as illusions of form instead of aspects of substance - completely obviates morality. To Jon, it isn't even meaningful to talk about moral choices in most senses, as "people" are just patterns of complexity moving through the universe, inextricable from one another and all other things.
It bumps up against the rather involved theories of metaphysics, morality and psychology that come out of discussions of determinism.
Toxic ToysAre you really taking my advice?Really?Registered Userregular
edited November 2008
I thought it was a little of both. She hooked up with The Comedian at some point in time but that one time it was rape. He thought he could get away with it because she gave it up before.
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3DS code: 2938-6074-2306, Nintendo Network ID: ToxicToys, PSN: zutto
I thought it was a little of both. She hooked up with The Comedian at some point in time but that one time it was rape. He thought he could get away with it because she gave it up before.
Pretty sure they never had sex until after the rape attempt.
So the lesson here is: Try to rape a girl and she'll fall in love with you.
That's that era: where characters like James Bond can be shown explicitly forcing a woman into sexual contact, only to have her 'melt' into his arms.
For women in the 30s-early 60s especially, the contradictory roles you were expected to occupy were dizzying. A woman was simultaneously supposed to represent a virginal flower, and a world waiting to be discovered and conquered. If she resisted too hard, she was a lesbian. If she didn't resist at all, a whore. They were in a real no-man's land.
To make it worse, many women internalized this facade, and as a result you have women like here where they're literally raped, and then they find themselves caring for the rapist as a conquering hero, with time. It's epically disturbing.
(There's more to this topic, obviously, but I think I'm being true to the discussion)
She didn't love him as a conquering hero. It was specifically when he showed tenderness. She didn't fall in love with him because he raped her, she fell in love with him despite it.
See, I don't agree: she loved him because he showed her the affection she needed after being raped. He created the very emptiness she then needed him to fill.
I have to tell you: if your definition of "softie" includes thinking it's a nice thing that she fell in love with a man whom raped her, then you and I are operating with very different dictionaries.
The man raped her. There's no do-overs in that little game: you rape someone, you're an evil, sick bastard. The idea of a woman falling in love with that person, at any point in the future, immediately tells of a broken woman with mental illness.
Loyalty to a more powerful abuser — in spite of the danger that this loyalty puts the victim in — is common among victims of domestic abuse, battered partners and child abuse (dependent children). In many instances the victims choose to remain loyal to their abuser, and choose not to leave him or her, even when they are offered a safe placement in foster homes or safe houses. This mental phenomenon is also known as Trauma-Bonding or Bonding-to-the-Perpetrator. This syndrome was described by psychoanalysts of the object relations theory school (see Fairbairn) as the phenomenon of psychological identification with the more powerful abuser. A variant of Stockholm Syndrome includes cases of abusive parents and abusive siblings in which the victim, even after entering adulthood, still justifies the family abuse.
Anyone getting the Watchmen hardcover that's coming out on Wednesday? It's 40 bucks but you do get a new Dave Gibbons cover and the re-colored pages from the absolute edition.
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Manhattan can only vaguely see him killing someone in the snow, or him standing over a blood(we are led to believe that it might be the Nite Owl). I can't remember that exactly without the book in front of me. But the reason is the tachyons that Oz released, it was keeping Manhattan from being fully, consciously connected throughout time. "I had almost forgotten the rush from the feeling of uncertainty!"
But he's entirely without flaw!
Just like me!!
And Frank Miller!!!
https://twitter.com/Hooraydiation
It was kind of ambiguous at what point he should have realized that he's the best person who ever lived.
Considering how arrogant Manhattan is, either is possible. He is used to being a man among ants, used to seeing the strings. Veidt manages to beat him for a brief moment by taking away Manhattan's sight.
He's the exact opposite of arrogant. He has no preconceptions at all, except in the most literal sense: he is profoundly aware of the future and the present in a simultaneous way, and this exceedingly non-linear consciousness is forced to operate within our linear reality. He has nothing in common, really, with a normal human. He's a force of nature by the time we meet him, and his interactions with humanity are more vestigial than anything else.
Edit: Also what Matt said.
And while he certainly loses more and more of human notions and conventions, that doesn't mean he totally loses his humanity. He cares more about humanity at the end of Watchmen than the beginning, albeit not quite in the manner we would expect. I would argue that his murder of Rorschach is an act of compassion and his final conversation with Veidt is an act of whimsy. And the comparison of Veidt's actions as the acts of 'the world's smartest ant' show a personality that is not just a force of nature.
And then Manhattan leaves to go spread life in the universe.
He's basically like a godhead E.O. Wilson.
i was under the impression that the tachyon field fuzzed out everything up to and around when jon was disintegrated again by veidt, but after that not so much. i would say it's probably unclear.
I agree with this interpretation.
I've always pictured Jon's perception of reality as being analogous to looking from above down at a sheet of paper. The tachyon emitters created a blurred splotch on the page that Jon could see around - he could see what happened on all sides of the tachyon field, but not into it - and that field runs up to right about the end of the book.
By contrast, humans normally live in the page, progressing from one side to the other, unable to look back or forward but rather only able to see the exact point in the page they occupy.
Jon's ability to perceive the entire structure - seeing "cause and effect" as illusions of form instead of aspects of substance - completely obviates morality. To Jon, it isn't even meaningful to talk about moral choices in most senses, as "people" are just patterns of complexity moving through the universe, inextricable from one another and all other things.
It bumps up against the rather involved theories of metaphysics, morality and psychology that come out of discussions of determinism.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GUmgQHvqqc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5EXW2-Fj9Q
Might be some arbitrary region restriction. Oh well. Pretty cool footage, anyway.
Not sure why they're calling it an extended trailer when it's like at least 50% new stuff.
until it gets taken down, here's another
http://74.53.95.28/
Thanks, I wondered where that site had gone off to!
I have just one question though. Did Laurie's mother and The Comedian have a relationship, or was Laurie's mother successfully raped at some point?
https://medium.com/@alascii
https://twitter.com/Hooraydiation
Pretty sure they never had sex until after the rape attempt.
https://twitter.com/Hooraydiation
He attempted to rape her and got the shit beat out of him.
Then at some point they reconciled and he impregnated her.
She still doesn't want him hanging out with her daughter, though. Their daughter.
That's that era: where characters like James Bond can be shown explicitly forcing a woman into sexual contact, only to have her 'melt' into his arms.
For women in the 30s-early 60s especially, the contradictory roles you were expected to occupy were dizzying. A woman was simultaneously supposed to represent a virginal flower, and a world waiting to be discovered and conquered. If she resisted too hard, she was a lesbian. If she didn't resist at all, a whore. They were in a real no-man's land.
To make it worse, many women internalized this facade, and as a result you have women like here where they're literally raped, and then they find themselves caring for the rapist as a conquering hero, with time. It's epically disturbing.
(There's more to this topic, obviously, but I think I'm being true to the discussion)
The man raped her. There's no do-overs in that little game: you rape someone, you're an evil, sick bastard. The idea of a woman falling in love with that person, at any point in the future, immediately tells of a broken woman with mental illness.
https://twitter.com/Hooraydiation
Also, Sally clearly had issues - hell, one of the themes of WATCHMEN is that you 'have to be a little crazy' to be a superhero.