Tales of the Black Freighter

[CeeKay]

another Watchmen tale.   they say it completes the experience- was it that big of a deal in the series that someone should see it before seeing the film?

[TiLT]

A lot of people say it's an essential and important part of the Watchmen experience. I disagree. It's a horribly written, cliched story with a "twist" you can predict at page 1, pretty much. I don't think leaving it out of the movie will hurt it.

[Turtle]

It is, essentially, a Nietzsche style tale of careful when you fight monsters lest ye become a monster yourself, or something similar.

I think it was pointless, I skipped it after reading the first few.  It didn't add anything and the comic on the whole itself told its story better than the inserts did.

[Chaz]

I liked the Black Freighter segments in the comic, but what I really liked was the way that those panels were interleaved with the panels from the "real world".  Taken as its own thing, probably not essential.  Also, I don't think they were badly written, I think they were written to sound exactly like one of the old EC comics that it was drawing inspiration from, which it definitely sounded like.

[TiLT]

I liked the Black Freighter segments in the comic, but what I really liked was the way that those panels were interleaved with the panels from the "real world".  Taken as its own thing, probably not essential.  Also, I don't think they were badly written, I think they were written to sound exactly like one of the old EC comics that it was drawing inspiration from, which it definitely sounded like.

If you write something that closely imitates something else that is badly written, wouldn't your own piece be that also, even though it might succeed at its goal? 

[Fireball1244]

I'm torn as to whether to buy this or not. I'm hoping that when Watchmen is released on Blu-ray, they re-interleve Tales of the Black Freighter with the main text.

[Caine]

I'm torn as to whether to buy this or not. I'm hoping that when Watchmen is released on Blu-ray, they re-interleve Tales of the Black Freighter with the main text.

i would buy this.  i also hope that they actually filmed out the original master plan and would splice it back in with a super long director's cut or somesuch. 

as it stands, the tale isn't great on it's own and really was only a counter-story to the main one.  as chaz points out, it was better when the panels were inter-leaved with the story as they purposefully drew them similarly.

[Chaz]

I liked the Black Freighter segments in the comic, but what I really liked was the way that those panels were interleaved with the panels from the "real world".  Taken as its own thing, probably not essential.  Also, I don't think they were badly written, I think they were written to sound exactly like one of the old EC comics that it was drawing inspiration from, which it definitely sounded like.

If you write something that closely imitates something else that is badly written, wouldn't your own piece be that also, even though it might succeed at its goal? 

Well, if you're trying to create an original work that's supposed to be a work from a different time period, then yeah, that's a success.  If I'm making a movie, and in it, the characters watch an old movie from the 20s, and that movie is in color and has the characters talking, that's a failure. 

[kathode]

It was one of my favorite parts of Watchmen.  I didn't think it was horribly written at all.  It's definitely a period piece and written accordingly.  I didn't predict the twist until well into it, and even then it was still enjoyable to read as the guy drove forward into his fate.  You could certainly take it out and not lose the plot of the main story, but leaving it out definitely takes away from some of the nuance of the book as a whole, and that kind of thing is really part of what elevates Watchmen over all other graphic novels for me.

[The Grue]

A lot of people say it's an essential and important part of the Watchmen experience. I disagree. It's a horribly written, cliched story with a "twist" you can predict at page 1, pretty much. I don't think leaving it out of the movie will hurt it.

I agree with you, but I still liked it being in the Watchmen series.  I, too, knew the twist pretty much from the start, but I still enjoyed the ride.