Before Watchmen: Comedian/Rorschach

LibraryThing member aadyer

Beautiful art, with interesting,mid not particuarly complex story lines, centreing this time around Rorshach & The Comedian. Tensely plotted, with both predictable & unpredictable elements to both stories involving both characters. This is harsh stuff, given the anti hero, vigilante subject matter.

I'm not sure it particularly fleshes out either character very much, or adds anything to the Watchman saga in any particular meaningful way, although these stories and encounters are very much in the vein of their characters from the seminal work. So much so, they're almost charactures of themselves. Still readable, & gorgeous art.

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LibraryThing member ecataldi

So far I think this may be my favorite Watchmen prequel. I started off skeptical of the Before Watchmen collection, but they have been winning me over, this set specifically. I really enjoyed getting some more back story on the Comedian and Rorschach. The Comedian's is dark and gritty, obviously,

and has a neat connection to the Kennedy presidency. Rorschach's story is almost even better, I've always been curious about his origins and some of the scenes in here really humanize him and give him some depth. Reading these just makes me appreciate the series even more.

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LibraryThing member sweetiegherkin

When I first heard about the Before Watchmen project, I was dubious about it. Eventually I decided to start checking out the series, starting with Nite Owl/Dr. Manhattan, which I was pleasantly surprised with so I moved on to this title next. Unfortunately, I was disappointed with this one.

The

Comedian half of this book tells an unnecessarily complicated and convoluted story about Edward Blake already as the super-"hero" Comedian getting involved in political messes including the Vietnam War and frequently involving his buddies John and Robert Kennedy. We don't really learn anything new about the Comedian's character or backstory. We have no idea how he became a costumed hero to begin with or why he ticks. We simply know he has a propensity towards violence and is more of an anti-hero than heroic; however, we already knew all of that in Watchmen. The text makes some fun allusions towards the soundtrack from the 2009 movie, but the plot itself makes variations from what the movie proposed. (Slight spoiler: In the movie, the Comedian is shown assassinating JFK, based on implications found in the original book; here he is seen in a remote location crying about it as he sees the breaking news footage with everyone else.) Despite so much of this book dealing with the Vietnam War, Dr. Manhattan never plays a role; there is, however, a brief appearance by Nite Owl and Rorschach. The illustrations are well done but occasionally make use of odd angles and framing, which, like the text, seem to be made complicated simply for the appearance of complexity without actually being complex.

The Rorschach half of the book started out much more promising. It involves a solo Rorschach (so presumably before he started teaming up with Dan) pursuing a New York City gang involved in drugs, prostitution, and violence while at the same time a particularly brutal serial killer is stalking the streets. However, it fizzled out pretty quickly without providing any real satisfactory endings to either of these storylines. In fact, the whole story was far too short to provide an interesting exploration of either of these subplots. There was a small theme touched upon about the general public and their propensity to be victims oblivious to the sordid underbelly around them unless their eyes are forced to focus on it, which at least gave this story a little bit of meatiness to it, although not much. The illustrations on this one are even better than the previous Comedian story, and make good use of lights and shadows to emphasis the dark world in which Rorschach inhabits.

Overall, it just seemed like these two stories were more interested in showing action and violence for their own sakes, without really delving into character or substantiative themes. Neither story provides any information or insight about these characters beyond what was in the original novel; neither story really has much to say. These stories are okay for some quick escapist reading, but I don't think they add to the Watchmen universe at all.

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LibraryThing member Rosa.Mill

So this was not my favorite of the Before the Watchmen books. Both stories felt a little disjointed and difficult to follow. I felt like Comedian's story conflicted things that appeared in the Minuteman volume of Before Watchmen (a little cross referencing goes a long way guys.) I felt like they

were just trying to mix in as many historical characters as possible at some points and the Vietnam sections were just confusing. Rorschach was never my favorite character but I enjoyed his store a little more as it was easier to follow....but it wasn't what I wanted covered. What I really wanted to know was how he became who he was and this was more of a story of a previous case. I liked the artwork for both stories and thought the styles selected for each character really worked with their stories.

I will admit these are my two least favorite Watchmen characters so I kind of wasn't expecting to enjoy the stories so I suppose that added my meh feeling about the stories.

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LibraryThing member Rosa.Mill

So this was not my favorite of the Before the Watchmen books. Both stories felt a little disjointed and difficult to follow. I felt like Comedian's story conflicted things that appeared in the Minuteman volume of Before Watchmen (a little cross referencing goes a long way guys.) I felt like they

were just trying to mix in as many historical characters as possible at some points and the Vietnam sections were just confusing. Rorschach was never my favorite character but I enjoyed his store a little more as it was easier to follow....but it wasn't what I wanted covered. What I really wanted to know was how he became who he was and this was more of a story of a previous case. I liked the artwork for both stories and thought the styles selected for each character really worked with their stories.

I will admit these are my two least favorite Watchmen characters so I kind of wasn't expecting to enjoy the stories so I suppose that added my meh feeling about the stories.

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LibraryThing member Rosa.Mill

So this was not my favorite of the Before the Watchmen books. Both stories felt a little disjointed and difficult to follow. I felt like Comedian's story conflicted things that appeared in the Minuteman volume of Before Watchmen (a little cross referencing goes a long way guys.) I felt like they

were just trying to mix in as many historical characters as possible at some points and the Vietnam sections were just confusing. Rorschach was never my favorite character but I enjoyed his store a little more as it was easier to follow....but it wasn't what I wanted covered. What I really wanted to know was how he became who he was and this was more of a story of a previous case. I liked the artwork for both stories and thought the styles selected for each character really worked with their stories.

I will admit these are my two least favorite Watchmen characters so I kind of wasn't expecting to enjoy the stories so I suppose that added my meh feeling about the stories.

Show Less

LibraryThing member Rosa.Mill

So this was not my favorite of the Before the Watchmen books. Both stories felt a little disjointed and difficult to follow. I felt like Comedian's story conflicted things that appeared in the Minuteman volume of Before Watchmen (a little cross referencing goes a long way guys.) I felt like they

were just trying to mix in as many historical characters as possible at some points and the Vietnam sections were just confusing. Rorschach was never my favorite character but I enjoyed his store a little more as it was easier to follow....but it wasn't what I wanted covered. What I really wanted to know was how he became who he was and this was more of a story of a previous case. I liked the artwork for both stories and thought the styles selected for each character really worked with their stories.

I will admit these are my two least favorite Watchmen characters so I kind of wasn't expecting to enjoy the stories so I suppose that added my meh feeling about the stories.

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LibraryThing member TheYodamom

Yes, a Rorschach book ! I saw this book and my inner Rorschach loving nerd went crazy happy. It all started with a President, a bleached blond bombshell and a very suspicious death. This prequel was a fun early look at my favorite character the fearsome Rorschach. His character stays fairly true to

the original.
The artwork is fabulous. Beautifully colored and detailed. I hope to grab the rest of the series.

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by Brian Azzarello

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