The Movies

Watchmen (The Ultimate Cut)

We’ve gotten the theatrical cut and the Director’s Cut, and now we have the Ultimate Cut. The Director’s Cut of Watchmen added in scenes that were left out of the theatrical version not because they didn’t fit but because they simply made the film too long for Warner Bros. to be comfortable releasing it to theaters. It is indeed a better version of the movie. The Ultimate Cut includes everything in the Director’s Cut plus the animated Tales of the Black Freighter, inserted throughout. The Watchmen graphic novel had this story as a comic within the comic. It is about an eighteenth-century sailor whose vessel is attacked by the Black Freighter pirate ship. He sets out first to save his family from the ship, then to get revenge. As his story progresses, he becomes more and more deluded in his quest for vengeance until the plot reaches its tragic climax. This sub-comic tied in beautifully to Watchmen, paralleling the heroes’ stories both imagistically and thematically.

This part of the comic was left out of both the theatrical and Director’s cuts. Now, in the Ultimate Cut, the filmmakers have gone back and inserted Black Freighter throughout Watchmen, much in the same way that it appeared in the original comic. However, it does not work as well. It suffers a number of problems, none of which are detrimental on their own, but when they are combined, they make for a distinctly flawed viewing experience.

To begin with, when Black Freighter is first introduced, it comes out of nowhere. We’re watching the normal events of Watchmen, and after a fade-out, we’re suddenly watching a cartoon. There is no sense even that it’s supposed to be a sub-reality to the film’s main plot; rather, it seems like the animated segment of Kill Bill, just another part of the movie that is, for stylistic reasons, animated. Once we do learn that it is a comic within the movie, it works slightly better but still does not mesh well. Whereas in Watchmen the comic, there were numerous visual and dialogical tie-ins with the Black Freighter panels and the events of the “real” world, in this movie there are only a handful. In the end it is unnecessary, and thirty total minutes of unnecessary is never a good thing – especially when the movie (the Director’s Cut) was already three-hours long.

As for Watchmen as a whole, it is still a great movie, though it is now flawed by the Black Freighter segments. Check out our full review of the non-Ultimate version of Watchmen here.

Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic

Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic is a semi-animated form of the original comic, covering the entire work essentially panel-for-panel and using the illustrations from the comic. As such, this movie is a doozy, clocking in at nearly five and a half hours. Overall, this is an okay work, mostly because it is an almost exact interpretation of the comic, but it suffers from a few distracting problems. The first of these problems is its length, which makes it practically impossible to sit through. Coming in a close second is its voice acting, which is performed entirely by Tom Stechschulte. Stechschulte does an adequate job with some of the characters, even the more idiosyncratic ones like Dr. Manhattan and Rorschach, but with others he falls flat. Case in point: the female characters, which sound ridiculous and occasionally laughable. Add to that the fact that Stechschulte’s voice often undergoes little change when switching from one character to another, and you’ve got a bad voice track on your hands. The story, of course, is amazing, but in the end, there’s really no reason for this adaptation to exist. You’re much better off either reading the comic or watching the real movie.

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The Extras

• *Commentary with director Zack Snyder
• *Commentary with artist Dave Gibbons
• The Phenomenon: The Comic that Changed Comics
• Real Super Heroes, Real Vigilantes
• Mechanics: Technologies of a Fantastic World
• *Under the Hood
• *Story Within a Story: The Books of Watchmen
• Watchmen: Video Journals
• My Chemical Romance - "Desolation Row"
• BD-Live
• Digital Copy

* Not included in the previously released Director's Cut

As opposed to having the Maximum Movie Mode commentary (complete with picture-in-picture and pull-backs to Snyder pointing out elements of scenes) like the Director's Cut Blu-ray, this release has two new, separate audio commentaries with no picture-in-picture. There is one with director Zack Snyder and one with Watchmen artist Dave Gibbons. Of these, Snyder's has a lot more information, most of which pertains to the way scenes were shot. For Gibbons' part there is a good bit of silence, but when he does speak up, he occasionally offers glimpses of his and Watchmen writer Alan Moore's thought processes pertaining to the original comic. Between these two commentaries there is some good information to be had, but it's definitely not worth the seven total hours it takes to listen to it all. The Director's Cut Blu-ray's commentary is much better. In that one, we hear from more people, we get denser commentary, we get a visual dimension on the commentary, we get storyboards, and you only have to watch the movie once through to get it all. That one beats this hands-down.

"The Phenomenon: The Comic that Changed Comics" is about the creation of the graphic novel on which the film is based. Most Watchmen fans know that Alan Moore has distanced himself from any film adaptation of his work, so, needless to say, the legendary author does not appear on the featurette, but we do get to hear from DC Comics execs and, most notably, Watchmen artist Dave Gibbons. There is a lot of talk simply about how groundbreaking and awesome the comic is, but they do delve a little into its making. It's interesting to hear that Nite Owl was a character that Gibbons had created when he was fourteen and had no project he could use him in until Watchmen came along. Overall, this extra is not incredibly deep, but it is worth a watch.

"Real Super Heroes, Real Vigilantes" is a serious but fun look at real-life vigilantes. The concept of vigilantism is addressed and examined in the lights of both practicality and morality. A few experts also discuss famous vigilantes, such as Bernhard Goetz and the Guardian Angels. We also get interviews with a Guardian Angel member and even a couple of no-name modern-day vigilantes (who appear, at first, to be a joke). The experts and vigilantes discuss what drives people to be vigilant and what (often unconsidered) perils such a way of life can lead to.

"Mechanics: Technologies of a Fantastic World" is probably the most interesting of the featurettes. It is essentially an interview with University of Minnesota physics professor James Kakalios, who was consulted for the science of Watchmen. Kakalios applies his "miracle exemption" rule to the sci-fi aspects of the film, essentially analyzing the particulars of the science under the assumption that the broader phenomena do exist (noting, for instance, that Dreiberg's Archimedes aircraft would actually be capable of flight if he could find an extremely efficient fuel source). Naturally, Kakalios' discussion of Dr. Manhattan is the most interesting portion of this featurette. He discusses, from a quantum physics angle, how the super-being would be able to alter his size or teleport from place to place. He even explains why he'd be blue.

"Under the Hood" is a faux interview show called The Culpepper Minute, in which the host, who exists within the world of Watchmen, interviews various members of the Minutemen (the first generation of masked vigilantes). We hear primarily from Hollis Mason, though Sally Juspeczyk (a.k.a. Sally Jupiter) and some non-vigilantes do some talking as well. Essentially this is a thirty-minute video roundup of all of the "back pages" sections of the original Watchmen chapters. It is a well-assembled fake program, but without being placed within the context of the individual chapters of the story, as they are in the comic, they lose a lot of their potency and relevance. You learn about the history of the Minutemen, but it only slightly enhances the story the film has told.

"Story Within a Story" briefly goes into the creation and histories of the aforementioned "back pages" portion of the comics, the "Under the Hood" featurette, the Black Freighter comic within Watchmen the comic, and the Black Freighter comic within Watchmen the movie. We also get some insight as to the roles each of these things play in the comic and the film, though most Watchmen fans will already have put that together without the assistance. It's fun listening to Dave Gibbons discuss the style and palettes used on Black Freighter in the comic, but for the most part there's not much to learn here.

The "Video Journals" are short looks at certain aspects of the film, such as costume design, set design, Rorschach's mask, etc. There's a good bit of information here -- a typical behind-the-scenes supplement.

"Desolation Row" is a music video by My Chemical Romance.

The BD-Live feature has the same functionalities that the previous release has. You can record your own commentaries and store them online, and you can set up screenings.

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Video/Audio

Just like the Director's Cut release, this Blu-ray looks awesome. The distinct color palette of the movie is as strong as ever. There are lot of both bright and dark scenes, and they are equally clear, with no artifacting. The brilliance of Dr. Manhattan is nearly as awe-inspiring as it would be if he was sitting next to you, and at the same time you can easily make out the creases on his face. The sepia-toned scenes look just as wonderful as the rest. This is definitely a disc you can use to show off your setup to friends.

The audio lives up to the picture. Rorschach's fight against the police is a demo-worthy scene. The sound of fire envelopes the room during his makeshift flamethrower attack, and bullets splinter wood all over the place as they fire at him. There are, however, times when the dynamic range can reach unsettling levels, such as at the opening kick to the Comedian's door and the baseball bat hitting the newspaper vending machine at 00:50:51. For the most part, though, the levels are fine.

The Motion Comic (which is presented in HD) looks surprisingly good and sounds fine, too. The bold, solid colors have a simple and unique beauty to them. The sound is nothing amazing, due more to the nature of the work than the disc's quality, but everything is clear (making the voice acting's shortcomings that much more obvious).

Packaging/Menus

This set is packaged in a sturdy cardboard box -- none of that flimsy crap you usually get -- with a magnetically sealed fold-over cover and a glossy cover emblem. You open the cover piece notebook-style, and the side reveals two disc cases: one for Watchmen, its extras, and the digital copy (three discs); and another for Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic (one disc). Inside the fold-out sections of both the outer case and the first inner case are iridescent images of characters from the film. The Motion Comic comes in a standard Blu-ray case. Overall, this is really a high-quality package. Our only complaint is that it seems particularly prone to wear, as ours arrived with the corners already showing some white. Another copy (our DVD copy, which has the same packaging) had the same problem but to a significantly lesser degree, so it seems to be a minor issue, and it's likely only to bother perfectionists.

Same old story on the menus. Select scenes and commentaries on the fly.

Conclusion

We've been big fans of Watchmen since it's release, and the Director's Cut made it even better. This Ultimate Cut tries to add even more, but most of what it adds is problematic. The film itself is marred by the Black Freighter scenes, which don't work nearly as well as they do in the comic, and the new commentaries are not nearly as engaging as the Maximum Movie Mode on the Director's Cut. With a motion comic that isn't worth watching and fidelity equal to that of the Director's Cut, you're much better off saving your money and sticking to that previous version.