In case I understated it in the title, this post will contain pretty much the biggest spoiler in the Watchmen film and, by extension, the comic on which it was based. Read on at your own risk.
Just to avert any accusations at the starting block, I'm not one of these people who demands absolute fealty to a film's source material. In fact, I generally find the better adaptations tend to conform to film rules first.
My problem is that the rest of film was so faithful to the comic, to change this one little thing seemed arbitrary, but made a big difference to final message of the film.
If you haven't worked it out, yet, I'm talking the substitution of Dr Manhattan's wrath for the "alien invasion" ploy. Both were concocted by Adrian Veidt as a way to trick humanity and avert a cataclysmic nuclear war.
In Alan Moore's original comic, Veidt used the research he was doing with Jon Osterman to make it appear the Earth was the subject of an alien invasion. In Zack Snyder's film, Veidt used the same research to make it appear as though Dr Manhattan had punished Earth for its stupidity.
End result is the same, then. The end justifies the means. What's the big deal?
My problem is that in the original incarnation, humanity recognised their own differences were insignificant in the face of the destruction of Earth. In the adaptation, it is an enforced peace in fear of an angry destroyer.
The former is a positive, progressive and genuine co-operation. The latter is a negative, regressive and false avoidance of conflict - it done for the wrong reason. Rather than elevating humanity to a more mature way of thinking, humanity was repressed into childish obedience.
But a giant space squid would look ridiculous!
Maybe. But, I'm not fussed about whether it looks like a squid. It could look like the alien from Cloverfield, or just appear as a kind of superweapon detonated on Earth with no aliens visible. The point is humanity puts its differences aside in favour of the survival of the species.
I just felt is was regressive Old Testament message that was worth criticising. That is all.
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