What was excellent, kind of a big one:
* A lot of people including me had never really heard of the Tulsa Race Massacre in 1921, when the most thriving black community in America was attacked by a mob, backed by police, with a lot of weapons, and private planes dropping firebombs, and acres of shops and houses were destroyed and a hundred or more people living there killed, but Watchmen brought it to a lot of people's attention.
What else was excellent:
* It projected the sensibilities of the original Watchmen into an alternate present shaped by those events, the international tension, the continuing rains of squid, the effects of Dr Manhattan
* But it didn't retell those concerns, it reflected problems currently in society's awareness like racial violence, employment, etc
* The music and visuals were AMAZING at evoking the feelings, both of gritty reality and magical alternate reality
* It showed what happened to many of the original characters without making them all about what we'd last seen of them. It was amazing to see Laurie move forward with her life without Watchmen. Rorsach's memory had been coopted by white supremacists. Ozymandias changed everything but maybe thought he was more unique in that than he was.
* All the new characters were memorable, Sister Night, Looking Glass, Red Scare, Pirate Jenny, Panda-head guy, tough police chief, rising politician, and reminiscent of the original setting without just repeating a new generation of costumed heroes
* It replicated the balancing act of making the plot about the the interesting characters, but the world-changing effects all due to a small number of things we already know about, rather than inventing a lot more characters with Manhatten-like powers
* When we do find out anything about Dr Manhatten it replicated the balancing act of making him seen human and sympathetic and alien all at the same time
What was questionable, kind of a big one:
* If you're going to make a series about how bad racism in America is, get more people who aren't white to help run it, aim for an audience that isn't mostly white, have more characters who aren't white, and have a lot fewer sympathetic corrupt police characters.
* A lot of people including me had never really heard of the Tulsa Race Massacre in 1921, when the most thriving black community in America was attacked by a mob, backed by police, with a lot of weapons, and private planes dropping firebombs, and acres of shops and houses were destroyed and a hundred or more people living there killed, but Watchmen brought it to a lot of people's attention.
What else was excellent:
* It projected the sensibilities of the original Watchmen into an alternate present shaped by those events, the international tension, the continuing rains of squid, the effects of Dr Manhattan
* But it didn't retell those concerns, it reflected problems currently in society's awareness like racial violence, employment, etc
* The music and visuals were AMAZING at evoking the feelings, both of gritty reality and magical alternate reality
* It showed what happened to many of the original characters without making them all about what we'd last seen of them. It was amazing to see Laurie move forward with her life without Watchmen. Rorsach's memory had been coopted by white supremacists. Ozymandias changed everything but maybe thought he was more unique in that than he was.
* All the new characters were memorable, Sister Night, Looking Glass, Red Scare, Pirate Jenny, Panda-head guy, tough police chief, rising politician, and reminiscent of the original setting without just repeating a new generation of costumed heroes
* It replicated the balancing act of making the plot about the the interesting characters, but the world-changing effects all due to a small number of things we already know about, rather than inventing a lot more characters with Manhatten-like powers
* When we do find out anything about Dr Manhatten it replicated the balancing act of making him seen human and sympathetic and alien all at the same time
What was questionable, kind of a big one:
* If you're going to make a series about how bad racism in America is, get more people who aren't white to help run it, aim for an audience that isn't mostly white, have more characters who aren't white, and have a lot fewer sympathetic corrupt police characters.