Before I read Watchmen, I was rather reluctant to read comics from that era. I had some hard feelings towards them for turning superheroes into mindless dickwards, but sometime later I thought "You know what? I'll give this a try."
And do I regret this decision? No! So let's see why I loved Watchmen so much.
Now reviewing this comic 36 years after the first issue was published, as a 15-year old who was born 20 years after it finished, and being raised with more silver-age heroes, You know I'll find it rather dated. And as much as I love it, I have to agree-with it's 80's bred cynicism and threat of nuclear war with the Russians, it's a rather dated comic. But I still love Watchmen for its more serious take on the genre. I love how Alan Moore managed to portray the heroes as real people more often than in other Dark Age-era comic books. And although I said it was rather dated, I don't think it was TOO dated-the comic holds up a lot better than other late 80's-early-to-mid-90 comics, purely because it knew when to have them be bastards. They aren't always murderous vigilantes, they're simply normal people trying to survive the worst the world can throw at them.
Out of all the characters, my faves were Nite Owl, Manhattan, and Rosharch.
Rosharch represents my dark side-a knight templar who will go to any extremes to destroy what I consider wrong.
Nite Owl represents my regretful, old-soul side, the side that comes out when Rosharch is under control. Regretful, sometimes sad, and wanting to leave behind what just happened.
Doctor Manhattan represents my normal side-kind-hearted (If I interpreted the guy right), but a confused outsider, and a bit of a superiority complex. He believes himself higher than humans, and he's not wrong (single-handedly winning Vietnam is more than enough proof). But at the same time, he's as low as them, as any complex like that will do.
Are there flaws to the comic? Yes, and here are a few.
While I understood the satire, The Cold War tensions were kinda flat. Because I believe that nuclear war is so bad that it'll never happen, It was kinda hard to understand it. But I did get the whole "extinction of humanity" threat.
I also wish that the heroes actually had powers. That would've been rather cool.
But what do I score Watchmen with? 8/10. It's not perfect, like it's characters, but it's defintly worth of a read. I highly recommend it.