WiC Watches: Watchmen

Watchmen 109. Lady Trieu 2. Mark Hill/HBO

Episode 109: “See How They Fly”

The Watchmen finale was basically an origin story for Lady Trieu, who, as it turns out, is the big bad of the entire season. The Seventh Kavalry and Cyclops, the Tulsa police department, the FBI, Adrian Veidt and even Doctor Manhattan were manipulated by Trieu so they would be right where they needed to be as her master plan unfolded. Lady Trieu wanted to be a god. Her plan was to use the Seventh Kalvalry to capture him, and then kill him and take his power.

in a flashback, we learn that Trieu’s mother stole a vile of Veidt’s sperm and injected it into herself in order to have his baby. Years later, Trieu arrives at Karnak — Veidt’s home in the Antarctic — and confronts her father. His pride bruised when he learns who she is, he refuses to acknowledge her and says he will never call her daughter.

Then, we’re shown Veidt in his prison on Europa as a ship lands. He escapes his prison through a tunnel he dug with the horseshoe a Mr. Philips (or a Mrs. Crookshanks) baked into his cake. As he approaches the ship — fully costumed as Ozymandias — the Game Warden rides up and warns him he will fire his gun if Veidt keeps walking.

Watchmen 109. Adrian Veidt. Mark Hill/HBO

The Game Warden fires, but Veidt catches the bullet as he did in the original Watchmen comic, and stabs the Game Warden with his sharpened horseshoe. As he bleeds out, Veidt cradles him. The Game Warden asks why he was made to wear the mask. “Because is makes men cruel,” Veidt says. Apparently, Adrian Veidt created the entire scenario with the Game Warden so he would have something to occupy his mind so he wouldn’t go insane while imprisoned on Europa. The trial, his imprisonment, all the clones of Mr. Philips and Ms. Crookshanks pelting him with tomatoes…they were all scenarios Veidt allowed to play out so he could have an opponent that he had to defeat. At the end, all the clones line up on either side of the ship, like they were playing a part in another play that Veidt wrote.

Anyway, we also learn that Adrian Veidt has been on Earth the entire season…as a golden statue in Lady Trieu’s garden. That whole deal just oozed Star Wars.

Okay, so, Angela makes her way to the Seventh Kavalry’s secret lair just in time to watch her husband — Doctor Cal-hattan — die. Of course, we had to sit through Senator Keene’s evil bad guy speech first, and then we got to enjoy Lady Trieu opening the door of the chamber he hoped would deliver Manhattan’s power to him only to see he had been completely vaporized into a mass of blood and goo. It was satisfying.

Cal-hattan used that goo to teleport Veidt, Blake and Looking Glass to Karnak in hopes that Veidt would figure out a way to stop Trieu. He does. He freezes the tiny squids and makes them rain down on Tulsa, killing anyone who wasn’t indoors and protected. Lady Trieu’s machine is destroyed by the squids and it crashes down on her, killing her. Ozymandias once again used squids to save the world.

Veidt then shows Blake and Looking Glass Nite Owl’s ship, Archie, which was NOT the ship Chief Judd used to destroy the Seventh Kavalry soldiers in the first episode. (Although it also kind of was, because apparently the police modeled their airships after it.) Before they leave, Blake and Glass arrest Veidt. He’s going to be brought to justice…for now.

Now let’s talk about the egg. “You can’t make an omelet without breaking a couple of eggs,” Angela’s grandfather tells her. He said Cal-hattan told him Angela would know what that meant when the time came.

Watchmen 109, Angela Abar. Mark Hill/HBO.

Once she and her children and grandfather are home, Angela begins cleaning the cracked eggs mess she created when Cal-hattan was making waffles in Episode 8. She finds one egg that was not smashed, and remembers a conversation where he told her he could put his essence in something like an egg, and his powers could be transferred to whoever ate it. Then, in theory, that person could walk on water.

Angela then goes into the back yard, eats the egg, and steps into the pool. And that’s it. Cut to black.

I very much enjoyed the finale of Watchmen. We don’t know if Lindelof and HBO are going forward with a second season, and honestly, I’m not sure we need season 2. This entire season was built and delivered to be a one-off series. Sure, I want another season, but if it doesn’t happen, I’d be fine with how it ended.

Watchmen 109. Agent Blake. Mark Hill/HBO

Now, we wait to hear if there will be further seasons of Watchmen, and let’s just sit back and watch as the show wins every award ever.

Episode Grade: B

Series Grade: A+

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