The second best thing were the opening credits, which were iconic and steeped in pop culture and so beautifully staged with lush coloring. I loved the opening credits and could watch them over and over again.

The rest of the movie was just as visually stunning, and so I was able to hang with it for the full length without getting bored. It was really a mixed bag for me, though. I appreciated the sociopolitical atmosphere it was going for and how the movie was trying to convey a message about the complexity of human nature and of super heroes as well, but my problem with the way it was executed was that, for complexity to ring true, it not only has to show dark sides of a character, but it also has to show what parts of that character are good. You don't respond to fakely positive and upbeat storytelling with unrelentingly bleak portrayals of despair - both ways of looking at the world are equally simplistic and reductive. The only character that even came close to showing that level of development was Rorscach, a violent sociopath. (My friend and I said he was like Dexter, but not as sexy or likeable. He's the desire for justice unleashed from the restraint of morality.)

I felt almost no human connection to any of the characters, which was understandable in the case of Dr. Manhattan, who was so post human as to actually be God like. (The husband had an interesting take on the evolution of Dr. Manhattan's involvement with the violence on screen and how it parallels with human concepts of God.)

I particularly did not care for Laurie. Yes, she kicked ass, but that was about it. (And WHY OH WHY must we insist on dressing every female superhero like a Vivid girl?) Just once I would like to see a super hero movie that does not reduce the female characters to supporting roles or plot devices or an excuse to parade boobs and ass around in tight spandex. Please, movie gods, do you hear my plaintive wails? NO MORE WEAK FEMALE CHARACTERS. PLEASE.

Finally, the sex scene. It reminded me of "Showgirls" in how it was completely explicit and porn-y, yet totally unerotic. It takes a special talent to have two attractive naked people rubbing together like that and not have me feel even the slightest bit aroused.

In all, though, I'm glad I saw that and not, I don't know, He's Just Not that Into You. As flawed as the movie was, it still gave me a hell of a lot to think about.

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That's funny - though I haven't seen 300, Watchmen (the graphic novel) read like it was meant to be a movie. Again, I think this is a rare case where the movie was better than the source material. At the same tie, the movie was just that great because it was so faithful - there was a lot of excellent casting choices and ridiculous, fangirl-appeasing attention to detail.

No corpse rafts, though. Boooo.

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