 What's up guys and welcome to one take I'm gil and today I'm talking about watchmen episode 6 This will be a full recap and review so it's gonna be full of spoilers with that Let's jump right into it the episode begins with hooded justice being interrogated by a couple of police officers and With the over stylized violence. We immediately know that what we're seeing here is is American hero story and the fact that we knew going in Based off of where the last episode left off that in this episode we'd be getting a deep dive into Will Reeves history So the fact that the episode started on hooded justice Immediately I knew they're telling us we're going to find out this episode will Reeves is in fact the hooded justice and all the fan theory was and all the fan theories were correct from there We see Laurie and Angela talking to each other in prison We get a little bit of exposition where Laurie says you know what nostalgia is and she basically explains that these nostalgia pills How they're made you put a chip in someone's brain absorb their memories and stick them into pills she warns Angela What happens when you take some of those pills you can have psychotic breaks you forget who you are and We strap in for a deep dive into Will's history as Angela experiences all of his memories One of the things I've praised watchmen for several times is how good a job They've done of delivering exposition in a very organic and subtle way the way they've done so much world building and Clever and like I said organic ways. This was one of the few instances where it really felt like Exposition the worst kind of exposition is when a character tells another character something they already know For the purpose of informing the audience of something and this was an example of that Angela already knows what nostalgia is in fact We as an audience already know what it is, but we get this line from Laurie that says you know what nostalgia is So a little bit of a knock against the episode there But this opening scene was pretty much just set up for the main event We quickly go into flashback mode We see Will in various stages of his superhero career and throughout the flashbacks Occasionally we'll see Angela take his place to sort of remind us that she is Experiencing these memories firsthand overall. I loved this episode Will's story was an extremely compelling one He's a super interesting character and where this show has been subverting the expectations of the superhero genre This felt like an episode. We actually got to experience real super heroics The parts where Angela takes Will's place didn't work that well for me But we will get into that so the first part of the flashback is Will graduating from the police academy a Fellow African-American police officer gets close to him and says beware of the Cyclops Next we see Will on patrol While out in the world he witnesses a character named Fred who will very quickly learn to hate this Fred character Throws a Molotov cocktail into a Jewish deli lighting it on fire Will tries to bring Fred into the police station He's told by some other police officers that they'll take care of it But not before one of them makes a Cyclops symbol on their forehead the next day We see Will at a newsstand the guy behind the newsstand is reading an action comics Featuring the character of Superman which was interesting to see because we know that in the Watchmen universe People don't read superhero comics. Why would you read superhero comics when you have real superheroes out there in the real World, but this shows us that before Superheroes were a real thing they still existed in comic books And it was sort of a poignant moment where the person behind the newsstand explains to Will the story behind Super Superman He was a child who was Sent away on a spaceship while his parents were left in a burning world We quickly get a flashback to Will as a child We remember what he went through in the Tulsa massacre in the first episode And I thought this was a way of the show saying look we're here to subvert the superhero genre But we do recognize that the superhero stories do have power and they do have relevance Just like we see here where Will connects with the Superman character I also found this scene interesting because like I said in the Watchmen world characters don't read superhero comics But here we see that they are reading a Superman comic So this felt like we were just on the precipice of Watchmen diverting from our world into this alternate history Watchmen takes place in an alternate reality But this feels like this episode takes place in our world just before splitting off into a new world When Will puts on the mask and just like that Superheroes leave the comic book page and enter the real world While at the newsstand Will sees Fred and it turns out that the other police in the headquarters are In the KKK and they're covering for Fred They let him go Will goes back to the police station makes some noise about this which doesn't go over well a few of the other cops pull Will aside in the back alley and Beat him up to teach him a lesson Just before the police attack him Jovan a depot does a great job. That's the character That's the actor who plays Will as a young man throughout the episode He did a really solid job in this scene right before getting beat up We get a close-up of his face and you can see the recognition on his face You can see he knows what's about to happen and he feels Helpless also the cinematography throughout this sequence was done it really well The cinematography throughout this episode was done great. There are a lot of long Slow shots even in the action one of the criticisms I've had of this show so far is that especially in close hand-to-hand Combat there are a lot of quick cuts not in this episode the cinematography was handed handled great throughout even in the action sequences After Will is beat up He is taken to a tree where they go to hang him and in that scene that we get a Camera shot from his POV a mask is pulled over the camera And we experience it from his point of view and hearing his Breathing hearing his breathing slowed down hearing the crunching sound of his throat being crushed by the rope All of that served to make you and me watching this feel claustrophobic you feel Will's anger that his wife told us about earlier in the episode and overall This scene just worked great After the hanging will is walking home dejected with the noose still around his neck when he hears a woman scream He sees a couple being beat up by some jerks and he walks over and Beats those guys up freeze the couple from harm's way this scene was so Incredibly cathartic in the previous scene we see will Helpless we feel his anger and not only that but throughout this whole season We've been like I said earlier subverting the superhero genre there hasn't been a clear villain Even when things are going wrong You don't know who to be mad at in this scene You've got a very clear scenario these are the bad guys and Will full of anger beats him up This is also the birth of superheroes in the watchman world because just before will attacks He takes the hood that he has in his hand rips a couple of eye holes into him puts it on his head and Thus becomes hooded justice and all the fan theories are proven correct Will goes home and his wife June actually helps him to solidify his role as a superhero She makes one change to his costume and that's putting white makeup on so when he wears the mask to the extent that people Can see skin around his eyes it'll appear white and people will not know the truth that he is an African-American man Will's first target as the hooded justice is that Fred character He follows Fred to a market which he owns He sees a few people go in just before making that Cyclops symbol on their forehead and Will doesn't waste any time he goes in and in another incredible action sequence beats up Everybody and inside he finds a book called mesmerism for the masses the first hint We get in this episode at the nefarious mind control plot that's going on behind the scenes in this action sequence at a certain point Will jumps through a window we get a freeze frame and then a very cool sort of bullet time effect where the camera Zooms around revealing that this is one of the instances in the flashback sequence where Angela has taken the Place of will reminding us that she is experiencing all of this First hand when we get the close-up of her face. We also see Lori show up in the flashback We learned that in the real world. She's administered Adrenaline it trying to wake Angela up and free her from this sort of coma She's in right now cow also shows up the two of them try to wake her up like I said earlier the Points in the flashback where Angela takes will's place didn't work too well for me because it's it felt like they the only Purpose they served was to remind us that Angela was living all of this out and experiencing it firsthand as a viewer I didn't really feel like I needed that reminder and all it did was sort of take me out of it I was super engrossed by will's story. I thought it worked really well and anytime Angela showed up It was kind of like well, you know, what's going on here the one exception to that is in this scene Because we see Angela struggle even though you only see her eyes You see her start to tear up and that worked for me Emotionally a lot better than the rest of the instances did when Angela showed up in these flashbacks From there we see Nelson Gardner aka captain metropolis show up at will's house And he basically serves a nick fury role here and forming will that he is forming something called the new minute men He doesn't say it in so many words. He claims that he's there on Captain metropolis's behalf, but it's pretty obvious after only a moment that he himself is captain metropolis from there we see that will and captain metropolis start a Affair together and while they're in bed together Captain metropolis tells will the hooded justice that if he's going to join the minute men He's going to have to keep his secret the fact that he is an African-American Man and that was some very clever retconning there. It's been part of the watchmen mythology that the first masked adventurer ever hooded justice his identity was never known and now we get a very clever reason for that It's because he could not show his true race He couldn't show who he was behind the mask or else he wouldn't have been accepted from there We find out that will's wife June is pregnant and I found it interesting in that moment I remembered that we haven't heard much about Angela's father He doesn't seem to have been an important role in all of this So I had a feeling that later in the episode one way or another Will's son it was going to leave and really not be part of the picture anymore and later on we do see that June Leaves will and takes their son with her From there we see will at a press conference with the minute men with Captain metropolis where will tries to seriously discuss the vast and insidious conspiracy that he's looking into and by the way that term vast and insidious Conspiracy is the same terminology that will used when he was talking to Angela Episodes earlier in reference to what was going on in Tulsa But before will can get very far and talking to the press Captain metropolis quickly jumps in and kind of takes the tone down makes it less serious makes it more of a joke and Then quickly turns it into sort of an infomercial You can see that will is pretty dejected and disappointed by this so he walks away One interesting note in this scene is that although will and captain metropolis are in focus The rest of the minute men are kind of blurry and that's kind of took me out of the scene a little bit because It sort of felt like Damon Lindelof is afraid to step on the toes of the original graphic novel too much They're showing us hooded justice. They're showing us captain metropolis But they don't want to give us a clear image of the rest of the minute men and you could argue That's because they didn't really matter. We're focusing on what's important and that's hooded justice and captain metropolis But we didn't really see that happen in any other instance in these flashbacks So it kind of took me out of it a little bit because it really felt like this sort of meta You know the minute men are very important figures in the graphic novel We don't want to step on the toes of that Super important work. It almost feels like they were holding it in too much reverence So took me out of a little bit, but overall pretty solid scene from there We see will going to a theater where there's been some kind of an incident a group of African Americans Who were in the theater suddenly turned violent and turned on each other? Will tries calling captain metropolis for help saying he's found evidence that some This people that are involved in this Cyclops conspiracy are using Film projectors to somehow mind control African Americans to turn them violent against each other But captain metropolis doesn't want to get involved basically saying this isn't the sort of thing that the minute men can work on So will gets frustrated hangs up the phone in angry fashion when suddenly who's there? Fred and the moment you see Fred you just want to see him get punched in the face and seconds later Will does us one better by shooting him in the face He kills Fred and then he walks into the warehouse that he know Belongs to Fred where he suspects that is the hideout where all these Cyclops people are hanging out And he goes into that warehouse and in another great action sequence kills everyone inside shoots everybody then goes to another room and Sees a man sitting there recording the subliminal messages that are being used in this mind control project He's out of bullets, so he uses the cord from the guy's headphone to Strangle him so I loved a very large portion of this episode It kind of made me realize because the story in this episode although it very clearly Tied into the overarching plot It felt like you could take this episode cut it out and make it its own solo story, and it would work great I've wondered throughout this season. Are we going to get a season 2 of Watchmen? Damon Lindelof has been pretty hesitant about that. He says he has One self-contained story to tell and we're seeing it But this episode made me thirst for Watchmen to turn into sort of an anthology series Because this episode shows us how well these solo stories can work Like I said, I loved a very large portion of this episode But I will say that as we got deeper and deeper into this mind control plot It did start to get a sort of shaky ground for me Watchmen thus far has definitely shown and hinted at some pretty crazy sci-fi stuff But when I watch Watchmen typically I accept that I'm watching an alternate history So those things don't really hit me in a weird way. I accept them But from the start of this episode like I said earlier I felt like I was watching our world just before it splintered into this alternate history So because I was watching it through that filter. It was sort of jarring for us to just accept Hey, these white supremacists all came up with mind control technology And Will isn't really that shocked by it. He just kind of accepts it So that was a little jarring even though like I said, I did love most of this episode from there We get back to present day and we see exactly what happened to Judd Will stops Judd on the road at using those spikes to take his tires out and Then a very difficult to watch scene. We see that will has repurposed the mind control technology He's taken it out of the giant film projectors and now has it in something That's really just the size of a flashlight He uses the mind control to get Judd to hang himself And like I said, the scene is really difficult to watch because although We know that Judd is not exactly a clean character And although we've heard that he's done some pretty awful things or at least we've gotten hints of it We came to like the character in the first few episodes He had a good relationship with Angela and the moment before he hangs himself He gives Will a look and because he's under the mind control He can't really say or do anything but the look says enough and it was just heartbreaking So like I said, it's kind of unclear how evil Judd exactly is We know that he had a KKK robe in his closet. He claims that it belonged to his grandfather So it doesn't belong to him But he does refer to it as his legacy and he maybe does sound a little bit too proud of that legacy He also claims that he's trying to help you people which he says to Will and our understanding is that Judd has sort of taken control of this KKK sect in Tulsa in Oklahoma and Supposedly he's doing that for good reasons. He's trying to keep them under control. He's trying to keep the peace But it is heavily implied that he's done bad things and he's crossed some lines But maybe his heart is somewhere in the vicinity of the right place I have a feeling that by the end of this season We're not going to have a clear picture where we can say that Judd or anybody else is clearly evil or clearly good And I think that's part of the point of this show But anyway, like I said, that was a tough scene to watch Then we're back in the present Angela wakes up in the same room as lady true I suspect that Laurie reached out to lady true knowing that she's probably the only person who can save Angela's life After her nostalgia overdose. I also expect that next episode We're gonna start to get some answers Because we know that will didn't want to tell Angela what's really going on until she knows enough to accept it And in this episode she got the memory downloaded from will now Angela is with lady true Presumably that means will is there as well and hopefully that means next episode We're gonna start to see what's really going on Maybe we'll find out what the Millennium clock is all about we'll find out what lady true and will are up to So I've said it a few times overall I really liked this episode will story was super compelling and something that could have worked as its own story This is close to being my favorite episode of the season But I think last episode where we get the deep dive into looking glasses story still tops it a little bit But I'm gonna have to think about it Part of me is torn on this episode though because I hate when you're watching a great series and as it starts to Really compelling as some of the mysteries are starting to get revealed you halt the brakes and get a flashback and although yes This flashback does reveal some of the mystery for the most part It felt like it could have functioned as its own story So almost because the Ozamandes stuff is so compelling because the lady true stuff is so compelling It was hard to walk away from that stuff and kind of take this deep dive into will's Story anyway that sort of thing is always a tough needle to thread It's something that Damon Lindelof it's something that he seems to have been Dealing with his whole career going all the way back to lost lost did this all the time where just as they were starting to Answer some questions it would they would take this break and say hold on first Let's do a couple of flashback episodes and then we'll get to this stuff You really care about now I think Lindelof has come a long way this show handles all that stuff way better But it's just hard not to draw those comparisons but anyway that stuff didn't bother me too much overall really enjoyed this episode and Psyched we've only got three episodes left in the season and Damon Lindelof has told us over and over again That this season will be a complete story So I don't think we're gonna end on a cliffhanger and I don't think we're gonna have too many loose Threads at the end of the next three episodes. So can't wait to see where this all goes But enough for me. What did you think of this episode? Did you love this episode as much as I did it? Were you surprised by the will is hooded justice reveal? And were you at all frustrated with the fact that we kind of put the main story on pause for these flashbacks? Let me know in the comments and let's get the discussion going and if you enjoyed this video Make sure to hit the like button Subscribe to this channel and hit the little bell icon to make sure you get notifications Whenever we do more videos like this one and you're especially gonna want to do that because we're doing a lot of live stream these days After every episode of Watchmen I try to go live and if you get notified you can join the live stream and get involved in the conversation Also, see the link in the show notes for the new one take podcast where you can hear more voices besides mine We're doing weekly discussions on the Mandalorian and general deep dives into the most interesting Movie film or even video game news of the week. Anyway, thanks for watching