Rorschach #9

[cyberghostface]

Comments

[lizard_of_aus]

...Alright, I'll admit it, I'm lost. Anyone able to summarise this whole meandering plot?

[filthysize]

It's the 2020 election and a right-wing Governor who idolizes The Comedian is running and has a real chance to win against President Redford. At the convention, Rorschach and his new sidekick somehow passed all security and attempted to assassinate the Gov, but was stopped and killed at the last minute. The FBI closed the case, believing it's a couple of mentally ill people playing dress up. The Gov is convinced that it was Redford who tried to kill him and there was a cover-up, so his campaign hired this detective to find out what really happened.

His investigation reveals that:
- New Rorschach was a reclusive comic book artist who is Not Steve Ditko and decades ago did a tape recorder seance with Otto Binder and Frank Miller trying to record ghostly messages from outer space. He'd been listening to this tape over and over for years, trying to make out what it's saying.
- The Kid was a girl from Wyoming who was raised in a militia that believes the squids are still on Earth controlling people's minds. She had a thing for befriending older men and convincing them they're the reincarnation or Rorschach.
- After the first guy she convinced to dress up as Rorschach and kill people got caught and arrested, she started writing to Not Steve Ditko. They became penpals, then very close, and finally met up.
- Together, they concluded that the outer space tape is a message from Dr. Manhattan trying to tell them how to stop the squids.
- They visited Frank Miller and convinced him to do another seance with them, since Binder is dead. The three of them believed that they heard Manhattan telling them to kill the Governor.
- While preparing for the assassination, they'd also recruited many others (Frank Miller included) who believe in the squid conspiracy.
- Not Steve Ditko contacted Robert Redford's campaign, and received help getting into the convention from them, which is how they almost pulled off the assassination.

[lizard_of_aus]

Thanks!

[donnblake]

Oddly enough, while Not Steve Ditko is Not Steve Ditko (and therefore Not the Creator of Not Rorschach), Frank Miller is Frank Miller, not Not Frank Miller, though in this universe his major work was on Not Pirate Batman.

[wizardru]

Assuming this is in the regular continuity of the Watchmen, this means Redford has been president for how long? What year is this supposed to take place in? I'm guessing by a lot of the tech, in the past, but how far? The Watchmen's world had electric cars by the mid-80s, so I'm curious when this takes place.

[filthysize]

It's 2020. As mentioned, the story surrounds the 2020 election.

The retro tech was explained in the HBO show, which also didn't have cell phones and the internet because all tech were powered by synthetic batteries made by Dr. Manhattan, and everyone got paranoid about Manhattan tech after he was publicly accused of giving Janey Slater cancer.

Tom King said he wrote this comic in a way that aligns with the HBO show since he's a fan, and there are references to it throughout indicating that it takes place after the events of the show, but there's contradiction between them in how long Redford's been President. Here it specifically says he's running for his fifth term, but he was in his seventh term in 2019 in the show.

[tinygaylaura]

I feel like this might read better in trade