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SYFY WIRE San Diego Comic-Con 2019

The Cult of Rorschach goes to war with the police in Watchmen's Comic-Con trailer

By Andy Hunsaker
Watchmen

Here we go — HBO has just dropped the official Comic-Con trailer for its upcoming series Watchmen, which looks to pick up after the genre-defining Alan Moore/Dave Gibbons DC maxi-series from 1986.

The previous teaser gave us reason to fear the militant right-wing legacy of Rorschach, but this new full trailer gives us a whole lot more, indicating a world where superheroes were thought to be gone but secret identities are very much in play with a full-out war between vigilantes and cops.

We get a good glimpse at Jeremy Irons as an older Adrien Veidt, Jean Smart as FBI Agent Laurie Blake, Tim Blake Nelson as Looking Glass, Don Johnson driving what looks to be Nite Owl's ship Archie, and a tease about the return of Dr. Manhattan. Even the World War II-era vigilante Hooded Justice makes an appearance.

Watchmen | Official Comic-Con Trailer | HBO

There's still no certain yea or nay on whether the Giant Squid happened -- a main difference between the source material and Zack Snyder's 2009 adaptation, but you can catch a glimpse of an artist's rendering of the squid in a quick shot around 2:24 into the video, and at 2:36 it's raining little squids on the windshield. Make of that what you will.

There is plenty to dig into here. Followers of Rorschach's example have formed their own cult militia, and after they went all out with coordinated attacks on police officers in their homes, the cops now wear masks to hide their identities, and Laurie Blake, likely the former Silk Spectre who seems to have surprisingly taken the surname of her rapist father Eddie Blake (aka the Comedian), has the astute observation that there's no discernible difference between a masked cop and the vigilantes they fight.

"Nothing ever ends," Veidt tells us. "It's only just begun."

Watchmen premieres on HBO this October.

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