The real "Ordinary schlub" in the story is Nite Owl. He's the one who represents the REAL everyman, the guy who became a hero basically because it would be an adventure and he would do some good; and who now finds himself middle-aged and frustrated with his life, but keeps trying to figure out how to do the right thing.

That's a normal human being.  Rorschach represents an animal monstrosity. And obviously Ozymandias and Manhattan are not everyday schlubs either.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;293778The real "Ordinary schlub" in the story is Nite Owl. He's the one who represents the REAL everyman, the guy who became a hero basically because it would be an adventure and he would do some good; and who now finds himself middle-aged and frustrated with his life, but keeps trying to figure out how to do the right thing.

That's a normal human being.  Rorschach represents an animal monstrosity. And obviously Ozymandias and Manhattan are not everyday schlubs either.

RPGPundit

To paraphrase: let them eat Cake...



Seriously, Pundit... I don't know any ordinary schlubs who have cool flying car things and low profile night vision goggles (in 1985 no less!!!), not to mention the utter lack of responsibility that comes with inheriting money, as Nite Owl reveals.

If you think Nite Owl is that ordinary you haven't spent enough time 'among the people', you elitist prick.


On a more serious note:  We do have a serious disagreement about the role of our animal natures and civilization.  I, for one, believe it is quite possible (easy even) to be overcivilized.  Leave aside 'decadence' and other ills of civilized peoples, I think once we've cast aside too much of the animal nature, the outrage over barbaric acts even, then we have gone too far. Rorschach may be an over-reaction, leaving aside too much of the civilized, but then again, the 'civilized society' depicted in the Watchmen may actually require that. It certainly seemed quite broken.

Regarding the ordinaryness of Walter Kovacs in comparison to Dan Drieberg:

Like most ordinary people Kovacs was not born wealthy.  His overwhelming obession with crime fighting leaves him jobless, and forced to live hand to mouth.  Like ordinary people. Drieberg, even when he isn't crime fighting, doesn't have a job.

Kovacs is not particularly handsome.  He doesn't get the girl.  Amazingly enough, not everyone is as sexy as I am, and most people can identify with an ordinary looking guy, even if they may fantasize about being the hero.  Dan Drieberg is the 'Hero', the Protagonist, certainly (he's handsome, rich, gets teh girl...), but that is not the same as being ordinary.

Guy, either you're play-acting for the sake of theRPGPundit persona, or you've got a really strange world view.  That someone would see Veidt as less bad than Rorschach is pretty messed up.

They are both psychotic. One is portrayed as possibly acceptably so and the other as unacceptably so. The choice is no choice at all.

"What you say about his company is what you say about society."

Yes, Tom Sawyer enters the thread.

Dude, its becoming clear to me that you've read Watchmen like, what, Once? Twice?

That's like reading Farewell to Arms or Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas or Amber or Thus Spake Zarathustra just once.  

Until you've read Watchmen at least three or four times, you won't have a fucking clue what you're talking about, there's too much depth and too many levels in the story for a single or even two reads to grasp it.

In the course of the last 24 years, I've read Watchmen something like 10 times, and EVERY SINGLE TIME,  I find some new detail, some new hint in the story or in the background images or some new angle to understand the characters by.

Quote from: Spike;293777Yes, we know about Ozymandias parents, but we never actually meet them. We only know about them in that he tells us about them... in passing.

We know that Ozymandias' family were rich immigrants, probably escaping the second world war in Europe.  He was born in the states though.  So he was probably both an insider and an outsider, just like he is as a hero; he's not Dr.Manhattan, not totally alien, but he doesn't quite fit in either.  He had to fake his test results down, to avoid calling too much attention to himself.

QuoteDoes Kovacs snap? Indisputably. He even tells us as much.  Does that make him a psychopath? Not so much.

What else would "snapping" make him if not a psychopath? "Ultimate Rorschach?", "Rorschach X-treme"?!  Do you think Moore's point was to say "Rorschach is now so much cooler because he killed those  dogs, and now has extra-special powers, so its AWESOME that he goes around killing pimps and muggers dressed in his own filth, eating beans and sugar cubes like an animal and living in a flophouse!"?

 

QuoteCertainly it doesn't make him the serial killer your analysis makes him out to be.

Let's see: he believes that all of mankind is rotten to the core, he was already essentially psychologically imbalanced from CHILDHOOD onwards, brutally attacking other children (leaving one partially blinded from a lighted cigarette); his whore mother was murdered brutally and his only response was "good"; he had a pathological distaste for "handling female clothing" (even the dress from which his mask is made, his comment: "When I had cut it enough, it didn't look like a woman anymore"). And all that shit was BEFORE he had the incident with the dogs.

He himself has clearly demonstrated a dissociative personality; he says that before the incident he was "just kovacs pretending to be Rorschach"; and that he was "very soft" because he let the "scum" live.

And he says, explicitly: "we do not do this thing (vigilantism) because it is permitted, we do it because we have to.  We do it because we are compelled."

QuoteCertainly he doesn't match the traditional profile of a serial killer or even a spree killer.  

No? He admits he is COMPELLED to be Rorschach, and that Rorschach does not let scum live.

He says "it was Kovacs who said 'mother' then, muffled under latex, it was Kovacs who closed his eyes. It was Rorschach who opened them again." and "existence is random, has no pattern save what we imagine after staring at it too long. No meaning save what we choose to impose"  and "streets stank of fire, the void breathed hard on my heart, turning its illusions to ice, shattering them.  Was reborn then, free to scrawl own design on this morally blank world. Was Rorschach".

That is the thinking of a serial killer. He has made his pattern, now he's following it. He's COMPELLED.

QuoteWe could even say that Kovacs has an excuse for his excesses, a rational.

What?!! His excuse is "I've gone batshit insane and believe that all of humanity deserves to burn".

QuoteOzymandias certainly has a REASON for what he does. Lets ignore the fact that he murders millions, thats abstract. Wasn't it Stalin that told us that once you've killed enough people they become statistics?  That's Ozy's big saving grace... that we can't truly grasp the individual horror of his millions of victims.

Ozymandias does. He tells Manhattan he's "made himself feel every death", and that he has terrible nightmares.

QuoteBut his actions in his Antarctica base, the murder of his staff in very personal, intimate interactions... that very cold, clinical murder, so far removed from the rage that informs Rorschach's actions, is remarkably telling.

Ozymandias is ruthless in what he does, there's no question of that. But he doesn't revel in it, NOR is he emotionless about it. He expresses his deep shame at the "inadequacy" of the way he's rewarding his servants for their years of loyal service. He kills them, again, because its "necessary" to him, to cover all the loose ends.  They were connected to the conspiracy.

QuoteIts been a few years since I read the Graphic Novel (its currently buried in a packing box somewhere), but I recall that unlike in the movie there were a couple of group murders rather than the just one of the movie.  

I'm not sure what you're referring to here; he does blow up all the people who were involved with the creation of the tentacle-thing.

QuoteCombine that with the almost clinically sadistic way he sees off his fellow Watchmen.  Surely a man as talented and smart as he is could have killed the Comedian cleanly and relatively painlessly, but instead he essentially beats him to death.

That's not because of sadism. That's because of the cover up. He doesn't kill him cleanly and painlessly because he needs to make it look like a random act of violence.  Of course, you can also say that in the Comedian's case its payback.  Ozymandias has to ALWAYS be the best, and prove it; and when he first met the Comedian the comedian intentionally attacked Ozymandias in the docklands, and apparently beat the crap out of him.  So this could have been the payback beating, and it could also be on account of how at the "crimebusters meeting" the Comedian had essentially dressed down Ozymandias for suggesting that the world's problems could be solved by intelligence, and Veidt then and there "swore to deny his kind their last black laugh at the Earth's expense".

 

QuoteThen there is the manipulation of Dr. Manhatten, the infliction of cancer upon a former lover...  

Again, necessary.  He HAD to get Manhattan out of the way. He wasn't sadistic, he wasn't like "bwahh hah hah hah hah!! I will give Wally Weaver cancer because I am EVIL!!!", he was just doing what he needed to do to save the world.

QuoteThe trouble is that Ozymandias, for all his Reasoning, has no excuse. Nothing pushed him to desperate measures, he is in full control of his actions, shapes events to his liking. He decides to do what he does with his full faculties, and for all his intelligence and talent, not to mention wealth, he deliberately choses the most horrific paths at every step of the way.  

No, he has no choice as much as anyone else (a recurring theme, Choice, in the novel). He recognized that Manhattan's presence accelerated rather than preventing the end of the world by nuclear war. He knew that being a nice guy would not help, that to save the world he had to "cut the gordian knot".

"Each step had to be taken carefully, constantly striving to keep in mind the enormous scale of what was at stake.  the Earth. Humanity. All we've ever known. 'End of the world' does the concept no justice. "

QuoteLets assume for the moment that I only have a fraction of Ozy's intellect (hard to swallow, I know....).  I can still think of half a dozen ways... within the framework of the narrative presented (that is, without exercising 'authorial control' which lies with Moore) that he could have reduced or avoided completely the individual crimes.

O Rly?!  He could have done that AND assured the maintenance of the conspiracy?

QuoteRorschach kills people because they are doing bad things, and because he sees that as the only way to stop them.

No. Rorschach clearly stated, he kills people because he is imposing his own pattern on a meaningless world. That's it. He may have picked "criminals" as his victims instead of "clowns" or "accountants" or "the dutch" because some vestiges of his shattered mind still want to connect to Kovacs the man, but he is now just defining his own personal inkblot.

QuoteOzymandias kills people to cover his own ass because he can't be bothered to think of a better way.  (Example: The 'assassin' that attacks him in his office...)

No, he kills people because he has to do what's necessary to save the world.

QuoteYou tell me which one is worse.

Rorschach. Ozymandias is killing people to try to save the world. Rorschach is killing people because his mommy was a whore.

RPGPundit

Quote from: Spike;293779Kovacs is not particularly handsome.  He doesn't get the girl.  Amazingly enough, not everyone is as sexy as I am, and most people can identify with an ordinary looking guy, even if they may fantasize about being the hero.  Dan Drieberg is the 'Hero', the Protagonist, certainly (he's handsome, rich, gets teh girl...), but that is not the same as being ordinary.

Dude, did you ever read the comic?! Seriously?  Because in the comic at least, Dreiberg is NOT handsome. He's lumpy and balding.  And Kovacs is not just "not handsome", he's this short ugly as shit snot-nosed ginger-haired pock-marked freak; which is part of the impact Moore creates at the moment you take off the mask, and uber-cool Rorschach (who up to that moment most readers are really impressed with) is revealed as a butt-ugly foaming-at-the-mouth snot nosed crying little loser.  It was Moore's way of saying "you know, guys who would think and act like this, they're NOT cool, they're not heroic, they're just disturbed".

Kovacs doesn't just "not get the girl", he believes all women to be whores and can't stand to be close to them or touch them. He's not an ordinary man, he's a lawncrapping freak.

Dreiberg was born rich in order to explain how he has all the toys. The place he lives, his attitudes and accoutrements (aside from the uber-tech) are totally and utterly middle-class. He's a nerdy kind of middle-aged middle-class dude who is deeply worried that he's a failure.

Its Ozymandias who is handsome, regal, rich, etc. in the comic. He's the one who lives high above the ordinary crowd.  His high aloofness, and Rorschach's wallowing in filth, are both meant to contrast with Dreiberg's ordinariness.

RPGPundit

Quote from: Spike;293777Rorschach kills people because they are doing bad things, and because he sees that as the only way to stop them.

Ozymandias kills people to cover his own ass because he can't be bothered to think of a better way.  (Example: The 'assassin' that attacks him in his office...)

You tell me which one is worse.

This is the key point to me. Rorshach kills, what, 3-5 people. He makes, according to his own reasoning, several passes on what could have easily been "justified" killings. The devil is in the details so lets look at Veidt's track record.

Out the gate he claims to be a peaceful man but...
He arranges his own assassination which gets his innocent assistant killed. He then overpowers the assassin, who he knows he can since he haired him, and force feeds him poison. Now, surely, not an "innocent" but he obviously has no problem with killing.

Next, he kills his staff. These are men who have been in on it since the beginning. Sure, they may not have the full picture but on the outside chance they may figure it out or tell what they know, he kills them, coldly with poison as he prattles on about his noble purpose.

Then we have several at the delivery company. He kills these men becasue again, they may lead back to him.

Then, of course, we have the millions in New York.

The capper for me though, is that Veidt does not have the stones to pull the trigger on Rorshach at the end. He needs his fellow watchmen to approve, to see that the murder of Rorshach is necessary. The biggest problem I have with the whole book is that Jon does not then kill Veidt to ensure he Veidt does not kill even more people in the pursuit of his "Utopia".

Oh, and I would say that Veidt and Rorshach are a purposeful study in the duality of "ends justify means". Rorshach snapped with the dogs while Veidt snapped at the "super hero team" meeting. They both use rationales to claim they do "good". They both have little issue with killing. Although, Rorshach actually seems a bit taken aback with killing children or killing in front of them. Veidt has no such inhabition.

Quote from: RPGPunditDude, its becoming clear to me that you've read Watchmen like, what, Once? Twice

Tempted not to read the rest after this. I think we all know that some people can obsessively watch some sci-fi shows over and over and memorize minute details of the settings without getting the point of the stories what so ever...

Although in this case it has almost nothing to do with the story and more to do with your own personal set of ethics.

The issue is not technical minutia, here. We're not discussing how Rorschach's grappling gun works. We're debating the literary themes of the comic and the analysis of character motivations.  And just like you would with War & Peace or with The Sun Also Rises; multiple readings and actually having studied the text and its themes makes a big difference over someone who's casually read the book once. It doesn't mean that you can't end up reaching differing conclusions with multiple read, part of what makes Watchmen great is that it leads to literary debate and varying interpretations, but that there is a fundamental difference between any shallow one-read interpretation and any interpretation borne of having actually looked at the text seriously.

RPGPundit

That's a cop-out to excuse your moral stance, and a rather weak one at that.

OMG...OMFGROFLMAO!!!!

My geek credentials have been called into question!?!  I obviously bow to the master of all things Moore, the Pundit. Forgive me for questioning your secret wisdom, your cunning insight into my lack of exposure has revealed me as the fraud I am...

> seriously... didn't I mention I hadn't read the book in a couple of years just a post ago? I hang my head at this secret shame<

I'm sorry, dude. Its gonna take me some time to actually address your reply. I'm fucking amazed I can type this I'm laughing so hard my eyes are watering. Wait... no.. those are tears of humilation... I can't tell...

No, its an analysis of the text.  I've not been calling Ozymandias a "good guy", and haven't from the start. I've suggested, from the start, that Watchmen is too complex to point at one guy and say "he's the villain", and that this is a product of stupid shallow reading.

I do think, also, that only someone seriously disturbed could suggest that Rorschach is in any way noble, or even heroic.  At best, he's a deeply flawed ethically neutral vigilante, not a villain, but certainly not a hero.

RPGPundit

Its not about "geek cred"; its about literary analysis.  Of course, part of the problem is certain people thinking that Watchmen should be read like any other comic, and bringing all the typical geek baggage into it.  I think that's what caused a lot of the grimdark period in comics; idiotic comic readers looking at Watchmen with a shallow reading and saying "holy shit, Rorschach is so awesome!!1!! He KILLS people and talks in broken sentences and he's all dark!! He's so dreamy, I'm having a social-misfit geek-orgasm!!!"

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;293784Dude, its becoming clear to me that you've read Watchmen like, what, Once? Twice?

That's like reading Farewell to Arms or Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas or Amber or Thus Spake Zarathustra just once.  

Until you've read Watchmen at least three or four times, you won't have a fucking clue what you're talking about, there's too much depth and too many levels in the story for a single or even two reads to grasp it.

In the course of the last 24 years, I've read Watchmen something like 10 times, and EVERY SINGLE TIME,  I find some new detail, some new hint in the story or in the background images or some new angle to understand the characters by.

I could, mockingly, suggest that if you can't grasp the details in a single read maybe you shouldn't have entered the academic profession.  I read most things once or twice. I've actually read the Watchmen a few more times than that, because I enjoyed it.  

And, you know, I DID admit that I hadn't read it recently as its packed away somewhere.  I did re-read V, but that's at best tangentally relevant.

QuoteWe know that Ozymandias' family were rich immigrants, probably escaping the second world war in Europe.  He was born in the states though.  So he was probably both an insider and an outsider, just like he is as a hero; he's not Dr.Manhattan, not totally alien, but he doesn't quite fit in either.  He had to fake his test results down, to avoid calling too much attention to himself.

Working from memory: What we know of Viedt comes from Viedt, and only from Viedt, regardless of the medium.  That is: we have what he tells us.   Unlike Rorschach, who provides us a flashback, unlike Manhatten, who provides us a Flashback, unlike the Comedian, who remains a cipher despite showing up in everyone elses flashbacks, and never explains himself.   It DOES make it harder to relate to him, and thus he is at some remove to the audience. Remember, this entire debate started because you had a bee in your bonnet that the plebs in the audience like Rorschach more than Ozymandias... I merely tried to explain why.  I make poke fun at the snobbish attitude you've displayed, but I didn't make it up from whole cloth.  You identify with Viedt for whatever reasons: seeing yourself as an intellectual peer, an immigrant son, perhaps even born wealthy... I don't know, you may even agree with his politics more. YOU see Viedt as more relatable, many people don't, for various reasons integral to the character and due to the way he is handled by the author.

QuoteWhat else would "snapping" make him if not a psychopath? "Ultimate Rorschach?", "Rorschach X-treme"?!  Do you think Moore's point was to say "Rorschach is now so much cooler because he killed those  dogs, and now has extra-special powers, so its AWESOME that he goes around killing pimps and muggers dressed in his own filth, eating beans and sugar cubes like an animal and living in a flophouse!"?

A psychopath suffers from a particular pathology. The Pathology of Rorschach is one of an Obsessive.  Seriously, man... You of all people should realize that there are right words and wrong words when discussing details.  Heck, you even touch on this latter.  A psychopath responds to stress with uncontrolled violent impulses.  The ONLY time Rorschach is not in control is the incident with the dogs.  At least as filmed even then he has control, it is the moment he decides it is not worth exercising.
 

QuoteLet's see: he believes that all of mankind is rotten to the core, he was already essentially psychologically imbalanced from CHILDHOOD onwards, brutally attacking other children (leaving one partially blinded from a lighted cigarette); his whore mother was murdered brutally and his only response was "good"; he had a pathological distaste for "handling female clothing" (even the dress from which his mask is made, his comment: "When I had cut it enough, it didn't look like a woman anymore"). And all that shit was BEFORE he had the incident with the dogs.

And where have I, or anyone in this thread ever tried to portray Walter Kovacs as a nice guy?  Or even well balanced?  Certainly his attitude towards women is... fragmented even from the outset.  It was a crime against a woman that drove him to become Rorschach, and it was men who victimized women (and children, yes...) who drew a disproportionate share of his wrath, and yet he clearly couldn't stand them.  Were he a real person and not a character in a comic book I'd suggest that it was the disillusionment that real women provided that spurred his distaste for them, that he actually idolized them and it is their failure to stand up to his ideals that drove his anger...  though if he were a psychopath then it would be far more likely that he would attack women and for the life of me I can't recall a single incident where he actually did.  

QuoteHe himself has clearly demonstrated a dissociative personality; he says that before the incident he was "just kovacs pretending to be Rorschach"; and that he was "very soft" because he let the "scum" live.

And he says, explicitly: "we do not do this thing (vigilantism) because it is permitted, we do it because we have to.  We do it because we are compelled."

No? He admits he is COMPELLED to be Rorschach, and that Rorschach does not let scum live.

Exactly my point.  Obsessive personality combined with what may be a mild psychotic break, or possibly some form of PTSD.  The existance of human monsters, and the inability of society drove him to deal with them drove him, an already obsessive type, to more extreme behavior.  When confronted by his own inability to save the child, the innocent, he retreated into his made up persona to protect his psyche, and became an avenger rather than a protector.  

QuoteHe says "it was Kovacs who said 'mother' then, muffled under latex, it was Kovacs who closed his eyes. It was Rorschach who opened them again." and "existence is random, has no pattern save what we imagine after staring at it too long. No meaning save what we choose to impose"  and "streets stank of fire, the void breathed hard on my heart, turning its illusions to ice, shattering them.  Was reborn then, free to scrawl own design on this morally blank world. Was Rorschach".

That is the thinking of a serial killer. He has made his pattern, now he's following it. He's COMPELLED.

You are not all that familiar with serial killers then. A serial killer is fundamentally selfish.  They don't kill because the world is random, because they've been disillusioned, because they made up a personality to protect a wounded mind... they kill because they enjoy it, or because (all to frequently) they don't want a lover to leave them, they don't regard others as people with their own motivations.  That is not what Rorschach displays in the least.

QuoteWhat?!! His excuse is "I've gone batshit insane and believe that all of humanity deserves to burn".

Well, if you want to play a 'phrasing game' I can say Ozymandias's excuse is 'I destroyed millions of lives because I believe I'm good enough make everyone elses lives better.'  

Eh. I could have done better, but its a silly game.   No, Rorschach's 'excuse' is that that people he kills have actually earned it, that the civilization that you accuse him of rejecting has utterly failed at stopping these people, that someone has too.  His 'excuse' is that he was pushed too far, saw too much.

QuoteOzymandias does. He tells Manhattan he's "made himself feel every death", and that he has terrible nightmares.

Again: Never shown, only told. An important literary device.  And, to contrast with your little word game above: Viedt's 'excuse' is what? "I'm smarter than you, so I can kill people with impunity'?

QuoteOzymandias is ruthless in what he does, there's no question of that. But he doesn't revel in it, NOR is he emotionless about it. He expresses his deep shame at the "inadequacy" of the way he's rewarding his servants for their years of loyal service. He kills them, again, because its "necessary" to him, to cover all the loose ends.  They were connected to the conspiracy.

So... as long as the murders are commited in cold blood you are fine with them. Its those hot blooded 'he raped my wife and deserved to die' killings you think are evil?  

QuoteI'm not sure what you're referring to here; he does blow up all the people who were involved with the creation of the tentacle-thing.

I'm referring to that, yes, but as I recall it was two or three discrete instances close together.  I seem to recall him causing a bunch to be killed by exposure, a rather nasty death compared to the 'painless' and 'clean' death of poisoning shown in the film.

QuoteThat's not because of sadism. That's because of the cover up. He doesn't kill him cleanly and painlessly because he needs to make it look like a random act of violence.  Of course, you can also say that in the Comedian's case its payback.  Ozymandias has to ALWAYS be the best, and prove it; and when he first met the Comedian the comedian intentionally attacked Ozymandias in the docklands, and apparently beat the crap out of him.  So this could have been the payback beating, and it could also be on account of how at the "crimebusters meeting" the Comedian had essentially dressed down Ozymandias for suggesting that the world's problems could be solved by intelligence, and Veidt then and there "swore to deny his kind their last black laugh at the Earth's expense".

Again: why is this better than Rorschach? If anything, its worse.  Rorschach kills people he believes (and, coincidentally society alongside him...) are evil and do bad things... because they are bad. Viedt kills people because they slighted him, offended him, or because they were in his way.  How DID his parents die again?
 

QuoteAgain, necessary.  He HAD to get Manhattan out of the way. He wasn't sadistic, he wasn't like "bwahh hah hah hah hah!! I will give Wally Weaver cancer because I am EVIL!!!", he was just doing what he needed to do to save the world.

Debatable, even Very Debatable. His entire plan to remove Manhatten worked because Manhatten was already leaving humanity behind, already less invovled with the world at large, and thus largely 'not paying attention anyway'.   Thus Manhattan wasn't really in a position to stop Viedt, and quite possibly would have left humanity behind on his own, or with much less brutal prodding.  

QuoteNo, he has no choice as much as anyone else (a recurring theme, Choice, in the novel). He recognized that Manhattan's presence accelerated rather than preventing the end of the world by nuclear war. He knew that being a nice guy would not help, that to save the world he had to "cut the gordian knot".

Self contradiction.  If the reoccuring theme of the novel was choice, then honestly no character could be said to be 'having no choice'.  

QuoteO Rly?!  He could have done that AND assured the maintenance of the conspiracy?

When Rorschach begins investigating the Comedian's death, Viedt causes two additional deaths to cover his ass, the man he hired as an assassin and his own assistant.  You yourself have suggested that the Comedian's death was deliberate, to pay back not one but TWO personal slights. How DID the Comedian find out what Ozy was up to anyway?  If he planned everything so very carefully, every step so very carefully the entire plot device of the Comedian's murder makes no fucking sense.  If the very people who were involved in the mass murders had to die to preserve the secret, why not the Nite Owl who had no burden of guilt?    

QuoteNo. Rorschach clearly stated, he kills people because he is imposing his own pattern on a meaningless world. That's it. He may have picked "criminals" as his victims instead of "clowns" or "accountants" or "the dutch" because some vestiges of his shattered mind still want to connect to Kovacs the man, but he is now just defining his own personal inkblot.

Way to overshoot the mark, chief.  For all your high minded talk about civilization you seem to forget that, if we use society as a pattern, criminals are disruptions; Not clowns, not accountants, not even the dutch.    The selection of targets is as important as anything else; more as the people he lets go and why.  

QuoteNo, he kills people because he has to do what's necessary to save the world.

Ah, yes... because you know his assistant was destined to birth the next hitler....

QuoteRorschach. Ozymandias is killing people to try to save the world. Rorschach is killing people because his mommy was a whore.

You can keep saying that but you have yet to show how that is his motivation.  Yes, mommy was a whore. Yes, Rorschach hated his mother and had a low opinion of women.  Yet: Rorschachs victims were men and his motivation for crime fighting was.... a woman no one saved. His motivation for killing a child no one saved.

So... how exactly is he getting back at mommy for whoring again?

Again, your lack of familiarity with the comic is showing. Ozymandias' story IS shown in flashback, and he does not kill anyone from exposure (unless you count the butterflies in his garden). Ozymandias didn't kill the Comedian because he was settling a score, he killed the Comedian because the latter had accidentally happened upon the island where the tentacle-thing was being created.   That he personally beat the shit out of the Comedian may have been an opportunistic payback, however. No one is denying that Ozymandias is a narcissist who always has to be the best, that's kind of his thing.

As for the theme of Choice, Ozymandias, Rorschach and Manhattan are shown consistently in such a way that they all feel they have no choice in their actions. Veidt because he thinks its the only way to save humanity, Rorschach because he's out of his mind and cannot bend the personal inkblot-pattern he's created for himself in a senseless universe, and Manhattan because he believes that all time is pre-determined.  Nite Owl, on the other hand, who again represents the average man, DOES have a choice. He chooses to go back to being a hero.  And Laurie, she chooses Dan; and also manages to convince Manhattan that he does have a choice, to come back to Earth.

Nite Owl didn't have to die because Ozymandias had already succeeded in his plan ("thirty five minutes ago"), and was now invested/stuck.  He couldn't have retribution against Ozymandias without the whole plan being revealed and everything going back to shit; and Ozymandias knew that Dan was too reasonable to let that happen.  Rorschach, on the other hand, did have to die, because he didn't care about humanity enough to not try to stop Veidt after the fact.

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