Watchmen: Tales of the Black Freighter (2009)

While the Watchmen movie is certainly crowded with story and layers, now that I’m reading the original graphic novel I have even greater appreciation for the volumeus complexity and nuance of the world created by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons. Watchmen: Tales of the Black Freighter, is a companion piece to the movie, that takes slightly or unused elements from the novel, and gives them movement. Forefront among these is the Tales of the Black Freighter, a comic book, within the original comic book, that serves as an extended metaphor for one of the Watchmen’s story arc’s. This is a bloody, roughly 25 minute anima about an 18th century ship wreaked sea captains attempt to get home to his family, and what he’ll sacrifice to get there. Secondly there is Under the Hood, presented as a 60 Minutes like new piece from 1975, chronicling the story of the original Minute Men of the 1940's and 50's, forerunners of the Watchmen that the comic and movie primarily chronicle. Also included is the first volume of the Watchmen ‘motion comic’, and behind the scenes stuff on the making of Black Freighter and Under the Hood. This DVD afforded me the opportunity to poke around some of the side streets of the Watchmen universe, something I’ve wanted to do since first seeing the film, and prompting a satisfied 3 1/2 out of 5 rating.