In the film 'Watchmen' there is no hero or team of heroes, only unusual people in unusual circumstances. And that makes it outstanding.

- Are you ready, kids, for a heap of theory, terms, and tediousness on a cinematic topic?

- Aye, captain!

- I can't hear you!

- Aye, captain! Just try to make it at least a little digestible, okay?

- I'll try. And I warn you right away about spoilers and a wild, just wild IMHO factor.

I'll start with the fact that for Hollywood (and, consequently, for the production of any commercial product) the standard mantra has long been the phrase "why reinvent the wheel if it was invented before you?" In terms of scripts and plot twists, variations are allowed, but deviating from the main outline – no way. 

That makes it all the more interesting to analyze works that, consciously or unconsciously, engage in deconstructing this very outline – or at least offer a non-standard approach to its implementation.

Take, for example, the cornerstone on which the vast majority of Dream Factory screenwriters rely – the Hero's Journey. By the way, for an introduction, I highly recommend reading Christopher Vogler's book "The Writer's Journey", in which the list of films that fit the basic formula alone takes up 8 pages. I won't retell it entirely – I'll just provide a photo of an illustration with an explanation from that very book.

Frodo or Bilbo from Tolkien's works undertake a journey through obstacles in absolute accordance with the path trodden by myths, legends, and the cultural heritage of humanity; Kevin McCallister learns a lesson by going through all the stages; Luke Skywalker sets off on an adventure; Dorothy follows the yellow brick road; and Tony Montana embarks on a criminal path.

So, have you seen the film "Watchmen"? 

Which character do you consider the central hero of the film?

Say, you favor the figure of Walter Kovacs a.k.a. Rorschach. A fine choice, I share it to some extent. What can we say about Rorschach's character development in relation to the given formula?

That he does not go through it in any way. At the start of the film, Rorschach is somewhere around phase number six, with already formed cynical views and extreme beliefs, undergoing trials, seeking allies and identifying enemies, trying to find out who killed his former comrade-in-arms the Comedian, ending up in prison, continuing his investigation by any means and despite everything. He ends his journey between phases eight and nine, receiving a peculiar "reward" in the form of being disintegrated for his loyalty to his principles, ha-ha. Nothing pulls him out of the ordinary world, and apart from a couple of flashbacks, we have no idea what he was like before his superhero activities.

Okay, if not Rorschach, then who? The mastermind of the whole earth, Ozymandias? Doesn't fit, because in this story he is assigned the role of antagonist – the debate about whether he is a villain or a hero we'll leave for later; the main thing for us is that he antagonizes most of the characters and poses a threat to the civilian population. The all-powerful Dr. Manhattan? Doc is shown to us above morality, above human passions; he seeks nothing and strives for nothing except his own peace, allowing the last thread to summon him to Earth from Mars to... what? Return without having done anything? Also crossed out. The femme fatale Silk Spectre? Possibly, but did her personality change much during the film, and let's be honest, how much do you remember about her?

And we are left with one single character whom Alan Moore himself in his notes called the moral compass of the entire work – Dan Dreiberg, Nite Owl. He fits perfectly. Starting the film at the stage of accepting a calm, ordinary life, he goes through all the phases: meeting the call and the mentor (interpreting the journey in my own way, one could say that both occur through the conversation with Rorschach at the beginning of the film, which is both an impetus to start the journey and the acquisition of a certain superhero mentor), he overcomes thresholds and trials, and finally receives a reward.

And who among us would say that the gray Nite Owl, who practically did not affect the world and people, who saves people from fire for an adrenaline rush and subsequent sex with a woman, and who joins the investigation of the masked hero killer case only at Rorschach's prompting – is the central character of the film?

This is where the very deconstruction of the standard Hero's Journey emerges, where all the attributes are given to a character who actually accomplished nothing, while people mostly remember other characters who did not go through this path. They remember Rorschach's ideology, Dr. Manhattan's godlike nature, and even the brutality and one-liners of the Comedian, who dies in the first ten minutes of the film. 

As it seems to me, this move lets us understand that there is no hero or team of heroes in the film; there are only unusual people in unusual circumstances. This makes the film strange, non-standard, laughing at the canons and brimming with love for itself and the source material, repeating it almost verbatim (we'll definitely talk about that another time).

And in some ways, truly outstanding.