HBO's Brilliant Watchmen Series Broke Every Rule In The Book

2 hours ago 9

Published Apr 16, 2026, 9:00 AM EDT

Zach Moser is a Philadelphia native who writes about film and television news. Zach has been published in Points In Case, Business Insider, Slackjaw, ROCA Travel, and McSweeney's Internet Tendency.

Spoilers for HBO's Watchmen.HBO's superheroic vision of the future is a nine-episode masterpiece that breaks a lot of classic TV rules. Superheroes are everywhere these days, except, surprisingly, on HBO Max. The vaunted streamer, with its legendary classics and unimpeachable miniseries, has avoided the wave of superhero movies and shows that have swept other streamers.

The superhero genre has been mostly represented by HBO's partnership with Warner Bros., which brought in the DCEU, but as for HBO Max original shows, there aren't as many superhero offerings as you might expect. This is HBO, though, so if there is a superhero show, you can expect it's going to be pretty good.

Watchmen is one of these rare few HBO superhero shows, and as you might suspect, it's excellent. In fact, it's better than excellent; it's one of the best miniseries on HBO and one of the best things to come out of our Superhero age, full stop. Damon Lindelof's nine-episode show is unlike anything you've seen before.

Watchmen Didn't Just Defy The Rules Of The Superhero Genre, It Broke The Rules Of TV

Watchmen does not follow conventional superhero rules, nor conventional TV rules, for that matter. Part of that comes from its source material. Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' Watchmen was a deconstruction of the superhero genre, and HBO's series takes its ideas and runs.

Watchmen the show takes a look at superheroes from a viewpoint we don't often get. Superhero satires have often dealt with the intersection of fascism and superpowered individuals, drawing undeniable links between people who wield ultimate power in comics and in the real world.

Watchmen Main Cast

Actor	Character
Regina King	Angela Abar/Sister Night
Don Johnson	Judd Crawdford
Tim Blake Nelson	Wade Tillman/Looking Glass
Yahya Abdul-Mateen II	Cal Abar
Andrew Howard	Red Scare
Jeremy Irons	Adrian Veidt/Ozymandias
Jean Smart	Laurie Blake/Silk Spectre
Hong Chau	Lady Trieu

Watchmen wants to look at race, and the intersection of nationality and racial makeup and history, mixed with the ideas of superheroes. The show starts with the Tulsa Race Massacre; it has something to say. When a black man in the '30s is harassed by racists, he realizes he can don a mask, fight crime, and people will love him.

Watchmen, like all of Lindelof's shows, wades into muddy water from the outset. It even breaks storytelling conventions. It's both a sequel to Zack Snyder's 2009 adaptation and the comic. It treats both almost like distinct stories, and yet winds everything together. You'll find Watchmen is like nothing you've seen.

Watchmen's Refusal To Continue With Season 2 Cemented Its Status As A Rule-Breaker

Watchmen cops wearing yellow masks and batons.

Watchmen breaks the rules up until the very last sequences. Characters you assume are certain to live die, and those you'd expect to die in any other media survive. Then, at the end of the show, we are almost perfectly set up for a second season, with our main character seemingly gaining god-like powers.

But there is no Watchmen season 2. Damon Lindelof does not want to return to the show and thinks he's told the entire story, and he's right. Despite the "cliffhanger" of Watchmen, it's not at all important what happens next; what's important is why we come to that ending.