Plot Overview

W atchmen begins in 1985, where New York police are investigating the murder of Edward Blake, however, the police have no leads, but Rorschach a costumed vigilante believes that there is something. Rorschach discovers Blake is the Comedian, who is a costumed superhero who has worked for the US government since the Keene Act. Rorschach believes that the person that killed Edward Blake is also going to try and kill other masked superheroes, so he decides to inform some of his fellow heroes. First he visits Dan Dreiberg or Nite Owl II, then Adrian Veidt or Ozymandias, followed by Jon Osterman and Laurie Juspeczyk or Doctor Manhattan and Silk Spectre II.

After the Comedian's funeral, Rorschach gets information out of Moloch, one of the Comedian's enemies. Mocloch tells Rorschach the Comedian babbled on and foreshadowed that someone is doing something really terrible and that although he has committed bad things in the past, nothing compares to this deed. After this, Doctor Manhattan goes on national television, where he is accused of giving several people cancer including: Wally Weaver, Moloch, and Janey Slater. Due to the presses questioning on Doctor Manhattan, he makes everyone move to a different place so that he could be left alone, and ultimately goes to Mars. While Dr. Manhattan is on Mars, his story is told of how he became who he is and the different interactions that he has been through.

Since Doctor Manhattan has neglected Laurie, she decides to go and stay with Dan Dreiberg. While doing this, they return back to their old ways and do vigilante work, growing closer together as a result. To reinforce, Rorschach's conspiracy theory that someone is out to kill masked heroes, Ozymandias is attempted to be killed, however the attempt failed and was able to save his own life. However, Rorschach is unable to try and pursue this lead because he is lead into a trap that makes it look like he killed Moloch and thus causing him to go to jail. While in prison, through the meetings with Dr. Malcolm, the audience is able to find out more about Rorschach and why he is the way that he is. Since Ozymandias was attempted to be murdered, Laurie and Dan feel that Rorschach's conspiracy theory is correct and to be able to progress in the theory they must break Rorschach out of prison.

After breaking Rorschach out of prison, Dan, Laurie and Rorschach find Doctor Manhattan waiting for them when they return to Dan's home. There Doctor Manhattan takes Laurie to Mars with him because that is where their conversation is suppose to take place. While on Mars, Doctor Manhattan reveals things to Laurie that she never knew, which causes her to cry, just as Doctor Manhattan told her how the conversation was going to happen. Away from Mars, Nite Owl II and Rorschach continue to try and solve the conspiracy theory of Rorschach and upon doing so, they find out that the person behind the Comedian's murder is Adrian Veidt. When finding this out they go to find Adrian, in Antarctica. They go to Antarctica to find out the reason why Veidt had to kill the Comedian. He had to because the Comedian found out about Veidt'splan to try and save humanity from an imminent Atomic War between the US and Soviet Union. To pull of his plan, he fakes an alien invasion in New York, which wipes out half of the city's population. He does this so that the nations will come together to fight against what they think is an enemy, but is really not. He also reveals that he arranged for Doctor Manhattan's past connections to be diagnosed with cancer, staged the attempt of murder on himself, in order for him to be placed off Rorschach suspect list, and setting up Rorschach for the murder of Moloch. Rorschach and Nite Owl attempt to stop Veidt's plan only to find out that he has done it "thirty-five minutes ago."

As Laurie and Doctor Manhattan arrive back on earth, they discover that much of New York City has been destroyed, while also discovering that his abilities are being limited by tachyons coming from Antarctica, and thus the two teleport there. They find out that Veidt is the one who was behind the mass killing of New York City and try to confront him about it. However, Veidt shows new broadcasts that global hostilities have stopped and combined against a new threat, the so-called alien invasion. This leads to everyone except Rorschach to believe that concealing Veidt's truth from the public is the best thing that should happen. Due to Rorschach's uncompromising behavior, he leaves intending to reveal what Veidt has truly done, however Doctor Manhattan confronts him. Rorschach says that the only way to make him not tell is for Doctor Manhattan to kill him, which he does by vaporizing him. Veidt then asks Doctor Manhattan if what he did was the correct thing to do and Doctor Manhattan responds by saying that nothing never ends.