In comics, it's never hard to find a good villain to pair with each hero: Superman has Lex, Batman has the Joker, and Space Ghost has Zorak. In fact, it's hard to find a classic comic in which there isn't a clear protagonist and antagonist. Traditionally, there has always been a hero fighting his arch-enemy. However, in Alan Moore's Watchmen, there is no clear opponent for the heroes to compete with. Instead, we find ourselves with six central characters who spend much of the novel searching for the villain. While each of the six is ​​almost totally unique, Watchmen's main heroes are presented in parallel pairs: Rorschach with Ozymandias, Dr. Manhattan with The Comedian, and Nite Owl II with the second Silk Spectre. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay The most striking of these pairs is that of Rorschach and Ozymandias. While it would certainly appear that the two heroes – or more properly called antiheroes – are different in every way, they share a strikingly similar trait. Rorschach is raised in the city's slums by his mother, a prostitute. He is an ugly, poor, secretive and almost worthless man. Unable to even pay his rent, he spends his days wandering New York as a wandering mute doomsday prophet holding a sign that reads "The End is Near." After the passage of the Keene Act, Rorschach remains an active superhero in direct violation of the law. Ozymandias, on the other hand, is a handsome, wealthy, public, and powerful man. When he leaves his parents' fortune at age 17, he donates every penny he has to charity, only to earn it all with his own hands. In anticipation of the Keene Act, Ozymandias is retiring two years before the law is passed. While Ozymandias is a generous liberal, Rorschach is almost fascist. Superficially the two characters are not at all similar. However, the two antiheroes firmly share a common belief: the ends justify the means. As a moral absolutist, Rorschach sees every act as absolutely right or wrong, devoid of the context of the act. As a result, he believes that all evil must be punished quickly and violently. This absolutism is reflected in his mask: the black and white patterns on the mask continually change and transform, but always remain completely separate; there is never a gray area. A childhood fan of Harry S. Truman, Rorschach admires his ability to make difficult, morally right decisions for the good of the people. Throughout the novel we discover that to acquire the information necessary to achieve a moral goal, Rorschach will unflinchingly break the fingers of those he knows are in no way involved in the crime. It doesn't matter what needs to be done to achieve his goal: the end justifies the means. Ozymandias has the same belief, although he puts it into practice on a very different scale. To do what he deems necessary to save humanity from itself, he gives several people cancer, kills numerous others, and ultimately wipes out half the population of New York City. However, he believes his actions are totally justified in the cause of ending the Cold War and uniting the world under one cause. While Rorschach commits a large number of relatively minor violent acts over the course of his entire life, Ozymandias spends several years preparing for the execution of a gigantic act. However, the concept behind both characters' actions is the same. The parallels between the two are further suggested in “Chapter V: Fearful Symmetry,” which focuses almost entirely on Rorschach and Ozymandias. This volume of the novel isperfectly symmetrical in almost every way. That is to say, the first and last pages (and all corresponding pages in between) have perfectly mirrored paneling, the same characters per page, and the same plot; the entire episode is split perfectly down the middle. To allow readers to relate the two characters to each other, on the other hand, Moore depicts the two antiheroes as total opposites, although each is attempting to perform acts that he believes will change humanity. In this regard, it's clear that Rorschach and Ozymandias are supposed to be completely opposite characters in almost every way, except for this unique, yet overwhelming trait. Another couple introduced to readers is Dr. Manhattan and The Comedian. These two heroes are the only ones in history who choose to keep their identities secret and register with the United States government after the passage of the Keene Act. Throughout the novel, the effects of one's life influence the other's. The Comedian begins his career as a vigilante at an early age, where his behavior is far from exemplary. After an encounter with a group of masked heroes, he attempts and fails to sexually assault the Silk Specter (whom we'll call Sally Jupiter for the sake of clarity). It is later revealed that the two then have an intimate relationship and that the Comedian is actually the father of Sally Jupiter's son, who later becomes the second Silk Specter (who we will simply refer to as Silk Spectre). Manhattan, originally Jon Osterman, chooses early in his adulthood to lead the life of an ordinary watchmaker, until his father pushes him to become a nuclear physicist. During his work in this profession, Jon is involved in a nuclear accident in an experimental test chamber and is transformed into the only true "superhero" of the novel, as he is the only one with truly superhuman powers. From there, Osterman is transformed into a hero by the US government thanks to his incredible abilities. Soon after his transformation, Doctor Manhattan meets and begins an intimate relationship with Silk Specter. After the passage of the Keene Act, the government has Manhattan and The Comedian team up to help the United States win the war in Vietnam. Here, both heroes begin to feel distant from the rest of humanity and begin to take on the philosophy of nihilism, where they no longer believe in the morality of any action. The Comedian demonstrates this with his past sexual assault of Sally Jupiter and the murder of the mother of his unborn child in Vietnam. Dr. Manhattan's views are much more brazen, as when he decides to exile himself to Mars at a time of the planet's potential nuclear annihilation during the Cold War. In fact, after deciding to let humanity decide its own destiny, the Silk Specter is the only one who can convince him to return to Earth and save the human race. This is because he is the only person who has ever been important to Manhattan (after his transformation), just as his mother, Sally Jupiter, was the only person who has ever been important to The Comedian. Although the Comedian and Dr. Manhattan seem like very different characters, they are surprisingly related. The final pair of heroes in the novel are Nite Owl II (who we'll just call Nite Owl) and the Silk Spectre, also known as Laurie Juspeczyk. The two are remarkably similar and each appears to be the opposite gender counterpart of the other. Laurie begins her career in crime fighting when she is practically forced into it by her mother. After Sally Jupiter retires, she pushes her daughter to take her place to become the second Silk Wraith. The case is similar with Nite Owl, Dan Dreiberg. Before him there was the original Nite Owl,.