Watchmen Season 1 Episode 6: This Extraordinary Being Recap and Review

It all starts with the minuteman. Hooded Justice is being interrogated by some G men. The guys want him him to take off his hood and mention that they know that Hooded Justice is gay and that they know his boyfriend is trying to frame J. Edgar Hoover. They want HJ to get some incriminating photos from his boyfriend. He takes off his hood, and they prepare to take some photos. He beats this shit out of some G men. Its bloody and rad. There previous conversation about the origins of HJ’s noose probably bares exploration.

Meanwhile Agent Blake is interrogating Angela Abar. She is already tripping balls on her grandfathers memories through the drug nostalgia. She wants to pump her stomach but Angela refuses. Angela finds herself surrounded by a squadron of white police officers who look like they are about to be inducted into the force. We get a sign that its the officer training core of 1938. A black police officer pins his badge on him/her and tells him/her to beware of the cyclops. Now that Angela/Grandpa are actual cops he/she is out to dinner with a reporter who was covering the ceremony. She says that he is an angry man. He claims that he is not. We get some terrible flashbacks to Tulsa. He doesn’t want to live in the past and that is exactly why he will be angry.

Now Reeves is walking his beat. We see via a newspaper that its the time of Nazis and he witnesses someone firebombing a store. He stops the perp and the guy does not seem concerned about getting arrested. Meanwhile back at the station our perp tries to call Reeves a racial slur and his fellow white cops aren’t having it as they lead him out.

Its now daytime and Reeves is out on the beat again. He has an interesting conversation with the newspaper guy about a comic that seems pretty similar to Superman and his own origin story. He sees the arsonist walking about. Reeves heads back to the station to complain. There is a sign the officers flashed to one another when they stood up for Reeves (my guess its the cyclops business). The booking officer tells him to let it go.

Its night time and Reeves is in civilian clothes walking down the street. Some cops pull over and offer him a ride home. They want to take him out drinking. Things feel REAL shady. He says another time and they drive away dragging two dead bodies???? Like what was that??? He turns down an alley and the same car stops him and three cops get out and beat him with their billy clubs. The drag him to the hanging tree and we see a noose tied around his neck. Man this scene is rough, terrifying, and evocative. The cops hang him for a minute but then cut him down. They tell him “keep your black nose out of white folks business you n#$%#. Woof pretty powerful moment. Also pretty messed up. He stumbles back to town still with the noose around his neck. As he walks back a woman screams for help and he sees two people getting mugged. He dons the noose mask and kicks some criminal ass in a pretty brutal fashion. He returns home to his crying wife

Sometime later he is resting on the couch while his wife puts ice in a towel for his face. The couple he saved has been talking up their encounter with the “hooded” figure to the newspaper and they both read the story. They discuss his favorite movie “trust in the law”. Its the movie that was alluded to earlier, staring the black marshal who kills the white evil sheriff. His wife tells him to keep the hood because that is the only way to get justice.

Hooded Justice is going after the organized crime syndicate that almost killed him. He finds a couple of the early low level targets and goes after them. Inside the building are a bunch of KKK folks. He beats the holy fuck out of them. Inside the room he finds some maps and other propaganda. He ends up in a store front where the store owner tries to shoot him. He jumps out the front window

Now we get an intermission from Agent Blake. They gave Angela some adrenaline but she is still all fucked up. Cal is there and hopefully can help her come back from her nostalgia coma. We get that the year is 2019 and he confirms Robert Redford is the president. She drifts away again.

She drifts back and now Roosevelt is president and Nelson Gardner has come for a visit. Gardner is there on behalf of Captain Metropolis. He wants a group of people to join together and he wants Hooded Justice to join them. He is convinced that Reeves is feeding Hooded Justice information. The New Minutemen want Hooded Justice. He leaves his card. Now both Garder and Reeves are having sex. Did not necessarily see that coming (no pun intended). Afterwards they talk about when Gardner new he was Hooded Justice. He asks him again to join them. Hooded Justice will legitimize the whole experiment. He wants them to wear their costume next time they do the dirty. We get a jump-cut to Reeves with his wife. He recounts how he found the baby when he was little as the escaped Tulsa. She tells him that she is pregnant.

He is putting on white makeup so that when he goes out as Hooded Justice people will not know he is black. There is a media scrum and the minutemen are answering questions. HJ starts to discuss the cyclops conspiracy but Captain Metropolis cuts him off and makes up some other shit about a big bad and harnessing the suns energy to kill the towns population. Clearly HJ does not love it and quickly leads.

As time progresses we see the new baby growing into a toddler, who grows into a boy all while watching his dad put on the HJ costume. Reeves continues to gather information about cyclops. He arrives in police uniform at a movie theatre that is surrounded by police and the scene is pure chaos. The other cops say some racist shit to him and its clear its a black movie theatre. As he looks at what happened inside there are lots of dead African Americans. He debriefs a witness who describes being hypnotized. He sees some henchmen loading some devices into a car and calls Captain Metropolis for help. CM refuses to help and says HJ is on his own. After the phone call he exits the booth and finds the arsonist who asks why he is down in this area of town. The firestarter does not remember him. Reeves (still in his officer uniform mind you) shoots him between the eyes. He walks into arsonist warehouse and kills everyone in it. He finds the plans and equipment that were used in the movie massacre and finally he strangles the last officer who was making the recording enticing black folks to fight one another. He then burns the bodies and the warehouse. There is a really incredible tableau linking the warehouse to Tulsa. Its wild and Lindelof is at his best here.

He returns back to his house with one of the projectors. He finds his son dressing up like Hooded Justice. He flips out. There is a big fight between him and his wife. She is leaving and taking his son back home to Tulsa.

We jump forward in time and he is old in a wheelchair. Police Chief Crawford gets out of his car and Reeves flashes a light and mesmerizes him. They discuss his possession of the klan robes that Angela found. Police chief says you don’t know me, Reeves says “yes I do” and gives the cyclops sign. Its really interesting the cyclops sign is a form of the ok sign which has caused so much controversy as of late. He shines the light again in the chiefs eyes and tells him to hang himself. Which he dutifully does.

Angela now comes to grips with all the historic demons of her pasts, and her ancestors past. She wakes up in the real world which is full of color. She happens to be a patient living in one of the facilities owned and operated by Lady Trieu. Trieu is there waiting for her. The episode ends.

this was a fantastic episode proving Lindelof does bottle episodes better than any else in the business right now. In many ways this reminded me of the bottle episode International Assassin that isn’t really a bottle episode but more a complete exploration of a different world all while driving forward the plot of the show. It like this episode was fantastic, weird and haunting. We are not worthy.

Lingering Questions/Comments

1. So Lady Trieu must have some powerful drugs she is cooking up to counteract all that nostalgia Angela took.
2. The use of black and white was goddamn brilliant in this episode.
3. No Ozy this episode, that was a bummer.
4. Maybe I am thick headed here but so did the new white HJ took over for Reeves when he went back to Tulsa?
5. So was Chief Crawford a part of cyclops or did Reeves just know he was dirty too?
6. I want an episode about Angela’s dad. He has some shit to say.
7. Once again the music in this episode is 100% on point.
8. There is a steam punk aesthetic to this series that is really great and I think makes the entire show a little weirder with a capital W.