I'm not judging Watchmen with modern sensibilities. I'm just saying that it's not the massively important work the Fanboys wish it was. Neither was Miller's Dark Knight. Yes, they're interesting explorations of the genre, but due to the unconstitutional censorship of comics, even as recent;y as the 80's, what they were exploring, the boundaries they were pushing, were just sort of pathetic when viewed from outside the superhero world.

That's all I'm saying.

It's hard to gauge Watchmen by modern sensibilities because so much of modern comics' vocabulary comes directly or indirectly from Watchmen. And, like Citizen Kane, it can seem like it's “not that great” to a modern audience because we're so used to seeing its tricks everywhere by now. We're just spoiled by the overall higher standards of today.

I by no means think of Watchmen as this perfect, sacred piece of literature, but you're being pretty unfair.

So there.

Watchmen doesn't suck, and I regret my choice of words. I'm just saying that it's not that great. There is nothing about the way it is written or drawn that is amazing. I'm not even sure the subject matter is all that innovative. Moore and Gibbens didn't grow up in America with the ridiculous and overbearing censorship of comics that would have set Congress on fire if it had been any other industry.

So yeah, if all you've read are superhero comics they sure, wooo, Watchmen.

For the rest of us who read other things, both comics and other media, it's not that impressive.

Sure, other, lazier creators and publishers learned all the wrong lessons from Watchmen, but we can't blame the work for the lack of vision or imagination of people who had nothing to do with it. And we shouldn't complain about them anyway. Without those guys fucking up for 25 years, Atomic Robo would not be poised to be the salvation of the industry ;D

By the 1990s, I had stopped reading most comics, then two things happened that rekindled my love: “Marvels” and “AstroCity”.