‘Watchmen’ Season 1, Episode 1, “It’s Summer and We’re Running Out of Ice’: 5 Things You May Have Missed

Watchmen makes the audacious choice to open on a recreation of a real-life atrocity: the destruction of “Black Wall Street” in Tulsa in 1921.

The Tulsa Race Riot (or Race Massacre) was a harrowing historical event that is only now starting to get the attention it deserves. Back in 1921, the Greenwood neighborhood of Tulsa, Oklahoma was the nexus of rising Black culture. Nicknamed “Black Wall Street,” Black residents enjoyed unique economic success and security until a young Black man was accused of raping a white woman. This event triggered a riot which in turn sparked a massacre. White residents of Tulsa stormed Greenwood, murdering, looting, and burning the community to the ground. Only now, literally a century later, are historians conducting a search for the mass graves.

Watchmen director Nicole Kassell took Decider through the intensely emotional process of recreating this event, but it’s worth noting that while everything else in Watchmen takes place in an alternate version of American history, this horrific event is real.

More than a sight gag, the “Four Important Presidents” poster that we see in Topher’s classroom is actually an explanation of this world’s alternate history as well as a fun nod to Alan Moore’s vision. In the graphic novel, Richard Nixon was not ever brought low by Watergate, and instead, took away Presidential term limits. He’s a hugely popular president, and it’s joked in the last panels of the book that some Hollywood actor “RR” is thinking of running in 1988. The punchline is that “RR” is not Ronald Reagan, but Robert Redford.

Watchmen show runner Damon Lindelof and his writers have leaned into this, imagining that Nixon held on to his presidency in 1988, died in office, and then Redford became president in 1992. The liberal idealist has been in power since then, and ushered in a progressive culture that gives reparations — or “Redfordations” — to descendants of Tulsa victims. However, there is a cancer calcifying in this seemingly ideal society and it is the bitterness of racism. Which is the whole theme of this Watchmen…

But, yeah, it was Alan Moore’s idea that Robert Redford would run for president.

About midway through the first episode of Watchmen, we follow Angela Abar as she walks to her bakery. The camera lingers on a newspaper headline telling us “Veidt Confirmed Dead.” Watchmen fans will know the Veidt in question is Adrian Veidt, aka Ozymandias, the super-smart mogul who ushered in clean energy (and  secured world peace by orchestrating a violent hoax involving a giant squid). But…is he dead???

There’s been a lot of playful winking from HBO on who it is Jeremy Irons is playing. The prevailing theory is that he is in fact Adrian Veidt. After all, he’s dressed in the luxe purples that Veidt preferred, and is surrounded by stately luxury. He’s also fixated on a play he’s written called “The Watchmaker’s Son.” This is a reference to Dr. Manhattan’s origin story. Though Dr. Manhattan is a blue superhuman living on Mars in HBO’s Watchmen, he was once, yes, a watchmaker’s son. He only attained his superhuman powers in a nuclear accident.

If Veidt were still alive, he would be fixated on Dr. Manhattan. After all, when Veidt explains his masterplan to fool the world into thinking an alien squid has attacked them (thus ending the need for nuclear brinksmanship – it’s a lot, guys), it is Dr. Manhattan who manages to rain on Ozymandias’s parade. He notes, “Nothing ever ends,” which seems to confuse and deflate the triumphant Veidt.

If Irons is Veidt, then that offers up more questions about where he is and what he is doing. Of the original Watchmen characters, we know that Dr. Manhattan is on Mars, Silk Spectre becomes an FBI agent (to be introduced in Episode 3), Rorschach is dead, and Nite Owl is hitherto unaccounted for. It seems that Ozymandias may be, too.

When she’s not Sister Night, Angela Abar seems to have a picture perfect life. She’s got a “bakery,” a hot husband, and three adorable children. Well, two are extremely adorable, and one likes to beat up racist kids in his class. Topher, played by Dylan Schombing, seems a tiny bit…off?

Topher is also the only one of Angela’s kids we see interact with her a bunch. He’s interested in the squids that routinely fall in this version of America, and incredibly protective of his mom. If he seems a little bit more angry and traumatized than most middle school kids (who are naturally angry and traumatized as a rule), we can confirm Watchmen will get into that soon enough. Still, we should probably keep an eye on Topher…

Oh, and those squids? Yeah, I guess that big one Ozymandias dropped on New York City wasn’t enough to secure world peace. Little ones drop regularly. Like Dr. Manhattan told Veidt in the comics, nothing ever ends…

The first episode of Watchmen is called “It’s Summer and We’re Running Out of Ice,” which sounds weird until you remember — and the show reminds you — it’s a lyric from the song “Poor Jud is Dead,” from the musical Oklahoma! Don Johnson’s character not only sees an all-Black version of the musical in the episode, but sings its main love theme at dinner. Finally, “Poor Jud is Dead” plays when it is revealed that Johnson’s character, Judd Crawford, is in fact dead.

Oklahoma! is an oft misunderstood musical insomuch that it’s not really a celebration of the state, but a withering look at how communities band together to bury their own sins. With that in mind, Watchmen seems to be saying something about this seemingly idealistic Tulsa where cops defend the rights of the weak. In fact, it could even be hinting something about Judd Crawford himself. Could it be that the kindly police chief isn’t all he’s cracked up to be?

Oklahoma! references aside, his death in the first episode could also mirror the instigating action of Watchmen itself: the murder of Eddie Blake. Over the course of the graphic novel, details emerge about the victims life that put him into, uh, the morally grey area. Could that be happening in Watchmen?

Just saying, Don Johnson’s playing a guy named “Judd” and that character isn’t exactly the hero of Oklahoma!

Where to stream Watchmen