Dept. of Literary Observances

Watchmen was a product of its time -- by which I mean full of mid-80s, duck-and-cover era of superpower brinksmanship.

When I read it again in the mid-90s, it seemed dated, and delightfully so. The Wall was gone. The Russians were our friends. Nuclear annihilation wasn't on the table, everything was rosy, and the pessimism of Moore's text seemed like a bad dream remembered years later.

I'm reading it again now, in advance of the film. I'm sad to say it doesn't seem so dated anymore.