During the 1930s and 1940s, costumed vigilantes fight crime in America and gain great popularity.
They form a group called the Minutemen to "finish what the law couldn't" and their original lineup
is very heroic, helping catch criminals and win World War II. However as time passes, the heroes
begin losing their morals or their sanity: they often suffer violent deaths in action,
decide to end things for themselves, get arrested for breaking the law themselves, get murdered by
activists, or even get sent to an asylum. History is very influenced by the heroes as well: Doctor
Manhattan establishes a friendship with President Kennedy and he becomes the first being on the
Moon, but later it's The Comedian who assassinates Kennedy. As all the heroes from the Minutemen get
in trouble, a second generation of heroes takes over with a group called the Watchmen. Besides the
Comedian and Manhattan, there's Laurie taking over the mantle of her mother's Silk Specter,
Adrian as Ozymandias, Daniel as the new Nite Owl, and Rorschach. Unfortunately the damage caused by
the first generation is too deep, and by the time Nixon starts his third term, an anti-vigilante act
is approved and the public hates superheroes. It's now 1985, and the Comedian is alone in his
apartment watching a tv show about the potential nuclear war with the Soviet Union. Suddenly,
a tall slim figure breaks into the room, but the Comedian isn't surprised and throws an object at
the criminal before grabbing his gun. However the figure quickly disarms him and the two start to
fight. As they trade a few blows, they break the furniture and even one of the walls. The Comedian
tries to use his kitchen knives, but the figure quickly gains the upper hand and hurls him through
the window of his high-rise. He is killed by the fall to the ground, and a smiley face button soon
lands on the pavement next to his body. Sometime later, after the police are done gathering
evidence and leave, Rorschach breaks into the apartment. Searching around, he discovers a secret
compartment in the closet where the Comedian has been hiding his suit and his weapons. He also
finds the button with the blood stain on it, and every detail of his investigation is written down
in his journal. Meanwhile Daniel is at the home of Hollis, the original Nite Owl. The two have
regular meetings and talk about old times, today they discuss the Comedian's death and Rorschach's
vigilante activities. Nixon's policies don't allow masked vigilantes, but this hasn't stopped
Rorschach so far. When Daniel arrives at his home, he discovers the door is broken and carefully
makes his way inside, only to find Rorschach in the kitchen. Rorschach shows Daniel the smiley
face button, so Daniel takes him to his secret Nite Owl lab for privacy. Rorschach speculates
that someone is killing the superheroes, but Daniel says that the Watchmen are over and that
Rorschach could ignore this since no one knows his real identity. The next day, Daniel visits Adrian,
who is in the middle of an interview. He talks about developing renewable energy sources,
saying that if he could eliminate the fear of not having enough, war would be obsolete. He
also speculates that Manhattan might be able to stop much of the incoming nuclear strike,
but not all of it. After the interview is over, Daniel tries to warn Adrian that someone may be
after the Watchmen, but Adrian isn't worried. In the evening, Rorschach uses various tricks like a
hole in the fence and jumping on roofs to break into the US Army Rockefeller Military Research
Center to talk to Manhattan and Laurie, who live together as a couple. Manhattan is caught in the
middle of an experiment and he must fix his own size to talk to his old friend. Usually he can see
the future, but he says that he cannot see it now due to temporal interference caused by tachyons
moving through time that may have resulted from a nuclear holocaust. When Rorschach gets too
annoying with his murder warning, Manhattan uses his powers to teleport Rorschach outside
mid-sentence. Afterward Manhattan tells Laurie that he has been working with Adrian to solve
the energy crisis in an effort to avert the war. He then reads her mind and observes her parents
fighting before telling her that he knows she wanted to have dinner with him, but that she'll
instead be going out to dinner with Daniel because he can't. When Laurie arrives at the restaurant,
Daniel is obviously smitten. They talk about the old days and Laurie confides that Manhattan is
becoming distant. The next day, Laurie is zapped over to her mother's home, where she immediately
throws up into the toilet. Sally is drinking margaritas in the afternoon and reminiscing about
her old Minuteman days, she even shows Laurie an adult comic that is based on Sally's days as the
original Silk Spectre. However Laurie is appalled by her mother's behavior, causing Sally to have
a flashback. Back during the Minutemen's golden age, the group had gotten together for a picture.
Afterward, Sally went to the billiards room to change out of her costume and the Comedian
followed her. He tried to get frisky with her, and when he ignored Sally's refusal, she had to punch
him. The Comedian immediately punched and kicked her back, then he pushed her onto the table,
ready to take advantage of her. Fortunately another superhero found them and quickly beat the
Comedian up to stop him. Meanwhile at a cemetery, the Comedian is given a funeral with military
honors. Manhattan remembers that during the Vietnam War, he and the Comedian fought the Viet
Cong and North Vietnamese Army. He had used his powers to make himself huge and make everyone blow
up while the Comedian enjoyed using a firethrower to burn his enemies down. After the war was over,
a Vietnamese woman confronted the Comedian and told him she was pregnant with his baby. When the
drunken Comedian refused to take responsibility and insulted her, she slashed his face with a
broken bottle, causing a permanent scar. Furious, the Comedian retaliated by shooting the woman
on the spot. When Manhattan expressed shock, the Comedian claimed that Manhattan's failure to act
showed that he didn't really care about humanity. Adrian also watches the coffin being laid to rest
and remembers a Watchmen group meeting. The Comedian had been a sarcastic, misanthropic
pessimist, while Adrian wanted to help humans. The Comedian had burned Adrian's display, saying that
the threat of nuclear war trumped any efforts by the Watchmen. Daniel also has a flashback,
recalling a time when he and the Comedian tried to calm down an anti-vigilante riot. Daniel had
tried to use diplomacy, but the Comedian jumped in the middle of the crowd and fought with the
protesters, attacking them with punches, bullets, and tear gas until they were all gone. Daniel,
obviously bothered by the way lawlessness had engulfed the nation, asked the Comedian what
happened to the American Dream, and the Comedian answered they were looking at it. Daniel then
throws the smiley face button into the grave. A man named Moloch, who used to be an archenemy,
also pays his respects leaving without noticing a man with a sign outside the cemetery. When he
arrives home, he opens the fridge and finds a note saying "behind you". Then he's suddenly
assaulted by Rorschach, who hurts Moloch to make him confess why he went to the funeral. Moloch
says that the Comedian had broken into Moloch's house a week before very drunk, then he had cried
and rambled about a list. Sometime later, Laurie and Manhattan are having an intimate moment when
Laurie realizes Manhattan has replicated himself. At first, she's put off by getting frisky with two
people at the same time, but then she realizes that a third Mahattan is working on the energy
machine at the same time. Angry at not having his full attention, she throws an object at him,
but it goes through his head. Laurie then leaves, and Manhattan teleports the machine to Adrian in
Karnak seeing it arrive on a screen. Laurie goes to Daniel's house saying she has nowhere else to
go, and Daniel invites her to visit Hollis with him. On their way to Hollis', Daniel and Laurie
see a stranger on the streets with a weird sign. When they walk into an alley, they're surrounded
by a large gang of street thugs. They may not have their costumes, but they still have their skills,
and the ensuing fight is incredibly one-sided. The duo beats up every thug using punches and
kicks to break their bones, the thugs' knives to stab them, and when one tries to shoot them,
Laurie uses another guy as a shield. In a matter of minutes, the fight is over and Daniel and
Laurie win. Meanwhile Manhattan uses his powers to dress up before teleporting over to a TV studio.
In front of the camera, he's accused of afflicting many of his former colleagues with cancer. His
ex-girlfriend Janey appears and reveals that she too is stricken, taking off her wig to prove it.
Everyone in the studio is going crazy over this news, surrounding Manhattan with questions and
lights. Overwhelmed, he suddenly screams "leave me alone" and teleports out of the studio Afterward
Manhattan appears on Mars, where he begins thinking about important events of his past,
like reassembling a watch with his father, how he fell in love with Laurie and having a loving
relationship together, his father's death to cancer, and the day he stopped being human. During
an experiment, he was accidentally trapped in the chamber of a generator of intrinsic fields. The
other scientists couldn't take him out, and soon the machine shot rays that disintegrated him layer
by layer. In the following days, people would see weird ghosts made of only skeletons or nervous
systems, and one afternoon, the mess hall started shaking until Manhattan was resurrected into a
blue humanoid. TV news reports filled the screens with him, and when he was told needed a logo,
he drew a circle with a dot in the middle on his forehead. After he showed off his new powers,
President Nixon enlisted his help to end the Vietnam War, but eventually he became the
president's weapon for the nastiest of jobs. When he joined the Watchment, he fell in love
with Laurie, and Janey broke up with him for his infidelity. Now Manhattan's tired of humans, so he
begins using his powers to build a large device on Mars. Meanwhile Nixon and the war cabinet
consider the recent events with the Soviet Union. Nixon seems willing to lose the East Coast in a
nuclear attack, but he also says Manhattan has two days to solve the problems. The next day, all the
industrial leaders have a disagreeable meeting with Adrian. He reminds them of his brilliance
and how he has a desire to unify the world before kicking them out. While one of the men tries to
apologize, the elevator door opens and suddenly a deliveryman starts shooting. The secretary and
various businessmen die on the spot, but Adrian eludes the bullets and subdues the shooter using a
decorator. He tries to ask him some questions, but the man swallows a poison pill and dies. During
lunchtime, Laurie and Daniel discuss the attack. Daniel says that it isn't safe for the former
heroes and suggests Laurie move in with him for safety, with which she agrees. As they leave the
restaurant, Rorschach's voice can be heard saying that he's watching them walk away, but not in his
costume. Later Rorschach reviews the ID card of the man who tried to kill Adrian. The guy worked
for Pyramid Transnational and Rorschach remembers he had seen a letter from this company at Moloch's
earlier. He returns to Moloch's apartment, but he discovers that Moloch is so recently dead that his
cigarette is still smoldering. Suddenly the police surround the building, knowing that Rorschach
is inside and accusing him of murder. When the cops go upstairs and are about to open the door,
Rorschach comes out and begins burning them down with a torch he made with a spray can. After
exchanging a few hits, he jumps out the window and continues to fight the cops on the street.
However there are too many of them, so Rorschach is captured and unmasked. Soon his real identity
appears all over the news, revealing he had been the crazy guy with the sign. Rorschach is jailed
for the murder of Moloch. The prison psychologist tells him that if he cooperates during the psych
evaluation, he'll send to a hospital instead of prison, where many criminals want revenge. As
Rorschach looks at inkblots, he recalls important moments in his life. At an early age, he saw his
mother kissing a random man, so she slapped him and said that she should've had an abortion. When
older kids made fun of him, Rorschach would jump on them and beat them up, even biting them too.
Rorschach is having violent thoughts but he's giving the psychologist silly answers like
"clouds", so the man demands the truth. When he was a fresh vigilante, Rorschach followed some
clues about an abducted little girl. He found the house of the abuser and discovered the girl was
fed to the dogs and her clothes were burned down. When the criminal showed up, he found his dogs
dead, and Rorschach jumped on him to handcuffed him to a chair before using the criminal's own
weapons to hit his head over and over. He tells the psychiatrist that his civilian identity died
that day and now only Rorschach remains, accepting there's no God out there. Rorschach ends up being
sent to a regular jail. At the mess hall, he's teased by another inmate on the food serving line,
and he responds by hitting him and splashing him with hot grease from a deep fryer. When he returns
to his cell, Rorschach is found by Big Figure, a criminal he had arrested 15 years earlier and
now promises to get back at him later. Meanwhile Laurie snoops around in the basement of Daniel's
building and finds his old flying machine. She guesses how to fire up the rocket engines,
which accidentally starts a fire in the lab. thankfully Daniel comes down and together
they put out the flames. Then Laurie tries on the night vision owl goggles, and she says that this
must be how Mahattan sees the world. Daniel looks disappointed and goes upstairs, but Laurie quickly
follows and tells him that Manhattan saw a lot of things, but he didn't see her. Then they get busy
on the sofa while a newscast in the background reports the buildup of Soviet tanks. That night,
Daniel has a strange dream in which he and Laurie are naked on a field under the stars. She pulls
off their skin, revealing their superhero costumes as a nuclear explosion goes off
and vaporizes them. Daniel suddenly awakens, and Laurie finds him staring at his Nite Owl gear.
The two decide to get into their costumes and go out for some fun. They fly around the city as they
listen to police messages and learn of a burning building, so they go to rescue the people trapped
there. First Daniel shoots at the water tank to take care of the roof flames, then he drops
Laurie into the burning building. Laurie guides all the people out and into the flying machine
right before the room blows up behind them. After dropping off the passengers, Daniel puts the flyer
on autopilot and the two superheroes get frisky again. Once they're done, they decide to try to
rescue Rorschach. Back in prison, a riot is taking place and prisoners are killing each other all
over the place. One of Big Figure's henchmen attempts to grab Rorschach through the door,
but he retaliates by binding the man's hands to the bars. Another henchman comes with a grinder,
proceeding to cut his friend's arms off and then cut open Rorschach's cell bars. Rorschach quickly
pushes the thug against the cell toilet and when the wires of his grinder touch the toilet water,
he gets electrocuted. A now terrified Big Figure runs to hide in the bathroom. While Rorschach
goes to the psychiatrist's office to get his mask back, Daniel and Laurie arrive and begin subduing
dozens of prisoners with fists and kicks, cleaning the area in seconds. A cop tries to arrest them,
but Laurie quickly knocks him out. Eventually they find Rorschach, but before they leave, Rorschach
stops by the bathroom and kills Big Figure. When they return to Daniel's lair, they find Manhattan
waiting for them. He teleports Laurie to Mars with him, and she almost dies over the lack of air,
but Manhattan puts an oxygen bubble around her before showing her his invention, which takes them
on a flight while they argue if humanity is worth saving. Meanwhile Daniel and Rorschach go out
again and at a bar, Rorschach hurts a guy until he provides some information. It turns out Janey
worked for Pyramid and hired Adrian's assassin, so the heroes decide to follow the money. Moments
later they break into Adrian's office and find out that Pyramid is owned by Adrian's company. There
are also many mysterious files about Manhattan. In the meantime, Nixon orders Def Con 1 to send
the bombers. At Adrian's base in Antarctica, a group of scientists toasts to Manhattan's energy
reactor, which is now online. Suddenly everyone begins feeling ill and it's revealed Adrian put
poison in their drinks. After Adrian walks away, the machine activates and disintegrates
all the bodies. In New York, Rorschach records his suspicions in his journal, which he drops off in
the door mailslot of a newspaper. Back on Mars, Laurie pleads for help for Earth, but Manhattan
says that life is overrated, so Laurie tells him to send her back to Earth so she can go down with
her loved ones, saying she isn't afraid. to prove her wrong, Manhattan uses his powers to make her
confront the details of her life that she doesn't want to remember. It's revealed that the Comedian
was Laurie's father, explaining why Sally always kept her away from him and why her parents were
always fighting. This leaves Laurie devastated and she furiously breaks Manhattan's machine.
He protects her from the falling debris with an energy shield and to cheer her up,
he admits he had been wrong. He explains that against unfathomable odds Laurie came from the
coupling of Sally and the Comedian. This should be considered a miracle, and Manhattan had never
believed in miracles until now. Then it's revealed that they are standing in a giant smiley face on
the planet's surface. Rorschach and Daniel fly to Antarctica, where Daniel's flying machine can't
deal with the freezing winds and crash lands. The duo begins hiking in the snow while Adrian watches
them from his security cameras in the company of his mutant cat. Eventually Rorschach and Daniel
manage to sneak in, thinking they have the element of surprise, but Adrian knows they are there and
quickly dodges their attacks. A fight ensues, but it only takes Adrian a few hits to overpower both
his friends. Then Adrian confesses he's behind all the murders, framing Rorschach, and that
machine that is blocking Manhattan's visions of the future. His own assassination attempt had been
an act to avoid suspicion. His plan is to unify the United States and the Soviet Union and prevent
a nuclear war with a global tragedy. By using devices with Manhattan's signature to destroy
various big cities, Adrian knows that the world will think that Manhattan is behind everything
and will unite against him, thereby stopping the impending nuclear war. Rorschach and Daniel
attempt to stop him again, but no matter how many times they try to attack, Adrian always overpowers
them with a few hits and pushes them away. In the end, he confesses he started the destruction 35
minutes earlier, so there's no point in fighting. On TV monitors, they see the machine activate and
one by one all the major cities begin getting destroyed by big balls of energy. Meanwhile
Nixon's war cabinet tells him that the energy signatures are from Doctor Manhattan, not the
Soviets. At that moment Laurie and Manhattan arrive at New York, which has become nothing but
a crater. Manhattan notices that the destruction was customized to make him look guilty, and they
teleport to Antarctica to confront Adrian. Manhattan tries to look for Adrian by walking
through a corridor and the mutated cat stops him, so Adrian uses the chance to activate the machine
and obliterate Manhattan while sacrificing his pet at the same time. Furious, Laurie pulls out a gun
and shoots him. Adrian falls down the stairs but he's only pretending, he actually caught
the bullet with his hand. Suddenly, Manhattan reappears as a huge figure outside and destroys
the ceiling, but Adrian runs away from his fist just in time. Then Manhattan teleports
back inside, so Adrian uses a remote control to switch the televisions to a broadcast of
Nixon blaming Manhattan for the destruction. After Nixon states that the US and Soviets have allied,
Manhattan realizes Adrian's plan is logical and revealing the conspiracy would only break the
peace. Rorschach doesn't want to keep the secret though, and he angrily turns to leave. When
Manhattan tries to confront him, Rorschach takes off his mask and demands that Manhattan kill him.
Manhattan finally obliges, making him blow up with his powers and only leaving a blood stain on the
snow. Afterward Manhattan shares a final kiss with Laurie and departs for another galaxy that is a
little less complicated. A devastated and furious Daniel re-enters the building and attacks Adrian,
telling him that he has deformed mankind, but Adrian takes the blows without emotion. Seeing
it isn't worth it, Daniel and Laurie fly away. Sometime later, Laurie meets with Sally. She
tells her mother that she knows the Comedian was her father, and they make reconcile. Daniel
appears and points out that his machine is ready for new adventures. Meanwhile a reporter looking
for a good story finds Rorschach's journal, which may reveal the whole truth about Adrian's plan.