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HBO’sWatchmenchanges Vietnam history to correct up a major storyline plait . Here ’s why Saigon looks so unlike in “ An Almost spiritual Awe , ” and what it means for the stopping point ofWatchmenseason 1 .
“ An Almost spiritual Awe ” detail the backwash of Angela Abar ’s ( Regina King ) drug overdose , due to the mass pulmonary tuberculosis of Nostalgia : pills that allow multitude to plunge themselves into the yesteryear by relive memories . o.d. on these pills make the user to forget their identity . While find under the care of drug Almighty Lady Trieu ( Hong Chau ) , the Tulsa police detective known as Sister Night is slow purged of her grandfather ’s painful memories , regain her common sense of self . The treatment caused her to recall traumatic experience from her past in Vietnam .
associate : watcher : Dr. Manhattan Comic Origin & Powers Explained
In tangible life , the Vietnam War ended after the Viet Cong enamor Saigon in 1975 , thus thrust the United States to send troops home , 10 year after the first soldiers arrived . InWatchmen , the Vietnam War stop much differently , and Angela ’s memory not only reinforcewhyshe became a law police officer , but also set up a revelation about the mysteriousDoctor Manhattan .
The opening sequence in “ An Almost Religious Awe ” unwrap that Doctor Manhattan helped America win the Vietnam War , and also that Vietnam became the 51st U.S. State . TheWatchmenepisode opens with documentary footage about Doctor Manhattan ’s defeat of Viet Cong force , with the voiceover recital implying that the superhero , primitively recognize as Jon Osterman , was viewed as both a liberator and a“blue conquerer who decimated an entire way of life . ” In theWatchmenuniverse , Doctor Manhattan presumably relocated to Mars 10 eld after the Vietnam War . In the present day , Tulsa occupier station personal messages to thesuperherothrough technology developed by Trieu Industries .
Young Angela raise up in the 51st American state , Vietnam , inWatchmen . Her memory revealed that on a national holiday recognise as “ VVN Day , ” many Saigon locals celebrate Doctor Manhattan ’s achievement by wearing blue mask and/or racy vesture . In this U.S.-liberated version of Vietnam , Angela ’s mother and founder keep VVN Day and courteously prompt their girl that she ’s not allowed to watch “ Sister Night , " a movie featuring a black character that at long last revolutionise Angela ’s present - day police force image . InWatchmen’s'70s - epoch Vietnam , there ’s a touristry prospect that correlate with substantial - life Hawaii , the United States ’ 50th state , located in the North Pacific Ocean .
Now that Saigon has been liberate inWatchmen’s'70s timeline , it ’s theoretically a pleasant position to live . In this creation , it ’s Doctor Manhattan - not the Vietnam War itself - that ’s viewed as “ a toxic incubus . " InWatchmen , the Vietnam sequences establishwhyAngela chose to become a police military officer : on VVN Day , her parent were killed during a terrorist attack , and she ends up living at the Phu Nhuan Home for fille , an orphanage under the control of a stern Vietnamese woman . When Angela ’s grandma June arrives in the ' 70s timeline , Angela will on the face of it be freed from the source of her excited trauma : her parent ' deaths in U.S.-controlled Saigon . But June dies from a center onslaught not long after her arrival , and life cash in one’s chips on for Angela in Saigon , now an American metropolis that ’s full of opportunities but also bitterness about Doctor Manhattan ’s intervention . Angela learn about dissimilar forms of justness during her old age in Vietnam , and applies those life lessons to her problem in Tulsa .
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In “ An Almost Religious Awe,”Watchmendoubles down with Vietnamese revisionist history through a concluding ironical pull , one that link up Sister Night with Doctor Manhattan , and implies that there ’s much more to be reveal about the moment when Angela first met her succeeding married man , Cal , in Vietnam .
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