![]() When we’re first introduced to Laurie in the comic books, she goes by Laurie Juspeczyk. In 1986, Watchmen skewered the way we love superheroes. HBO’s take isn’t a straightforward sequel and is set 33 years after the comic book, but it’s clear that the comic’s events happened and have ramifications in this world - albeit with varying degrees of irreverence. What Petey is obliquely referring to, in a meta way, is Laurie’s adventures in the Watchmen graphic novel. He tells her, point blank, on their way into the city about how much he knows of her involvement with the storied events of 1986 and what happened with Rorschach to make him such a symbol for white supremacy. Though we do get a hint about her past, pre-FBI life from Agent Petey, the fanboyish FBI agent who is quickly promoted from the kid manning the projector to the backup that accompanies Laurie to Tulsa. ![]() Jean Smart as Laurie Blake in Watchmen HBOīut we don’t know exactly who Laurie is or how this woman became such a force when we first meet her. With how easily she dispatches vigilantes (it’s her day job, after all), Laurie’s confident arrival is like a storm rolling into Oklahoma. Joe Keene (James Wolk), she and the FBI are called into Tulsa to investigate whether or not a vigilante is responsible for killing Police Chief Judd Crawford. When we first meet Laurie in the episode, she’s calmly staging a sting at a bank to catch a law-breaking vigilante. While there’s true delight in watching Laurie chew men up and spit them out, there’s also a secondary layer of pleasure in watching a character that Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons created in Watchmen find a new life onscreen. She takes no prisoners, has no time for nonsense, and, in one fell swoop, puts the entire Tulsa police force on edge. Smart’s Laurie Blake, a sharp-shooting FBI agent, is called into Tulsa from DC to investigate the death of Judd Crawford and figure out if it was the work of a vigilante. Laurie even manages to make us almost forget about the big question from the end of episode two: Who or what took Will into the sky? In her first appearance on the show, Laurie (played by Jean Smart, whose swath of TV credits range from Fargo to Frasier) somehow manages to upstage all matter of exciting events: main protagonist Angela (Regina King), saving 20 or so people from a suicide bomber at a funeral the reveal that Jeremy Irons’s mystery character is Adrian Veidt and the gnawing mystery of whether Will (Louis Gossett Jr.) killed Police Chief Judd Crawford (Don Johnson). ![]() The third episode of Watchmen belongs to Laurie Blake. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |