Was it ever explained in the comic book series why Rorschach investigated Edward Blake’s murder?
If I recall correctly, he didn’t know Blake was the Comedian until he found it out during the course of his investigation. So he went to the crime scene thinking Blake was just a regular guy who had been murdered in his apartment.
NYC in the Watchmen universe presumably had lots of murders happening every week. (Historically, NYC averaged around six murders a day in 1985.) Rorschach couldn’t have been investigating all of them. Was it explaining what drew him to this particular crime scene?
Or were we supposed to infer that it was just another random coincidence in the chain of events that led to the story’s climax?
Spoilers below…
Yes, I’d say mostly coincidence. On the very first page he is seen walking by the murder scene, uncostumed, carrying his “End is Nigh” sign. He nearly steps on the Comedian’s badge lying in the gutter. A couple pages later he is still in the area, and walks past the two detectives who are investigating the murder, just as they happen to be discussing Rorschach himself. (The last panel on p.4 is a pretty blatant hint as to his identity, which of course I didn’t notice the first time I read it.) Obviously he was interested in this case by this point, and that night he breaks into the apartment and finds the Comedian’s hidden gear.
So basically he already suspected that Blake was the Comedian before he went up to the crime scene. And that suspicion was what caused him to take an interest in the case.
So did he investigate every routine homicide that happened in New York City each day? Or just a random sampling and it was a coincidence that he discovered this one involved other masked vigilantes?
Blake’s death was peculiar (as Rorschach comments while investigating), so even without knowing his identity, it would have gotten his attention…though it was mostly coincidence that he heard about it.
Yeah, that was definitely my impression. Edward Blake was tossed out of a luxury high-rise window. Even in Watchmen’s mildly dystopian 1985 New York, defenestration is probably a pretty unusual method of murder. It probably would have made the local news, and if Rorschach was monitoring a police scanner, it would have stood out, so it was probably just the crime that was on the top of his pile that day. Then he found the smiley-face button…
Blake’s civilian identity, IIRC, included being a US diplomat, which gave him an excuse to get into other countries to do covert stuff in his Comedian persona. So this wouldn’t have been just a “random homicide” even before Blake’s costumed past was discovered: someone broke into the home of a US official and murdered him in a pretty dramatic fashion, which would probably be enough on its own to attract Rorscach’s attention.
Also, the cops have no leads, right? They figure it may have been a guy on some serious drugs, and then they conclude that it must’ve been multiple assailants, and then, uh, that’s it; no eyewitnesses describing the men they saw fleeing the scene, nobody who got the license plate of a car that zoomed off — there’s a big fine list of things they don’t got this time. So maybe the idea is, if a robbery or whatever turns into a homicide and the cops have a lead, then Rorschach is the kind of guy who says, yeah, they’re working on that; the defenestration story, not so much.
Given Rorschach’s opinions on things, he’s not going to investigate some murders at all (anyone who Rorschach thinks of as less-than-human can get murdered at will as far as he’s concerned). A diplomat in a penthouse getting killed? That qualifies as the kind of thing that Rorschach considers worth looking into - not urgent (it is “routine”) but involving someone he considers “people.”
I would say the opposite. Rorschach took a very personal view of crime. It was based on his own history of being the subject of abuse as a child. He fought crime where the criminal reminded him of one of his abusers or where the victim reminded him of himself. And he wanted to fight the kind of crime that he could punch in the face.
Blake’s murder didn’t fit that scenario. There was no obvious suspect for him to identify much less beat up. And Edward Blake, on the surface, had nothing to make Rorschach feel a connection with him. He was a wealthy and powerful man who was murdered in his penthouse; not a situation Rorschach would have identified with. The only connection Rorschach would have felt was after learning that Blake was another masked crime fighter. But he appears to have learned that connection existed after he had already decided to investigate the case.
I’m not sure. We know that Rorschach, after learning that Blake was the Comedian, numbers him among the “men who died in their country’s service.” We know that Blake, as the Comedian, served in the field with the military; what do we actually know about Blake as, uh, Blake? What would it say, in his secret-identity obituary, about whether the guy was a decorated veteran before he became a diplomat?
I agree with some of this. Rorschach certainly wanted crime he could punch in the face. He hated child murderers - but everyone does. He fought gangsters, too, who may have represented something personal to him. But his idea of himself was distorted, so his idea of protecting people like himself was also distorted. He saw people like Blake (rich, diplomat) as good guys, not as the kind of jerks who abused women like his mother. And he though of everyone at the working class bar as a criminal who could be tortured for information - not as people much like him.
Also, as far as I can tell (a) he also thought pretty highly of President Truman; and (b) the closest thing he has to a good friend is — a rich guy who went to Harvard?
I always got the impression that it really *was *a place where a lot of criminals hung out. I mean, that’s where he found the guy who hired Roy Chess. And everyone in the barknew who the guy was. And the guy that killed Hollis was also there.
Thanks. I guess it’s been too long since I’ve read it.
Rorshach does fantasize about his father being an aide to Truman, though, right? So worrying about the murder of diplomat Blake might reflect a desire to avenge a father figure.