Watchmen Adds a Sinister New Twist to Ozymandias’ Storyline

HBO’s Watchmen is nearing its halfway point this week, but many of the series’ mysteries are only getting more bizarre and unpredictable. One of the most buzzed-about elements of the series has arguably been the storyline of Adrian Veidt/Ozymandias (Jeremy Irons), who has left the public eye and become a lord of some sort of country estate. It’s been clear that Veidt’s current situation has some weird elements around it — and this week’s installment made things even darker. Spoilers for this week’s episode of Watchmen, “If You Don’t Like My Story, Write Your Own” below! Only look if you want to know!

This week’s Veidt interlude opened on him fishing in a lake on his estate, and catching two humanoid-like babies. He took the babies to a steampunk-looking device, and began to play some music as the device did its magic. Once the device was done, the latest clones of Ms. Crookshanks (Sara Vickers) and Mr. Phillips (Tom Mison) arrived.

Veidt began to monologue to Crookshanks and Phillips, remarking that they wouldn’t be able to speak for several hours more. He told them that he was their master, but not their maker, because he would not have ever thought to bring something like them into the world. He then got them dressed and ready for work, and led them into the dining room — where a slew of massacred Crookshanks and Phillips clones were strewn throughout. Veidt apologized for the display and remarked that he had gotten “angry” at the other clones the night before.

Later on, Veidt had the new Crookshanks and Phillips make use of the dead clones, by loading them one-by-one into a giant catapult. On Veidt’s command, the catapult would be launched, plunging a Phillips clone into whatever abyss was beyond them. During this whole process, Veidt revealed that he had been trapped in his current predicament for four years and that it had gone from a paradise to a nightmare that he wanted to escape.

This adds a dark and rather confusing layer to the Veidt arc thus far, especially when juxtaposed against other details from the episode. Namely, there’s the introduction of Lady Trieu (Hong Chau), a trillionaire businesswoman who, according to “Peteypedia”, bought out Veidt’s company in 2012 and began to operate it in 2017. Even prior to Trieu’s debut, some had speculated that she could have a closer tie to Veidt’s current whereabouts than we’re currently led to believe. The fact that Veidt wasn’t officially declared dead until September of 2019 – and that a Trieu spokesperson cited he died by “unknown causes” – could certainly support the theory that Trieu is behind Veidt’s current condition.

There’s also the nature of the clones, which bring to mind another scene involving Trieu earlier in the episode. In the opening scene, Trieu attempts to buy out a farm from a couple in Oklahoma, and uses the fact that they weren’t able to conceive a baby to help convince them. Trieu provides the couple with a newborn baby made of their genetic material, but never dives into exactly how that baby was produced to begin with. It certainly doesn’t seem impossible that Trieu Industries could be dealing with cloning — and providing Veidt with a neverending array of clones to use as his house staff.

Watchmen airs Sundays at 9/8c on HBO.