Watchmen y psicoanálisis. Doomsday clock, and then…

Abstract

Through the study of Watchmen in its 3 formats: comic, film and series, a dialogue with psychoanalysis is proposed, in order to extract readings that allow us to think about the time, characterized by the threat of cataclysms and large-scale war conflicts, in the framework of a generalized pandemic with its consequent impact on the population. The fantasy of the end of the world, present in Watchmen, is sustained by a common, trans-historical denominator: the object of jouissance, singular for each subject and, therefore, inseparable from his own history. On the one hand, the segregative effects to which the object as a kakón can lead are considered. On the other hand, it is evident how the series moves the bowels of the reactive field to which post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) has been circumscribed. As a counterpart, two key concepts are placed in view of the loss of the object: of satisfaction, in the trauma in its two times, and of love, in the duel, which will allow us to return to a reading of the epoch, when it became, not only as an impact, but mainly as an effect of the unique narratives of people’s lives.