Watchmen: The Ultimate Cut 4K Blu-ray Review & Comments

I have the Director's Cut of the 2009 1080p Blu-ray, which is one of my favourites. It might be useful hear to see a summary of the AVForums review of it from 2009, and another 2009 review on Hi-Def Digest is also worth revisiting. Reading the review of this new Ultimate Cut 4K disc, I'm not sure that it is sufficiently better than the Director's Cut from 2009 to make me buy it..
It depends on if you already got the Director's Cut or not as if not that cut is also in the Ultimate Cut case.

Some differences in the cuts from IMDB
In Thailand the genitals of Dr Manhattan are masked and where Rorschach attack with an ax the victim's head is heavily blurred.
A "Director's Cut" brings the film from its theatrical 162 minutes, to 186 minutes. Scenes include expanded action sequences, and additional exposition.
The "Ultimate Cut" brings the film from its theatrical 162 minutes, to a whopping 215 minutes. Scenes include the expanded action sequences and additional exposition from the director's cut, even more exposition segments, and additionally interweaves the animated Black Freighter short into the story to mimic its role as the story within the story in the graphic novel.
The Director's Cut is 20 minutes longer than the Theatrical Version. Differences:
  • While Rorschach is in The Comedian's apartment, two uninformed cops enter to investigate noises.
 
It depends on if you already got the Director's Cut or not as if not that cut is also in the Ultimate Cut case.

But I had begun my post #25 with: "I have the Director's Cut of the 2009 1080p Blu-ray ". Thanks for the differences that you give in the spoller alert. I think I'll stick with my 2009 Director's Cut though, it continues to look and sound very good.
 
I've just watched the iTunes version and enjoyed the movie but found the quality quite poor. I have 100mb fibre but watched via wifi connection but will re-try with a direct connection.

Not sure how to describe the pq but it seemed to 'fizz/sparkle' quite a lot on the background colours and even on faces when they filled most of the screen
 
I have the American 4K disc and I can honestly say I didn't like the presentation at all (though I do like the film a lot). Thanks for the in-depth look at the picture side of things in this review, Cas. Sounds like it's definitely an upgrade. I will think about it. :D
 
I think it’s quite easy to work out the merits (or otherwise) of the different versions of Watchmen.

The Theatrical Cut, avoid, it’s pointless.

The Directors Cut, well worth watching if you are not familiar with the graphic novel or are familiar with the graphic novel, but don’t like the ‘story within a story’ concept.

The Ultimate Cut is the definitive version for fans of the graphic novel.

I have the USA version of the UHD but find it a pretty mediocre “upgrade” over the Blu-Ray. In some places, it’s actually worse than the Blu-Ray. I may get the new UHD version if I’m persuaded that it’s sufficiently improved, but I’m dubious that will happen.
 
I think it’s quite easy to work out the merits (or otherwise) of the different versions of Watchmen.

The Theatrical Cut, avoid, it’s pointless.

The Directors Cut, well worth watching if you are not familiar with the graphic novel or are familiar with the graphic novel, but don’t like the ‘story within a story’ concept.

The Ultimate Cut is the definitive version for fans of the graphic novel.

I have the USA version of the UHD but find it a pretty mediocre “upgrade” over the Blu-Ray. In some places, it’s actually worse than the Blu-Ray. I may get the new UHD version if I’m persuaded that it’s sufficiently improved, but I’m dubious that will happen.
That's it for me too. I have the US version of the 4K and would need to see them side-by-side to decide if it's worth it. Amazon order and return if unhappy, maybe? Hmm.
 
yeah ill be watching via a 65" oled and a q90 soundbar (its the all singing all dancing 7.1.4 atmos samsung jobby) so it should sound pretty decent. Wife out tomorrow afternoon so might slip it on then with a cheeky afternoon beer :D

Cool, that's good then, I'm watching it on an LG 65" OLED B8 so hopefully be good to hear your thoughts on the image quality then, tonight will be my third and final night of trying to get through it although i did start it far to late on the first night to have any hope of a chance of doing it over 2!
 
Cool, that's good then, I'm watching it on an LG 65" OLED B8 so hopefully be good to hear your thoughts on the image quality then, tonight will be my third and final night of trying to get through it although i did start it far to late on the first night to have any hope of a chance of doing it over 2!

Ha - exactly the same TV
 
Dora or Dong - hard choice.
 
It would be good to hear from anyone who has had the opportunity to compare US and UK releases as to whether they feel the DV on the UK version does enough to warrant the additional purchase.
 
Finished this on Saturday night did not think the cartoon story added anything to it apart from the length time could have done with that as an extra and did see the ending of the story anyway.
I wonder if they got some of the idea for the comic from that episode of The Outer Limits that there showing on TV which is one of my top favorites from the series.

An adult superhero film very good but on the long side.


 
I got this for Christmas and just watched a bit. I have to say the disc is really disappointing, it’s the first UHD I have watched where I literally can see no difference at all compared to the standard Blu-ray. In fact it looks much the same as the 10 year old director’s cut disc, if not marginally worse with a slightly elevated black level.

While I think this is a hugely flawed movie (especially in light of the far superior recent TV show), I do still like it and was hoping for a significant step up from the old disc. I wasn’t expecting a super clean pristine image, but it’s very soft and adds no visible detail at all, the muted colours don’t benefit at from the HDR pass, and no upgrade at all to the audio (the old disc has DTS-MA, so arguably better). Last night we watched Leon on UHD and that‘s a grainy, relatively low budget movie, but it still looked incredible with grain intact, bags of detail, vibrant HDR, and sounded excellent with an Atmos track. I don’t have the Ultimate cut on any other format, so that’s something, at least.

I can’t agree with the “Unmissable” award though, I would say a marginal recommend at best, and only if you don’t own it already or really want to see the extended version.
 
I got this for Christmas and just watched a bit. I have to say the disc is really disappointing, it’s the first UHD I have watched where I literally can see no difference at all compared to the standard Blu-ray. In fact it looks much the same as the 10 year old director’s cut disc, if not marginally worse with a slightly elevated black level.

While I think this is a hugely flawed movie (especially in light of the far superior recent TV show), I do still like it and was hoping for a significant step up from the old disc. I wasn’t expecting a super clean pristine image, but it’s very soft and adds no visible detail at all, the muted colours don’t benefit at from the HDR pass, and no upgrade at all to the audio (the old disc has DTS-MA, so arguably better). Last night we watched Leon on UHD and that‘s a grainy, relatively low budget movie, but it still looked incredible with grain intact, bags of detail, vibrant HDR, and sounded excellent with an Atmos track. I don’t have the Ultimate cut on any other format, so that’s something, at least.

I can’t agree with the “Unmissable” award though, I would say a marginal recommend at best, and only if you don’t own it already or really want to see the extended version.

Agree with the chap above here, i just caught Watchman over the weekend and couldnt believe it was '4k'.

It looked decent, but...it didn't look 4k...
 
Agree with the chap above here, i just caught Watchman over the weekend and couldnt believe it was '4k'.

It looked decent, but...it didn't look 4k...

One of these images is a zoom from the 4K UHD, one is from the 2009 Blu-ray. Try to guess which is which. UHD Blu-rays have been on sale for nearly 4 years now - discs like this should not be shipping at this stage.

watchmen_compare.jpg


Believe it or not, the bottom image is from the UHD!
 
This was never going to look 4k. It had a 2k DI so was always going to be an upscale at best. but i don't think it's even that - these usually bring some improvements in resolution. my gut instinct tells me they took the 1080p file they used for the blu-ray and did an HDR pass and that's it.
 
This was never going to look 4k. It had a 2k DI so was always going to be an upscale at best. but i don't think it's even that - these usually bring some improvements in resolution. my gut instinct tells me they took the 1080p file they used for the blu-ray and did an HDR pass and that's it.
The 1080p file is 2K.
 
But don't 2k DIs typically have slightly higher resolution (horizontally) ? in which case, it can't be exactly the same file as the blu-ray.
I don't proclaim to be an expert, but i can say with confidence it's definitely not native 4k - so that would certainly explain the lack of resolution upgrade.
 
But don't 2k DIs typically have slightly higher resolution (horizontally) ? in which case, it can't be exactly the same file as the blu-ray.
I don't proclaim to be an expert, but i can say with confidence it's definitely not native 4k - so that would certainly explain the lack of resolution upgrade.
Around 6% larger in horizontal resolution and also file size which is fairly insignificant.
 
So where was the maximum movie mode on the standard bluray directors cut?
It doesn't seem to be on there.
Glad I kept the US Bluray from way back when it was first released.
Its only on the US blu's and not the UK.
 
Thank you
And strangely enough, the UK blu has very slightly better PQ compared to the US. Conversely, the US 4K disc has a tiny bit better PQ than the UK 4K disc apparently.
 
From eagle eyed member pyoko at BD forums:

So I got curious about the different look of the international Paramount UHD release and decided to acquire it for some analysis. My hunch was correct in that the color difference between the Paramount and WB UHDs happens to be exactly that of a Rec2020<->DCI-P3 conversion. This means the likelihood that one or the other is faulty about 99.99%, instead of it being due to any creative differences.

The Paramount UHD has the wrong colors and is oversaturated due to an incorrect or missing color conversion somewhere, perhaps the grade was exported as a DCI-P3 master and then erroneously treated as if it were Rec2020 during authoring. A shame because the Dolby Vision does help the HDR somewhat, and although I'm not a fan of the retooled HDR grade in the first place, the Paramount error doesn't help, making skintones overly ruddy and grossly oversaturated in the low tones.


Personally, I like the UK 4K irrespective of this. Same applies to Braveheart which has a similar error.
Ultimately it's down to personal preference.
 

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