Watchmen: Chapter V - page 20

PAGE 20

Panel 1:  in which the doomed sailor from the “Black Freighter” comic makes the comment that, “hades is wet.  Hades is lonely,” echoing Dan’s own “hell” comments.

Also, the pages transition visually from Dan lying in bed on his stomach to the image of one of the corpses floating the raft in a similar position.

Panel 6:  Note that the shark received the splinter of the mast in its right eye, which is blood-spattered, echoing the blood splatter on the Comedian’s smiley face button over its right eye.

Also, it should be noted that the sailor is clutching to his raft in a pose very similar to that of Dan as he lay in bed in the final panel of the previous page.  However, in this panel, the sailor is positioned in a mirror image of Dan – reinforcing the reflection/symmetry theme of this chapter.  Also, if these two images were put side by side, with Dan on the right and the sailor on the left, it would form Rorschach’s signature.

The final caption box:  “I hung on desperately, cursing in the bitter stinging spray” is another transition into the next page.