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"Every week, Mashable presents \u201CLet\u2019s Talk About \u2026,\u201D a Monday-morning look back at the biggest, buzziest WTF moments from the weekend\u2019s most talked-about new movies in wide release. If you haven\u2019t seen the film, be warned: This doesn\u2019t just contain spoilers \u2014 it is spoilers.\nThose \u201CWatcher\u201D rock-monster things were crazy, right?\nWe\u2019d been reading for weeks about the \u201Cgiants\u201D who played a huge part in Noah, Darren Aronofsky\u2019s cinematic vision of the Biblical flood story. But nothing came close to hinting at what they turned out to be.\nSee also: SoCal Earthquake Didn't Damage Much, But 'Noah' Showings Were Extra Freaky\nThat\u2019s largely because they were purposely never revealed, which itself is bizarre enough.\nIn this age of movie studio marketing\u2019s rampant oversharing \u2013 we get first-look set images, character posters, teasers of teaser trailers, featurettes and merchandise photos before ever setting foot in a theater \u2013 Paramount kept a tight lid on the massive, igneous rock-beings.\n(Go ahead, Google-image search \u201CNoah Movie Giants Watchers,\u201D or some combination like it \u2014 you\u2019ll get virtually nothing.)\nParamount was smart to do this. And they\u2019ve got an unexpectedly strong $44 million domestic box-office opening to show for it.\nFor one thing, Aronofsky\u2019s film was already on the hotseat for overuse of creative license; revealing the Watchers, who probably never came up in your Sunday School, would have only thrown gas on that controversy. For another, keeping them shrouded in mystery while that debate raged on only provided an incentive to make it out to the theater.\nBut the Watchers are not nearly as out-of-left-field as they may have seemed.\nThey\u2019re actually mentioned in the Book of Enoch, an ancient Jewish religious text traditionally ascribed to Noah\u2019s great-grandfather. That script, estimated to have been written in multiple stages from 300 B.C. on, never made the Biblical canon, though the authors of the New Testament were surely aware of it.\nThe book tells of the Watchers, fallen angels tasked with watching over men. But there is nothing in the Dead Sea Scrolls texts to suggest the Watchers were bungalow-sized rock formations with multiple, crustacean-like appendages, glowing eyes and gravelly voices. No, those characteristics are unique to Noah, the movie.\nThough the Book of Enoch is unspecific as to their origins, the film presents the Watchers as beings forged of fire, made by \u201CThe Creator\u201D (the film never mentions the word \u201CGod,\u201D for what it\u2019s worth) on the Second Day \u2014 the same day he made the heavens. By Aronofsky\u2019s accounting, they came along well before Adam and Eve.\n\u201CWe were not stone then, but light,\u201D one explains to Noah early in the movie. \u201CRock and mud shadowed our glow.\u201D\nIndeed, we see one of these luminescent figures as it first smashes to Earth. Its fiery form melts the very rock and soil, until it is enveloped in it; the newly formed crust cools, hardens and breaks. What\u2019s left is a jagged, vaguely humanoid creature made of volcanic boulders and interconnected stones (which looks and moves a lot like the rock monster from \"Galaxy Quest,\" in the image above).\nIn Enoch, these creatures became covetous of human women, which caused God to forsake them. In Noah, however, they simply fall out of favor with The Creator and are hunted by wicked men \u2014 only a few dozen still roam the planet, and they are pretty bitter about their lot in life.\nLuckily for Noah, his lineage (he\u2019s from the good side of the Cain/Abel equation) and purpose (to help the Creator cleanse the Earth of man\u2019s wickedness) win them over. That\u2019s a good thing, too, as they become incredibly handy when its\u2019 time to 1) Build an ark the size of a giant airplane hangar in the days before modern logging and construction equipment 2) defend it against a murderous horde hell-bent on getting onboard as the rains finally come.\nIn that battle, the Watchers witness one of their own get speared to death and lo! His phosphorescent innards, released from their stony shell, go shooting to the heavens. Realizing that the Creator has not given up on them at all, but will beam them up upon their death, they begin to sacrifice themselves one by one in the service of seeing Noah\u2019s ship set sail.\nThe Watchers may not even be the weirdest thing about Noah, Biblically speaking. Aronofsky lays on thick themes of free will vs. faith, ultimately positing that the Creator does not decide whether to spare mankind from the Flood \u2013 He leaves that one up to Noah himself. \u201CThere but for the grace of Noah go I,\u201D we might say in the wake of this version of events.\nAnd there are some heavy-handed calls to vegetarianism and environmental austerity measures that distract us from much of the loopy, pseudo-spiritual stuff. So maybe the Watchers should be given a pass here.\nBesides, giant rock-based creatures are becoming old hat at the movies anymore.\nRemember these gems?\n\n\n\nHave something to add to this story? Share it in the comments."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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