Doctor Manhattan (Dr. Jonathan Osterman) is a fictional DC Comics character created by writer Alan Moore and artist Dave Gibbons. He debuted in the limited series graphic novel, Watchmen. The series is noted for addressing metaphysical issues, with Doctor Manhattan being the primary exponent. He is often used as an example of a post-human god. Doctor Manhattan later appeared in the Before Watchmen comic book prequel. In 2016, as part of DC Comics' Rebirth relaunch, Manhattan became a major character in the DC Universe. It was revealed that he was responsible for the Flashpoint event, creating The New 52 timeline/universe in the process, a factor that removed 10 years of DC characters' history. That led him to become one of the main characters in the Doomsday Clock miniseries, published from 2017 to 2019. Doctor Manhattan made his first live-action debut in the 2009 film Watchmen, played by Billy Crudup. He also appeared in the 2019 limited television series Watchmen, played by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II in his original form played by Darrell Snedeger. Publication history Doctor Manhattan was partially based on DC Comics' Captain Atom, who in Moore's original proposal, was surrounded by the shadow of a nuclear threat. However, Moore found he could do more with Manhattan as "a supreme super-hero" than he ever could have done with Captain Atom. Moore sought to delve into nuclear physics and quantum mechanics in constructing the character of Doctor Manhattan. He believed a character living in a quantum universe would not perceive time from a linear perspective, which would influence the character's perception of human affairs. Moore also wanted to avoid creating an emotionless character like Spock from Star Trek, so he allowed Doctor Manhattan to retain "human habits", but eventually grow away from them and humanity in general. Gibbons had created the blue character Rogue Trooper, and reused the blue skin motif for Doctor Manhattan, as it resembles skin tonally, but with a different hue. Moore incorporated color into the story, and Gibbons noted the rest of the comic's color scheme made Manhattan unique. Moore recalled that he was unsure if DC would allow the creators to depict the character as fully nude, which partially influenced how they portrayed the character. Gibbons wanted to tastefully depict Manhattan's nudity, selecting carefully when full frontal shots would occur and giving him "understated" genitals—like a classical sculpture—so the reader would not initially notice it. Dr.