There was a Watchmen screening last night at 7:30 PM. Before getting there early, we picked up our Taco Bell on the way making it an official Blog Outside The Bun event. We weren’t allowed to bring recording devices and we had to turn our phones off, but seriously, Taco Bell made Watchmen that much better.

Even without Taco Bell though, Watchmen was an all around good movie. It did a great job holding true to the source material, and a lot of the imagery translated well from the book to the movie. Some of the sub-plots were lost, but there are nods to them all over the place.

Watchmen as a movie was kind of cool. To a person that has never read the book, the pacing was a little bit slow and story was slightly difficult to follow, but generally, it wasn’t bad. It had a lot of action, it was well directed and the acting was great, but obviously it couldn’t convey everything the book ultimately did.

A surprising but terribly satisfying aspect of the Watchmen movie was that it was gritty. It was dirty, gory, bloody and it portrayed the overall tone of Watchmen perfectly. Bones were broken, plenty of people died and there was oh so very much blood. Anything less than an R rating would never have done this movie justice.

Another important thing to mention is the music featured in the movie. It was all true to the period and a lot of it was alluded to in the book, but at times, it felt like a crazy mashup. The movie has a great soundtrack, but the songs together make for a slightly confusing feel. The music in the movie had trouble translating into something that felt coherent and carefully pieced together.

Among some of the things missing from the movie were the Black Freighter series, Veidt cigarettes, sugar cubes and alien squids. Some of these things make an appearance in the movie, but only if you know what to look for. There’s a Black Freighter poster in place of the Lesbian Rights poster and if you look real close you see a few Knot Tops here and there. The absence of these things take absolutely nothing from the movie, but the addition of them really shows Zack Snyder’s devotion to fans of the series.

As fans of the work, it was easy to tell that Zack Snyder did his best to touch on everything in the book, even if briefly. Fans will notice quite a few nods to the original book that take nothing away from the casual viewer. Watchmen seemed impossible to translate to the big screen, but Zack did a better job than anyone else ever could have.

The Fiesta Taco Salad is probably one of the most underestimated items on the Taco Bell menu. This item seems overlooked because many people refuse “salads” and accuse them of being healthy, bland or all around no good. The Fiesta Taco Salad is an entirely different story. Its a crispy tortilla bowl filled from bottom to top with beans, lettuce, the meat of your choice, sour cream, cheddar cheese and tomatoes. It also comes with salsa and crunchy lime-seasoned tortilla strips on the side.

The most important part of this salad is the edible bowl that holds all of the ingredients. It bears no resemblance to any of Taco Bell’s other shells, which is very important. Rather than a regular a corn bowl, the Fiesta Taco Salad has a flaky, almost buttery bowl. Without the shell, this taco salad would be mediocre at best.

The salsa and flavored tortilla strips make the Fiesta Taco Salad even more unique. The salsa consists of diced onions and tomato chunks and the tortilla strips have just a tinge of lime-flavoring. These both add to the overall flavor without taking away from the other ingredients.

Verdict: Despite being overlooked, the Fiesta Taco Salad is a winning item any day of the week. The flaky bowl and added salsa make this item stand out. The Fiesta Taco Salad is great if you’re looking to change things up a bit.

Ah, the Enchilada. Or is it Enchirito? During our last Taco Bell expedition, we discovered that Enchirito is a not-so-fancy word made up by Taco Bell that means Enchilada. We also learned that the Enchirito (Enchilada) is really a sad excuse for something anyone would actually eat. In theory, its just an open-ended burrito with meat, beans and onions on the inside with red sauce and cheese on the outside. Or, that’s what the picture on Taco Bell’s website would have you believe. The Enchiladas (we tried all four flavors) were just flat, bean-ridden abominations of man. Oh, and did I mention that there’s about a thousand million onions?

The biggest problem with this item is that the flavors of the beans, onions, red sauce and meat are all too sharp. Instead of Fiesta Salsa to add some contrast with tomatoes, they went for onions alone that make the experience much worse. The beef, spicy chicken and steak all have their own juices lending nothing to the tastes already in place. Even the grilled chicken (which we had the most hope for) absolutely fell flat. Without any of its own juices, it was slightly more bearable than the other flavors but still not very pleasant.

Verdict: The Enchirito/Enchilada is really a sad item altogether. The flavors of the meats along with the overpowering taste of the red sauce completely negates any flavor the cheese has and the addition of onions makes it even worse. All in all, this item is mostly a failure. Even if made like on Taco Bell’s website, this item would have a long way to go to be eatable by humans.

The Baja Chalupa is one of the most popular styles of Chalupa that Taco Bell has to offer. Of the many combinations of Chalupa, the Chicken Baja is specifically the most masterful, followed by steak, and finally trailed by beef. The Baja Chalupa contains your choice of meat topped with Baja sauce, shredded lettuce, a three-cheese blend and fiesta salsa, all inside of a fried Chalupa shell.

The Chalupa has a lot going on inside and this complexity makes it a staple of Taco Bell cuisine. The perfect Chalupa has a freshly fried shell with warm chicken, cold lettuce, fiesta salsa and cheese. When you bite in, you get the warmth of the shell and chicken, but the contrasting coolness of the lettuce and cheese, all made better by the lukewarm Baja sauce seeping from the middle. When done correctly, this balance of temperatures makes the Chalupa what it is, but brings to light two major risks when ordering:
1) If you wait too long to eat it, the balance is easily lost
and
2) if the Chalupa is made with cold chicken, warm lettuce or other mediocre ingredients, all is already lost.

Verdict: The Baja Chalupa is one of the major players on the Taco Bell menu and the taste of the perfect Chalupa completely offsets the risks that come along with ordering it.

Ahh, the Meximelt. The Meximelt is like the super soft taco of Taco Bell. It gets along with the side items, but still has connections with the major players of the menu. It bridges the gap between meal items and side-items and always has its place in a balanced Taco Bell experience.

The Meximelt is much like the Soft Taco in many ways, but a few small differences make it something much more. Its a soft taco tortilla filled with the meat of your choice, fiesta salsa and a three-cheese blend, then melted to perfection. The meat is less important to the taste of the Meximelt but beef is the popular choice. Meximelts are normally wrapped in an open-ended burrito fashion with the ingredients stacked on top of one another. Recently I’ve seen a few that were folded over like soft tacos, the way they appear on the website, but its new to me. Steak and chicken are only subbed in if you really don’t want beef, but take away from the value for your money of the item.

Verdict: The Meximelt fits snugly between the side items and meal items. Its an upgraded version of the Soft Taco and adding sour cream brings even more to the table. The Meximelt is worth the value when bought with beef, but not so much when chicken or steak are subbed.

The Crunchy Taco is an important part of a balanced Taco Bell experience, just like french fries, breadsticks or other items that come along with the rest of your meal. The Crunchy Taco is a corn taco filled with beef, shredded lettuce, cheddar cheese and you can add sour cream and diced tomatoes by making it supreme.

The Crunchy Taco is good, but it is important to note that the it is nothing more than a side item. You eat Crunchy Tacos with the rest of your meal. You eat crunchy tacos between Chalupas, Gorditas and Meximelts. Crunchy Tacos are not meals in themselves, no matter how many you eat, despite what Taco Bell might lead you to believe. The Crunchy Taco is a gateway food, leading you to try other taco-shaped items, but shouldn’t really be considered anything else.

Verdict: The Crunchy Taco is a construction of the basic ingredients in many Taco Bell menu items. Its as simple as it gets without omitting anything important, but it is by no means a meal.

When made correctly, the Nachos Bellgrande is the pinnacle of nacho achievement. It consists of Taco Bell’s signature tortilla chips, a layer of beans, the meat of your choice, nacho cheese, diced tomatoes and a dollop of sour cream.

In this case, the choice of the meat is very important. The beef is an okay choice, but the juice of the beef alongside the nacho cheese it is sometimes a little bit too acidic. The steak is slightly less acidic, but only because it carries with it just a little less juice than the beef. This is a good example of a time in which the dryness of the chicken is an upside. The flavor of the chicken plays well with the taste of the nacho cheese and sour cream and does nothing to hurt the beans and tomatoes in the process.

Verdict: The Nachos Bellgrande is well worth the value but you have to exercise caution; It can be filling, but with such a shallow range of tastes, it shouldn’t be your first choice. Its good for munching, that is, if you’re only going to Taco Bell to munch (but really, who does that?). If you really want the taste of the Nachos Bellgrande but still want the variety of other items, go for the slightly smaller (and cheaper) Nachos Supreme.