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The Wednesday Webcomic: The Abominable Charles Christopher
(Webcomics are, to be honest, completely awesome. Produced purely out of love (and occasionally going on to acclaim and publication), they’re comics unfettered from the restraints of the commercial market. There’s a massive variety of comics on the web – and so, in the spirit of exploration, I’ll be doing a relatively regular showcase every Wednesday of stuff you should be reading – webcomics that are fun, experimental, adventurous, or just plain insane. And if you have any recommendations of webcomics you’d like to see highlighted, please let me know in the comments below…)
We start off with one of the best out there – The Abominable Charles Christopher. The work of writer/artist Karl Kerschel, this is a weird, sprawling and wonderful epic that’s part magical fantasy, part environmental fable, part tragedy, and part comedy. The closest comparison I can get is if you imagine a cross between a Looney Tunes cartoon and a Hayao Miyazaki film, but even that doesn’t quite capture the mixture of poignancy and playfulness that Kerschel gets away with here. It’s the story of a silent, often confused and yet difficult-to-stop abominable snowman named Charles Christopher, and what happens to him when he wanders into a magical realm full of talking animals – and fans of Jeff Smith’s epic comic book series Bone should absolutely check this out. While there’s a main overarching plot going on throughout The Abominable Charles Christopher, there’s also room for the kind of four-panel charm, oddity and humour that you’d normally find in a really well-crafted newspaper cartoon, but if you do get involved in the story, be prepared to weep bucketloads as well – when this comic goes tragic, it really doesn’t mess around. Running since 2007, Kerschel has done a pretty good job of keeping this updated with a new page every wednesday – there’s a lot of story for you to read, and you can catch up on the wonderfulness of The Abominable Charles Christopher right from the start by clicking here.
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Movie Review: Immortals (2011)
Cast: Henry Cavill, Mickey Rourke, Stephen Dorff, Freida Pinto, Luke Evans ~ Writers: Charley Parlapanides, Vlas Parlapanides ~ Director: Tarsem Singh
[xrr rating=3/5]Reviewer: Saxon Bullock (aka @saxonb)
The Low-Down: A ridiculously stylised and deeply demented flipside to last year’s Clash of the Titans, Immortals is a barmy mix of mythology, action and borderline insane costume design that packs in some unexpected pleasures for those willing to go along with such a seriously kooky approach.
What’s it About?: Thousands of years ago in ancient Greece, a conflict took place between two warring groups of immortal beings. The defeated, named the Titans, were imprisoned beneath Mount Tartarus, while the victors, naming themselves ‘Gods’, now rule over the world but are forbidden to interfere in the fate of mankind. However, the Heraclian king Hyperion (Rourke) is on a vengeful quest to bring down the Gods, and the only man able to stop him may be humble peasant Theseus (Cavill)…
The Story: (A brief note – Immortals was shot in native 3-D, but as I’ve recently been having major problems watching 3-D movies (and prefer not to get headaches and eye-strain at the cinema), the 2-D version is the one under review.)
For someone who’s only notched up three directorial credits so far, Tarsem Singh is ending up as a seriously divisive filmmaker. Right from his movie debut, the 2000 serial killer thriller The Cell, he’s showcased a deliberately sumptuous, lush and in-your-face approach to visuals, costume design and filmmaking technique that there’s absolutely no middle ground on – you either get swept along by his almost theatrical approach to visualising fantastic sequences on film, or you find his whole ethos deeply annoying and ludicrous in the extreme. Now, eleven years later (and with his only other movie inbetween being the quirkily weird and beautiful low-budget drama The Fall, which Singh mostly self-financed with his lucrative work in the commercials sector), he’s made a return to big budget filmmaking, and there’s absolutely no sign of him backing away from his idiosyncratic visual stylings – in fact, Immortals takes the lush insanity of the fantasy sequences in The Cell and The Fall and pushes it even further than before.
The result is a mythological actioner that basically functions as a style-over-substance fever dream, a lush and barmy journey into a world where normal rules of cinematic reality don’t apply. Anyone going into Immortals expecting a 300-style tale of throbbing manliness is largely going to be disappointed – while Henry Cavill looks admirably heroic with his shirt off and there are a selection of very well-realised traditional combat sequences, the limb-lopping, bone-crunching violence is more influenced by Park Chan-Wook’s Oldboy than Snyder’s testosterone-soaked opus. Added to which, with its approach to mythology, Immortals frequently plays like a creature-free, gory version of a 1960s Ray Harryhausen adventure, tackling its story of gods and men with an admirably po-faced level of seriousness. Indeed, it’s hard to think of a fantasy actioner that’s been this deliberately portentious and stony-faced since John Milius’s Nietzche-influenced take on Conan the Barbarian, and the melange of accents and acting styles, along with the truly bizarre approach to costumes and visuals (with the strongest visual reference being 16th Century painter Caravaggio), all gives the film a wonderfully rich and exotic sense of mythic oddness.This bizarre blend also includes the approach to the story, and while Singh has an amazing eye for visuals, with Immortals embracing even more than 300 the idea of making greenscreen movies deliberately artificial, the story doesn’t always hang together. Weirdly enough, at various points the movie is both a remix of Greek myth and a ‘realistic interpretation’ – we get intertitles informing us of specific dates and locations, and Theseus’s showdown with the bull-helmeted ‘Beast’ soldier is obviously meant to be the beginning of the legend of the Minotaur, and yet the film also plays the mythology as completely real. This is absolutely a film that’s at least attempting to tackle what it means when Gods mess about with human lives, but it’s only fitfully successful in doing this, while also showing a weird habit of building up strong conflicts only to either abandon or forget about them.
Lysander (Joseph Morgan), the traitorous soldier who sells out Theseus’s village (and is also the victim of one of the more memorable and eye-watering moments of baroque violence) is built up throughout as a relatively important character, only to be abruptly dispatched with little ceremony in the climax, while oracle Phaedra (Slumdog Millionaire’s Freida Pinto) is given a potentially major problem – she’ll lose her powers of prophecy if she loses her virginity – but then hops into bed with Theseus halfway through the story and spends the rest of the film as window dressing. The story of Theseus really boils down to a fairly predictable hero’s journey, as he’s maneuvered into place by fate, destiny and the actions of the Gods, and the film never quite comes to grips with one of the biggest features and problems of Greek myths – keeping dramatic tension going when, at any moment, powerful deities can turn up and deliver stunningly realised ultraviolence at the drop of a hat.
Of course, in a film that features more than its fair share of exotic, eccentric and downright insane costume choices (particularly Hyperion’s natty giant lobster-claw hat), the weirdest and probably most divisive choices are kept for the Gods themselves. Presented as fey, ludicrously beautiful fashion models swanning around Mount Olympus in massive gold cloaks and headgear that boggles the mind (especially Apollo and his spiked-mohican helmet), they’re a gigantic distance from the usual portrayal of Greek gods – and yet, it’s almost as if they’re a deliberate litmus test, that Singh is pushing his love of operatic theatricality as far as it will go and challenging the audience to keep up, making the Gods seem exotic, weird and oddly inhuman in a way that doesn’t involve using CG (a device he only really uses to transform landscapes and create insanely over-the-top violence). It’s a stylistic choice that manages to be utterly ridiculous and yet weirdly effective and powerful at the same time, especially in the final battle, where the Gods are finally pitched against the bestial, dog-like Titans, and suddenly those perfect bodies are being subjected to all kinds of blood-soaked gory violence.Immortals isn’t a film to look to for a traditional, expected version of Greek mythology, and what it tries to say is somewhat muddled by Singh’s sheer determination to make everything subservient to the wonderfully weird visual atmosphere he’s building. The performances vary wildly, with Rourke and Cavill feeling like they’re in different films, although Cavil does acquit himself well – aside from a woeful rousing pre-battle speech – and shows enough screen presence to make him an intriguing choice for the upcoming new Superman film. Rourke’s natural sense of mumbling menace is occasionally effective, although it’s hard not to think Hyperion would have been an even more effective villain with half as many scenes, and his climactic fight with Theseus seems to go on for at least five minutes too long before his absurdly protracted death.
But ultimately, this isn’t an actor’s film – it’s a fantasy romp and a visual feast that’s so deliberately off-the-wall that for some, the emphasis on surreally theatrical eye candy is either going to be too much or boring in the extreme. Once again, there’s no middle ground on Singh’s sword-and-sandals epic, and yet while 300 is undoubtedly more focussed and direct, Immortals is weirder, more textured, less grotesquely right-wing, and ultimately a hell of a lot more interesting. Tarsem Singh may have a genuinely great film in him somewhere (although, from the looks of the recently released trailer, it certainly isn’t his next project, the dreadful-looking fairy tale comedy Mirror, Mirror), or he may be destined to remain a filmmaker who dazzles the eyes while never quite mastering the art of balancing the style with substance. However, for the moment, he’s made a fantasy action adventure that’s nuttier and more visually bizarre than anything else on the market, and with most Hollywood blockbusters going out of their way to be as bland and homogenous as possible, that’s at least something to be applauded.The Verdict: The best example of visual style balancing out muddy storytelling since Tron: Legacy, Immortals is undoubtedly a brutal, eccentric and frequently ridiculous movie – and yet, there’s something about its single-minded determination to deliver visual weirdness that’s ultimately quite beguilling. A mess, but a visually stunning and weirdly compelling mess all the same.
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Movie Trailer – The Hunger Games (2012)
If you haven’t heard of The Hunger Games yet, treasure that feeling – it’s unlikely to last very long. With the Harry Potter series having come to an end, and the death-rattle of the Twilight Saga already beginning with the release of Part 1 of Breaking Dawn, Hollywood is desperate to generate another hugely popular multi-volume teen franchise. Given the excitement that already exists around teen dystopia series The Hunger Games (and its two sequels), the upcoming movie adaptation isn’t much of a surprise, and anyone following movie news websites for the last twelve months will have been deluged by reports and rumours about casting of the various characters, making it pretty certain that even if The Hunger Games isn’t the next Twilight (in terms of impact), it’s going to be pretty damn close.
Now, the first trailer is out for the movie adaptation, directed by Gary Ross (who hasn’t directed a film for nearly nine years (horseriding drama Seabiscuit in 2003), although he’s had a major reputation as a screenwriter ever since 1986’s Big)… and I’m actually kind of impressed. The story of teenagers chosen by the government to compete in a fight to the death, it’s essentially a teen-centric fusion of The Running Man and Battle Royale, and there’s certainly a healthy dose of kookiness in the costume design and general appearance of The Hunger Games’s future world (especially in the wonderfully eccentric names – with everything from Peeta Mellark to Haymitch Abernathy). The trailer certainly isn’t without its cheesy moments, but the casting looks pretty strong – especially Jennifer Lawrence, who was exceptional in the drama Winter’s Bone and did a wonderful job as a youthful Mystique in this summer’s X-Men: First Class – and the restless, hand-held visual style actually looks like it’s going to give the film a healthy amount of edge. The fact that it’s aiming at the Twilight-related market means there’s going to be a number of people lining up to rip the hell out of The Hunger Games at the first opportunity, but I’m now genuinely interested to see how it turns out. The only question is – do I read the books first to see how it measures up, or leave myself unspoiled? Only time will tell…
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Intermission: We Apologise for the Delay…
Hello.
Just a brief heads-up to say that while things are extremely quiet on Schizopolitan at the moment, they haven’t completely gone away. After a ridiculously busy September, I’ve had to go into ‘Silent Running’ mode for October in order to finish a novel that I’m working on. I’m hoping to have some more content up here soon. For now, Schizopolitan is on hiatus – I just wanted to say thanks for stopping by, and do feel free to check back. Enjoy…
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Comics Review: The DC New 52, Week 5 – All-Star Western, Aquaman, Batman: The Dark Knight, Blackhawks, The Flash, The Fury of Firestorm, Green Lantern: New Guardians, I, Vampire, Justice League Dark, The Savage Hawkman, Superman, Teen Titans, Voodoo
Reviewer: Saxon Bullock (aka @saxonb)
ALL-STAR WESTERN issue 1
Writer: Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray ~ Artist: Moritat ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=4/5]
One of the steadiest, quietest comics successes of the last few years was Jonah Hex which – unlike the terrible movie adaptation – was genuinely good, serving up monthly western tales that were largely self-contained, illustrated by a rotating guest list of artists, and all of which starred the titular horribly scarred bounty hunter. Now, in the post DC relaunch world, the Jonah Hex writing team of Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray have been moved over to the slightly more DC-centric All-Star Western, where it looks like Jonah Hex will be directly encountering elements of the DC history in the late 1800s. Here, Hex visits Gotham and ends up investigating a serial killer with the aid of psychologist Amadeus Arkham (eventual founder of the Asylum, and a character from Grant Morrison and Dave McKean’s experimental Batman tale Arkham Asylum), and we’re soon neck deep in a gritty investigative thriller that pulls off a healthy number of twists. Palmiotti and Gray are one of the most reliable comics-writing teams out there, and with the distinctive, gorgeous art of Moritat giving the story an extra dose of scratchy elegance and life, this is certainly an intriguing start. I doubt it’ll sell spectacularly, but hopefully the New 52 can continue to support this kind of storytelling.
AQUAMAN issue 1
Writer: Geoff Johns~ Artist: Ivan Reis and Joe Prado ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=4/5]
He’s never been anywhere close to being the coolest superhero on the block (a fact this issue goes out of its way to acknowledge, arguably a little too much), but this debut issue from Geoff Johns turns out to be an engaging introduction to the underwater hero. It’s especially surprising considering Aquaman was one of the least interesting elements of both Blackest Night and its follow-up Brightest Day, but Johns does a typically reliable job here of bringing us up to date with the character’s background, filling in the important mythology, and providing some attention-grabbing setpieces. It’s one of the few slow-burning New 52 debuts that actually gets away with a gentler pace, and it’s helped in this by some characterful work from Ivan Reis and Joe Prado that minimises the heroic posing and gives the central character plenty of nuance. Add some intimidating-looking villains, and you’ve got a traditional setup for a series that looks likely to be an entertaining (if far from revolutionary) superhero adventure.
BATMAN: THE DARK KNIGHT issue 1
Writer: David Finch ~ Artists: David Finch and Richard Friend ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=2.5/5]
Less than a year after the last issue 1 of this series, now we’ve got a relaunch of the title that finally limped to 5 issues in August of this year. DC have lined up several collaborators for superstar artist David Finch, as the New 52 is strongly committed to getting the issues in on time, but it doesn’t alter that this is steroid-enhanced, amped up Batman writ large, an absurdly serious and hilariously muscular take on the Caped Crusader. Finch’s art is always capable of hi-jacking the attention, and there’s a thankful minimum of showy single- or double-page splashes in this comic, but in the wake of Scott Snyder’s excellent work on Batman last week, this is in danger of feeling a little irrelevant (especially considering we get another supervillain Arkham breakout here, for the second time in a fortnight), and possibly even downright silly. The appearance of new female villain the White Rabbit would have been enough, but the ending – which has Finch (presumably accidentally) throwing in some Jamaican homophobic slang, calling Batman “Batty Boy” – pushes this into unintentionally hilarious territory. Like an enjoyably bad cult movie, this has its pleasures, but The Dark Knight is a long way from being an exemplary comic.
BLACKHAWKS issue 1
Writer: Mike Costa ~ Artist: Graham Nolan, Mike Lashley ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=4/5]
The Blackhawks – a collection of ace pilots – have been around in one form or another since 1941, and this relaunch essentially dumps all previous continuity except for a few character names. What we get is a traditional action adventure with technologically able pilots flying super-planes as part of a UN-sponsored strike team, and it’s a fun counterpart to the slightly less succesful Men at War. Introducing all the characters briskly, we get some well-played twists and enjoyable characterisation, and it’s a good example of nuts-and-bolts adventure done right. Only a couple of storytelling moments feel off, and the cliffhanger doesn’t have the impact it needs, but otherwise this is a promising title that could grow into something seriously enjoyable.
THE FLASH issue 1
Writers: Francis Manapul and Brian Buccellato ~ Artist: Francis Manapul ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=4/5]
With many of the DC New 52 having the distinct feeling of being designed at least partly with digital in mind (especially with the heavy emphasis on visuals, and large letterbox-format panels), it’s a real pleasure to see a comic that makes full use of the page, and really looks at its best in print. Artist Francis Manapul does a good job on his first script (co-written with colourist Brian Buccellato), stepping into the shoes of Geoff Johns, and the story is as fun, energetic and colourful as the best Flash comics always are. What sells this is Manapul’s art, which finds ever more creative ways of depicting Barry Allen’s high-speed life, and pulls off some imaginative and beautiful moments. It may not be very deep, but this shows how fun and engaging superhero comics can be when the mix is right.
THE FURY OF FIRESTORM issue 1
Writers: Ethan Van Sciver and Gail Simone ~ Artist: Yildiray Cinar ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=2/5]
Sometimes, collaboration is a good thing – and sometimes, you get an ungainly mess like The Fury of Firestorm, a reboot that takes the basic characters from the most recent version of the Firestorm character (jock Ronnie Raymond and science nerd Jason Rusch) and puts them down into a new setting. Gail Simone’s presence seems to have resulted in at least some decent dialogue for the first half, and while the art isn’t outstanding, the story rattles along in some promising directions… until the bad guys attack, the power of Firestorm (or, to be more precise, the Firestorms) is unleashed, and everything gets irretrievably silly. From the terrible dialogue (“What did you DOOOO?”) to the completely bizarre set of powers that Firestorm now has, to the annoying new ‘character’ who debuts on the end page, this is like watching a car crash in slow motion. Simone and Sciver had better be able to improve this mix of earnest melodrama and thunking superheroics pretty fast, or The Fury of Firestorm is going to remain pretty missable…
GREEN LANTERN: NEW GUARDIANS issue 1
Writer: Tony Bedard ~ Artists: Tyler Kirkham and Batt ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=2.5/5]
This is exceptionally bizarre – as a debut issue of the new Green Lantern spin-off, New Guardians 1 is certainly one of the weirder examples of a relaunch. Here, we get a retold version of the origin of Kyle Rayner, our main character and member of the Green Lantern Corps – except, this is the origin that happens in the wake of Emerald Twilight, a story that’s nearly 17 years old that deals with Hal Jordan going off the rails and slaughtering the entire Lantern Corps. Starting a ‘new reader friendly’ series with this is just plain bizarre, especially since we’re not even told specifically that it’s a flashback until a later caption announces “Present Day”. The intro to Kyle is actually fairly well handled, but then we’re hopping around between various locations in space (with various characters being horribly mauled and mutilated, as is normal for a Green Lantern title), and the result is the story feels so disparate that it’s barely gotten started by the time we get to the end of the issue (an ending which, admittedly, does manage to be intriguing). Fans will lap it up, while I suspect everyone else will just continue to be unsurprised that the somewhat over-involved Green Lantern mythology hasn’t broken out into general pop culture.
I, VAMPIRE issue 1
Writer: Joshua Hale Fialkov ~ Artist: Andrea Sorrentino ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=3.5/5]
DC does paranormal romance, and the results are… intriguing. There’s almost no concession to the rest of the DC Universe here (and considering the scale of some of what happens, it’s hard to know if this title isn’t going to be in its own separate timeline), but instead this is a dark spin on the ‘Vampires declare war on Humans’ story, with the love affair between two vampires – one a queen, the other a rebel torn between the two sides – providing the emotional backbone. Some of the storytelling is a little vague (in terms of what timeframe everything is happening on), but the rest of the issue manages to be darkly romantic, hitting the right notes and standing as its own take on vampires (especially since they have Dracula-style transformation powers), rather than the shameless cash-in it could have been. Add some impressive art from Andrea Sorrentino into the mix, and you’ve got one of those left-field titles that could prove to be an extremely interesting read, and will certainly make the DCU a more interesting, varied place.
JUSTICE LEAGUE DARK issue 1
Writer: Peter Milligan ~ Artist: Mikel Janin ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=2.5/5]
A slightly disappointing introduction to a very promising idea, this title is essentially at the core of DC’s attempt to re-integrate the weirder, more magical Vertigo characters back into their superhero universe. And, after having said for ages that the DCU needed more weirdness, I’ve got what I asked for… but while this debut issue has its moments, it doesn’t feel like it completely hangs together. It’s another ‘bringing the team together’ tale, and Peter Milligan gives us plenty of strangeness, including a selection of one-panel weird moments that could have come straight out of a Grant Morrison Doom Patrol comic. Ultimately, it’s a mix of the plotting, which is once again very disparate and unfocussed (all the team appear, but hardly any of them together), and the unusual art style. Janin’s work has some very impressive moment, but it also sucks the life out of a selection of scenes, and while I’m completely up for a weird slant on the Justice League, this ends up feeling like a slightly frustrating missed opportunity.
THE SAVAGE HAWKMAN issue 1
Writer: Tony S. Daniel ~ Artist: Phillip Tan ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=2/5]
Yes, because the world was screaming out for a Hawkman reboot! And not just Hawkman – Savage Hawkman. Another one of those characters that DC seems determined to believe are cool (despite all the evidence to the contrary), this latest remix for the often-rebooted character features atmospheric but sometimes murky art from Phillip Tan, and a script from Tony Daniel that’s high on the melodrama and low on the explanations. In short, there is nothing in this comic that actually tells me who the hell Hawkman is, or why I should care about him – and by the climax, when we’re getting lines like “I’ll show it my gratitude by whoopin’ some tail” and “I must have your power, Hawkman. Your Nth Metal!”, it becomes pretty obvious that this isn’t going anywhere remotely sensible. There’s a handful of good ideas here, but very few of them are hitting home, and for new readers this is going to be bordering on incomprehensible.
SUPERMAN issue 1
Writer: George Perez ~ Artists: George Perez and Jesus Merino ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=4/5]
Considering there barely seems to have been a week when the new version Superman hasn’t been turning up in one DC comic or another, it’s something of a surprise to find that it’s taken until now to reach the next official ‘headlining’ Superman title. For those keeping score, Action Comics is telling the new version of Superman’s early days, five years ago, while this title follows Superman’s adventures in the DCU’s present day. Under the guidance of comics veteran George Perez, this is a fun and engaging, if seriously old-fashioned comic that captures some of the spirit of Morrison’s version, even if it does end up feeling a little stiff at times. Most of all, however, Perez is excellent at producing comics that are both thrilling and dense – there’s a lot of content here (with one page managing up to 14 panels), and this does give this first issue a feeling of true size and scale. In terms of plot, we’re strictly in introduction mode – there’s a big fight, but we don’t know why, there’s an alien blowing a massive horn (first seen back in issue 1 of Stormwatch) but we don’t know why, and by the end of the comic all we can be really certain of is that Lois and Clark’s relationship is on a very different footing to where it used to be. Combined with the impressive art (by Jesus Merino, working from Perez layouts), this is a good-looking, thoroughly traditional comic, the equivalent of a summer blockbuster that you don’t feel massively disappointed by. It may not be the most sophisticated comic in the world, but it’s well-produced and likeable, and together with Action Comics, it’s making the Superman comics feel more relevant than they have in a very long time.
TEEN TITANS issue 1
Writer: Scott Lobdell ~ Artists: Brett Booth and Norm Rapmund ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=4/5]
The writer of Red Hood and the Outlaws rides again, but thankfully this is much better, and free of the slightly creepy fratboy tone of last week’s issue – in fact, this ties closely in with Lobdell’s other title, Superboy, and sees the initial birth of the supergroup known as the Teen Titans. Lobdell is able to write fun, lively comics and he does a good job here of setting up the Teens vs Adults conflict that’s obviously going to fuel most of the action. Throwing in plenty of setpieces, this is one of the best of the teen-centric titles, managing to feel like a modern slant on this kind of story, while giving us plenty of enjoyable one-liners. There are problems – Red Robin’s new costume, with its Vegas Showgirl-style wings, is very difficult to take seriously, and there’s the sense that we should really have a slightly better idea of what the stakes are in this conflict – especially since, after two issues (this and Superboy 1) we still don’t have the faintest idea what the sinister organisation N.O.W.H.E.R.E. are up to – but Teen Titans still looks likely to evolve into one of DC’s more enjoyable titles.
VOODOO issue 1
Writer: Ron Marz ~ Artist: Sami Basri ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=2/5]
If last week’s hilarious bout of costume sex and ‘How many times can we get Catwoman to show her bra?” competitions didn’t provide you with enough shameless titillation, here’s the wonders of Voodoo, an ex-Wildstorm character who’s been reborn in the DC Universe because, apparently, there was a severe deficit of comic characters performing lapdances. Essentially this is ‘Species – The Comic’, following a stripper with a very dark secret and monstrous secret who’s soon going to be forced on the run, but it seems like someone was worried that the audience might forget that the main character is a stripper, so they made sure she’s stripping or doing lapdances virtually every time she appears. It’s a pity that the sheer level of ‘shocking’ near-nudity is so ridiculous, as the art itself is very good – slightly reminiscent of Phonogram artist Jamie McKelvie – while there’s also a certain amount of quality in the writing, at least when the story isn’t concentrating on Voodoo’s state of permanent undress. Writer Ron Marz is capable of good things with this kind of material (he is the man who turned the deeply silly T+A comic Witchblade into a pretty respectable read), and Voodoo may eventually be heading in the right kind of direction, but it’d be nice if right now it didn’t feel like quite such a sleazy experience to read, and coming after last week’s female character-related misfires, this is the last thing DC should be doing right now…
Previous DC New 52 Reviews:The DC New 52, Week 4 – Batman, Birds of Prey, Blue Beetle, Captain Atom, Catwoman, DC Universe Presents, Green Lantern Corps, Legion of Superheroes, Nightwing, Red Hood and the Outlaws, Supergirl, Wonder Woman
The DC New 52, Week 3 – Batman and Robin, Batwoman, Deathstroke, Demon Knights, Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E., Green Lantern, Grifter, Legion Lost, Mister Terrific, Red Lanterns, Resurrection Man, Suicide Squad, SuperboyThe DC New 52, Week 1: Justice League
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Comics Review: The DC New 52, Week 4 – Batman, Birds of Prey, Blue Beetle, Captain Atom, Catwoman, DC Universe Presents, Green Lantern Corps, Legion of Superheroes, Nightwing, Red Hood and the Outlaws, Supergirl, Wonder Woman
Reviewer: Saxon Bullock (aka @saxonb)
BATMAN issue 1
Writer: Scott Snyder ~ Artists: Greg Capullo and Jonathan Glapion ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=5/5]
Scott Snyder is turning into one of the major stars of the relaunch – he’s been assigned to two of the highest profile titles, and after the success of Swamp Thing, he’s scored another slam dunk here. Considered as the more ‘superhero’ aimed Batman title (in contrast to the grittier-slanted Detective Comics), Batman issue 1 is a cracking piece of comics storytelling that does everything you’d want from a first issue, bringing the reader up to date with the current status quo while also throwing in some fantastic narrative curveballs. With plenty of ideas on show and a likeable, engaging storytelling style, Snyder has this under control from page 1, utilising exactly the right level of atmosphere, delivering some great dialogue and building everything up to an effective cliffhanger. On top of this, there’s Greg Capullo’s art (with Jonathan Glapion on inks) which pulls of a nice mix of cartoonishness and atmosphere that avoids too many current superhero visual cliches, giving us some great moments (including the gorgeous Batcave double-splash page). Packing in plenty of value, this sets the flagship Batman title off at a brisk run, and looks to be one of the strongest comics in the New DC 52 line up.
BIRDS OF PREY issue 1
Writer: Duane Swierczynski ~ Artist: Jesus Saiz ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=2.5/5]
Really? Birds of Prey without Oracle, or their long-time writer Gail Simone? The long-running title where Barbara Gordon spent most of her time as info-tech jockey Oracle is relaunched here (only just over a year after the last relaunch), and while Swierczynski packs in some characterful moments and good setpieces, this is a long way from being either distinctive or interesting. Admittedly, it is a women-centric DC comic that isn’t jaw-droppingly exploitative (which, in the week of Catwoman issue 1, is a definite good thing), but while there’s some enjoyable banter it isn’t like we get to know either of our two main characters that well, while Jesus Saiz’s artwork is a little stiff and lifeless at times (especially in a couple of the action sequences). Leading up to a cliffhanger that acts as the working definition of ‘out of nowhere’, Birds of Prey feels like a title that’s in need of a distinctive identity if it isn’t going to end up feeling a little on the mediocre side.
BLUE BEETLE issue 1
Writer: Tony Bedard ~ Artists: Ig Guara and Ruy Jose ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=3.5/5]
One of the few ‘legacy’ superhero characters who hasn’t ended up killed off so that they can be replaced by their older (supposedly ‘better known’ predecessor), Mexican kid Jaime Reyes has made it into the DC New 52, athough the story of the Blue Beetle gets a fairly big revamp here. Now, the powerful alien scarab that Jaime inherits is a dangerously lethal war machine, and there are some clues that this take on the series is going to be a little harder edged than DC’s previous Blue Beetle offerings. There aren’t many surprises here, but Bedard does a good job of getting everything in place and making Jaime an engaging protagonist, while we also get a couple of intriguing continuity nods (especially the fact that eccentric supervillains The Brain and Monsieur Mallah (a brain in a jar, and a communist talking gorilla with a french accent) are alive and well in the New DC universe. It’s good to see such a likeable and enjoyable teen comic getting another lease of life, and so far Blue Beetle is looking to be one of the better of DC’s sub-family of ‘Young Justice’ comics.
CAPTAIN ATOM issue 1
Writer: J T Krul ~ Artist: Freddie Williams II ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=3/5]
One of the many DC comics that had me thinking “Why would I want to read a comic featuring that character?”, Captain Atom doesn’t really succeed in coming up with any particularly convincing answers to that question. Of course, the thing that’s interesting about Captain Atom is that he’s a character originally published by Charlton Comics, and who was used as the loose basis/inspiration for the god-like Dr Manhattan in Alan Moore’s Watchmen, and it looks like the story is certainly heading in a direction that’ll be exploring pushing Captain Atom’s powers in a more deliberately cosmic direction. The art from Freddie Williams II is wild and energetic, especially when it comes to depicting the title character, and there’s several intriguing moments, but the issue doesn’t come together, and there’s several pages that seem to wander into complete bizarreness without any warning whatsoever. There’s a certain amount of ambition on show here, but this needs a bit more focus – and heaven only knows what any brand new readers would make of all this…
CATWOMAN issue 1
Writer: Judd Winick ~ Artist: Guillem March ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=1.5/5]
Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. The issue that essentially set the internet on fire (resulting in articles like this very astute analysis from Comics Alliance’s Laura Hudson) is a working example of how cranking the lever marked ‘Sexy’ up to eleven sometimes isn’t the wisest move. There’s been lots of chatter online recently about superhero comics and their general approach to female characters as well as female writer/artists, and I was never really expecting this first issue of Catwoman to be a particularly progressive example (the cover pretty much tells you exactly what kind of audience they’re going for). Plus, with a writer like Judd Winick and especially an artist like Guillem March, subtlety was definitely off the menu, but even so I wasn’t expecting something quite so leery and exploitative, even for the remarkably broad standards of a Catwoman comic. Somewhere behind the insane number of cleavage and bra shots, there’s the vague potential for a decent attempt at setting up Selina Kyle’s character in the course of one issue, but it’s pretty thin stuff, and the emphasis is so strongly on softcore titilation that the effect is pretty ridiculous. And that’s even before we get to the end of the issue, where (SPOILER WARNING) Catwoman and Batman spend multiple pages engaging in some incredibly ludicrous sex, while still keeping their costumes ‘mostly’ on. Laughable and horribly adolescent, this is the kind of comic that clearly states that yes, female superheroes can be confidant and wildly sexy as long as they flash their bra at least three times an issue – and it’s not even the worst of DC’s female character excesses this week…
DC UNIVERSE PRESENTS issue 1
Writer: Paul Jenkins ~ Artist: Bernard Chang ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=4/5]
What’s planned as a series of stories spotlighting the smaller characters in the world of the DC Universe gets off to a promising start with this look at Boston Brand, aka Deadman, a circus daredevil turned unwilling spirit who now has to help others in the hope of rebalancing his karma. One of the more significant resets in the new DC U (wiping out all the recent shenanigans which involved Brand being resurrected in the pages of Brightest Day), this is an engaging old-school take on Deadman which manages to be characterful and engaging, as well as packing in plenty of material. Giving a nicely supernatural edge to the DC Universe, it’ll be interesting to see how this title evolves, but so far writer Paul Jenkins is aiming in some promising directions.
GREEN LANTERN CORPS issue 1
Writer: Peter J. Tomasi ~ Artists: Fernando Pasarin and Scott Hanna ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=3/5]
The Green Lantern franchise juggernaut continues, as the title which up until now has been ‘everyone except Hal Jordan’ gets a relaunch, setting up the new status quo with Lanterns Guy Gardner and Jon Stewart. While there’s a certain level of bewilderment in the level of detail, making this not the most friendly of the issue 1s, this does at least feel like a genuine attempt to bring the audience up to speed, and certainly feels much more like an actual fresh start than last week’s Green Lantern did. Of course, there’s still the usual mix of melodrama, heroics, weird space opera and over-the-top violence, while the end-of-issue cliffhanger is a little clunky, but this is at the least a fine new start for one of DC’s most popular titles.
LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES issue 1
Writer: Paul Levitz ~ Artist: Francis Portela ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=1/5]
Last week’s Legion Lost was fun, if a little on the flawed side, and at least managed to be relatively intriguing for someone who knew nothing about the Legion of Super-Heroes. This week’s Legion-related outing is, on the other hand, a borderline incomprehensible mess that makes virtually no concessions to any new readers. Yes, there are captions that introduce the characters, but I lost count by the time we reached what felt like character introduction no. 15, and at no point do we get any idea of what the setup is, what everybody’s relationships are, or even what the Legion of Superheroes actually does. There is action. Things blow up. Lots of things are shouted. There’s a completely bewildering cliffhanger. For regular Legion readers, this probably all makes sense – but the whole point of this relaunch was to welcome in new readers, and this issue 1 is likelier to make them want to hurl the comic across the room.
NIGHTWING issue 1
Writer: Kyle Higgins ~ Artists: Eddie Barrows and J P Mayer ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=4/5]
After his stint as Batman, Dick Grayson is back in the costume as Nightwing – with a new, slightly more Red ensemble – and what we have here is one of DC’s best traditional superhero books so far. Giving us a characterful reintroduction to Nightwing’s world, writer Kyle Higgins does a much better job here than on Deathstroke in giving us a protagonist we actually care about, while giving the dialogue plenty of spark and energy. On the story alone, this would be a fun and engaging start – what lifts it further is the art from Eddie Barrows and J P Mayer, which gives the book a cinematic style and impact, but also uses some imaginative panel layouts to give the story its own distinctive visual identity. This is old-school superhero action, but pulled off with a considerable amount of class and style.
RED HOOD AND THE OUTLAWS issue 1
Writer: Scott Lobdell ~ Artist: Kenneth Rocafort ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=1.5/5]
And then, of course, we get to the other point of contention this week. For about 50% of the time, Red Hood and the Outlaws (featuring ex-Robin turned criminal/mercenary Jason Todd, aka the Red Hood) is a dumb but energetic action comic that’s firmly aimed at the audience that laps up similarly dumb action comics like Marvel’s Deadpool, and which also benefits from some attention-grabbing artwork from Kenneth Rocafort. Unfortunately, for the other 50% of the comic we’re dealing with the relaunched version of longtime Teen Titans character Starfire, and while the softcore take on Catwoman is merely misguided and trying way too hard, what they’ve done with Starfire is downright creepy. An alien princess who’s always had a habit of not wearing very much, Starfire’s never exactly been a flagwaver for progressive superheroines, but at the least she was an engaging, warm-hearted character with a broad-minded attitude to sex and a long and complicated love-life. Post relaunch, she’s been transformed into a joyless blank-slate sex doll who (apparently thanks to her previous life as a sex slave) barely even remembers any of her past lovers, spends the whole issue striking porn star poses, and sleeps with new Red Hood sidekick Roy Harper simply because he’s there. The level of exploitative frat-boy ogling in the art (which, amazingly, has actually been slightly toned down – originally, Starfire’s skimpy bikini in the beach sequences was supposed to be slightly see-through) is just downright wrong, and while Lobdell fairly obviously has some plans to explore and expand Starfire’s character, resetting a well-known character (especially thanks to the fun TV cartoon Teen Titans) into nothing but a sex object is a blatant way of pandering to the predominantly male audience, as well as being lazy and retrograde storytelling of the highest order. DC stated upfront before the relaunch that they were mainly chasing an audience of 18-34 males – I just wasn’t expecting them to give the female comic-reading audience quite so many reasons to stop reading…
SUPERGIRL issue 1
Writer: Michael Green and Mike Johnson ~ Artist: Mahmud Asrar ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=2.5/5]
In a sensible world, we’d have gotten the Power Girl team of Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray, along with Amanda Conner on art duties, and considering how incredibly charming their take on Supergirl was in Wednesday Comics, it’s hard to imagine who would have complained. Of course, we don’t live in a sensible world, so here we get the first appearence of the all-new Supergirl, a character who’s had her fair share of reincarnations and reboots. In this case, she’s a confused Kryptonian who’s just crash-landed in Siberia, and while this title may be going for the teen alienation theme, what it boils down to is an entire issue that’s not much more than Supergirl being bewildered and punching various heavily armoured men. The art from Mahmud Asrar packs in plenty of energy and vigour, but the heavy emphasis on the visuals means this is another DC title that feels dangerously thin. Especially for a comic that’s going to appeal to a female readership, it might have been nice to have a little more characterisation and content – as it is, I’ve gotten to the end of issue 1 and I still have no idea where exactly this is heading, which isn’t the best way of getting new readers to stick around for more…
WONDER WOMAN issue 1
Writer: Brian Azzarello ~ Artists: Cliff Chiang ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=3/5]
If there’s one character that was desperately in need of a focussed and straightforward relaunch, it’s Wonder Woman. The last couple of years have seen the ill-advised J. Michael Straczynski-helmed story ‘Odyssey’, which also saw the controversial costume change, as well as the much-discussed and eventually shelved Wonder Woman TV pilot episode, leading to a general feeling that nobody really knows how to handle this character. Getting a writer with the reputation of Brian Azzarello in is a good idea, and artist Cliff Chiang is an interesting collaborator, and the advance reviews led me to believe that this would be exactly the kind of sharp, action-packed adventure WW needs. And yet… what we actually get is nothing short of bewildering. Azzarello goes for the ‘throw us in at the deep end’ method of storytelling, giving us violence, death and horse-murder, and the end result is a comic that basically reads like somebody decided to do an ultra-violent update of Xena: Warrior Princess. The handling of Wonder Woman herself is mostly excellent (although it’s hard to imagine that any other DC superhero would have had their first scene being discovered naked in bed), giving the character lots of impact and showing off her physical skills in a well-executed fight sequence. However, from the bloody horse decapitation on page 5 to the limb-slicing in the combat sequences, this is a graphic book that’s taking a more deliberately horrific angle on the mythology of Wonder Woman, but doesn’t always feel like it’s concerned about taking the audience along with the ride. Too much of this issue 1 is bizarre or inscrutable, and while the setup it delivers is promising, there’s also the sense that the one ingredient that’s lacking is a sense of fun. While this may be exactly what some fans want from Wonder Woman (the lead character kicking arse and killing lots of mythological creatures), as a first issue this is more befuddling than intriguing, and the new version of Wonder Woman is going to need a lot more shape and direction if it’s going to be a true success.
Previous DC New 52 Reviews:
The DC New 52, Week 3 – Batman and Robin, Batwoman, Deathstroke, Demon Knights, Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E., Green Lantern, Grifter, Legion Lost, Mister Terrific, Red Lanterns, Resurrection Man, Suicide Squad, SuperboyThe DC New 52, Week 1: Justice League
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Movie Review: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)
Cast: Gary Oldman, Colin Firth, Mark Strong, Tom Hardy, John Hurt, Toby Jones ~ Writer: Bridget O’Connor, Peter Straughan ~ Director: Tomas Alfredson
[xrr rating=4.5/5]Reviewer: Jehan Ranasinghe (aka @Maustallica)
The Low-Down: Detached, clinical and brooding, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy makes full use of the embarrassing wealth of talent at its disposal to deliver an absorbing, intelligent and admirably restrained espionage thriller.
What’s it About?: During the height of the Cold War, British intelligence veteran George Smiley (Gary Oldman) finds himself shunted out of MI6 after his mentor Control (John Hurt) – suspecting that a Soviet mole has infiltrated the organisation – spearheads a disastrous mission in Budapest. However, Smiley’s retirement ends abruptly when overseas agent Ricki Tarr (Tom Hardy) returns to the UK with information: the mole is real, and is operating undercover at the very highest level. It falls to Smiley to investigate and flush out the enemy hiding right under MI6’s nose…
The Story: It’s tempting when regarding a film such as Tinker Tailor Solider Spy to kid yourself that what it accomplishes is easy, or that it’s something you can in some way take for granted. It is, after all, a project which seemed to have everything going for it from the very start; a stellar cast, an acclaimed director and the template of one of Britain’s best-known spy thrillers to work from. Surely all that needs doing from there is to show up on set, flick the cameras on and let the magic happen; job’s a good ‘un, right?
Well, no. Film history is littered with the corpses of would-be prestige pictures – Steven Zaillian’s All the King’s Men and Joe Wright’s The Soloist spring to mind in recent years – which seemed starred for fame and acclaim due to the their lavishly-assembled personnel, only to underwhelm and disappoint when finally arriving in cinemas. So we must give dues, then, to director Tomas Alfredson and his collaborators on Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, a work that showcases all-star filmmaking at its very best: an overflowing array of hugely talented individuals coming together for a genuine team effort, each willing to share responsibility for delivering a film of near-undeniable quality and class, one that lives up to its pedigree with room to spare.Given the nature of that pedigree, that’s no mean feat. As noted, the 1974 novel is an established classic of its genre, calling on author John le Carré’s real-life secret service experience to create a tense and brooding potboiler; more pressure still is added by enduring memories of the equally iconic 1979 BBC television adaptation, which saw Sir Alec Guinness turn George Smiley into one of the most closely-associated roles of his illustrious career. Both the book and TV series have the key advantage over the film of not only getting there first, but also having far more time and leeway to explore the languorous intricacies of this most low-octane of spy stories, in which espionage is carried out via mumbled, shifty conversations involving dour men with briefcases, rather than lantern-jawed beefcakes in tuxedos.
As it transpires, the 2011 version of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy shows very few signs of intimidation about the presumably pitfall-laden adaptation process, aggressively trimming material that covered almost seven hours on TV into a disciplined 127 minutes. What results is a film that moves at a brisk, occasionally disorienting pace through methodical exposition, bubbling tension and undercurrents of character drama. Action junkies will find nothing to sate them here; throughout, the film maintains a languid, stifled atmosphere, with little in the way of flashpoints or adrenaline spikes. But that isn’t to say there’s nothing going on; on the contrary, it’s incredibly fleet of foot in story terms, hopping between different perspectives and frequent flashbacks as it diligently assembles the pieces of le Carré’s narrative puzzle. A side effect of this is that the audience sometimes has to move faster than they might anticipate in order to keep up, but there’s very little here that feels overly unclear, even without in-depth knowledge of the material.Besides, those who do feel lost during this journey will at least have some high-calibre travelling companions to smooth things over. Again, the pedigree of this cast will lead some to take the quality on offer for granted, but it’s still worth giving credit to the assembled talent for performing so unselfishly in low-key roles that are largely free of fireworks. Typically alpha-male presences like Mark Strong and Tom Hardy show they’re prepared to work hard with slightly more passive and introspective characters; Colin Firth and Benedict Cumberbatch add splashes of rakish colour; Toby Jones and Ciaran Hinds, meanwhile, inject much-needed presence into characters who otherwise would have come perilously close to being underwritten, considering their key roles in the overall mystery.
Fittingly, however, it’s the top-billed names from in front of and behind the camera that prove to be Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy’s greatest assets. As Smiley, Gary Oldman clearly recognises that he’s been handed a potential milestone role in his career, just as it was for Guinness; as a result, it’s hard to recall him ever being better. Oldman’s Smiley is a performance that creeps up on you, a seemingly passive, soft-spoken and unexplosive presence that gradually radiates more power as the film progresses. Observing events quietly through unfashionable bifocals, Oldman slowly seizes control of the film from his illustrious co-stars with piercing gazes and measured delivery, with Smiley’s taciturn single-mindedness bringing to mind some kind of investigative Terminator.Aiding and abetting Oldman is the work of Swedish director Tomas Alfredson, the film’s other main weapon and the secret ingredient in what could have been a rather conventional stew. Making his English-language debut, there was no guarantee that the Let the Right One In helmer’s talents would translate; happily, he acquits himself with distinction, with his drained yet striking palette, ice-cold atmospherics and clinical sense of detachment proving vital in interweaving Smiley’s character with that of his world. Alfredson’s Cold War-era London is a muted and paranoid environment, with the sense of unease only increasing as the threads of le Carré’s story come together and are pulled taut.
In fact, if there’s one overriding disappointment about the film, it’s that this admirable slow-burn tension-building never really gets the payoff it deserves. This is very much a film that’s much more about the journey and the process than the final destination, and there’s plenty to be said for that; still, when Smiley’s carefully laid trap finally closes on the villain, it’s with a gentle creak rather than the sharp snap one might expect, leading to an inescapable sense of slight anticlimax. That’s not to accuse the film of needing anything so crass and sensationalist as a last-minute rug-pull or “gotcha!” moment, but it’s hard to imagine many audience members feeling much sense of surprise at the end of this mystery, even ones who haven’t anticipated the outcome.Despite this, it seems churlish to suggest that many people are likely to exit Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy with feelings of disappointment. Naturally, personal taste and mileage will vary with a genre piece of this kind, but it’s hard to recall another major film released this year with such an indisputable level of craftsmanship, skill, intelligence and sheer quality. With any justice, this film should solidify Alfredson’s place as one of the hottest directorial prospects of the moment and could potentially snare Oldman his first Oscar nomination; indeed, with numerous other le Carré books to work with, it may also herald the start of a potentially exciting new franchise. And if none of that comes to pass, then we’ll at least have this smart, clinical and exceptionally adult thriller as consolation.
The Verdict: Brilliantly constructed, sharp as a tack and featuring a magnetic central performance, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is a film that’s every bit the sum of its parts. And when the parts are this good, that’s more than enough to qualify as a major triumph.
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Movie Trailer – The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Extended Trailer)
It’s been a little while since the ‘leaked’ Red Band version of the initial trailer for this upcoming David Fincher adaptation (and the slightly less effective mass-market version), and now we’ve got a surprisingly long look at the new version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo :
At 3 minutes 45 seconds, this is a hell of a lot longer than we normally get (from reports, it seems to be a cut down version of an eight-minute promo reel that’s doing the rounds), and I’d imagine there’ll be a slightly shorter version once it turns up in cinemas. And, so far, I’m still definitely impressed – having seen the original Swedish version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, I thought it was good but not outstanding (some of which was down to the pulpiness of the original material), and the idea of letting Fincher loose on that kind of story is certainly interesting. What we’ve got looks as slick and technically accomplished as you’d expect from Fincher, combined with an impressive cast and an occasionally bewildering selection of accents. It’s nice to see Daniel Craig looking a lot more charismatic, engaging and real than his recent stiff turn in Cowboys and Aliens, but of course all eyes are going to be on Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander, and it looks like she’s doing a damn fine job of taking on a role that’s already been played well by Noomi Rapace (who’s the best thing about the Swedish originals). She certainly isn’t recognisable from her brief but pivotal role in The Social Network, and it’s going to be very interesting seeing how Fincher handles the material, especially with some of the dark places that Salander’s story goes, and the rather melodramatic nature of the novel’s ending (which has apparently been reworked in the movie). We also get a very nice sample of Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’s new score, which certainly has me intrigued – there’s barely been a week in the last year when I haven’t listened to The Social Network soundtrack at least once, and this sounds like it’s exploring some new territory while still keeping a lot of the old style. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is one of the few films I’m definitely looking forward to over the winter months, and this trailer certainly hasn’t done anything to change my mind…
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Movie Review: Troll Hunter (2010)
Cast: Otto Jespersen, Glenn Erland Tosterud, Johanna Mørck, Tomas Alf Larsen, Hans Morten Hansen ~ Writer: André Øvredal ~ Director: André Øvredal
[xrr rating=4/5]Reviewer: Jehan Ranasinghe (aka @Maustallica)
The Low-Down: A triumph of filmmaking imagination on a shoestring budget, Troll Hunter may not be the deepest film in the world, but it displays more than enough creativity, craft and audacity to be a thoroughly entertaining romp.
What’s it About?: This “true” story alleges to be the recovered footage of a trio of Norwegian university students making a documentary about a man they suspect to be an illegal bear trapper. When they catch up to the presumed poacher, Hans (Otto Jespersen), they discover instead that he’s a professional troll hunter, tasked with keeping populations of the mythological creatures in check for the Norwegian government. Hans decides to allow the students to accompany him on his excursions and document his work – a decision that threatens to make their university film project rather more hazardous than they realise…
The Story: It’s been curious watching the development of the “found footage” filmmaking subgenre in the last decade or so. It was always inevitable after the phenomenal success of The Blair Witch Project that imitators would spring up in its wake, but it’s nevertheless been surprising just how mainstream this once revolutionary filmmaking style has become. From indie efforts like [REC] and Paranormal Activity to blockbusters such as Cloverfield, directors have been queuing up to embrace documentary-style concepts such as the shaky viewpoint, improvisational dialogue and to-camera monologues, rendering these ideas – groundbreaking in 1999 – as conventional and familiar as a fake-out scare or musical sting. This isn’t to say that all found footage movies post-Blair Witch have been worthless (though the quality has certainly been variable), but it can sometimes be difficult to recall exactly what made this genre seem so interesting in the first place.
This is one of many reasons why writer/director André Øvredal’s Troll Hunter – originally released in its native Norway in 2010, but only now receiving its general UK cinema release – comes across as such a breath of fresh air. A gutsy, good-natured and endlessly creative work that works near-miracles with a tight budget, this is a film that evokes the Blair Witch spirit in all the right ways – and not just because it features long stretches of two guys and a girl running for their lives through a dark forest. Rather, it calls back to the same ideal of making something out of nothing and allowing the boundaries of low-cost filmmaking to act as a guide rather than a limitation, resulting in a movie with a delightfully homemade feel to accompany its pleasingly robust credentials as a cinematic thrill-ride.One of the first things you’ll notice about Troll Hunter is this: it is exceptionally Norwegian. From its endless shots of wild, haunted landscapes to its constant references to local cultural trends, both ancient and modern, every part of the film’s identity is inextricably tied up with that of its home country. Of course, a Scandinavian flavour is no obstacle to international success these days, thanks to films such as Let the Right One In and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, but one does sometimes feel in the case of Troll Hunter that it’d probably be impossible to ever fully understand its full range of allusions without actually being Norwegian, or at least coming armed with a list of annotations.
But that matters little when the lore within the film that does translate does so with such effectiveness, most notably in the case of the trolls themselves. To create his creatures, Øvredal comprehensively raids the store of fairy and folk tale conventions, selecting and discarding iconic traits with equal glee. There’s no riddle-solving or fee-fi-fo-fumming involved with these trolls, concepts pooh-poohed as silly children’s stories by the characters; conversely, tropes such as bridge-dwelling, turning to stone in sunlight and sniffing out the blood of Christians are retained, rationalised with cheerfully pseudoscientific explanations and utilised as the basis for tense action set pieces. Øvredal shows equal opportunistic skill in turning contemporary Norwegian cultural touchstones to his film’s advantage – illegal bear hunting becomes a cover for the troll hunter’s activities and the country’s enormous power pylons become anti-troll defence systems, while a clip of Norway’s prime minister Jens Stoltenberg is amusingly deployed as an off-kilter punchline.
Throughout Troll Hunter flows the likeable sense of a team cobbling together the best film they can with the materials they have to hand, Blue Peter-style. This extends through to its cast, an amiable collection of young unknowns and Norwegian comedians who generally don’t excel, but nevertheless fulfil their roles more than adequately. The clear standout is Jespersen, the titular troll hunter himself, who makes for a compellingly gruff presence as he portrays Hans as a jaded civil servant who’s sick of years of low-paid, underappreciated work and filling in “slayed troll forms”. However, the most remarkable use of resources comes in terms of the film’s visual effects, which utilise a variety of intelligent techniques – smart lighting, evocative camera work, economical use of effects shots – to make a budget of $4 million go much further than you’d think possible. Granted, some of this is accomplished through misdirection, with rapid cuts tricking the brain into thinking it’s seen more than it really has, but you’d be churlish to complain about corner-cutting when the film reveals the Jotnar, its colossal 200-foot showpiece monster, which wouldn’t look out of place in a film with ten times the resources.
In fact, if there’s any major problem with Troll Hunter, it’s that its skill with individual elements of filmmaking technique sometimes exceeds the quality of the film itself. For all the ambition showed in its production, the final work is exceedingly simple, often to a fault; once the initial thrill of being introduced to the trolls has passed, it becomes clear that there isn’t a huge amount more than that going on, with light elements of satire about the oppressive Norwegian government playing second or third fiddle to enjoyable but shallow troll-battling thrills. Beyond the deliberately distant and enigmatic Hans, there also isn’t much in the way of character interest; the central trio don’t really get much development, with dramatic, tragic developments for the group being brushed off with disconcertingly little fanfare. One does feel that the film – with its desolate backdrops and its strangely sad, subdued monsters and protagonists – probably could have afforded to explore its melancholic overtones more deeply had it so chosen; that it doesn’t is a cause for slight disappointment.Still, when a film gets as much right as Troll Hunter does, it’s exceedingly difficult to wish it anything other than success. It certainly deserves to make back its modest budget and achieve cult status, both inevitabilities once its English-language run is complete; it’ll also be interesting to watch the progress of the equally inevitable US remake, options for which have reportedly already been picked up by Chris Columbus’ production company 1492. Certainly, it’s hard to see how well this would work outside its Norwegian setting, or if its low-rent charms would translate across to a higher-budget production, but none of that should concern Øvredal and crew; however well or badly the remake fares, it shouldn’t take away from the success of their idiosyncratic and hugely charming effort.
The Verdict: It’s not big and it’s not massively clever, but Troll Hunter is everything you want from a cult creature feature; ingeniously made, blackly humorous and full of well-crafted thrills.
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Comics Review: The DC New 52, Week 3 – Batman and Robin, Batwoman, Deathstroke, Demon Knights, Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E., Green Lantern, Grifter, Legion Lost, Mister Terrific, Red Lanterns, Resurrection Man, Suicide Squad, Superboy
Reviewer: Saxon Bullock (aka @saxonb)
BATMAN AND ROBIN issue 1
Writer: Peter J. Tomasi ~ Artists: Patrick Gleason and Mick Grey ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=3/5]
The second of the main Bat-titles to shift back around to an all-Bruce-all-the-time approach, this opening issue from Peter J. Tomasi basically acts as a primer to set up the troubled Bruce/Damian relationship, being the first point where Batman’s ten-year-old son has officially teamed up with him as Robin (aside from the brief sequence back in Batman: The Return). There’s all the disagreement and the conflict you’d expect – for new readers, this is slick, efficient if not exactly incredible, with the added bizareness of a sequence where a public swimming pool seems to be conveniently mounted above a nuclear reactor. However, the Bruce/Damian dynamic doesn’t really generate anything but the most predictable of sparks – against Dick Grayson’s cheerier Batman, Damien was a brilliant, grumpy contrast, but here the result is two characters locked in an ever-increasing stoic grumpiness contest. Batman and Robin started out as a place for Grant Morrison’s wilder, cartoonier ideas – this is an okay start, but it could really do with establishing a slightly sharper identity.
BATWOMAN issue 1
Writer: J.H. Williams III, W. Haden Blackman ~ Artists: J.H. Williams III ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=4.5/5]
Now, this is what you call a long wait. Delayed from launching early this year (and this after an acclaimed Detective Comics run that was held back time and time again), JH Williams III’s glorious interpretation of Batwoman is finally back in comic stores, and it’s been worth waiting for. No longer written by Greg Rucka, the script maybe lacks a little of the sharpness and edge, while Williams also sensibly doesn’t go too stylistically nuts in this issue, easing readers into the world of lesbian ex-marine turned vigilante Kathy Kane while also setting up some very intriguing questions. The story is well presented, and there’s some nice links to elsewhere in the DC Universe (especially in the appearence of Chase, one of the first characters Williams worked on at DC), but ultimately it’s the visuals that are the star, and the issue doesn’t disappoint. Quite a few of the DC relaunch titles don’t take enough chances visually, and Batwoman shows exactly what you can get away with when you’ve got an artist functioning at the top of his game.
DEATHSTROKE issue 1
Writer: Kyle Higgins ~ Artists: Joe Bennett and Art Thiebert ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=2/5]
There’s plenty of titles in the DC New 52 that had me scratching my head as to why anyone would want them, and high on the list was this – a starring role for Deathstroke, aka Slade Wilson, the grizzled, eye-patch wearing assassin and mercenary who’s happy to leave a massive bodycount in his wake if it means the job gets done. There’s no shortage of attitude here, and the action’s presented with plenty of visual energy – unfortunately, the black humour is in very short supply, while Higgins’ script barely gives us any reason to actually care whether Wilson lives or dies. Another example of DC’s bizarre 90s nostalgia kick, Deathstroke isn’t dreadful, but is certainly lacking in anything but the most basic “look, we’re being really Edgy!” action.
DEMON KNIGHTS issue 1
Writer: Paul Cornell ~ Artists: Diogenes Neves and Oclair Albert ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=4.5/5]
Just when I was feeling like the relaunch wasn’t really succeeding in going anywhere that felt truly new, Paul Cornell comes along and restores my faith. Demon Knights is a blast, an energetic medieval action romp that introduces all of its characters with a brisk amount of energy, while also showcasing some promising bad guys and a seriously intriguing world. Set in the medieval era of the DC Universe, this is sword-and-sorcery territory populated by some of the weirder, more immortal DC characters like Madam Xanadu, Vandal Savage and Jason Blood (along with his demonic alter-ego, Etrigan the Demon), and this first arc is basically aimed as a lively pastiche of the Magnificent Seven, throwing our heroes together in a quiet little village under threat. There’s some interesting choices – like the fact that, at least for now, Etrigan isn’t speaking in rhyming verse – and like Justice League, this is one comic where DC’s general decision to concentrate on the visuals means that this is more of an ‘opening five minutes’ than a self-contained chapter in it’s own right – but that’s partly because Cornell sets things up so nicely that you’re already up for the next chapter the minute this one ends. I had my issues with Stormwatch’s first issue, but Demon Knights is fresh, funny, and certainly one of the most engaging DC relaunch titles yet.
FRANKENSTEIN: AGENT OF S.H.A.D.E. issue 1
Writer: Jeff Lemire ~ Artist: Alberto Ponticelli ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=4/5]
Here, the DC Universe gets its own take on Hellboy – and following the appearence of the Shining Knight in Demon Knights, another character from Grant Morrison’s epic series of relaunches Seven Soldiers of Victory gets a starring role here. Setting up Victor Frankenstein’s tragic creation with his own team of ‘Creature Commandos’, this is lurid fun from Jeff Lemire that’s very different in tone from Animal Man. Alberto Ponticelli’s art gives the whole thing a very dark pulp feel, pulling of some excellent splash pages, and there’s enough lurid weirdness here to suggest that this dark adventure could head down some very promising roads.
GREEN LANTERN issue 1
Writer: Geoff Johns ~ Artist: Doug Mankhe and Christian Almy ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=3/5]
Out of all the DC relaunches, Green Lantern was always the one that was going to be touched the least – Geoff Johns is the current DC Comics golden boy, after all – and no surprises, Green Lantern 1 is the most perfunctory of all the first issues, making virtually no allowances for any readers jumping on. Admittedly, the setup is relatively intriguing – with Hal Jordan stuck on Earth and powerless, now that his Green Lantern ring has, for reasons unknown, chosen his arch-nemesis (and previous Yellow Lantern) Sinestro. Johns is always a reliable, no-nonsense writer and the art from Mankhe and Almy is as sharp and impressive as ever, but it would have been nice if this had felt a little more welcoming to new readers, and more of a genuine relaunch, rather than simply a pause in a story that’s been going a long time and won’t be stopping anytime soon.
GRIFTER issue 1
Writer: Nathan Edmondson ~ Artist: Cafu ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=2/5]
Weirdly enough, we’ve got two comics this week starring characters on the run pursued by mysterious (possibly demonic) forces that they barely comprehend, and this ongoing title starring a character previously from the Wildstorm team comic Wildcats is certainly the lesser of the two. As with Deathstroke, there’s an assumption that we’re just going to care about the lead character simply because he’s the lead character – Edmondson pulls off some good setpieces, and Cafu’s art is slickly executed without ever being remarkable, but the whole thing feels somewhat aimless. The central character at the moment is basically locked as a combination of Gambit from the X-Men and Sawyer from Lost, and this action adventure is going to have to have something major up its sleeve if it isn’t going to be the first of the New 52 to die a swift death.
LEGION LOST issue 1
Writer: Fabian Nicieza ~ Artist: Pete Woods ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=3.5/5]
There are plenty of people in the world who don’t have the faintest idea who the Legion of Super-Heroes are, and weirdly enough we get this spin-off title appearing before the main title itself. Here, a squad of characters from the 30th Century incarnation of the Legion get accidentally stranded in the present day, with plenty of problems to tackle- the biggest of which is the deadly virus that’s just been loosed onto the world. Nicieza does an efficient job in introducing the characters, while there are some entertaining setpieces and an enjoyably pulpy SF feel to the whole adventure. Along with some effective, well-executed art, this is one of the more promising middle-of-the-road DC titles.
MISTER TERRIFIC issue 1
Writer: Eric Wallace ~ Artist: Gianluca Gugliotta ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=4/5]
Here’s an example of a DC Comic actually getting it right, and making me interested in a character I knew virtually nothing about. With an emphasis on science that’s creative and fun, this introduces celebrity scientist Michael Holt (aka Mr. Terrific) well, bringing us up to date on his history while also throwing some serious threats in his path. Visually it’s well executed, with some excellent splash pages, and it’s hard not to feel that this is what the very lacklustre Green Arrow should have felt like. Giving us an intriguing central character and setting up a number of conflicts, there’s also the welcome appearence of DC character Karen Starr – who longtime DC readers will know better as the cleavage-tastic heroine Power Girl – and a cliffhanger that certainly sets the stakes high for issue 2.
RED LANTERNS issue 1
Writer: Peter Milligan ~ Artists: Ed Benes and Rob Hunter ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=3.5/5]
The latest addition to the Green Lantern franchise is this somewhat inevitable ongoing starring the rage-fuelled Red Lanterns, and it benefits a lot from having ex-2000AD and longtime Vertigo writer Peter Milligan onboard. There’s a darkly grotesque feel to this, while Milligan sets up the character of Atrocitus in some effective ways, giving the audience a mix of well-written introspection and over-the-top violence (especially in the opening sequence, featuring the lethal Red Lantern cat Dex-Starr). It’s not without its moments of cheese, however, while the earthbound revenge plotline is (at least so far) a little bewildering, and the art goes for the cleavage-heavy cheesecake approach at every conceivable opportunity. Nevertheless, Milligan has at least set this up as a worthy addition to the already crowded GL franchise ranks, and looks to have plenty in store.
RESURRECTION MAN issue 1
Writers: Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning ~ Artist: Fernando Dagnino ~ Price: $2.99 ~[xrr rating=4/5]
One of the most reliable writer teams out there, Abnett and Lanning always deliver well-crafted and entertaining comics – here, coming back to a character last seen in the Nineties, they’ve given us another entry in the darker and weirder edges of the DC Universe. Mitch Shelly, the man blessed/cursed to resurrect with a different superpower every time he dies makes for an interesting protagonist, and the whole atmosphere of dark brooding atmosphere pays off in spades. Dagnino’s art just amps up the darkness, pulling off a handful of nicely executed and inventive moments, Abnett and Lanning raise the tension and set up plenty of mysteries, and by the climax this is certainly looking like one of the more intriguing of DC’s ‘Dark’ family of titles.
SUICIDE SQUAD issue 1
Writer: Adam Glass ~ Artists: Marco Rudy ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=2.5/5]
Any fans of Secret Six should look away now. This isn’t anywhere near as good as Gail Simone’s magnum opus of morally grey supervillains, while Harley Quinn’s new look is shameless exploitation for its own sake (as well as a shameless bid for the Arkham Asylum/Arkham City computer game geek crowd). Ultimately, writer Adam Glass does get a certain amount of fun out of this very, very old set-up – death-row criminals sent on near-suicidal missions with the vaguest chance of redeeming themselves – and also pulls off an ending that’s certainly attention-grabbing. Unfortunately, this is also so deliberately, self-consciously edgy it’s almost painful to read at times, and does feel like a collection of most of superhero comics’s worst excesses wrapped up in one rather worrying parcel.
SUPERBOY issue 1
Writer: Scott Lobdell ~ Artists: R.B. Silva and Rob Lean ~ Price: $2.99[xrr rating=4/5]
A pleasant surprise, this, as we get a setup for this new iteration of the Superboy character that’s similar to the previous history (he’s still a clone with some of Superman’s DNA) but also adds in plenty of themes from Flashpoint’s Project Superman miniseries. A surprisingly dense and well-crafted script takes us through some engaging drama, contrasting Superboy’s gradual discoveries about the world via his ‘education’ with the corporate shenanigans and skullduggery going on around him. On top of this, there’s some excellent, clean-lined art from R.B. Silva (the recent Jimmy Olsen special) and Rob Lean, giving this a bright and colourful feel that’s pleasently different from some of the darker, murkier, more Jim Lee-influenced titles to be found elsewhere. A satisfying set-up, this only really runs into problems with an ending that links directly to Teen Titans – a comic with isn’t out yet, meaning the final page might be a bit confusing to those not in the know. However, this is an efficiently executed superhero comic that hints at some interesting stories to come.
Previous DC New 52 Reviews:
The DC New 52, Week 1: Justice League
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Saxon Bullock 