The Black Demon – Film Review

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

Ever since Steven Spielberg brought the novel Jaws to life on the big screen there’s been a demand for shark movies. Despite being nowhere near as dangerous as the films portray them to be, sharks have ended up capturing people’s greatest fears about the oceans; the fear of being helpless in an environment humans just aren’t equipped to survive in.

Sharks have gone on to represent a primal fear, and it looks like their popularity as a monster of the deep isn’t going away any time soon. Since Jaws we’ve seen regular sharks going after swimmers in films like Open Water, man-made monsters turning on their creators in films like Deep Blue Sea, and we’ve even got prehistoric sharks returning from extinction in stories like The Meg. If you’re looking for sharks, there are plenty of different takes on them to scratch whatever itch you’ve got. They’re even in tornados now too.

The Black Demon begins in the dead of night, at a remote oil rig off the shore of Baja, where a pair of workers are preparing to take a sneaky dive into the waters below. It’s clear that the two of them are up to no good, and that there’s more going on than first appears, and when one straps an explosive device onto part of the rig those suspicions are confirmed. However, we don’t get much of a chance to learn more about them, as something strange begins to happen to the diver as he starts to see things that aren’t really there, before he’s attacked and killed by a shark.

From this intriguing cold open we meet the Sturges family, who are driving to a small town on the Baja cost. Paul (Josh Lucas) works for an oil company that owns El Diamante, the rig we saw at the start, and he’s on his way there to perform a safety inspection. Along for the journey are his wife, Ines (Fernanda Urrejolas), teen daughter Audrey (Venus Ariel), and young son Tommy (Carlos Solórzano), who are planning to spend some time relaxing on the beach whilst Paul heads out to the rig. Expecting to find the quaint little town where they first fell in love, Paul and Ines are shocked to find a ghost town, a place on the verge of collapse where most of the citizens have already left it.

With much of the town’s woes being firmly placed at the feet of the oil company, the Sturges family soon meet animosity from the locals, and Ines and the children are forced to flee for their own safety, jumping on a boat and following Paul out to the rig. Unfortunately for the family, the rig is under attack from a massive shark; one that won’t allow anyone to leave alive. Trapped on board with a pair of survivors from the original crew, they’ll desperately need to find a way to survive, little knowing that their time is quickly counting down.

The Black Demon will likely feel quite familiar to those who’ve seen a few shark attack films. The El Diamante rig’s isolation makes our protagonists unable to escape to safety. The angry locals means that rescue isn’t coming. And the old, half broken rig and literal ticking clock means that they simply can’t just sit back and wait for help. The characters are alone, without help, and need to think of something fast. It’s the kind of scenario you expect with this movie. But The Black Demon does at least try to do a few things slightly differently. The first of these being that this isn’t a regular shark: it’s a megalodon. Megalodon’s are ancient, prehistoric sharks that existed for 20 million years, and died out around three million years ago. The largest sharks to ever inhabit the Earth, they could reach up to 60ft in length, and dwarfed even their modern day cousins, the Great White.

This isn’t the first film to use a megalodon, and The Meg book series became a huge hit for doing so, and whilst that story and its big screen adaptation went out of its way to explain how a prehistoric shark species could still survive and return to our oceans, The Black Demon does not. However, that does kind of play into the second thing that the film does to try and be a bit different: it introduces the supernatural. There is suggestion in the film that the shark has been sent as a punishment by the rain god Tlāloc, and that there’s no scientific explanation for its presence. Whilst this could be chalked up to local superstition (a view Paul has to begin with) the film doesn’t seem to want to give a concrete answer. The shark does seem to have the ability to make people see things that aren’t real, and the film makes a point of lingering on images of Tlāloc at times. It leaves it down to the viewer to decide if this is a prehistoric survivor, or a gods revenge.

Whilst the possibility that the killer shark might be a supernatural being gives the movie an interesting edge, most of the rest of the film ends up feeling like things that we’ve seen before. The script doesn’t seem to want to try anything too innovative, especially with its characters. The characters that we do have are fine, but there’s nothing about them that’s hugely interesting, and even familial strife does little to add drama. Sadly, because the characters do little to stand out or really appear interesting (other than the young Tommy) it means that you don’t care a huge amount about who lives or who dies. Added on to this, there being young children involved seems to lessen the tension somewhat, as you never really feel like they’re going to be in any real danger.

The Black Demon tries to push the killer shark genre in some interesting directions at times, whilst at others it seems to want to play it safe and rely on tried and tested tropes. Because of this, it ends up being one of those films where you’ll be entertained but will likely not come back to it again. Some of its ideas might stick with you, but thanks to the film not doing much with it the project kind of feels like a missed opportunity. Pushing more into the supernatural angle, and making a firm stance on it may have alienated some viewers, but it would have ended up with a stronger final product. As it is, The Black Demon is a decent way to spend an hour and a half, but ends up being nothing more than that.

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Us by Sara Soler - Graphic Novel Review

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

Us is an autobiographical comic memoir by Spanish artist Sara Soler, which tells the story about her relationship with her partner Diana. What makes her story interesting is that her partner is a trans woman, and this story begins before Diana came out, and charts not only her journey to womanhood and acceptance, but Sara’s own journey of self discovery in regards to her identity.

Before now parts of US were produced as a small fanzine that Sara created for a comic con in 2014. But since then the book has expanded, becoming this new graphic novel. This is the first time that the book has been produced in English, and it offers a whole new audience the chance to discover a lovingly crafted, beautiful looking, personal story about what life is like both as a trans person, and as someone who loves a trans person.

I feel a small disclaimer is needed before going too deep into Us: I am a trans woman. I’ve made no secret of that on this site, and have talked about it a number of times, but thought it would be worth mentioning here as I feel that reading Us felt very different for me than it would to a cis reader, especially one who might not know much about what it’s like to be trans, or the trans experience. My review will absolutely be coloured by my own experience (as would anyone’s review), and I think that I’m going to connect with this book in a different way, but one that made reading Us a very special experience.

Us begins with a couple of pages that gives the reader a lot of info up front; Sara doesn’t bury the lead here. It explains that Diana is a trans woman, that some of the stereotypical experiences of being trans in the media are not going to be present here, that all types of gender discovery journeys and expressions are valid, and gives a little history on the book. After that, we begin with what is to many trans people one of the most frightening and nerve-wracking experiences: Diana’s coming out. Most of the time these scenarios are presented from a trans perspective, so seeing it from the point of view of the person that’s on the receiving end is an interesting change. Sara knows her partner well, and knows when something is bothering her, and slowly teases the information out of her, encouraging her to open up. The way that the fear and the panic around Diana is drawn feels incredibly relatable, that aura of pain and worry that leaks off of you.

This sparks an interesting part of the book – Sara’s own journey. Whilst Diana’s initial coming out doesn’t go very far, and she represses her feelings for two years and pretends to be a perfectly fine and happy cis guy, it doesn’t stop Sara from having to think about what this would mean for her. She begins to question if she’d stay with Diana, if that would make her gay, if there had ever been any signs of her being queer in the past. In some ways Diana’s coming out changed who Sara was, though it wasn’t until Diana couldn’t keep pretending anymore that she came to a firm conclusion about her own queerness.

After this somewhat rocky start, of Diana not knowing if she wanted to come out or not, of the two of them not knowing if they could even stay together if she did, they come to an acceptance that Diana is a trans woman, and that Sara is bisexual, and that their love and relationship would continue.

From here the book covers a lot of the things that you would expect: Diana beginning to medically transition, having to come out to family and friends, having to deal with both open and veiled bigotry, and about finding the kind of person you always were meant to be. But again, this story also has Sara there, going through the same, supporting her partner, and dealing with those same issues. It’s rare to see a duel coming out story like this, and whilst much of the focus is on Diana and her journey the book never forgets to show you Sara’s perspective, and her feelings.

Sadly, as with most trans stories, the book has to deal with some dark things. Diana and Sara’s journey isn’t a smooth one at times, and bigotry does rear its head in Us. It can be hard to write about such things in a way that doesn’t feel full of doom and hopelessness, and talking about experiencing bigotry can easily bring the mood down because it’s an awful experience. But somehow Sara Soler has managed to make these moments not as bad as you’d expect.

Yes, they were painful to read at the time, in part due to having experienced the same and it bringing up those memories, and trans people being targeted by hate is an incredibly common occurrence (I’ve literally received messages on social media whilst writing this very article where I’ve been called a paedophile and a groomer just for being trans). But, thanks to Sara being there for Diana, and thanks to the way the book is presented, these moments are a fleeting speck of darkness in what is otherwise a wonderfully bright and hopeful narrative.

Sara isn’t just the writer of the book though, she’s also the artist. The art on Us is very, very pretty. The artwork on the front cover is absolutely gorgeous, but isn’t what you’re going to be getting throughout the book 100% of the time. There are several moments that have that style, but for the most part Sara uses a much simpler style, with stylised and cartoonish versions of characters. And this style works wonderfully for the story.

Thanks to the kinds of emotions running rampant during Sara and Diana’s story, it could be a lot less fun to draw in a more realistic way then you’re drawing yourself and your loved one in panic mode, going through fear and heartbreak. As such, the more stylised version means that it’s easy to convey these emotions without having to go deep into them. It also means that the flip side is easy to do too, and the moments of pure joy, the times of gender euphoria and love are represented in wonderfully fun and clear ways. And the moments when Sara and Diana break the fourth wall to talk to the reader directly feel right for the tone too. Plus, the colour palette of pink, white, and blue works perfectly too.

Us is the kind of book that brings me very mixed emotions when reading it. The lows feel really impactful, the moments that remind me of my own journey’s stumbles and pains hit hard, but it also means that the moments of happiness and joy grab me too. There’s a lot of love in the pages of this book, not just in how they were made, but in the people this story is about. Sara and Diana are a beautiful, wonderful couple.

Their love story isn’t just engaging, it’s inspiring. With so many people casting loved ones aside when they come out as trans, and with some women who leave their partners for being trans being so disgusting as to call themselves trans widows, seeing a story of such unconditional love, of such deep affection and caring for a trans person is the kind of story we all so desperately need right now.

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The Surviving Sky by Kritika H. Rao – Book Review

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

'High above a jungle-planet float the last refuges of humanity—plant-made civilisations held together by tradition, technology, and arcane science. In these living cities, architects are revered above anyone else. If not for their ability to psychically manipulate the architecture, the cities would plunge into the devastating earthrage storms below.

'Charismatic, powerful, mystical, Iravan is one such architect. In his city, his word is nearly law. His abilities are his identity, but to Ahilya, his wife, they are a way for survival to be reliant on the privileged few. Like most others, she cannot manipulate the plants. And she desperately seeks change.

'Their marriage is already thorny—then Iravan is accused of pushing his abilities to forbidden limits. He needs Ahilya to help clear his name; she needs him to tip the balance of rule in their society. As their paths become increasingly intertwined, deadly truths emerge, challenging everything each of them believes. And as the earthrages become longer, and their floating city begins to plummet, Iravan and Ahilya's discoveries might destroy their marriage, their culture, and their entire civilisation.'

The Surviving Sky is the debut novel from Kritika H. Rao, and tells the story of a married man and woman whose relationship is close to breaking point, and who are trying to find a way to reconcile. It’s also a story about the last of humanity surviving the end of the world on giant floating cities made from plants, so there’s something a little bit more unusual thrown into this well crafted human drama.

The book takes place in Nakshar, one of a number of flying plant cities. At some point in the past the Earth became uninhabitable thanks to Earthrages: massive, destructive storms that move across the surface, destroying all human life that they come into contact with. In order to survive, humanity took to the skies.

Thanks to a specialised group of people called engineers, humans found a way of manipulating plant life, shaping it to their will. These engineers are able to enter a special state called trajection, where they’re able to see both the world around them as it exists, and the life-force and connective pathways of flora. Using these connections, engineers can transform plants into everyday objects, from furniture to the buildings that people live in, and even the floating cities that humanity uses as their refuge.

Whilst this has allowed humanity to survive, it has also resulted in fraught tensions within the last of humanity. The engineers are held up above other citizens, as their survival means the survival of all of humanity. Treated as the best of the best, the engineers have become the leaders of Nakshar; reluctantly sharing a few council seats with the sungineers, the inventors and mechanics of Nakshar.

Iravan is one of the best engineers on the council, able to manipulate plant life in ways others could only ever dream of doing. Despite being one of the best in the city, his marriage has taken a turn for the worse. His wife, Ahilya, is an archaeologist, a profession most see as useless, and is looking into humanity’s past to try to find better ways to exist in the future. Sadly, this often brings the two of them into conflict, especially as she thinks engineers treat those unable to traject as lesser people.

When Nakshar lands on the Earth below during one of the lulls in the Earthrages, Ahilya sets out into the jungle with a small expedition group to study the animal life that manages to survive the massive disasters, hoping to find information that could lead humans to do the same. However, when a disaster leads to one of the group being killed, and the city is forced to take to the sky again, Iravan is accused of being close to becoming Ecstatic, a state in which engineers lose themselves in their powers and become destructive. However, Iravan insists that something is wrong in the trajection, and that it could spell disaster for the entire city. Now he and Ahilya will have to work together to try to figure out what’s wrong, not only to clear Iravan’s name, but to save all of humanity.

The Surviving Sky is one of those books where you have to double check that it’s a debut novel. There are a lot of times where you see an author’s first novels and you can tell that they’re still trying to find their feet, still figuring out the style they want to use, and how to clearly tell their story. Kritika H. Rao, on the other hand, seems to have arrived on the scene with a firm grasp on the kind of writer they’re going to be. This is not a simple story, nor is the world that Rao has created an easy one to describe.

It has a complex system and a very alien way of living that could result in a book that leaves the reader left behind as they try to figure everything out, but Rao is able to make the most impossible and alien feel real and relatable. More established and experienced writers have tried to craft complex worlds like this, and have failed to convey things in as clear and easy to understand a way as Rao does here. Add onto that, they’re able to craft a wonderfully realistic and engaging human story at the heart of the book too, and this is an author whose career you’re going to want to keep an eye on.

Speaking of the human relationship, Ahilya and Iravan are messy people. They’re complex, they have flaws, and whilst they both clearly love each other they also both frustrate each other in a lot of ways too. They’re not one of these romantic couples whose relationship is in trouble who just spend a little bit of time together and fall back in love all over again. No, they have to work hard, they have to get over their flaws and annoyances and learn to look past that at what really matters. Their relationship feels incredibly realistic because there are no easy answers for them here, just like there are none in real life.

The Surviving Sky is a wonderfully creative and interesting story, set in a world unlike any other you’ll have seen before. It’s a wonderful mix of science fiction and nature magic that takes the best of both worlds to craft something wholly its own. It’s also a wonderfully inclusive world, filled with loving queer characters, and is inhabited by people of colour (it’s amazingly refreshing to have a story with no white people in it for once). The central mystery will very quickly draw you in, and the realistic human stories will get you invested. The Surviving Sky is a superb debut novel that is hard to find fault with, and I can’t wait to see what the author does next.

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The Comic Cave – Flashpoint

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

The Comic Cave is a bi-weekly feature where we spin the Wheel of Comics and see what graphic novel story it brings up for us to deep dive into! For our first time out, however, we’ve decided to cover Flashpoint, the Flash event that changed the DC Universe forever.

The Flash is one of the more well known heroes that DC has. Outside of Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman, he’s perhaps the next best known hero, due in no small part to the recently ended CW television series that ran for nine seasons. He’s been a figure in shows such as Smallville (though that was technically Impulse, not Flash), has appeared in Batman the Brave and the Bold, and was a key cast member of Justice League and Justice League Unlimited. Despite having this long standing recognition, most people would be hard pressed to name a big Flash story; even those who read comics might struggle to name more than a handful of iconic titles.

Whilst you might get recommendations for things like The Flash: The Return of Barry Allen, The Flash: Terminal Velocity, or The Flash: Rogue War (all great books worth reading), one story that always seems to appear on lists and recommendation lists is Flashpoint. It’s easy to see why Flashpoint would be on such a list, despite being a book that encompasses the entire DC universe it is very much a Flash story, in the same way that Blackest Night effected the entire universe but was a Green Lantern tale. However, Flashpoint often also gets overlooked as being a Flash story, due in part to what the event leads into, and how people reacted to the changes that it brought about. Flashpoint was used as the reason for The New 52, a universe wide reboot that upset a large number of fans, and that a lot of people will argue ended up damaging DC for a number of years.

With that in mind, how does Flashpoint stand up as a piece on its own? Is it worth the ire that it’s sometimes associated with, just because of an editorial decision that only comes into play in the last handful of pages of the book?

Written by Geoff Johns, with art by Andy Kubert, the main Flashpoint title consists of five issues, and focuses on Barry Allen. Barry Allen is the second Flash, and the first to wear the costume that people will picture when they think of The Flash (the whole Jay Garrick thing is complex). Barry was The Flash for a number of years before the comic event Crisis on Infinite Earths, in which he died. From there the mantle of Flash was passed onto his young sidekick, Wally West, who would be The Flash for almost as long as Barry. After being dead for more than twenty years, Barry Allen was returned to life, and spent a few years struggling to find his place in a changed universe. This is the foundation for the character going into Flashpoint, and is kind of a key reason for the story happening.

The book begins with Barry waking up at work one day, having apparently fallen asleep at his computer. At first he doesn’t really pay attention to the subtle differences around him, the odd names that people are saying. It’s not until one of his rogues, Captain Cold, is referred to as a hero named Citizen Cold that Barry realises that something is seriously wrong. Rushing out of the crime lab he goes to change into The Flash, but realises his Flash ring is gone; not only that, but so has his speed. Falling down the stairs, he comes face to face with his mother; who’s been dead for decades.

Barry realises that time must have changed, and starts quizzing his mother for information, learning that most of the heroes he knows don’t exist. One that his mother does know is Batman, and this sets Barry on a course to Gotham City looking for answers. However, what he finds in Gotham is a complete surprise to him. Batman isn’t Bruce Wayne, it’s his father Thomas. In this new timeline it was Bruce Wayne who was shot and killed, and his father became a brutal vigilante in the wake of it; a vigilante who kills. Despite this, Batman is still recognised as one of the best heroes around, and Cyborg, America’s biggest hero, tries to recruit him and a group of other odd heroes to his cause.

This new world is at war, Aquaman and Wonder Woman are at each other’s throats, and their nations are locked in a vicious conflict that has already seen half of Europe drowned and Britain occupied by the Amazons. Millions are dead already, and many more are at risk as the two global powers continue to clash. Cyborg is trying to put together a team to stop them, but Batman refuses to join. However, when Barry breaks into the cave beneath Wayne Manor and finds Thomas as Batman he manages to convince the vigilante to help him get his speed back and fix the timeline.

The beauty of the main Flashpoint title is that it’s a very simple concept. Something changed time, the world is bad, it needs fixing. And it seems like perhaps the initial concept for Flashpoint was to just be a simple Flash focused time travel story, and then the decision to use it as the launching point for the big reboot was taken later on; which could explain how when the story is expanded upon in its tie-ins it begins to make less and less sense in places. The main title keeps things fairly tight, and moves with a decent pace. This is in part down to the fact that it takes place across only five issues, something that most events don’t do. Big events like Secret Invasion, Final Crisis, and Secret Wars will play out over 8-12 issues, and will try to pack as much in as they can. Flashpoint doesn’t do this.

The main title hints at the bigger world, and gives the reader small teases at what the changes have been. For example, in this timeline Shazam is Captain Thunder, and requires five children to become one hero when they transform. There’s no information on Captain Thunder’s backstory, or how he differs from Shazam; he’s simply there inhabiting the world. Other characters get a bit more time given over to them, such as Thomas Wayne’s version of Batman, and even Superman, who only briefly appears in the story, have more time than you’d expect given over to them. But for the most part it’s left vague, and this works better for the story as it means you don’t have to get bogged down in the details.

However, if you do want to get bogged down in the details, a number of tie-in stories and mini-series can do that for you, expanding the story from five issues to sixty one. (And yes, I did read every single Flashpoint book to prepare for this article.) Most of these tie-ins are three issue series that pick a character and show how they’re different in this new timeline. Some of them, such as Flashpoint: Batman – Knight of Vengeance and Flashpoint: Deadman and the Flying Graysons are pretty good, and give us wildly different versions of these characters. The Batman book is perhaps the best thing to come out of Flashpoint, even if it doesn’t quite fit into the main title like its supposed to. It ends up being a decent Elseworlds style Batman story that has a few really cool surprises and shocking moments in it, and is definitely worth a read.

Others of the tie-ins are less good, and end up feeling like much more of a slog to get through. The Aquaman and Wonder Woman books give much more insight into the war than the main title, and actually turn the two characters from vicious warmongers into fools who’ve been tricked and manoeuvred into global war by conspirators in their kingdoms. The Green Lantern book is perhaps the most unusual though, not just because it takes the visual designs from the then upcoming film for all of its characters (a terrible choice considering the reception that film had), but because it also shows that the changes to the timeline have impacted the wider universe beyond Earth. The Blackest Night is already happening, with Black Lanterns spreading across the universe, the Red Lanterns have been a threat, and Abin Sur is still alive, and is the Earth Green Lantern in the Flashpoint timeline. The most frustrating part of all of these tie-in books is that none of them even touched upon the Canadian zombie wasteland teased in the main series.

The big revelation for Flashpoint (spoiler time) is that the timeline was fractured, leading to ripple effects that changed multiple things, when Barry travelled back in time to save his mother’s life. Whilst this one change wasn’t enough to plunge the world into ruins, Barry not understanding how to manipulate time caused the issues. And in order to put things right he needs to allow his mother to die. The story ends with Barry heading back in time a second time to stop his younger self from saving his mother. This is where things then get complex, and the book earns its criticism. Whilst travelling through time a mysterious hooded figure (later revealed to be Pandora) talks about how the timeline was fractured into three, and how she needs to repair it.

Some real world background now. DC were looking for a way to incorporate the Wildstorm and Vertigo imprint into their main universe, bringing more characters into the DC Universe. Wildstorm was originally founded as an independent comic company by Jim Lee in the 90s during the comic boom and the popularity of ‘edgier’ books. Wildstorm created characters such as Stormwatch, The Authority, and Gen 13, but was ultimately bought out by DC a year before Flashpoint. Flashpoint actually used a Wildstorm character, Grifter, in the event. Vertigo, on the other hand, was always a part of DC, though its stories existed outside of the main continuity and featured characters like Swamp Thing, Constantine, and The Sandman universe which had crossed over with the main universe briefly in the past. At the end of Flashpoint Pandora merged these three universes/timelines into one new universe, giving birth to The New 52.

The New 52 is something that has provoked varying reactions in people. For some people it was a perfect jumping on point to start reading comics (DC’s big reason for doing it in the first place) as all of its books started at number one again, and it promised to give a fresh, easy to understand take on DC. In reality, it was kind of a disaster. There appeared to be no plan for The New 52, and some of the events from the previous timelines still happened, but they wouldn’t say which, and when it did come up which events happened they didn’t explain how they could have happened in these new timelines that actively contradicted the events of those books. The timeline was condensed down to just five years, making a lot of stuff they say happened impossible, and many of the characters were changed on a fundamental level, with new hero identities, costumes, and origins. A lot of long-time DC readers would end up jumping ship thanks to The New 52 (myself included), and it was only through later fixing of the timeline that they were able to correct a lot of this.

Should The New 52 being terrible affect the quality of Flashpoint? No, but for a lot it will. It’s hard to read this book and not think about the lasting damage it caused, and how for many it wrecked DC. It’s also sad that the first few pages of the book are the last time a number of beloved characters are ever seen until they get fixed through subsequent events such as DC Rebirth, Infinite Frontier, and Dawn of DC. That being said, taken on its own Flashpoint is an okay story; a throwaway alternate timeline tale that doesn’t really mean much. Which makes people’s insistence that it’s one of the best and most important Flash stories all the more baffling.

Perhaps because of the universe-wide impact it had, and maybe because it’s a modern story, Flashpoint feels like it’s been over-hyped, to the point where it’s now being adapted for the third time already. Yes, the upcoming Flash movie is the reason why our first instalment is covering Flashpoint, because The Flash is a very stripped down version of the story. Instead of the Thomas Wayne Batman we’re getting Michael Keaton back as an older Bruce Wayne; the locked up experimented upon Superman who gets saved by the heroes is Supergirl; and instead of the Atlantis/Amazon war it’s the invasion of General Zod from Man of Steel. But this will not be the first time that the story has been adapted like this, with The Flash series having very briefly used the concept for the start of their third season, and the animated movie Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox having been made in 2013.

Flashpoint might appear on a lot of lists, but it’s pretty far from being a good Flash story. There are much better books about the character out there, with better alternate timeline adventures on offer too. But thanks to the larger impact the book had, and for giving us the Flashpoint Batman (who would later enter the main universe) Flashpoint is going to be a book that sticks around. Though perhaps my dislike comes about because it wiped away the version of DC I loved, and wrecked my enjoyment of comics for several years; so don’t necessarily take my opinion as fact and go give it a try for yourself.

Flashpoint was published May – August 2011 by DC Comics.

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The Day The Hiccups Took Over by Jo Simmons - Book Review

 

'Frank has a big day ahead of him - a trip to the dentist, a trumpet exam, a swimming trial, and then the event he's been looking forward to for months, his knitting hero live on stage here in his hometown! Frank can't wait, but he also can't stop hiccuping. HIC! HIC! HIC! They start before breakfast and they will not GO AWAY! Helped by his new friend Daisy, Frank tries ever more hare-brained ideas to get rid of the HICS! Will they ruin his day, or can Frank overcome the hiccuping horrors?'

On the surface, The Day The Hiccups Took Over is a silly story about a young boy whose day is being ever more disrupted by the worst case of hiccups that he's ever had, and this leads to silliness and fun. However, Jo Simmons has managed to sneak in some pretty awesome messages about being true to yourself, and to follow your passions and not be ashamed of the things that bring you joy.

Frank is a boy with a secret. He loves knitting. Whether it's making scarves, hats, or thick woolly jumpers, he loves nothing more than getting out his needles and making things. The only problem is that he thinks that people will judge him for his hobby, even his parents. So, Frank keeps his passion a secret from everyone, even going so far as claiming he found his lovely hand knitted scarf at the park instead of telling people that he made it.

This means that he's also been planning and saving in secret so that he can attend the World Knitting Games, and today is the day. It's also the day that he has several other things he needs to do first such as visit the dentist, but once he's through that he'll be off to the event where he can watch his hero knitting live on stage. Frank is all ready to start his day when he starts to hiccup, the strongest, loudest hiccups he's ever had.

Frank tries everything he can think of to get rid of them, but nothing helps. When he literally runs into the new girl from school, Daisy, she tries to help him out, and the two of them try even weirder and weirder tricks to get rid of the hiccups. And after a while it looks like they might be gone, but when they come back Frank has to try and force his way through the day hiccuping the whole way.

The Day The Hiccups Took Over is a book with a lot of silly humour to it, and Frank's hiccups lead to more than a few fun scenarios that younger readers will have a lot of fun with. Both the ways in which Frank and Daisy try to cure him, and the things that happen as he tries to go about his day have a number of moments that will make you chuckle. But the real hart of the book is Franks love of knitting. The book ultimately has the message that you need to embrace who you are and the things that you love, and to not worry about who might judge you for that because there will always be people who end up supporting and encouraging you. The latter part of the book, where Frank essentially 'comes out' as a knitter is actually quite sweet, and has some wonderfully affirming messages that I think younger readers will take to heart.

The book also has a number of illustrations by Lee Cosgrove, who also provides the cover art for the book. Cosgrove's art has a really nice feel to it, and it's less realist, more cartoon-like style lends itself great to the events of the book. Moments such as Frank spitting juice all over the wall whilst hiccuping, or Frank biting his Dentist by mistake are all fun to read, but when accompanied by Cosgrove's art these moments become even more delightful.

There's a lot of fun to be found in The Day The Hiccups Took Over, and it was enjoyable to read. Younger readers will have a blast with how humerus the story is, whilst also learning a pretty solid lesson too.

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Jon Richter's Dark Fiction - Book Review

 

'Jon Richter returns to horror with a new collection of short, chilling tales, splicing together his best previously published works with a batch of nerve-shredding new fiction. Encompassing science fiction and fantasy as well as gothic horror and outright weirdness, the anthology is brought twitching and wriggling to life by the brilliant illustrations of David T Wilby.

'Dark Fiction will slake the thirst of anyone who craves original, fiendishly crafted stories with twist endings that cling to you long after you've finished reading...'

Anthology books are a wonderful way to spend your time finding new authors. Sometimes it can be daunting picking up a book with a name on it that you're not familiar with, and you want to test the waters before making the plunge, and so reading a short story is a good way of doing this. But once you've found an author that you like you can easily forget to read their short stories in favour of their novels. Jon Richter seems to be an author who enjoys writing short stories, and has released a number of anthology collections alongside his regular books; and it's not only a lot of fun getting to read these short, shocking tales, but also getting to see how versatile Richter is as a writer.

Dark Fiction plays around with the format a little, and the book begins with you the reader being in the shoes of Jon Richter's literary agent, asked to come out to his remote country home to check out his new work. You see, the Jon Richter of the book needs his agent to come to him, because his new work can't be read, it has to be experienced. Suspecting some kind of weird literary art installation, and wondering how the hell to spin that, the agent enters the massive old home, where they can go from room to room to experience the stories held within them. 

The book, which I read in ebook form, offers you a choice as to which room to enter, or if you're don, to go to the final room, with a contents page that allows you to select whichever story you want. This immediately made me think of those 'choose your own adventure stories' where you could pick your own path. And whilst the epilogue does bring this framing story to an end I was slightly dissapointed that each story didn't take the reader back to the hallway to pick a new room, but instead continued in a linear pattern making your way through the list. But that's only a small gripe in what's otherwise a fun way to craft this collection. But now, for the stories on offer.

'Leviathan' tells a historic tale that feels like it could have been lifted from the works of Lovecraft, written through a series of journal entries. It follows a journalist who has been assigned to follow a record breaking deep sea diving attempt, where a scientist and a rich explorer are attempting to descend deep beneath the ocean in a new submersible. Unlike the other stories in this collection, this is written in journal form  and between that and its period setting it ended up reminding me books like Dracula, and Frankenstein. I really enjoyed this story thanks to these nods to other literary styles and settings, and found its slow burn thriller style approach to be incredibly engaging; and thanks to some events going on in the real world, it made this story all the more disturbing and unsettling. 

'The Thanatologist' is the story that I think surprised me the most. It's a romantic comedy of sorts, and follows a woman who seems to have given up on trying to find a nice guy, and is just trying to enjoy her life as best she can. Whilst going through a list of ten best hidden restaurants in London, she keeps seeing a man, also out for dinner on his own. The two strike up a conversation, and soon realise that they like each other. As the story progresses you see the two of them get closer, and you forger that this is a Richter story, and that something else has to be happening here. We get hints that the man is more than he seems, that he might be something a lot more sinister, and the tension starts to mount. I liked this story a lot thanks to how different it felt to all of the others, and for how it played with my expectations.

'Vengeance', as the description tells us, takes inspiration from East Asian revenge thrillers, and tells the story of a man who went to prison to protect his son after a feud between them and a local business leads to ever mounting hostility, and ends in a death. The story is written from the point of view of the father, talking to the son that he's not seen in years, trying to explain why everything happened, and how they got to this point. Whilst at first it seems like this is perhaps going to be a story of a father and son reunited, you remember what the story was inspired by and begin to suspect that something awful is waiting for you at the end; but you'd be hard pressed to imagine the horror that Richter has planted in this tale.

'Polaris' is a great little monster horror story that was a favourite of mine in one of his previous books, and I'm pleased to see it return here. The intro explains that it's a nod to The Thing, and as a fan of that movie this story really ticked a lot of boxes for me. Set at an abandoned mining station in Antarctica, it's filled with creepy atmosphere and haunting visuals as a small group of explorers attempt to track down a mysterious creature that has been killing local wildlife. Despite not getting long with the core cast of characters they're very quickly and very clearly defined, consisting of a pilot, a tracker, a hunter, and a cryptozoologist. The story relies on slow burn and mounting tension rather than in your face horror, and this makes it one of the creepiest stories in the book. As the story progresses we get a few answers as to what might be happening on this remote island, but never get any definitive answers. By the end of the story I was so fascinated with this thing hunting the main characters and just wanted to know more. Of all the stories in this collection this is the one that I wanted longer with. Not just more to this story, but a whole book to itself. Hopefully this could be something that Richter will revisit one day in the future.

'Something Waits' is a fun change of pace to some of the other stories on offer here. Set in a fantasy world, it feels like the start to a dark Dungeons and Dragons campaign, or an old Fighting Fantasy game book. The story takes us to a kingdom where heroes and warriors can come to try to conquer the deadly labyrinth beneath the city in order to win a grand prize and eternal acclaim. This year the prize is the princess, and the chance to eventually become king. Whilst this has attracted a number of warriors, some little better than criminals, it's also attracted a legendary assassin, who plans to try to free the people of the city from the king's cruel heel. This was a really refreshing story, and one that felt very different to the other stories in the book. I think that Richter has a good style for darker fantasy tales, and I'd love to see him tackle that genre more. Though I will warn potential readers that this story does contain sexual assault. 

These are just a couple of the stories on offer in the book, and there are so many great ones here. There's not a single story that was bad or boring, and whilst some will appeal to reader more than others thanks to the varied style and themes on offer it also means that this book has something for everyone. No matter the kind of horror that appeals, whether it's sci-fi, fantasy, the mundane, or disgustingly bloody, this collection has at least one story that you'll love; whilst also giving you the chance to try out something different too. Horror fans should not miss out on this collection, and should definitely also check out Richter's other works too.

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Man of Steel – Throwback 10

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

There’s a perception outside of comic readers (and sometimes even within) that Superman is a boring character. People look at his powers and think that he’s too strong to ever really be challenged, or they see his positive outlook and ‘Truth, justice, and a better tomorrow’ catchphrase as being too cheesy. Both of these views are, frankly, ridiculous, as good writers know how to challenge Superman so that his raw power isn’t going to win him the day. There are so many examples of Superman not just being a cheesy one note character; just check out Superman Smashes the Klan, or the moment he goes after an arms dealer in Superman: Birthright to see how fantastic he can be.

To the general public he’s one of these characters that many feel can’t be engaging unless he’s changed to be edgy. This is how you get versions of the character like Injustice: Gods Among Us where he’s a fascist, pastiches like The Boys and Brightburn, and even actual Superman movies like Man of Steel that are made so devoid of happiness and hope that they fundamentally get a lot of the character and his mythos completely wrong. And, sadly, it would also lay the groundwork for a shared DC universe that would continue to falter, struggle with its characters and tone, and ultimately, need rebooting a decade later.

Superman: The Man of Steel is one of the seminal Superman books. Created just after Crisis on Infinite Earths it retold Superman’s origin for a modern audience, and for the new world that had been created. With Man of Steel set to become the first in a new series of Superman films, the fact that it was sharing the name seemed like an indicator that the same level of care and attention would be going into the project. Following the financial and critical failure of Superman Returns, a sequel to the Christopher Reeve movies, DC was looking to reboot their flagship character on the big screen, especially with the success of the Christopher Nolan Batman movies. Several comic writers were called in to give pitches for the film, including well known Superman writers such as Grant Morrison. In part, however, it appears that the film was pushed into production in order to avoid having to pay the Siegel estate lost revenue.

Following the success of The Dark Knight Rises, screenwriters David S. Goyer and Christopher Nolan were brought on board to try to recreate Superman for a modern audience, and to set a tone for any future DC movies. Original plans were to include references to other heroes existing within the universe, something that was all but dropped and moved to the incredibly bloated sequel. One of the first directors approached to helm the movie was Guillermo del Toro, who turned down the job to work on the still-unmade At The Mountains of Madness project (how different a DCEU would we have gotten under his leadership). After going through a number of possibilities, it was finally decided that Zack Snyder would direct. Having already produced a few comic book movies Snyder was seen as a safe choice by the studio, especially after Watchmen, a book that was said to be unfilmable, although how well done that adaptation was is definitely up for debate.

Man of Steel follows a young Clark Kent (Henry Cavill) as he tries to find his place in the world before discovering his Kryptonian heritage. After being taught by his father, Jonathan Kent (Kevin Costner), that being a hero isn’t the right thing to do and that it could put him in danger, Clark has tried to live a simple life, but keeps ending up doing good where he can, such as saving men from a burning oil rig; though he does let his anger get the better of him on occasion, such as destroying a man’s truck. Unfortunately for him, his heroics have led to a trail of urban legends and whispered stories that ace reporter Lois Lane (Amy Adams) is determined to get to the bottom of. Their paths converge when they both end up in the Canadian Arctic, where a team of scientists have discovered a crashed spaceship.

When the ship reacts to Clark, he takes the craft and hides it. However, thanks to the ship’s AI, it’s able to recreate his birth father, Jor-El (Russell Crowe) as a hologram, and Clark learns about his home world. Jor-El inspires hope in his son, and putting on one of the Kryptonian suits, he begins to embrace his powers. Before he’s able to really become the hero he’s always meant to be, a Kryptonian ship under the command of the criminal General Zod (Michael Shannon) arrives with the intention of converting Earth into a New Krypton. Now Clark has to face the remnants of his people in order to save his adopted home; a fight that will earn him the name Superman.

Cavill would prove to be a good choice for the role of Clark Kent/Superman, and is perhaps the best thing in the movie. Cavill brings a sense of kindness to the character that is desperately needed in order for him to work on a fundamental level, and there are large portions of the film where Superman isn’t present. The film focuses a good deal on Clark Kent, and his decision of whether or not to put on the cape, and Cavill gave these moments a great deal of humanity. Sadly, this conflict would prove to be one of the biggest missteps in the film.

Whether alive or dead in the comics, Jonathan Kent is one of the most important figures in Clark’s life. Not only does he take in this alien baby and raise him as his own with nothing but kindness and care, but he also instils in Clark a strong sense of right and wrong. Jonathan has, across dozens of different stories, inspired Clark to be the best he can, to keep pushing for a better world, and to be the best of humanity. Man of Steel doesn’t do this, and instead Jonathan actively discourages Clark from being a hero. This has gone on to become one of the most contentious points of the film, with fans of the movie defending it, whilst others point out that Jonathan telling Clark he should have let a bus filled with children die is antithetical to the character as he’s always existed. Jonathan’s reluctance to see Clark be a hero even culminates in him allowing himself to die in a tornado, something Clark could have easily saved him from. Sadly, this would not be the only issue with the film.

One of the cardinal rules for pretty much all of DC’s heroes, and especially for Superman, is that he doesn’t kill. Over the years Superman has fought against countless threats, beings stronger, smarter, and faster than him, with powers he couldn’t even contend with. And in each of those cases he’s found a way to stop them without killing, and in some cases even without violence. Superman has gone up against some of the worst that this world and the universe beyond has to offer, and yet he refuses to take a life.

There’s a famous Superman comic, Action Comics #775, ‘What’s So Funny About Truth, Justice & The American Way?’ in which a group of edgy heroes that kill challenge Superman over his no killing stance. This group start to win public approval, and they keep pushing Superman over his stance. Superman eventually tricks them, makes them think he’s finally snapped and that he’s started killing the team, and it makes him a terrifying figure, and he says that the killing would be the easy choice. At the end, the leader of the group screams at Superman that his no killing rule means he’s living in a dream world, to which we get the reply “I wouldn’t have it any other way. Dreams save us. Dreams lift us up and transform us. And on my soul I swear until my dream of a world where dignity, honour and justice become the reality we all share I’ll never stop fighting.” Man of Steel has Superman kill; it has him make the easy choice, and it betrays his character. The push to make Superman edgy, a character who never needs that, created a version of the character that loses the right to be called Superman.

But a fundamental misunderstanding of the character is baked into Man of Steel, and you need not look much further than the visual metaphors and imagery that surround him in both the film and the marketing. In Man of Steel, Zack Snyder uses Superman as a Christ allegory. There’s a sequence in the movie where Superman floats away from a spaceship, his arms spread wide at his side to look like Jesus on the cross. He visits a Christian church to seek council from a priest, with the camera focusing heavily on images of Jesus in the scene. And one of the film’s marketing strategies was to release a nine page document called ‘Jesus – The Original Superhero’, designed to help the clergy incorporate Superman into their sermons and to directly compare him to Jesus. Whilst that last one is clearly quite crass, they all have one big issue: Superman has never been a Jesus allegory. He’s Moses. 

Superman’s origin shares a striking similarity with Moses, Superman is sent away from his doomed home, and is taken in in another land, raised by the people there, and is treated as one of them. However, later in life he learns of his true origins, and  realises that the gifts he has need to be used to help the downtrodden, the mistreated, and those in need. You can even closely line up the story of the burning bush talking to Moses and telling him who he is with the recordings from Jor-El teaching Clark the same.

But there’s also the fact that Superman was created by two Jewish men, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. Both of them drew upon Jewish folk tales such as The Golem of Prague in the design of his powers (man of clay becoming man of steel). He was also created at a time when things were dangerous for Jewish people, particularly in Europe, where their families were from. Superman was made in part as a response to rising antisemitism, of a feeling of needing a hero in such dark times. The fact that Superman was bulletproof even came about in response to Siegel’s father being shot and killed. Superman is heavily steeped in Jewish culture, his creators were Jewish, and whilst the character of Clark Kent might not be Jewish in the comics it’s hard to deny that he’s a Jewish figure in a lot of ways. As such, the push to paint him as a Christ figure in Man of Steel felt incredibly wrong to a lot of people, and it sparked a number of articles, and intense debate on the subject.

Despite that criticism, there is some good to be found in Man of Steel. The film’s score, by Hans Zimmer, is very well executed, and there are a number of key moments in the film that are absolutely elevated thanks to that score. The scene in which Clark flies in the Superman suit for the first time is perhaps the most beautiful scene in the film. Zimmer made the smart choice to avoid any inclusion of, or allusion to, the famous John Williams Superman theme (something that would bafflingly be included in Cavill’s cameo in Black Adam), and instead would craft a really well made modern Superman theme. And whilst his theme will never reach the cultural saturation and recognition as Williams’, it is still a beautiful piece.

Man of Steel also includes some interesting design choices, particularly in regards to Krypton. Compared to almost every other live-action adaptation of Superman, the film spends a great deal of time on Krypton before the events of its destruction. The opening follows Jor-El as he goes up against General Zod, and we get to see the planet in its glory before its fall. This version of Krypton takes a big step away from what we’ve seen before in terms of design, and forgoes the brightly coloured robes and fancy headdresses, instead taking on a more muted tone, and using the planet’s technology as the basis for their buildings, armour, and costumes. These design choices would prove to be great later on in the film when the Kryptonians arrive on Earth, and their armour has such an alien look that it almost evokes the work of H.R. Geiger. Whilst Superman’s suit itself isn’t the best we’ve had, taking a lot of design cues from the New 52 look, it did at least look halfway decent, especially when next to the other Kryptonians.

Man of Steel is pretty far from a perfect Superman movie. It misunderstands the character in some pretty big ways, and seem focused on drawing in people who have demonstrated numerous times in online forums and on social media that they hate the source material. The desire to make a darker, edgier Superman for those that don’t like comics only went on to create one of the darkest, edgiest comic series yet, with Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice, and Zack Snyder’s Justice League as the direct sequels to this.

Even some of the spin-off films seem to be following in its path of failing the character, with upcoming The Flash looking set to end this shared universe in a similarly bad way. You can’t really blame one film, or one director, for how terrible these films would become, but it’s hard not to argue that if this film had been made under a different director the DCEU and its films wouldn’t be in the sorry state they’re in now and in desperate need of a reboot. Man of Steel tried to remake Superman into something he’s not, and was ultimately a failure because of that.

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Mockingbird: Strike Out - A Marvel Heroines Novel by Maria Lewis - Book Review

 

'S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Bobbi Morse needs to get out of LA. Like, yesterday. With her painful divorce from Hawkeye still being hashed out, Bobbi could do with a new job to take her mind off the mind-numbing mediations. Luckily, an old friend and mentor of Bobbi’s is missing, so a jaunt to the UK might be the perfect distraction. What Bobbi isn’t anticipating is having to team up with the snarky and handsome Lance Hunter, but her options are limited if she wants to solve this mystery. Someone is trying to recreate and weaponize the original Super-Soldier Serum which could spell global disaster. To save the world, Bobbi will have to face her past, put her problems behind her, and let the Mockingbird take flight.'

Whilst I've read a decent amount of Marvel over the years, Mockingbird is a character that I've not really encountered before, and my only real experience with her is with her character from the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. television series. That being said, when I saw that the latest book in the Marvel Heroines line was going to feature her I was excited to read the character for the first time. Then I read the description and saw that Lance Hunter, another character I had no comic experience with but had enjoyed in the television series, was going to be in the book, and I was absolutely on board.

Mockingbird: Strike Out begins with Bobbi Morse, the titular Mockingbird, dealing with a difficult chapter of her past as she's going through divorce proceedings with her husband, the fellow costumed hero Hawkeye. Things are not going well for her, not only has her difficult marriage fallen apart, but she and her husband seem to be at each others throats and trying to make things as hard as they can be. Tired at fighting with Clint over who gets what, Bobbi jumps at the chance to leave the country for a while for a special mission for S.H.I.E.L.D..

When a former mentor of hers, who's been working in Oxford as a professor, goes missing, Bobbi is sent to investigate. It might be nothing, but the fact that her professor used to work on a super soldier programme, and her having left under a dark cloud, means that her disappearance might indicate something more nefarious is going on, and that she might be walking into danger. Not long into the investigation Bobbi ends up running for her life, alongside S.T.R.I.K.E. agent Lance Hunter, who's also been investigating the professors disappearance. When the two agents are ordered to work together by their respective organisations, they start to find that they actually work really well together; and as the investigation goes on Bobbi finds herself becoming more and more attracted to the man. But is it too soon for her to jump back into the world of romance once again?

 There seem to be certain stories that work well in the comic book medium. Bright costumed heroes flying through the air, punching monsters through buildings, and performing great feats might work well in prose, but the drawn pages of a comic is where they excel. And whilst there have been some fantastic espionage style comics over the years, I've found that those kind of tales tend to just click more when presented in the prose format, and Mockingbird: Strike Out really exemplifies this, as a story that would have been a really good comic becomes an excellent novel thanks to the format it's been presented in.

One of the best things about this book is that we get to go deep into Bobbi Morse. Comics will allow the reader to do this to a certain degree with thought bubbles and narration boxes, but even then limited page space means that these tend to just be snippets. Mockingbird: Strike Out spends a lot of time getting to know Bobbie, and there are multiple times where we leave the world around her behind and go into her thought process, her emotions, and her history in a way that enhances both her character and the story around her. I loved getting to see such an intimate dive into a character that I've never gotten to read in the comics before, and came out of the book feeling like I'd gotten to know her really well. It was interesting to see how her mind worked, to see that she's not a cold, calculating secret agent super spy, but a woman with insecurities, passions, and a deep well of emotion. It humanised her wonderfully.

The book being able to slow down like this also helped with the style of story that it was telling. Instead of trying to cram things into a couple dozen pages of comic issues, chapters had room to breathe, and it meant that our heroes could take their time investigating, that they could explore more avenues, and that we the reader could have things explained to us in more detail so that we could keep up with it. Scenes like Lance explaining how they're going to figure out where a set of three historic keys would work based on their time periods and blueprint designs felt like an interesting deep dive into history and architecture; but it also felt like the kind of scene that would either be very cut down, or cut completely, from a comic. With this being a mystery story, one where investigation and the finding of clues is a key part of the narrative, being able to take as much time as needed and not being constrained by the format helped in spades; and I came away from the book thinking that this is probably the best way for stories with these kinds of characters to be told. Nick Fury would probably be a much better character in novel form than he is in the comics.

We also got a lot more time given over to the romance that forms between Bobbi and Lance, and it ended up feeling both incredibly natural, and well earned over the course of the book. Having only really known these characters from the TV series they were in, them getting together felt like the most obvious direction to take them; and I wasn't disappointed to see it happen here. Lance is also written very similar to his TV incarnation; though I don't know if that's because his comic counterpart is like that too. Maria Lewis manages to bring a lot of charm to a character that could easily slip into brash or annoying.

Lewis also does a good job at leaving hints throughout the story that I completely missed until moments later in the book that led to a big reveal or two. Looking back on it, some were less obvious than others, but there was one I was slapping myself for not having seen. She manages to make you think one thing is happening before throwing something ridiculously fun into the mix that reminds you this is a world of big, weird characters, and that it's not just a spy story set in our world. I think Marvel fans are going to have a lot of fun when these moments happen.

I had a great time with Mockingbird: Strike Out, and it was a genuine delight getting to know Bobbi Morse and Lance Hunter in this way. Whilst I've enjoyed all of Aconyte's Marvel novels, I really hope that we get more with these two characters in the future, as their style of adventures suit the format well, and it feels like so many more adventures with them can be told.

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Burning Paradise (1994) – Blu-ray Review

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

When most people think about martial arts movies they either picture slick modern productions, or older films that were made with little budget and felt like they were churned out to cash in on the popularity of the genre. Whilst more modern martial arts movies vary in tone quite a bit, older films tend to feel much the same: fairly light movies, with a comedy sidekick or two, and some over-the-top spectacle thrown in to wow the audience. Burning Paradise immediately feels different, and from the first few minutes of the movie I was surprised at how dark, violent, and bloody this Wuxia film ended up being; a feeling that would only grow as the film continued.

Directed by Ringo Lam, best known for grittier crime flicks such as City on Fire, and Prison on Fire, as well as the Van Damme action movie Maximum Risk, Burning Paradise takes a step away from the more whimsical side of martial arts action movies, and takes viewers to a darker place, ending up feeling like the nightmare version of the genre. The film opens with religious texts burning, statues of Buddha being destroyed, and the decapitated bodies of Shaolin monks. There’s no way to sugar-coat what is being depicted on screen, and Lam drops the viewers into the middle of a massacre with no apology.

From here we meet Fok Sai-yuk (Willie Chi Tin-sang), a young Shaloin disciple, and his master as they flee the massacre in the desert. Unfortunately, they’re pursued by more than a dozen soldiers on horseback. With no way of escaping, the duo have to make a valiant stand; at which point Fok Sai-yuk draws his huge sword and starts cutting his opponents into pieces. As soon as one of the soldiers is cut in half, his severed legs still on the horse, spraying blood whilst his upper torso hits the ground in a gush of body fluids, it becomes clear that this is a film that isn’t going to shy away from the violence. Despite being a Wuxia movie, this film doesn’t glamorise or enhance the fighting a great deal, and other than one or two moments much of what we see in Burning Paradise feels startlingly real.

Managing to defeat the soldiers, Fok Sai-yuk and his master take shelter in a small building, where they meet Dau Dau (Carman Lee Yeuk-tung), a young woman trying her best to survive. When the three of them are captured, Fok Sai-Yuk’s master is killed, and he and Dau Dau are taken prisoner and sent to the Red Lotus temple. The Red Lotus temple is ruled by the evil Elder Kung (Wong Kam-kong), a sadistic jailer who tortures his prisoners, fills his temple with death traps, sexually abuses women, and spends his days painting using blood. As Dau Dau is taken away to be his latest concubine, Fok Sai-yuk must find a way of escaping the prison with his life.

It’s once the film reaches the Red Lotus temple that things really click into place with Burning Paradise. From this point on the film loses all daylight, and we’re stuck underground, in a dark and twisted place filled with death and suffering. The temple has cages filled with suffering prisoners, pits where the dead are dumped, rooms decorated with corpses, and deadly arenas in which troublemakers are forced to fight to the death. In a lot of ways it feels like the heroes of the movie are stuck in a hell on Earth, and that tone bleeds into almost every part of the movie.

However, this means that Lam is able to concentrate upon the setting, and we get some really interesting set-pieces because of this. One of the fights in the film sees two opponents on a suspended platform, flames and spikes below them, fighting to the death. Blades and spikes shoot out of the platform at different points, adding a dangerous dynamic to the fight that means the combatants are never sure if their next step is a safe one or not. It feels like a Mortal Kombat arena brought to life, more so that any location in the actual Mortal Kombat films, and the ultra-violent deaths that occur feel like a vicious fatality move.

The traps that are scattered throughout of the movie also add a delightful wrinkle to things, as you’re never sure if a character is about to die horribly. And yes, it does happen more than once, as so it never feels like an empty threat just thrown in. The traps are cleverly thought through, and the moments that they come into play make for some truly shocking scenes that result in an ‘oh my god, did you see that?’ moment.

With the film taking such a serious tone, or at least such a dark tone, it’s not spoiled by any of the acting. Hong Kong cinema has a wonderful tradition of marrying comedy into its action movies. Some of the better loved movies and bigger name stars in Hong Kong cinema use comedy to keep their movies light and to keep the moments between fights fun. Burning Paradise doesn’t have any of its cast making jokes or acting the fool between its action scenes, and instead embraces the dark tone the movie has. We get to see Fok Sai-yuk getting pushed to the edge as he realises that he’s either going to have to kill to escape, or die in the temple, and Dau Dau goes from an outgoing and confident young woman to one almost broken by the torture that Elder Kung puts her through, with one of the most disturbing scenes being the moment that leads up to her rape. The cast act their hearts out, and it’s their performances that help to keep the intensity of the piece going.

The new Blu-ray release features a newly restored 1080p HD presentation of the movie from the original 35mm negative, making this one of the crispest and cleanest versions of the film to date. The film is also presented in its original Cantonese with English subtitles, though there is an English language audio commentary from Asian film expert Frank Djeng, who has provided commentaries on a number of Eureka’s releases. Unfortunately, the rest of the disc runs pretty light, with an archival interview with the movie’s producer Tsui Hark, and a trailer.

Those that come to Hong Kong martial arts movies expecting a bit of light-hearted fun are going to find Burning Paradise quite different, and something of a surprise. But it is a pleasant one. Lam has crafted a film that feels unique and different, yet also reminds me of a number of other films with a similarly dark tone (though I’ve struggled to put my finger on exactly what it is it reminds me of). Compared to a lot of films in the genre, Burning Paradise feels like one that will stick in your memory a lot longer.

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