Movie Review: Dracula Untold

'Untold' the title threatens.

Now there's been a lot told about Dracula over the decades, probably more than any other fictional character, to tell the truth. So that's a pretty big claim as far as subtitles go. At least it isn't Dracula 'Revelations'.

But as far as things go, it's not a far off claim. This is a story of a human Vlad Tepes, a family man, a soldier, and a hero to his people. A story set in the time before he was Dracula.

Untold. It definitely isn't anything Stoker wrote, and not remotely historically accurate, but it does live up to the title.

Like any movie with the 'Legendary' tag. Dracula Untold starts us off with glorious vistas and amazing costumes. It looks great from the first moment. A young, still human Vlad, prince of Transylvania, is scouting with his band of merry assholes through the forests, searching for the traces of Turkish soldiers, encroaching on the peace agreed between the two countries. Vlad is handsome, sharp, dashing, and intelligent, and essentially makes a lot of the other characters irrelevant by a few paces in.. The rest of his D&D party are there to bounce of his comments and give him occasional 'my lords' but not a one of them has a strong character behind them. They are all a little Jon Snow in nature, and entirely interchangeable. They're named, but you'll forget them soon enough, like I did, so for the remainder we'll call Vlad's crew Phil, Grant and Peggy.

Vlad senses something is off when he is led to the helmet of a turkish solier, mysteriously left in the Transylvanian rivers falling from a great mountain. Vlad knows what's up, and sends Phil, Grant and Peggy back to Castle Dracula while he goes to investigate the shadowy caves atop the mountain.

Deep in a bat filled cave high in the rocks above, Vlad and some unlucky redshirts are attacked by an inhuman entity, fast and strong, and only Vlad's speed and skill leave him to escape, noticing the terrible power of the beast he fought.

It's interesting to see an origin given to Dracula himself, as usually writers use Dracula as the no-questions asked first Vampire. An origin story is hard to do with a character so seminal, and I think they do a good job in that respect. He's your usual Ned Stark type, brooding and thoughtful, but he cares about his people, and his family.

As Vlad returns to castle Dracula, we get to meet the rest of the family, the doe eyed wife he loves above all things, and his spry little son. And just as we are introduced to the life of proud rulership Vlad has, the inevitable stake is thrown into the works. A group of sinister Turks bring an ultimatem to Vlad during a feast celebrating peace. Vlad must surrender a thousand boys to the armies of the Turkish Emperor Mehmed II.

Feeling betrayed by his old brother in arms, Vlad rides to meet Mehmed and parlay for the future of his people. Now Mehmed is your standard Thulsa Doom villain. An unquestioning military leader, he's bad, he's commanding. Apart from the vaguely alluded to past fighting alongside Vlad, we never really find much more about him. When you have a character as strong and dramatic by turns as Vlad in the lead, Mehmed seems a somewhat empty antagonist by comparison.

Naturally Mehmed is unmoved by the pleas of his brother, and Vlad returns to Transylvania in disgrace, and knows he must either give up a thousand boys, or condemn his people to war and extermination.

I had a touch of trouble swallowing this plot point, really. Vlad knows that the boys in the Turkish army are treated well, and grow up talented warriors. Vlad himself proudly was one of those surrendered as a child. He knows this, and he knows surrendering those boys will continue the peace with the Turks that his people love him for establishing. He also knows that he does not have any chance of defeating the Turks in open warfare, and still Vlad goes out, brutally does away with the Turks sent to claim the boys, and starts a whole new war. Nice one Vlad.

With the armies of Mehmed approaching to tear Transylvania apart, Vlad goes to the only power he knows that can strike fear into the hearts of men, and once more ascends the mountain to meet with the dark monster that lives above.

In the darkness of the caves above, Vlad finds himself confronting the Vampire that has been killing Turkish soldiers, and has apparently been living trapped in the darkness of the caves for centuries.

The elder Vampire is a kitschy part to play, rife with monster cliches, but luckily Charles Dance is a damn fine actor, and actually is the film's highlight performance here.

He's frightening, savage, temperamental, and commanding. He hisses a story of darkness and fear to Vlad, and offers him the power to defeat the Turks if he only drinks of the blood provided.

Vlad is warned of the terrible price for such power: If he partakes of human blood at any time in the next 72 hours, the change will be permanent, and he shall forever take the elder vampire's place in the dark.

Here's where things get going, naturally.

Waking up in the rivers washing down the mountain, the newly invigorated Vlad finds himself filled with the powers of the night. He is strong, fast, and can EXPLODE INTO BATS at will. It's great fun to watch. He takes an uncharacteristic delight in it all at first, blasting through the trees of the forest as he returns to defend Castle Dracula, from the Turkish assault, already fully underway.

Now Vlad is a complete badass, now that he has his powers.

A Turkish army one thousand strong charges into battle against him, and he goes out to meet them alone. (After donning a longer coat first, naturally) As his army watch on, Vlad completely obliterates the entire force in moments without a scratch. It's a brilliant fight. The powered up Vlad just tearing into his enemies with fist and blade and bats. One guy obliterating an entire army, it's like Dynasty Warriors. It's wild. It also makes it very clear to us that he is so powerful, nothing the Turkish army can possibly do can stand in his way. Here's another plot hiccup that I personally couldn't get over. With this power at his disposal, why doesn't Vlad take it to his enemies immediately?

There is nothing to stop him flying to tear apart the Turkish forces at their heart, give Mehmed a gigantic Vampire wedgie of darkness and ending the war right then. Instead, after Phil, Grant and the rest of the Transylvanian army hilariously trundle up after the fight is finished, Vlad commands them not to question his new powers, and to evacuate Castle Dracula for a monastery in the mountains instead.

With the powers that Vlad has, of course they need a shortcoming of some sort, a weakness, and we are only presented with two of the classic vampire weaknesses here. Neither of them elements present in Stoker's work, I might add. A vulnerability to sunlight, and a sensitivity to pure silver.

The passage of day into night as the rest of the film goes on becomes a little difficult to follow, I find. Some days seem to pass in minutes, other nights seem to pass in one battle scene. The three days of Vlad's trials resisting human blood pass in a flurry, and it's easy to get a spot lost how much time has passed since his original bargain took place. Vlad is holed up in his tent while his family and the rest of his army head up to the monastery, and is absent when they are set upon by a small Turkish skirmish unit.

His Vampire senses tingling, Vlad bursts from his tent the moment sunlight fails, to rush to aid his family. As a Turkish soldier takes down Phil in brutal combat, Vlad emerges just in time to rescue his wife and son in turn, and aid his people in making it finally to the monastery. Vlad's bat form is unstoppably powerful, he surges over opponents like a wave of death, and no one can really defend against it at all. The only reason Vlad didn't arrive in time to save Phil was because he was dicking around with theatrics elsewhere in the battle. If his bat form can pick up a Turkish soldier and toss him across a battlefield, why can't he fly by and safely whisk his family away from danger in the blink of an eye?

Arriving at the monastery, Vlad holes his people up to await the inevitable assault from the main Turkish forces. Amongst the monks that were previously his dear friends, Vlad encounters the first opposition amongst his own men. It's good to see an element of this addressed, because until this scene, his newfound powers haven't really been questioned by anyone. When his oldest friend amongst the holy men notices his vulnerability to sunlight, he confronts Vlad in a tense moment and asks that Vlad allow himself to be destroyed for the good of his soul. Not the best time for it, really, but a holy man is a holy man through and through. This escalates quickly into an out of the blue insurrection, with all Vlad's followers attempting to burn him alive. Almost as soon as this starts it's over, with Vlad promising his people that they are safe, and that he will stop Mehmet. It's a little fast a push towards that being resolved, it seems all these people are awfully quickly swayed one way or another, but it gets things moving.

Soon enough, the final battle approaches, there is something of a subplot with Mehmet convincing his entire army to wear blindfolds for the entire march so they don't fear Vlad, but it really wasn't relevant in the end. It makes the entire enemy army look ridiculous, as if they're just going to take the blindfolds off as soon as the battle starts, what was the point? These aren't superstitious militia we're dealing with, these are highly trained soldiers of the world's finest army. They aren't going to scare easily.

Vlad takes to the top of his highest tower, wearing his best long black coat, and takes in the size of the approaching army of a hundred thousand. Drawing on his power to command the creatures of the night, Vlad summons a colossal horde of bats to do his bidding. This was probably the most fun scene in the entire film, it's great fun. Commanding his squeaking, flapping army with movements of his hand, he drives the bats into the approaching hordes like a battering ram (Hehe, geddit?) and then, ordering them all up into the sky, bringing them down again to desolate the Turks like the meteor scene in Armageddon. It's awesome, it's like one of the crazier disciplines in Vampire: The Masquerade brought to life. However fundamental physics make it all a little silly when you think about it. These bats he's controlling thunder into the enemy, throwing armoured soldiers into the air like rag dolls. Regardless of how many he's controlling, they are still just tiny bats. In the end, the result of such an assault would feel less like a meteor and more like a million ping pong balls falling on your head.

After the initial bat assault, Vlad takes to the field, and the full battle commences, but his physical prowess is let down by his battle planning, and a unit of Turks gets into the monastery to assault the defenseless people of Transylvania. Vlad's son is taken by the Turkish commander, and his wife is left hanging precariously from the highest tower. With all Vlad's speed, he can't quite get there in time, leading to an excruciatingly melodramatic falling scene, set to music, in slow motion, as she falls to her doom. By the time Vlad's done chatting with her remarkably unharmed but close to death body after that fall, the Turkish army has got away, and the monastery is left in ruins. If all this sounds like a weirdly paced and tumbly assortment of events, it's because it really was. Why did Mehmet himself even need to be there? Why leave only taking one captive? No booty? Did the Turkish soldiers even get to rest? You marched them the whole way here blindfolded and now you're marching them all the way back to Turkey after a battle? You asshole Mehmet!

Vlad does the only thing he can over the body of his beloved wife. He takes her blood, gaining the full power of the Vampire, and condemns himself to the darkness. Returning to walk among the fallen in the monastery, Vlad sees people are shattered and defeated, and his son and heir to the throne of Transylvania taken by the Turks. He knows he must go after them. In a quite great moment, he goes to Grant, who lies dying, and asks “Do you want revenge?”

The eyes of many of the fallen and broken look up to him, realizing what he offers. It is a good scene.

Mehmet's main camp watches as a storm approaches, lightening crashes, and the darkness surges in. The newly changed Grant and Peggy lead a group of vampires down on the Turkish army, slaughtering them wholesale, while Vlad make the final assault on Mehmet. In the silver coated finery of Mehmet's tent, where Vlads son is held captive, the final confrontation takes place.

Of course Mehmet has a silver sword. We've gone the whole movie with no one being able to remotely stand against Vlad in combat, there had to be some threat, but it feels somewhat forced, when we know he can explode into unstoppable bats at will, or just bring the tent down around him. But fight honorably Vlad does, somehow Mehmet seems the superior combatant, knocking Vlad around plenty. The presence of silver is a sort of excuse to this odd encounter, but Vlad wore a silver ring around his neck the whole film and still tore apart armies without trouble. That it would weaken him so much to as to lose most of the battle against an ordinary man didn't make much sense.

Vlad defeats Mehmet, drawing strength from his son, and returns outside to face his new brethren. Peggy suggests killing the boy, their last link to humanity, and Vlad is torn between his new existence and his old. The boy is saved by the inexplicable appearance of our hero monk from the monastery, who arrives to take the boy to safety, while the sun burns down from above and exterminates the vampires. The vampires that are standing around rows and rows of tents that are historically proven to keep out sunlight. That was a head scratcher.

Vlad himself lets out a cry of defiance as the sun comes down on him, and he falls, left in the dust of the destroyed Turkish camp. It would have been a fair ending, with the young son being crowned king of Transylvania, to carry on the peace into the next generation.

But no, we know Dracula can't end here. It must go on.

Dragged from the battlefield by a mysterious follower (He was around earlier, the only one in the whole movie who tries on a Transylvanian accent, we'll call him Dirty Den) who pulls the body of Vlad from the sunlight and into a tent, to force his blood down the throat of the vampire, and return him from the dead. 

Fast forward six hundred odd years. Yes it's one of those endings.

A modern day Vlad walks amongst the streets of a glistening city, when he comes across a woman who looks the spitting image of his lost wife. He introduces himself, sounding just like he did in the 1400's, and she says her name is Mina. Ah, so here we have come around at last to the Dracula we know. They walk off together, the threads of fate seemingly intertwining them again. All the while the elder vampire watches on (God DAMN does Charles Dance look sharp in a suit) 

There are a few mystifying turns about Dracula Untold. The exact mythology behind the 'curse' Vlad is under doesn't really make sense. The elder vampire states he's been trapped in the cave for years, until he found someone to take his place. There seemed to be no reason he couldn't leave whenever he wanted, and Vlad certainly wasn't compelled to take his place when he drank human blood. That didn't make much sense. It seems Vlad never really used his powers as well as he could, and everyone that dies manages to do it dramatically in Vlad's arms. That all said, it does a good job of not slipping into the melodrama you would expect. I could have done without a lot of the scenes involving Vlad and his wife, they just seemed to drag on, but not because she was bad, just because their relationship was very dull compared to the rest of the action.

It's also fun to play spot the Game of Thrones residue amongst the cast, with Paul Kaye and Art Parkinson both playing the exact same character they do in the HBO show (This will go triple if they bring back Tywin Lannister as a vampire in season 5)

As far as historical action/drama supernatural movies go, Dracula Untold is up there with other big, fun, stupid films like Underworld and Pathfinder. They have their place, and there are certainly worse choices for a bit of Dracula entertainment in the month of Halloween. At least you won't have to sit through hearing Keanu Reeve's English accent again.

Movie Review: The Guardians of the Galaxy.

The Guardians of the Galaxy are a team that’s close to my heart. They’re my crew, my guys. A bunch of misfits awkwardly thrust together, their missions usually staggered and suicidal, yet somehow the bond of friendship between these guys is stronger than anything you find in the Avengers. The Avengers was a great film, why? Because it leapt in head first from the very start, full steam ahead, with action and fun and a story that could get going from the first scene and never let up. This was possible because every character within it had been established in a film all their own, the slow parts already taken care of, as it were. What do you do when you start a new film, and have to echo the same breakneck pace of story, with five all new heroes and a handful of new villains, without the time to fill in the backstory?

Guardians gives us hints at our heroes’ backstories, but this is no origin tale. Who they were perhaps isn’t too important, it’s who they are from now on that counts.

We open on our hero, Star-Lord. The sad story of the loss of his mother haunting his past, Peter Quill was raised to the stars by the happening by of the mercenary Yondu, and has spent his entire adult life among the world beyond. Our introduction to our new leading man sees him searching the mysterious ruin of an alien city, his treads light, observations keen, like a trench-clad Indiana Jones. That is of course, until he pulls out his beloved 1980’s era Walkman. Headphones on, Star-Lord dances and skips his way through the ruins with a swagger to rival Jagger. He’s got a sass smarmier than Tony Stark, and with it he saunters into the ruin to reclaim the film’s whole MacGuffin, the orb.

It’s a bit tired that the whole film, and indeed pretty much all our heroes and indeed our villains revolve around the orb. But then that is of course, pretty damn comic book: someone’s always trying to steal an Infinity Gem or a Cosmic cube, and wield the terrible power it grants. Simple as this premise is, story driven this film is indeed not. It takes a while to get started, and a few of the earlier scenes involving the protagonists are a little shaky. Our first introductions to Ronan, Gamora and Nebula happen all in one scene, which is a little much to swallow, especially to those members of the audience not familiar already with these characters.

A little better paced with their introduction are the films class act duo, Rocket and Groot. Both these characters are charming, funny, and well implemented. Rocket is crass and sharp from the first moment, as he almost narrates his own introduction scene. His buddy Groot being weird from the first moment, drinking from a water fountain. They’re bounty hunters, it’s an easy enough setup, and we don’t really need to know much more. The narrative here takes place on the idyllic future world of Xandar, the home to the Nova corps. The Nova corps are an intergalactic police force, and boast some tremendous character actors amongst their number, with Glenn Close, John C Reilly and Peter Serafinowicz all making appearances. It’s here on Xandar that our heroes are dragged together in a simple cohesion of events, Star-Lord trying to sell his stolen orb, Gamora on a mission from Ronan to steal it from him, and Rocket and Groot eager to catch the bounty on Star-Lord. It happens fast, they seem to be buddies awfully quickly, but it does the job. In short order four of our five heroes are thrust together, interacting. Hints at Rocket’s and Gamora’s past are suggested throughout these scenes, giving a little extra flesh to what we know about them, but we’re not dragged into any heavy exposition to slow down the narrative. It keeps up the pace, and lets us go with it.

 

 

Gamora, a green painted Zoe Saldana, is not terrible, but not the eye-catching ass-kicking female lead she really needs to be. Usual female character tropes are avoided for the most part; she doesn’t need help from the boys, suffers no romantic delusions, and no matter how hard he tries, Star-Lord just can’t get in her pants. Her outfits are modest, there’s no skin scenes, and the writers treat her like an actual woman, believe it or not. We’re introduced to Gamora and her sister Nebula as assistants to Ronan. I’m concerned that their relationship with Thanos, Ronan, and indeed each other isn’t quite clear enough to those who don’t already know it however, as it’s a fair bit rushed over.

 

Our heroes are thusly thrust together in a filthy intergalactic prison, and it’s here where they begin to really develop. Rocket’s technical genius shining, reminding the audience that this little furry guy is smarter than Tony Stark, Star Lord tries his hardest to romance Gamora, and is swiftly rebuffed, and just when you’ve forgotten about the fifth member of the team, he makes his appearance.

 

Drax is a surprising standout member of the cast. Comic fans may balk that his backstory, demeanor, and indeed overall character have quite changed from the source, but I’d say it’s a solid and enjoyable set of changes. Drax is a muscle bound, tattooed warrior, hardheaded and stoic, with his mind set on revenge against Ronan for killing his family. At first his character seems oddly played, but a few scenes in, it’s clear how much fun Dave Bautista is having playing Drax. The idea is that Drax takes everything absolutely literally, and it’s used to great comedy potential. Dave does a great job, and I was surprised to find just how much I enjoyed his performance.

 

Once the five Guardians are together, our story can continue. The separation between the act structures is a little tenuous, moving more or less at the same pace the whole film through. It’s a speedy pace, and keeps up the action throughout, but certainly leaves the whole experience feeling a little choppy here and there. After a daring escape from the prison that holds them, the orb in tow, the Guardians follow their information on the object’s original buyer to a location on the far edges of the galaxy, the mining colony of Knowhere, located in the decapitated head of a celestial creature the size of a planet.

Amongst the gritty mining colony of Knowhere, the archetypal sci-hi hive of scum and villainy, that we finally get to catch up with The Collector. Sadly, Benicio Del Toro’s wonderfully eccentric character only appears for a scant few minutes, which is mainly exposition as to the origins of the mysterious and powerful Infinity stone within the orb, and just why everyone wants to get their hands on it so much. I know there really wasn’t much more to do with him, and his character may have worn thin soon, but it would have been good to see a little more of such an interesting personality.

 

 

It’s here on Knowhere that we get glimpses into the inner workings of our heroes’ heads. We find Rocket and Drax bonding over betting on bloodsport, while Groot watches on in horror. Star-Lord tries in vein to tell Gamora just how much he loves music and dancing, failing to impress to stony eyed assassin, and when the team ends up in a drunken bar room brawl over an insult, you get the feeling this is the sort of back on forth camaraderie and animosity that real friends go through, the real personality of this team coming together.

Drax puts his foot in it, of course, when he stumbles drunkenly out of the bar and signals Ronan in an angry rage, challenging the accuser to come and get him, leading to an all-out Star Wars style space battle with mechs, lasers and explosions in space. All that good stuff. When the dust settles, a hero lies in jeopardy and the stone in the hands of evil, the only one the Guardians have left to turn to is the brutal mercenary forces of Star-Lord’s adoptive father, Yondu.

Yondu couldn’t be more different than he was in the comics, really. Gone is the contemplative native-American allegory in favor of a hard bitten biker type, played by the Walking Dead’s Merle, Micheal Rooker. With a glowing metal Mohawk that flares with power at the use of his sonic controlled arrow, Yondu rescues the Guardians and together they head out to rescue Xandar from the encroaching forces of Ronan, and take back the orb that caused all the trouble. Everything comes back to Xandar for the showdown, as Ronan descends from the skies to wreak havoc on the peaceful world below, the power of the Infinity stone enough to rend the whole planet asunder. While the combined forces of the Nova Corps gather to repel the invasion force, The Guardians form a splinter group to get into Ronan’s ship, and put an end to the big man himself.

The villain of the piece, Ronan the Accuser, is less of a character and more of a force. He reminds me somewhat of Nero in Star Trek. Both powerful men with armies below them, driven onward by a single cause. Be it revenge in Nero’s case, or simply utter destruction in Ronan’s. I personally was very disappointed with Ronan’s character in this film. When our heroes are so fleshed out, and so funny and enjoyable to watch, it’s a shame the villain isn’t nearly as much so. The character as written in the comics is remarkably complex, trying to do what is best for his kind, whilst skirting law and generally being a stone cold fascist, but an inherently moral man. Lee Pace’s Ronan, on the other hand, is simply a terrorist, bent on destruction. Seemingly not even against someone who personally wronged him, but simply the opposing side of a political treaty he disagrees with. It’s easy to see him as the villain, what with wanting to destroy planets and such, but when our heroes are so enjoyable, it’s a shame the villain isn’t equally so.

The arch villain on the other hands, the Mad Titan Thanos, is finally given his formal introduction to the Marvel cinematic universe here, and whilst he only gets a few short scenes, it’s a solid job of getting the audience familiar with a character who will be very important later. Played by a stern voiced Josh Brolin, Thanos controls the fates of hero and villain alike from behind the scenes, and is simply a looming threat in this story, waiting to take center stage in a later film. His scene will thrill fans of the comics, and does a good job of making you want a little more of the mad titan on your screen.

The film’s climax, compared to the rest of the film, might be considered overlong, it arrives a little before you might expect, and stays longer than you might desire, but regardless of its pacing issues, it’s a spectacle. Guardians incredible special effects are at some of their best here, between the glittering streets of Xandar and the stone cold tomb like interiors of Ronan’s ship, there is amazing stage design going on everywhere. So many characters are involved, it’s a huge ballet of team effort of a final battle, and here is probably what I liked most about it: It is a real team effort. Everyone has a part to play, a friend to support. This is not Star-Lord and the Guardians of the Galaxy. This is not Hulk defeating Loki and Iron Man stopping the bomb whilst somewhere the rest of the Avengers are standing around whistling. The film’s final crescendo on Xandar, as Ronan prepares to ignite the stone and lay waste to his hated enemy, with only the Guardians standing against him, as a united team, was a perfect example of this. I was thrilled to see the team united against him, as one.

What did I learn from Guardians of the Galaxy? I learned that five heroes can be written well, and given their own chance to shine. I learned that Bradley Cooper is a pretty damn good voice actor. He brings our snappy remarks and laughs and tears in a voice genuinely not his own, and all quite convincingly. I learned how to pronounce d’ast. I learnt that there is still a solid appreciation for creature shop out there, with everything but Rocket and Groot themselves being real people in incredible makeup effects as opposed to CGI characters. In the face of some of the most impressive special effects I’ve ever seen, the costuming and real makeup is still scene stealingly outstanding, particularly the hodgepodge of alien races that make up Yondu’s crew.

Most importantly, I learned that you can make a film, and make it about a team. Not the leader of a team with backup, but about the whole team. Star-Lord may be our lead, but nothing would happen without the constant interaction of the other Guardians. The villain is defeated by all of them, together. It’s a lot of work to squeeze in the characters they do, and the film certainly suffers for its high speed being crushed between plot development and characterization at times, but the people we meet are great fun, we’re introduced to a villain bigger than the whole story just waiting in the sidelines for a wider world to conquer, and The Guardians of the Galaxy are an enjoyable enough bunch of misfits to be welcomed back onto the screen.

All I can hope for is more Cosmo next time.

 

 

Englishman, Scholar, Complete Bastard. Remembering Rik Mayall.

Irreverent comedy is a British tradition. From the genre defining classics like Monty Python and Benny Hill to modern nutters like The League of Gentleman, the Brits have done it funnier and weirder than all the rest for some time.

Today, we've lost one of the greats in the field, a comedian par excellence, as well as a writer, producer, musician, father, husband, and award-winning star of stage and screens large and small, Rik Mayall.

When I was nine, I went to hang out at a friends house and watch TV, and he pulled out a videotape belonging to his father, that we weren't supposed to watch. It was foul, it was disgusting, and it was the funniest thing I had ever seen. It was Bottom Live 3. This was my introduction to the inimitable talents of Rik Mayall and Ade Edmondson, the best comedy duo since Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie.

These two had a stage relationship unlike any other. Two guys who knew each other so well, they can finish each others unscripted jokes, and make the moments when it all goes wrong funnier than anything written down could have been.

It was moments in Bottom Live 3, like the seagull, the secret hatch that didn't work, and that heckler so flawlessly dealt with, that made Rik Mayall my favorite comedian for most of my childhood.

Ah, but it's all toilet humor and fart jokes, you'd think I'd stop laughing at that kind of humor when I was grown right? No sir! When I was in high school I delved back further into the history of Rik and Ade, and found a wealth of funny to enjoy. The Young Ones became my favorite show in the world. Rik Mayall played Rick, the Cliff Richard obsessed Sociology student, and Ade was the inexplicably violent punk prodigy Vyvian, in a house full of failed college skivers. This was Ben Elton comedy at its absolute best. It was a chunk of 80s British culture that showed the opinions and concerns of 'The Kids' better than anything else, and had farting midget demons and exploding bricks and punk hamsters to boot.

The Young Ones was influential in being a part of who I was. One time in high school, my best friend and I spent weeks getting our costumes just right, so we could turn up at school dressed as our closest facsimiles of Vyvian and Rick respectively. He spent days sticking stars to a denim jacket and spiking his red hair and I drew an anarchy symbol on the back of an old blazer and stared at myself in the mirror trying to perfect the right Rik Mayall sneer. He kicked the door to our class in when we first arrived on that day and the entire class burst into laughter. Worth every moment of effort.

Rik Mayall's career was more than just a partnership though. The man had an incredible list of comedy feats under his ever expanding belt.

You can't be a fan of the seminal classic show Blackadder and not love his performance as Mad Tom or the perpetual scene stealer Flashheart. It's rare for anyone to steal the scene from comedy greats like Stephen Fry and Rowan Atkinson so thoroughly, but Mayall's Flash would manage it every time. (“Still worshiping God? Last I heard he started worshiping me!”)

Most well known of all his performances to American audiences, Mayall starred in the eponymous 90s comedy hit Drop Dead Fred. This one was a bloody corker, with Mayall as the imaginary friend every kid wanted. I personally found this film amongst a pile of old VHS tapes at a car boot sale when I was 12, and loved every minute of it. Mayall so energetically threw himself into this role that he drew many comparisons to American funny man of the time Jim Carrey.

Working with Ade again, their show Bottom took over where The Young Ones left off, only wittier, grosser, naughtier, and even funnier. The adventures of these two aging old bastards took us to new heights of British gross out comedy. The episode 'Hole', which found our protagonists Richie and Eddie stuck atop a deactivated ferris wheel, is one of the single funniest episodes of any comedy show I’ve ever seen. Cleverly using nothing but the single set for the duration, it's virtually the Samuel Beckett piece of gross-out comedy.

Bottom would be a cultural hit for over decade, lasting three series and five spin off stage shows that were quoted endlessly in colleges and universities around the country. Tailor-making each set to fill in jokes for every venue and location performed in, Rik and Ade worked the stage perhaps best of all. These were performances to watch over and over, the immense skill with which these shows were performed hidden in the effortlessness at which both of our boys did every little thing. Together, they battled flawed stage design, the contents of the script, and, as always, the crowd itself. Somehow, the two would always emerge triumphant. At the time I watched Bottom, I was in drama school myself, and could draw a lot of inspiration from the way any situation was handled by Rik and Ade: drop character only when it's funny, and never give your audience an inch on you.

Rik would suffer a quad bike accident in '98, leaving him in a coma and the public on the edge of their seats. Immediately upon regaining consciousness, our man allegedly accused the doctor: “So you're the bastard who keeps sticking needles into me.”

Regaining his strength from the accident in hospital, Rik would write the first draft of the Bottom movie: Guest House Paradiso, that would take Richie and Eddie to new heights of depravity, starring the likes of Simon Pegg, Bill Nighy and Vincent Cassel. I remember nights watching this towards the end of my time in high school, how “Feeeeb hello?” became the catchphrase of the year, and forever carrying the weight of knowing exactly what Rik Mayall looks like wearing nothing but a pair of women's spiked rubber underwear.

 

That wasn't the end of Rik's varied world of appearances of course, with roles in the likes of films such as British classic The Wind in the Willows, and, although due to editing never appearing in the final product, playing Peeves the Poltergeist in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. His voice was a focal part of all his performances, being instantly recognizable almost anywhere. He read audiobooks with a flair only he could manage, voiced every character in the hit Playstation game Hogs of War, was the eponymous Sod in How to be a Little Sod, and even turned up in the strangest places like an episode of SpongeBob Squarepants or getting eaten by Kirby in an old Nintendo ad. Mayall's presence in British culture was truly staggering.

First and foremost. He was one of us, one of the dirty everyday slobs who made it to the big time and was proud to be there. With a wife and three daughters, Mayall was the consummate family man, won a primetime Emmy for Outstanding Voice-over performance, and had his ugly mug in the Millennium Dome for millions to see as we clocked over into the new millennium. As in the name of his autobiography, 'Bigger than Hitler, Better than Christ.'

He certainly was.

My time as a fan of Rik Mayall's has lasted twenty years now. I go back and watch the old greats all the time. I introduce The Young Ones and Bottom to hordes of new people. I remember sitting back after a long day shooting a film in 2007, everyone on set exhausted, and putting on Bottom Live 3 and leaving everyone laughing. I wish I had gotten the chance to thank him for all the laughs over the years.

However, the last word on the man himself, can only be given by his comedy partner of so many years, Ade Edmondson:

“There were times when Rik and I were writing together that we almost died laughing. They were some of the most stupid, carefree days I ever had, and I feel privileged to have shared them with him. And now he's died for real. Without me. The selfish bastard.”

Movie review: The Amazing Spider-Man 2.

In this world gone mad, with Superhero movies bursting out of every studio with the force of freight trains every few weeks, it takes throwing your weight around to be noticed. A big villain, a big name, a major plotline from comic-book history, all these are things it takes to get the crowds coming back.
The latest installment of the titular web-slingers movie franchise is certainly no different, and packs no less than three classic Spidey villains into one film, with the promise of a whole bunch more soon to come. They had their work cut out for them making this one, that much is clear from the get go.

Our story cold opens with some major history that will rub canon fans the wrong way, as the mysterious past of Peter Parker's science savvy parents is revealed amid a James Bond style crashing airplane battle over a tenuous internet connection. It may feel more like a tech-thriller than Spider-Man, but it beats opening on some tired old Uncle Ben stuff eh? The action really gets going full-force in scene two, as our hero swings into action against stock Russian terrorist, Aleksei Systevich. This entire encounter really is the old cartoon brought to life. Aleksei (played by a completely over-the-top Paul Giamatti) is as snarling and ridiculous as you can get playing a Russian killer, and Spider-Man is at his wise-crackling best from the first line. Caught stealing an armoured car full of plutonium isotopes, Aleksei is beaten and bested by Spider-Man in minutes, leaving us with a reminder of just how dexterous and strong this particular version of the hero really is.
Arriving late to his own graduation ceremony, Peter drops in to reintroduce us to his love interest, the ill-fated Gwen Stacy. The relationship between the two is blossoming, yet haunted by the specter of Gwen's father, killed in battle against a Welshman last movie. The foreboding stares of her father's ghost forces Peter to wedge a gap between the two, ending their relationship. It isn't wildly fun getting into the relationship between these two again. It's teen romance, we all know what it's like already, awful and terrible and full of headphones and pillow punching. What is far more fun is watching the developing villains go about their pre-villainous lives.
Manic, self-confidence deficient electrical engineer Max Dillon was rescued by Spider-Man in a happenstance encounter, and now talks to the hero in his miserable apartment when no one else is around. Max is both self obsessed and horribly afraid of social embarrassment, with obvious and severe abandonment issues, stumbling over his words trying to interact with anyone as he goes to his bottom of the ladder job at questionably evil megacorporation Oscorp. You know the character, you've seen him before. He may be played by a weird haired Jamie Foxx here, but he was played by a weird haired Jim Carrey before he became the Riddler in Batman Forever, and a weird haired Guy Pearce before he became Aldritch Killian in Iron Man 3. The stepped on and overlooked scientist, the unseen genius. Oh, one day, if only he had the chance. It doesn't take long for Max to stumble into a room filled with fizzing electrical wires and tanks full of electrical eels (no really) and go get himself done turned into his very own Dr Manhattan.

Now the fledgling Electro is an interesting character. The transformation doesn't force a personality change at first, leaving the awkward, needy character in a wildly powerful new body. With no knowledge of how to control himself, or indeed why everyone is looking at him as he comes to times square, his body inadvertently seeking the energy sources found there. His complex fixation with Spider-Man comes to fruition when he is forced to encounter his hero face to face.
When the world is focused on him, just for that one perfect moment, and everyone pays attention to him, he seems almost content. Then his hero arrives and tears all the attention away from him immediately. Worse, Spider-Man forgets Max's name. Electro comes alive.
Now Electro is by far the strongest villain of the film, and once he makes the transition from tired stereotype to full fledged bad guy, becomes one of the more exciting villains to appear in a recent film. His body moves with fluid electricity, swarming and moving over his translucent flesh, and his voice reverberates with a bassy distortion that is just wonderful. Even more distinctive, is the swelling music that follows the character through the film; A deep, rolling dubstep that not only sets the dread of his incredible power perfectly, but even moves and jumps in tone with the character on screen, making each of his scenes feel beautifully kinetic and bringing so much more to the atmosphere. The rest of the music in the film pales in comparison.
Spider-Mans confrontations with Electro are by far the film's most visually impressive sequences, the villains powers evolving through the course of the film from simple energy manipulation, to moving as a living current of electricity spiraling through the air in waves of blue and purple surges. It's gorgeous to watch, I just wish the changes in his personality were explored a little more as the film went on. He desires to take control of what is rightfully his by design, the city power grid, but once this is accomplished, we never really find out what goes through his mind. What would the sheltered, fearful little scientist become when endowed with such power? (and how did the transformation fix the gap in his teeth?) I would have enjoyed seeing Electro fleshed out more in the third act.
The third act devotes its time mainly to another, however. Young Harry Osborn makes his entrance early on in the film, a seemingly innocent yet dark young man returning to see the last moments of his dying father. Norman is bed ridden, twisted and dying from the same disease that courses through Harry's veins, and with a cryptic warning, passes his companies malevolent research onto his son. Thus beginning a subplot of intrigue within the Oscorp company, of plot and deceit from those that Harry is forced to trust upon taking his father's throne. Now Harry is a well done character here. The young Osborn is usually treated as ancillary to his father, but here the elder is done away with swiftly, establishing the deep disconnection the two share and complete lack of family trust, as well as give us a glimpse into this dark young man who once called Peter Parker friend. The two share a very real feeling moment where, after encountering one another after almost a decade of absence, they insult one another and laugh. Their friendship feels believable, and it's a moving development when Harry's illness requires him to obtain the blood of the newly famous Spider-Man. Connected to Spider-Man through is photography (sadly absent is J. Jonah Jameson in this one) Peter is forced to refuse Harry's pleas.  Harry is a dying young man, he's desperate; and to be betrayed by his only real friend in this world of hateful businessmen fighting him for control of his birthright, might be all it takes to knock him over the edge from desperation into insanity. Here returns the earlier established backstory of the Parker parents, and their dark relationship to Norman Osborn and his research. In a noir little mystery sequence Peter must follow the trail set by his father to a hidden lab beneath the city, to find a long abandoned lab his father left behind and unveil his secret research. Although filled with the only real link Peter has with his parents, this didn't seem to pay off all that much in the rest of the film, and actually seemed to further more to Harry's medical plotline than it did Peter's family strife.

The action and interplay between these two major villains is interesting, with Electro gaining control of his new powers and growing stronger, and Harry losing control of his company and growing weaker. Electro becomes the weapon which Harry uses to stab his way back into his empire. It's a shame these two characters only really have a couple scenes together, as it would have been interesting to see how they would interact later on in the films events.
As Spider-Man comes to a shattering showdown with Electro, containing a moment where Electro creates a replica of his leering face in the sparking ruins of a New York skyscraper that truly impressed me as a new super-villain classic, Harry is descending to his destiny in the vaults below Oscorp, where he is injected with the imperfect spider serum in last ditch effort to save his life.
Harry goes from 0 to Green Goblin in a matter of seconds, which may have been a bit fast in my opinion, the whole film going into the final waves of act 3 in very short order.
The two climactic battles with our villains coming one after the other was a little bit of an odd choice of pace, with Electro having been built up longer and simply more impressively than the Goblin, and he is done away with a little easily with Spider-Man's first solution to the problem. Gwen Stacy being courageous and running around in the midst of the explosive battle was also ridiculous at times to watch. She's talking to Spider-Man like he's just her average old boyfriend whilst he is literally being attacked by the highly explosive supervillain. Yes, we understand you're a strong, intellectual woman who can look after herself and solve problems, but get your head down in the line of fire bitch!
Speaking of Gwen, those in the audience who're fans of the story will know she's not seeing the end of this one. As Spider-Man battles the newly powered Harry, who does look brilliant in a very grotesque new take on the Green Goblin, Gwen's life hangs in a precarious balance. We're waiting for it to happen, and in a way that takes away from most of the threat in the rest of the fight.

Now Emma Stone isn't a bad actress, googly eyes and all, it's just that the character of Gwen Stacy just isn't great. She's too perfect, too intellectual, too successful. Her relationship with Peter is so picturesque in its ineffable romance that she really did have to die. The character of Peter Parker, and indeed any superhero, is most exciting when it is strained, when it is challenged and under assault. Remember Spider-Man 2? With poor Peter Parker losing everything in his life bit by bit, life raining crap on him day after day? He's at the brink of giving up everything before Doc Ock even turned up. It was compelling stuff, and the death of Gwen Stacy here, which was done well in a mix of both the classic comic book event and the creation of Venom; is a step on the trials this new Spider-Man has to face to become the hero he needs to be.
The film doesn't really wind down, it just gets going again, almost as if it's about to introduce another act. We are treated to a shameless introduction to the next story in the franchise, with the beaten and imprisoned Harry Osborn directing a mysterious benefactor to ready the experiments for a new group of supervillains. Just a few men, would it be a stretch to guess about six? How sinister.
The first of this crew is handed to us for the final scene, as Aleksei returns from his stint in prison, powered up in his tank-like Rhino mech and ready to claim his revenge on Spider-Man.
Rhino could have been scary and intimidating, but the way he's played here is just too comic-book to be so. He's fun, he's wacky, and the final clash leads us into the idea of Spider-Man routinely battling this sort of villain as his everyday occurrence. Some may say it's baiting for a sequel, but this kind of movie doesn't need to bait. It chooses to go out on a high note, a playful one, one that reminds us Spider-Man does this every day, and there will only be more of these guys coming. This film also subtly introduces us to the characters of Felicia Hardy and even Mr. Smythe; for those who remember the creator of the Spider Slayer robots in the animated series.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is a good film, it's fun, doesn't take itself too seriously most of the time, and when it does the melodrama doesn't overstay its welcome. Visually there are scenes that will stun you in here, and the movements and actions of the titular hero have never looked better. With great villains and solid performance by the protagonist, I'd say the franchise has been done a favor by this installment.

Super Special Dooptacular Doop Special.

There are many heroes in the Marvel Universe.

Characters that have captured the imagination of millions across the globe since before the majority of us were born. Spider-Man, Iron Man, The Hulk, Captain America. To name only a tiny fraction of the many and varied heroes that provide everyone with excitement, entertainment, even inspiration in their everyday lives.

But is there one amongst the legions that shines brighter than the rest? A hero so great we can all aspire to emulate? One amongst the Avengers, Earths Mightiest heroes? Or the Fantastic Four? A team held together by family and love? Is there truly a hero grander than all the others?

No. Just kidding. This article is about Doop.

'But just who is this Doop?' I hear you blithely ask, Ignorant of the absurdity of your question.

Those who are in the know are painfully aware of the floating little green potato looking thing lurking around the pages of Marvel comics. Just look at that lovable little green blob.

He's been kicking around since 2001, a (one can only assume off the cuff) creation of Peter Milligan and Mike Allred in their run on X-Force. You see Joe Quesada had taken over at that point, and various comics were getting overhauls. With British talent Milligan (Penner of some truly classic 2000 AD stories) writing and Madman legend Allred with the pencils, the team that emerged from the duo would turn out to be one of the most surreal in Marvel's history. They would come to be known as the X-Statix.

So what we end up with are a bunch of self-obsessed and morally deficient young heroes with powers ranging from wholly useless to ridiculously specific. They would be killed off left and right, act like immature idiots, and generally be a irresponsible team, albeit one of the most interesting there's ever been. Through the swiftly changing roster, one of the only standbys of the team is their cameraman. Or cameraperson. This little floating green potato that looked a bit like a stop halfway between Slimer and Gary Busey.

You could be dooped into thinking he wasn't important, and although ever-present, he never actually does all that much. But if there was a soul behind the body of the X-Statix, it would be green and Doop shaped. He floats around, rarely doing much more that getting footage of the team going about their business and sneaking shots up the female team-members skirts, occasionally spouting dialogue in a nonsensical wingding that is apparently unintelligible. 

So what exactly are Doop's powers? Who the hell knows? They're super-dooper, how about that? At one time or another he's shown evidence of super strength and resilience, transforming and enlarging his body, dooplicating items, something that seems to resemble creating pocket dimensions in his own body, energy beams, and just plain weirdness like taking himself bodily apart with no physical limitation.

Doopseak remains an enigmatic secret buried far deeper than anything in a Dan Brown novel. In universe, everyone seems to understand it of course, leading to baffling comedy in the reactions to whatever it is the little guy is saying.

In a crossover event with the Avengers near the end of X-Statix's run, Doop is taken hostage by Russian terrorists and turned into an atomic superweapon. Captain America makes a vague reference to something called 'The Doop Project' in the final days of the Cold War. Could Doop possibly be of Soviet Origin? Who the hell knows, we never hear any more on the subject.

That covers literally all we ever really discover about Doop. There's some vague allusions to relatives at one point, but they remain an unsolved mystery. Through thick and thin, Doop remains the  most stalwart member of the team. They send him to deal with a trouble-making prospective member at one point, and Doop does the kid in with an axe. Holy shit, that's some brutal stuff, Doop. He's capable of all sorts of things, including being an ordained Anglican priest and engaging in apparent sexual relationships with She-Hulk and Madonna. He palled around with Wolverine on a noir-style detective romp for a couple of issues, and one time the little guy went toe-to-toe with the Mighty Thor in a confrontation so calamitous it awoke the sleeping Valkyries of Asgard.

So how do salacious tendencies, mystical dialogue, a dooplicitous nature and some incredibly poorly defined powers combine into a cult character shadowing the margins of the Marvel universe?

Who knows, but when the X-Statix had their comic canceled (A criminal travesty as far as I'm concerned), every team member was apparently done to death in the last issue. The issue is chiefly focusing on the more vocal heroes of course, and Doop is seen in the background in one frame, lying sprawled over a chair with a nasty stomach wound.

Could the blob be done in so easily? Was that the end for our hero? Doopsday?

No chance.

Other members of Marvel's creative team took notice of that little chap. In an unrelated comic, somewhere in the multiverse, a passing child might be seen clutching a familiar looking green doll. Jean Grey had an awfully distinctive blob of a keychain one time. In an issue of symbiotic hero Toxin's self titled comic, a scrawl of graffiti in the background proudly reads: Doop Lives.

Was the little blob becoming an almost Christ-like figure within the ethos of the Marvel universe? Not quite, but had he subtly infiltrated the lines between? Indoopitably.

A few years later Doop resurfaced, alive and well, a mysterious entity discovered deep in space speaking in an all too familiar tongue. He reappeared in the Marvel universe not with a bang, but with a whisper. A simple reemergence unquestioned by readers who knew Doop not. Among other things, Doop went on an utterly sdoopid kung-fu adventure with Iron Fist, acted as a criminal investigator to the mutants of Utopia (Driving his victim to tears with an interrogation comprised completely of questions about French cinema) and appeared in a mutant romance special that was truly weird.

Since then, Doop has been appearing in the pages of every mutant based comic there is, apparently having found employment with the Jean Grey School for Higher learning. You'll see him at a desk in front of students, sleeping through one of his own lecture periods, or eating doughnuts in the staff room. He seems to be doing well in the teaching profession. Of course, Doop's employment as staff is purely a front for the real job at the school, that of an undercover security professional, looking out for the safety of the students, and rooting out trouble at the heart of the problem. Logan can count on his old buddy Doop to do what needs gettin' done.

That about brings us up to speed. Marvel NOW is in full swing, and creeping up on us very soon for some strange reason that only the correct alignment of planets could possibly have allowed, Doop is getting his own little limited series. Set during the events of the massive mutant book crossover 'Battle of the Atom' Doop is getting his own slice of the center stage after all this time.

Screw The Avengers, go out and buy your kids (or wife, boyfriend, grandmother, etc) some Doop. They'll love you for it.

You said it man.

Comic Review: The Trial of Jean Grey.

Comic book crossovers can be a scary thing.

If you're a veteran comic book fan, you're used to it. The mass blender of characters and story lines that are thrust at you three or four times a year and mix up the stories and the bad guys. They're epic, they're fun.

If you're new to the comic book world of course, they may intimidate and frighten you. Who are these characters I know nothing about? Who are all these strange names on the covers? This new art is strange and unfamiliar! Why can't we just go back to the was it used to be?!

All it takes is a little getting used to, is all. Try to see it not so much as the literary clusterfuck it initially appears to be, and more like a sampler CD. One of those big ass ones you got for a few dollars that feature all sorts of stuff you've never heard before, but has that one track you really like. You have the comfort zone of the ones you know, can skim over the guys you aren't so keen on, and just might find something new you love, and go out and buy their record afterward. This is exactly what a comic book crossover event is like, so turn it up. Or open the page, Whatever.

  

The Trial of Jean Grey is the first crossover involving Marvel's biggest property, The X-Men, and it's newest (But swiftly rising star) property The Guardians of the Galaxy. Only a little one, three books of each completes the entire story. It's not unusual for crossover events to involve characters or books that are a little under the radar and mix them with the big leagues, as of course it's a good way to introduce people to a book they may not have picked up before. It's no coincidence that the Guardians just happen to be crossing over with the X-Men six months before their big budget movie comes out of course, you gotta introduce people somehow. It's similar to what they did at the start of this latest Guardians run, having Iron Man amongst the team for a trial run, a sort of viewpoint character, an everyday (comparatively) human amongst these spacefaring pirate nutters. It helps that a few members of the Guardians can out-flirt and out-wisecrack Tony Stark or Bobby Drake at every turn, Rocket Raccoon is a hilarious character and he's been particularly enjoyably written into this crossover event.

Now I came into this crossover from the opposite side of how most will. I follow the Guardians, and getting back into X-Men again was a strange feeling for me. They were my team back in the 90's and it's strange to see how much the characters have aged as I have. The series is All-New X-Men in particular I should point out, the concept of which is that the original X-Men from the teams beginnings in an idyllic superhero group under the tutelage of Professor X, have been pulled out of time and to the present, where the rebellious Cyclops is leading rogue mutants against his old comrades in a post Charles Xavier world.

Pretty heavy concept to swallow, I know, but it's a hell of a lot of fun to see.

Of course where most people will be learning is in the other team. The Guardians of the Galaxy, led by cocky American Star-Lord, will be new to many readers. They haven't been involved in too much heavy plot dragging them down yet, so it's easy to jump into getting to know the team, from gun-loving weapons specialist Rocket Raccoon (Yes, he's a raccoon), to smoky female melee combat expert Gamora. The teams latest member, Angela, might take a little more salt to accept, as she is a fresh addition to the Marvel universe, created by Neil Gaiman and recognizable character from the popular comic book Spawn. Yes, THAT Angela.

The crossover is a little unforgiving in that if you only really want to pick up your book out of the two, you're out of luck. The two books trade the crossover in chapters, so you'll be entirely out of half the story if you're only reading one. It's all in with this one.

I for one didn't mind picking up All-New X-Men and giving it a chance, it got me back into enjoying a few characters I didn't even realize I had been missing for a while. The relationships between young Jean and Scott is charming and brings you back a little to an earlier time of comic heroes. That's when they're from of course, and they pull it off well.

 

The story itself that all these heroes are mixed up in? Heavy stuff. This is a Jean Grey prior to the Phoenix force, long before her power grows and she becomes a danger to herself and others. The Jean from this universe never had the chance to stand trial for her crimes, on the account of being long dead of course, so when an intergalactic tribunal, lead by classic X-Men foe the Gladiator, kidnaps Jean to face trial for her future self's crimes as the Phoenix, the young X-Men are dragged along for the ride as the Guardians of the Galaxy take the plucky group into the stars to rescue Jean Grey.

 

 

Now some characters are more important than others in all this. It's a lot to juggle essentially having ten main characters to throw around, and you may find your favorite getting lost in the clash.

The focal characters between the teams: Jean Grey, Star-Lord, Scott Summers, are fully fleshed out, having their whole range of emotions on show, but I could count the lines said by Drax or Angel on one hand. X-23 seems to appear out of nowhere five books in. There is also the threat, as with far too many crossovers, of simply having too many characters! Mixing the members of X-Men and the Guardians should be enough already, but then the Starjammers turn up, intergalactic pirates with a heroic streak and a family tie to the X-Men, and it starts to get a little packed in there. There is a panel of everyone sat in the Guardians spaceship filled with so much spandex and weird coloured skin it looks like a convention in there.  It's an enjoyable mashup though, the dialogue between the teams is great, and the sardonic wit of Rocket and the stone-cold sexy of Gamora plays well with personalities as strong as those of the hyper-intellectual Beast or over-excitable Ice Man. The hamburger scene is just....great.

 

The story as a whole, is solid. Simple even. Physics-bending moral dilemma aside, It's a rescue story. Jean Grey is held imprisoned by the Gladiator and his men, seeking her to not only face punishment for crimes she has yet to commit, but to atone emotionally for them as well. Gladiator's stubbornness and seeming cruelty makes him a strong villain, and his incredible physical capabilities make him a solid match for both teams put together as it is. It's a shame there really is only one brief confrontation with all the characters present, as the story does pass an awful lot of time with the getting-there as opposed to the rescue in actuality. When the inevitable showdown does come to pass, it's over a little quickly, but is off-the-page huge of course.

 

Gladiator should know that messing with time isn't always so easy, and the resolution of the story looks like it could have some lasting consequences for the X-Men. Jean Grey theorizes her emotional state has been pushed beyond the point her previous self ever was, and that maybe the Phoenix force will effect her differently this time around. Her all-new (and all-naked!) new form is nothing wildly unexpected, but it does at least show us that this Jean we haven't seen the best of yet. Even the ever amicable Cyclops, already thrashed into subservience by the events of his own book, steps up at the end and makes a decision that could hugely change the story on his end.

 

 

As for the Guardians, sadly there isn't so much to say for this story really making a change to them. Apart from Star-Lord getting a little more-than-just-friends with Kitty Pryde, no major friendships are established or developed. The whole thing is definitely much more about the X-Men that it is our space heroes. The more you think about it, the more you need to ask: 'Did the Guardians really need to be there?' Are they just in this story for the sake of a crossover? The interplay is great fun, but could these two comics have gone their separate ways without forcing the readers to buy both? If there are further reaching ramifications for the Guardians resulting from this story, I will be surprised.

All in all, I for one did enjoy the thing. For a big fan of the Guardians of the Galaxy, it did a great job of reminding me how much I used to like the X-Men too. It even gave me the nudge to pick up a few more of the past books of their new series and enjoy them too. The Guardians and the X-Men, although wildly different teams, fit well together, and perhaps we'll see more of how they work together in the future. There was a lot unsaid at the end of this story, both happy and grave, and I hope we see these characters develop further to establish themselves in the vastness of the Marvel universe.