The Watcher: Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter

History is never quite the way we remember it, as the saying goes “history is written by the victors”. This is the root idea for the film based on Seth Grahame-Smith’s novel of the same name. Adapted into a screenplay by Grahame-Smith himself, but directed and co-produced by Timur Bekmambetov with the assistance of Tim Burton. 

Everything else you need to know about this movie is within its title - the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, is a vampire hunter. But he doesn’t start out that way...

As a boy he witnesses the death of his mother at the hands of his father’s employer, whom they owe money to. Unbeknownst to him this man is actually a vampire. Abraham vows that one day he will avenge his mothers death. Years later - after his father's passing - that day finally arrives. Nervous and armed with a pistol, Abraham (Benjamin Walker) confronts his mothers killer, who then reveals his secret. This is a battle Abraham is not prepared for. Losing and about to die he is rescued by a man called Henry Sturgess (Dominic Cooper).

Sturgess takes Abraham back to his mansion to recover from his wounds. He then reveals that there are vampires in the world and that he is in the business of hunting them down. Abraham requests that he be trained so that he may succeed in his mission for revenge. Sturgess agrees on the proviso that Lincoln does exactly as he says and only kill when ordered to.

After an apparent 10 years of training with Sturgess he travels to Springfield, Illnois to begin his hunt. Abraham soon finds himself drawn to a young woman by the name of Mary Todd (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) who at the time is being courted by Stephen A. Douglas (the brilliant Alan Tudyk). Even though he was warned by Sturgess to not form any sort of close relationships, Abraham falls head over heels for her (and strangely Douglas doesn’t ever seem to put up a fight for the love of his fiancée?!).

After some time of leading the double life of courting Mary and killing local vampires, he gains the attention of Adam (Rufus Sewell) the originator for all vampires in the US who decides that he needs to meet the infamous Mr Lincoln.

Abraham decides that there might be more than one way to skin a cat (or vamp!) and takes an interest in the world of politics to search for a more permanent solution to the slave trade issues as well as the vampires heavily involved in feeding upon them! He hangs up his axe and decides to leave hunting in order to focus on politics and eventually becomes President. As per history, his beliefs on slavery cause a divide in the states, the vampires side with the Confederacy which means Abraham has to come up with a plan to eliminate them as well as win the overall war.

Benjamin Walker looks a lot like a young Liam Neeson and pulls off the action with ease also. Dominic Cooper is massively charming and seems to be mostly channelling Robert Downey Jr which is perfect as he portrayed Tony Stark’s father in Captain America: The First Avenger.

The movie’s stylised colour palettes and specific 3D effects - like the vampire’s eyes and their vanishing powers - were enjoyable and added to the whole feel of the film. Unfortunately real life history tends to get in the way of all the vamp-slaying fun, luckily the film is very loosely based on the novel and doesn’t actually delve to much into the history of good ol' honest Abe.

I have never understood the recent fascination with culture mash-ups like this but I did find myself pleasantly surprised, it has some fun axe-tion sequences which do get a bit crazy later on but its a perfect popcorn movie for a Sunday afternoon with a hangover.

Stefan Harkins was very, very hungover. Apparently.

New Beginnings - Prophecy #1

Whenever I see the name Ron Marz I automatically think of Witchblade or Green Lantern, so to see his name on a Dynamite branded comic certainly caught my eye. Admittedly my exposure and knowledge of Dynamite is very limited, but there are characters I already recognise such as Red Sonja.

Prophecy #1 is the first part of a seven issue crossover which also includes Vampirella, Dorian Gray and Dracula (to name but a few). What is also good is that this is completely self contained. Readers won’t have to worry about missing parts or story arcs in other titles or comics - it is a focused and direct event. In an age when we have seen Marvel trying to cash in on Fear Itself across over 20 different titles or DC using Flashpoint to push a multitude of “new” but limited titles it’s certainly refreshing to see a publisher which is looking after the story first.

The story opens in 1890 with a very well know fictional detective and his faithful ward Dr Watson investigating a murder with a distinct Mayan flavour to it. All in a day's work for the genius of Holmes, but then the why of it all opens another door. Skipping back in time we are introduced to our heroine, Sonja, and her nemesis Kulan Gath, both doing what they are best at. For Sonja this is fighting and for Gath it’s magic and witchcraft. This also includes a very special dagger that hurls Gath through time with Sonja in hot pursuit wanting his head. Unfortunately for her they become separated and she is thrust into the world of vampires.....

Marz has written a strong story that is easy to read. It can be a little wordy in places and normally this is something that I shy away from, but given whose involved (mainly Holmes and Watson) you can understand why. It fits the mythology of the characters well. When reading the Mayan section you get a complete feel for the old movie style filled with clichéd action and cliff hanger action which was really enjoyable. I did get a slight whiff of cheese from the story but it was just at the right level to make it fun without making you frustrated with the dialogue too.

Walter Geovani has provided the artwork for this issue. Every frame is packed full of details with a lot of attention paid to virtually every person in the frame. Even people in the background have been given extra touches and adornments that mean they don’t fade into the colour wash. This is certainly a piece of work that a lot of time has been taken over. Even when the frames open up into full page images the level of detail increases even further and they become softer and more lush.

As a new comic on a publisher people may not know this is a good introduction. As this miniseries goes on I think it will engage a lot of different characters, which some may find overwhelming, but it gives you an introduction to Dynamite’s roster.

A fun story so far and one which will open doors for sure.

Matt Puddy pulled off a last minute substitution.

52 New Beginnings - The Dark

I, Vampire

reviewed by Kate Townshend

Well, after joking a couple of weeks ago that the next stage in female character outfit evolution would be Harley strutting around au naturel on a front cover, I, Vampire has made me realise that I’m already behind the times. Our protagonists are pictured looking mean and moody; him with jeans and rippling biceps, her with, well pretty much nothing at all actually (I refuse to count the ‘slightly darker shading’ that has been used to prevent the comic from being consigned to opaque plastic bags on the top shelf).

Despite this, I Vampire is exactly the sort of story I should like, focused as it is on the interpersonal dynamics between two rather striking characters. He is a tortured Angel type, wrestling with his darker impulses, while she is fearless and amoral and rather compelling actually. The artwork is pretty cool too, all flowing lines and stark blacks and whites juxtaposed against one another, and it works because this is a world where lines of good and evil are being drawn against a sense that it would be delightfully easy to just go with the flow.

And I love the fact that this first issue is fundamentally just a conversation between the two main characters... it’s an effective way of drawing us into their world and demarcating the lines that will drive the story. Some of the dialogue is a little clunky, but I can’t make up my mind whether or not this is just the awkwardness of the character or a flaw in the writing. The revolutionary parallels that Mary tries to draw are interesting if not terribly subtle, and there is a real sense of an epic narrative being set in place.

But back to the nakedness. Part of me wonders if this is just an explicit parallel being made between Mary and her animalistic side, in which case you could make an (admittedly rather tenuous) case for it as a justified part of characterisation. She is "magnificent", "free" and unfettered and maybe she’s just cooler than the rest of us with our bourgeois preferences for textiles. The less generous interpretation though, is that this is another tired attempt to link sexual women with evil ones. In which case, yawn.

Overall though, it’s fun, interesting and worth a second look. (At the contents… not just the cover!)

Justice League Dark

reviewed by D Kai Wilson-Viola

Of all the comics, bar Teen Titans, this has actually be one that I’ve been looking forward to. I live in a ‘Cartoon Network’ household, which means things like Teen Titans, Justice League and Static Shock are actually franchise sets that I recognise, so when I heard I was getting JL:D, I squeed a little.

And, of all the comics I’ve reviewed so far, this one has to be one of the better ones. Maybe it’s because I know some of the mythology they’re using for once, or perhaps I just really got the pace, the colouring and the techniques, but this one is definitely one that I’d like to continue with. It’s interesting enough that it held my attention from the outset, and I liked (and yes, recognised) some of the characters. There are some nice precedents established, plus, I was quite interested to see whom they’d dragged in from Justice League, so from the outset there is crossover and interaction. I won’t spoil that, but it’s enough to say that the overlay story and narrator works really well, while allowing the story just to unfold, which is something I think is very neat. There’s control and direction there while the story evolves, and as a writer, I love seeing that technique employed properly. In contrast to the Deadman comic last week (who, coincidentally makes a brief appearance), which swung and missed, this was perfect.

There are – kind of – styles associated with each character, though so far we haven’t seen them all in the same place, so I’m not sure if that’s going to be something that continue through the comic, which will be interesting, but mostly, I like the overall and underlying story, along with the stronger, deeper story going on. It’ll be neat to see where this one goes.

The Reluctant Geek - Preserving the blood-lines

So I love steak. Mandatorily rare. Preferably still twitching a little tiny bit as I shovel the meaty deliciousness (stop sniggering at the back) into my mouth. And much as unanchored in context, it’s kind of disgusting, it’s the moist, pink texture that you only get from still-bleeding cow that really does it for me. I mean, it’s nature own sauce isn’t it? No need for faffing around with jus or coulis or reduction or whatever. (I realise all the vegetarians in the room are fleeing, appalled at this stage but if you bear with me, there really is a point). The irony is, when it comes to blood in other situations, I’m the wuss at the back of the room who has stolen the attention by fainting while their friend has their leg chopped off. Something about the sheer sensual intensity of its redness, combined with the fact that in general blood is something we aren’t supposed to see gives it a contradictory, queasy fascination.

Of course, the symbolic significance of blood is such that we play out this simultaneous attraction and revulsion in a whole host of cultural myths. If the zombie renaissance is very much a 21st Century thing, (‘perchance sir, could you lend me your quill? I wish to pen an ode to brains…’) it is overlaid by a more long standing if less flashy obsession. Vampires never go away really, particularly not as fodder for the fantasy geek, and as they lurk at the edges of our consciousness, equally they haunt the pages and frames of the stories we choose to tell ourselves.

Most recently this blood lust has manifested itself in the True Blood TV show, entering into its fourth romping, boundry- pushing series. If every generation gets the vampires they deserve then this is one side of ours. Based on a series of novels set in Deep South, small town America, True Blood oozes languorous, claustrophobic atmosphere, linking vampirism to a whole host of modern obsessions, from addiction to abuse to religious fundamentalism. The vampires here are gorgeous, but usually deadly and often sadistic, and their glamour is juxtaposed with a messy, visceral approach to blood drinking. Don’t look for two neat little bite marks artfully arranged on some virgin’s lily white neck here (although True Blood does have its own version of a white gowned virgin for a little while.) Look for blood smeared across faces, flakes drying on kitchen floors in the sun, and graphically unforgiving murder scenes. The message of the series seems to be that despite the right-on, out and proud PR of a world where vampires have quite literally come out of their coffins, (and they play with this parallel to great effect… graffitied billboards with messages such as "God hates fangs" appear in the background of shots) none of us, vampire or human alike, can really resist the calling of the animalistic side of our nature.

Lots of people though would rather confront this rather unforgiving version of vampirism than its equally modern non-identical twin. If I ask you to imagine some sun-dappled, flower-bedecked meadow then you might be thinking we’re straying outside of traditional vampire territory. But wait! Who is this pale and beautiful creature striding through it? He appears to be… Surely he can’t be… Oh god, is he… sparkling? Well, yes, he is actually. He’s a Twilight vampire and that’s what they do. Despite the fact that the Twilight novels are something of a guilty pleasure for me I’ve got some serious issues with this updating of the vampire myth. And the shiny, shimmery sunshine thing is the least of them. For starters, although True Blood is dark, although it portrays misogyny and racism and a form of sexualized gore, it knows it is doing this. The thing that makes the Twilight world so dangerous (to an uncritical audience rather than the characters themselves) is that it has its own elements of abuse and misogyny and unthinking fetishisation of violence, all dressed up in some fluffy, sparkly treatise on purity and abstinence and the idea that True Love™ will wait forever. Poor mopey Bella and masterful protective Edward are obviously designed to appeal to the legions of teenage girls ( and should-know-better, only-just-thirty somethings) that buy the novels and see the movies. But this bloodless, simpering fairy tale has far nastier elements than anything True Blood can dream up.

And who knows what the next evolution will be for vampires? It sort of depends on what the next evolution is for humanity really. All of these mythical beings, zombies and vampires and werewolves and ghosts, are ways for us to explore the darker sides of ourselves whilst simultaneously retaining a sense of separateness from them. And at the edge of society it’s no wonder that they are a natural subject for fantasy and science fiction which themselves teeter on the very edge of the mainstream. One of the key functions of story though, is to provide a mirror for us to hold up to our faces. By their very nature, Vampires make it pretty damn tricky to see what is looking back.

This week Kate is fervently wishing for another opportunity to wear the Sookie Stackhouse costume.