Category Archives: Review

Terry Pratchett: Eric

As I mentioned a couple of times, I want to start reading more again.
So the first book I read for that occasion – and to get my head away from thinking about my thesis that was being reviewed at that time – was Terry Pratchett’s Eric.

What is it about?

3 of 5 stars


Eric is one of Pratchett’s Discworld novels and tells the story of the young demonology hacker Eric Thursley that summons a demon to fulfil him three simple wishes:
He wants to be the ruler of the world, meet the most beautiful woman that has ever lived and be immortal.
It isn’t really his fault that he summons the most incompetent wizard Rincewind that had been trapped in a Dungeon Dimension to help him with this. And it also isn’t his fault that they end up in places – and times – were his wishes might be granted a little differently than he had anticipated.

The reading experience

As you might have figured: I read this in German. Simply because almost every book I own is the German translation/version. Therefore I can’t say anything about Pratchett’s original jokes, as I don’t know which are his and which came through the translation.

The only thing that I can properly say about the reading itself is, that the novel is far too short.
It seemed a bit rushed at times and I am certain there would have been way more stories to tell, but we only got a little glimpse of that. Still a fun read though.

The characters

Eric pretends to be an old and wise demonology hacker, but is in fact barely older than thirteen. Therefore his antics are childish and naive in certain situations, but the more they go through the more he learns that Rincewind more or less knows what he is doing – and more importantly WHEN they should run.
Rincewind is one of the reoccurring characters from the Discworld. His first appearance was in The Colour of Magic and it took me quite some time to not misread his name as Reiswein or Ricewine…
Anyway, in this story he is seemingly granted the power to fulfil wishes through snipping his fingers (whereas otherwise he is barely capable of doing simple spells), which in turn leads them to places where his natural flight instinct is rather useful. He shows again that he has a minimum of responsibility for the people he travels with and is capable of knowing exactly when and in what direction he would need to flee. His pessimistic realism is always quite fun to read and of course his often not understood sarcasm. I might even go as far as to say he is amongst my favourite characters (way after DEATH obviously).
And he never is anywhere without the Luggage (which by the way is called „Truhe„/Chest in German). I like Luggage…I just don’t want to ever meet it/him as an enemy…and his role in this novel was again quite a fun one: Eating through armies, hell gates and simply appearing every time his master is in trouble.
The other major character beside Eric is Astgfl the King of Hell. Or rather the bureaucratic King of Hell that cancelled all the fun in purgatory to be replaced with boredom. That alone makes him a quite fun parody. On the one hand you could see that his plans worked, EVERYONE suffered, on the other hand you could see why there might be some controversy towards his methods of sending out memo’s and files and organizing everything. Even if h e just wanted to improve hell…
As with most of the Discworld stuff I can’t really say that there is a character that I don’t like. I might not have gotten a proper connection to some of them, due to the length of the novel and their short appearances, but no one really stood out negatively. Not even the Tezumen tribe and their „god“ or other army people and demons they met. Heck not even the crazy parrot…

General Opinion

As I said: This novel was way too short, but still fun1. It had some interesting ideas in the ways the wishes were granted (including the creation of the universe, a tribe of Mayan like people and a Trojan-like horse).
The thing that stuck with me most was however the boring bureaucratic hell with Boredom as eternal punishment. It seems to be a rather horrible idea if you are the one being punished…or doing the punishing…
It doesn’t really live up to the other novels I’ve read so far. Which is probably due to the shortness and the bare hints at other story lines instead of actually following them like he does with in of his other novels. Still interesting and funny though.

Stuff I’d like to add

This story was alternatively called „Faust“ and was probably some strange variation of the tragedy by Goethe, but I personally can see the connection only with squinting. With Rincewind being Mephisto, Eric being Faust and Astfgl maybe being god and the „most beautiful woman that ever lived“ being Gretchen or Helena. But I don’t really read it as Faust-like tale…but that’s just my opinion, as someone who kind of really likes the original.
PoiSonPaiNter
© For the cover belongs to its rightful owner.
1 I really like the footnotes in his novels…

Markus Heitz: Kinder des Judas

It’s been several years since I first started reading Markus Heitz‚ „Kinder des Judas“ (KdJ – in English: Children of Judas). As it was published in 2007 I got it around that time as well and never really had the chance and the muse to finish it until now. Like last year I thought that over the Christmas days I at least had to try to finish one book, as I can’t remember what else I have read that year – again. When I first picked up the book, after I had chosen it, I tried to continue reading, but soon realized that I would have to start anew, as what I read a few pages before that was just gone.
But let’s start at the beginning.

What is it about?

3 of 5 stars

KdJ is Heitz‘ first vampire-story, but not remotely romantic. The story is told through two different time lines: 18th century Serbia and current day (2007) Germany – Leipzig, to be precise.

The history part picks up the story of Scylla a young girl with a hunger for knowledge that loses her mother through the Turks. She is then raised by her (formerly unknown) father to follow him in his scientific studies and to become his successor. The more time she spends with him, the more she learns, but not just through their research. Her father is part of a hidden society of scientists that are calling themselves the Children of Judas and she soon finds out what exactly that means.

In Leipzig Theresia „Sia“ Sarkowitz is a caregiver for a hospital, who knows when death is about to visit her patients. But she is also a bouncer and combatant in illegal and nasty fighting matches, just to feel alive. When a young patient dies she decides to write down Scylla’s story. Soon her old live catches up to her. Her brother Marek forces her to remember who – and more importantly what – she really is and to return to where everything began. To the place where she was Scylla.

The reading experience

As I said I started the book back in 2007 or 8. I had read about a hundred pages and never really felt like continuing.
Before I decided to start from the beginning I read a couple of pages to get back into it. I soon found out that where Sia currently was, was a place where I nearly had been last year: The Moritzbastei in Leipzig. She was even at a concert of Das Ich, one of Germany’s oldest Gothic bands, that I actually have partly seen at last years Wave Gothik Treffen (Wave Gothic Meeting – the report for this will be added one day >_< ), in Leipzig. 😀 A thing that meant absolutely nothing to me all those years ago. It was just a location and just a band, no connection whatsoever and now I have memories of a guy with a clowns-hairdo in an industrial hall. 😀
But when I skipped more pages backwards I realized that it would be better to start from the get go again…as I couldn’t remember who certain people even were.

As I am not really a Dwarves fan, my first experience with Heitz (who is mainly known for his novels about Dwarves) were his novels Ritus and Sanctum, about the Werewolf of the Gévaudan and his version of what actually happened back then. Those two had the split storyline KdJ has, as well, so I knew what I was getting into.
Though from what I remember this was a bit different as it occasionally switched between the storyline within one chapter and had several, well, in-chapters. Let’s try again: The book is divided into four parts – called books: Mädchen (Girl), Aeterna, Entdeckungen (Discoveries) and Tod (Death). The chapter numbers continue throughout them. In each chapter there are notes for when and where something is happening, new notes show time jumps within the chapter. And occasionally that jump was into the other storyline.
This itself isn’t really confusing, though the point of view changes. Everything from the past is narrated, current events are told in Sia’s perspective. At one point she writes something and it is in first person as well. This is a bit odd, but you can still understand the different narrations quite well.

At some points I stumbled over spelling mistakes, but the book is from the first printing and things like that can always happen. What bothered me a little more was Heitz‘ way of describing things with too much details in some cases, but I’ll get to that later.

The characters

Sia herself isn’t really explored until later in the book when most of Scylla’s backstory was revealed. We have scenes with her that describe what she is doing, but you can’t really grasp why she would do that without completely knowing Scylla’s story. Of course the thought that she is Scylla and that she is a vampire (which they are by the way never called, as Heitz‘ preferably used the term „upir“ and variations thereupon) is always there while you read it, but not addressed until far down the storyline. She is not a character you would like, but somehow none of them are really likeable. Her actions are way more thought-through than Scylla’s and it’s a really nice contrast to the person she once was.

Because, well, most of what is told happens in Scylla’s childhood and young adult years, well up until her 70s… But still, Scylla was forced to grow up fast and had to live through quite some ordeals while growing up. Part of her stayed rather childish when it came to pursuing her goals. It was unfortunately not that much explored how she thought up certain plans, therefore some of her decisions don’t really make sense. At other points she even seems nymphomaniac, as her approach to gain power in man-ruled world is to sleep her way to wealth. Not really a kind of female representation one would like to read, but I suppose it might have been a necessary thing to do back then. Still don’t like it though. She had a brilliant mind (as she was raised to be a scientist) and had to restore to use her body instead….

And the only times she did fall in love didn’t end well…
Because everything boils down to the scientist society, The Cognatio, that has other things in mind with her (scientific) abilities. Members of that include Scylla’s father Karrol, her half-brother Marek and her occasional lover Lydia. Just like Scylla’s reasoning theirs is barely mentioned. Some of it is hinted at, some just not mentioned.

It is a pity, he could have done so much more with those three, but he settled for overprotective father, lovesick brother and shifty love-interest. And barely even mentioned other members of the circle. Thinking about it, Scylla/Sia and other side-characters could have gotten a better treatment as well.

There are no favourites or absolute dislikes in this, as simply everyone has reason’s to do what they do. Sometimes ridiculous or unexplained, yet still a reason…and, well, they are not portrayed enough to get some kind of connection.

General Opinion

If you don’t like explicit descriptions of fights – and I mean bloody and brutal fights – then none of his work is suitable for you. He also has a liability to describe sexual scenes with quite some detail. I don’t mind the blood, but the other stuff should be left a bit more to imagination in my opinion. Beside that, Scylla gets naked for a ridiculous amount of times, especially while fighting and that just bugs me.

Unlike the Werwolf-novels this one couldn’t really capture me, which might explain the break between reading. I don’t really know why, but between long and bloody descriptions of how someone was dissected or killed, the suspense didn’t really build up. You couldn’t guess what would happen next, but the moments where you hoped something wouldn’t happen where quite rare. Additional to that the characterization wasn’t the best either.

It was still interesting to read this different approach on vampires. Heitz created a variation of vampires based on Eastern folk tales, giving them names and abilities accordingly. He used people and places that actually had significance in our world in regards to our belief in these creatures. And as he writes well and fluently I can overlook most of the negative stuff above.
This book is different, not special, not a must-read, but different. A nice diversion to all the romanticisation of vampires these days.

Stuff I’d like to add

Even though this book seems closed, there are two sequels: Judassohn (Judasson) and Judastöchter (Judasdaughters). For the sake of completeness I have them as well, but I have to say, that I don’t really know what story they follow.
And there is a novel called Blutportale (Bloodportals) than somehow uses elements of both stories (Werwolfs and Vampires) and adds new stuff in a new setting. I’ll let you know what I find out when I managed to read all of them. 😉
And: None of them (including KdJ) are sold in English, sorry.
But I wouldn’t mind helping you out, if you were to try and read in in German. 🙂

PoiSonPaiNter

© For the cover belongs to its rightful owner.

Thor: The Dark World

This time a quite on time review about Thor: The Dark World as I have just watched it in the cinema.

But before I start I’d like to say: Back in 2011 I refused to watch the Thor movie, due to my dislike for Marvels approach on the myths. I only did it because someone in The Forum claimed it would be essential for understanding The Avengers, which I’d really wanted to see. So I borrowed a copy of the DVD from Iron Eve and watched it the day before we went into the cinema.

And what can I say?

Looking at it as just a movie it was pretty entertaining.
I only had to not think about it as Marvels (crippled) version of the Norse Mythology, (otherwise I’d be pretty much like the comic artist Humon in this comic).

For the Marvel Cinematic Universe to move on they had to continue with stories about the supposedly demi-gods of Space-Asgard.
So one kind of had to at least watch it to see if there is any major link from this towards the next Avenger movie.
My reasons for actually watching it in the theater were kind of weak …

#1 Christopher Eccleston plays the villain: As I probably won’t get to see „The Day of the Doctor“ I at least wanted to see „my“ Doctor on the big screen.
#2 Tom Hiddleston reprises his role as Loki: Apart from the fact, that Hiddleston is a brilliant actor, the character is pretty fun, but more to that later.

So much for my motivation to see this movie … *cough*

But what’s the movie about?

(If you can’t guess from the meaningful trailer)

Unsurprisingly Thor: The Dark World or Thor 2 is the continuation of the events of Thor and The Avengers. The nine realms went into chaos after the Byfrost (The Rainbow Bridge of Asgard, that is used for travelling between realms) was destroyed and Thor and his Warriors Three and the Lady Sif have to sort it out after it was repaired, while Loki is put into prison underneath the palace. All the while life on Earth continues and we meet Jane Foster, Darcy Lewis and Dr. Eric Selvig again, trying to cope with live after everything that had happened. While doing that Jane discover an anomaly and is transferred to a different realm where she accidentally re-awakens an old power source called the Aether, which then inhabits her.

With it the Dark Elve Malekith awakens as well, striving to get a hold of it. Long before the current events his kind has battled Odins father Bor to gain control over it. He wanted to return the universe into the state of darkness it was before the light and the realms were created and for that he needed the Aether and a special constellation of all the realms, the so called convergence, when all realms are within a straight line, which is coincidentally close by.

So all the hammer-wielding hero needs to do to save the day: Free the imprisoned brother, save the girl and stop the elve.

The watching experience

As I don’t really have much time the upcoming weeks I spontaneously decided to go this week. Eve would have accompanied me, but didn’t get my message in time so I went on my own, which had the only downside that I couldn’t discuss it right away with someone. But that’s beside the point.

The movie was in 3D, again, but it could have worked just as well without it. Some scenes were nice to look at, but most of it was nothing special.
Additionally, it was pretty weird to read the 3D-subtitles used for the Elvish.

Which brings me to the point that you could at least hear Ecclestons voice throughout those scenes, while everything else was dubbed. The German dub is quite well done though, especially Peter Lontzek, the voice actor of Hiddleston in all three movies, does a great job as he manages to capture quite a bit of the original portrayal of the character.

Other than that it was not surprising how empty the cinema was (roughly 20 people), even though the movie had only started a week ago. Even less surprising was the number of men compared to women, the movie is after all aimed more at men and as by now most people knew that there always comes a scene after the credits quite a few waited for it.

The characters

Let’s start this part with Thor, so I am done with that. And yes, I don’t like him. But that has nothing to do with Hemsworths way of portraying him, which he does quite well, and more with the fact that I generally don’t like main characters. What we see of him throughout the three movies is just not enough to make him remotely likable for me. At one point in the story my brain even shortly went into a sing-song of „Thor is being clobbered, Thor is being clobbered“ before I told it to stop and quietly enjoy the scene. Still this movie had some nice scenes that made him a bit less shallow and a bit deeper, but those were more thanks to his interaction with Loki.
Also his movie relationship with Jane is just plain weird. I mean: They knew each other for like three days, from what I’ve read about the comics, this whole things makes a bit more sense, but movie-wise it’s far too rushed. But I better stop right here before I get completely Off Topic. Again: This is my dislike for the characters, NOT the actors. They still do a pretty good job.

Loki on the other hand is a completely different matter. For a semi-side character he is shown to have quite an emotional depth, though that might come from Hiddlestons portrayal of him, which I think is utterly brilliant. You kind of can see all the suffering he is put through, yet he still manages to surprise the audience with his actions. Apart from that do I simply like this kind of character and I already rambled enough about it in my post about Faust’s Mephisto – which also was my first encounter with a character of this kind. I also drifted into the topic again when I introduced our devilish character from the book I’m co-writing – and yes he is based on Mephisto not Loki.

As mentioned above my other reason for watching this movie was Christopher Eccleston playing Malekith the Dark Elve. Apart from the fact that I imagine Dark Elves to not be blond and pale, he had far too little screen time, but what little he had was quite interesting. You couldn’t completely understand his reasoning as the movie kind of rushed through that part and as Icewolf put it so nicely: One could ask if he exchanged his brain with a wet bread roll during his sleep as he simply tried to do the same thing again after his first failure. Only this time getting into trouble with the offspring of those that had defeated him the first time.
And it was fun to see him attack London, a city that Eccleston had saved as The Doctor before. 😀
By the way: Is the English version of his name pronounced with „th“? They kind of dropped the „h“ in German.

In this movie they tried to include the side characters a bit more.
We learn a bit about Hogun. We see a bit more of what Sif thinks about/feels for Thor. We learn how protective everyone is about him, with a quite funny queue-joke. And we learn that even though Zachary Levi replaced Josh Dallas it didn’t really make a difference. Though I buy the philandering Fandral a bit more from Levi.
What we also learn is that Dr. Selvig apparently didn’t take Lokis mind control as well as Hawkeye, but judging from the post credit scene of Thor the „god“ might have stayed with him a little longer than the Chitauri invasion. All of this resulting in quite some hilarious scenes. Another unintentionally funny scene was when Jane tried to date someone, who is none other than Chris O’Dowd, known as Roy from The IT Crowd, which was quite a nice surprise as I hadn’t expected him to be part of the movie.

One of the visually most beautiful scenes concerned Frigga, the (adopted) mother of Thor and Loki. We learn a bit more about her and her relationship with her husband and son(s). I don’t know how much Joss Whedon(, who is said to have re-written some of the scenes) had a say in those scenes but it looked pretty much like his writing …

All in all the characters gained a bit more colour throughout this movie, though Darcy still is pretty much only a comic-relief character.
And even Hugin and Munin, Odins ravens, had a proper cameo this time. 😀
And speaking of cameos: Stan Lee’s was pretty fun again, too.

General opinion

The movie again was fun to watch. It had pretty great humor and action, but also conveyed some parts with much emotions. It all felt a bit rushed at times (e.g. the Frigga scene) and was mostly carried forward through character interaction, but I can live with that. I don’t mind seeing it again this time with the original voices, as that is always a bit different.

However, I still prefer the Myth-version of the characters and stories. Marvel does well in creating a world that makes sense on its own, but it still has this weird aftertaste of wrongness. Especially as Marvel leaves out all the fun: The Horse, the Cross-dressing and the Monster Babies. 😀

Stuff I’d like to add

Apparently the movie was released in Germany/Europe before it was broadcasted in the States. Which doesn’t happen that often and quite surprised me upon finding out.

And „The Dark World“ is a „Kingdom“ in the German version, for whatever reason.

They also had a funny advertisement before the movie:
They showed a trailer for Call of Duty and started with a shot if a satellite called „Odin“ and who was the narrator? Odin >_< (Or at least his German voice actor.)

PoiSonPaiNter

© Rights for the poster belong to Marvel.

Rise of the Guardians

I know the movie was released some time ago in 2012, but as I already have a habit of posting stuff way later then when they happened, I thought I might as well write a bit about this as I just re-watched it and felt like sharing my thoughts.

I first read about the movie on the deviantArt page of the artist Johane Matte (aka rufftoon) that was involved in its creation. To celebrate the release of the Trailer she posted a series of cartoons that introduced one of the characters she had been working on, a character that was only eyes in the shadows of a closet at first, but then fully visible in the conclusion when the trailer was finally out and he could take revenge on another character that had previously mocked him about not being allowed into the light – which was by the way Zhao from Avatar – The Last Airbender.
This in combination with the trailer made me curious about the movie. It looked like a fun family movie. As a result I asked Iron Eve if she wanted to accompany me into the cinema as soon as I knew when the movie would hit the German theaters.

But what’s the movie about?

(Might be that there are still people who haven’t watched it)

Official poster
One of the official posters of the movie.

The Rise of the Guardians is an Animation Movie by Dreamworks Animation and is about the Guardians of Childhood: Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy and the Sandman protecting the children of Earth with a strong hand … wait … no, that last one was nearly a line from Avantasia’s song „The Tower„. Let’s try again: Those four were chosen by The Man in the Moon to protect the children from any danger. Each of them protecting a certain aspect of childhood: Dreams, Hopes, Memories and Wonders. But of course something does in fact endanger these things: The Fear created by the Bogeyman. He had been weakened over the centuries and now tries to regain the powers he had throughout the dark ages, because all mystical beings can only exist as long as people believe in them. And no one really believes in the Bogeyman anymore. Therefore – much to the dislike of the Guardians – he tries to make children believe in him through turning their dreams into nightmares and stopping their belief in the Guardians to weaken them instead. With the help of a newly appointed and still not so happy about it Guardian – Jack Frost – they try to fight off the new threat and protect the last believer, the boy Jamie, at all cost. But Jack first has to decide which side he choses, as no one ever truly believed in him before.

The watching experience

As I mentioned I watched the movie in the cinema for the first time and as it nowadays is a must-have to show everything in 3D it was also only shown as such.
I have to say I am not a fan of this trend. On the one hand it is pretty annoying to wear the 3D glasses above your actual glasses and on the other hand do 3D movies have the tendencies to either only include short sequences where it is nearly a waste to use it at all or use it in sequences that are that fast that you get dizzy while watching it. Well, at least we have a 3D-capable theater by now and did not have to watch the 3D material in a 2D cinema…(I had that when I watched „The Last Airbender“ and it made some scenes even worse…)
Instead of doing either of it RotG did use the 3D effects quite nicely for the dream- and the nightmare-sand and general movement and perspectives. I kind of think it makes more sense to use these effects in an already animated movie than in a real-people movie, where you can’t actually get the same experience.
Other than that was it also interesting to see when we laughed and when the actual children laughed about certain jokes. It is always fun to be in a children’s movie as a semi-adult. 😀
As we watched it in German we also had the German synchronization and I think it was quite well done, especially now that I’ve watched the original version. The voices are quite similar and even the translation was quite on spot. Though they did change the calling name of the Tooth Fairy from Tooth to Fairy (Fee), they probably just didn’t want the characters to shout „Zahn“ all the time. 😉
Other than that: North (Santa) also has the Russian accent, Bunnymund (Easterbunny) calls everyone a mate (though in the Berlin-way: „Keule“), Sandy (Sandman) doesn’t speak at all. Oh, and Pitch (Bogeyman) is voiced by Son Goku (Dragonball Z), but he can pull off the tragic villain as good as the universe savior. 😀
I really liked that Sandy communicated only through sand-pictures and the Baby-Tooths only through whistling instead of actual talking.

The characters

What I liked about the characters of this movie, is that all of them have enough quirks and antics to not seem as „perfect“ as protagonist in movies often tend to be. It is rare for me, but I don’t think that I really do NOT like any of the characters, especially none of the main cast. (I will probably cover this at some point in time with a separate post)
Maybe it’s because of these things:
North changes from childish to Warrior in seconds.
Bunny is the big and bossy Australian *cough* kangaroo *cough*, that can also be adorably cute.
Tooth is all business, but quite obsessive when it comes to teeth and children.
Sandy slightly silly, but the secret badass of the four.
Jack, the childish prankster that just wants to be seen.
Pitch, the „bad boy“ that just wants children to remember him.
And the kids, that are just kids being silly kids. 😀

As I already have a tendency to like villains I couldn’t help myself but to be taken in by Pitch Black as well…
Apart from sympathy for his chosen colour I felt pity for him at the end of the movie. All he did was trying to regain the powers he had held centuries ago and that allowed him to be seen by people – and not just children. Of course his way was by far not the nicest – or even the cleverest – but he probably just didn’t knew what else he should do to change his demise. There are much scarier things in this world than the Bogeyman, but I’ll come to that later. What also made me like him more were rufftoons comics about his past that can be found in her gallery here. Incredible comics that partly show a different back story than the official one portrayed in special comics and other stuff from Dreamworks and of course the books by William Joyce (The Guardians of Childhood).

The Sandy-toy facing in a weird direction
The Sandy-toy facing in a weird direction

After that I think it would be a tie between North with his weird jokes, the yetis and the elves, Bunnymund and his walking eggs and of course Sandy, though he might even be on par with Pitch. I even have the McDonalds figurine of Sandy standing/lying in my book shelf. 😀 (Eve got Bunny by the way). Though the magnet used to move him is weird. It always gets stuck when he is nearly facing the holding thing, but it’s a fun toy nonetheless. 🙂

Jack and Tooth, though I do not dislike them and they do have some nice scenes, are just a bit too plain to be among my favourites.

Among the kids I consider Cupcakes to be the funniest. Typical bully turned friend, but still fun, just as much as Monty, the kid with glasses, whose reactions were sometimes hilarious … 😀

It is also great that you can see why the characters act the way they do. Common sense makes you understand the competitiveness between Bunny and North, Christmas is after all the much more celebrated holiday. But you also can understand why both Jack and Pitch strife for being believed in. I think it must be one of the worst feelings to see all these people around you and knowing that they cannot see you in return. It is already awful to be ignored as normal person, but as personification of an aspect of life (Fear, Frost) it must be even worse. At least in our cases others would bump into us, instead of walking right through you.

General opinion

The Rise of the Guardians is a great movie. It has just the right amount of silliness and seriousness needed to portray an important message: Without belief in Wonders, without Hope, Dreams and good Memories there would only be Fear in children and children are our future that we must protect at all cost.
It also shows that even though children do not believe in the Bogeyman himself anymore, there is still enough Fear for him to still exist. Sure what people fear has greatly changed throughout mankind’s history, but it is still there and I could write a whole post about that alone – in fact I once wrote quite a long article about it, maybe I’ll translate it one day.

The movie has some really precious scenes and well portrayed characters.
Angry Sandy, not-believed in Easter Bunny, silly Elves and annoyed Yetis and all that wrapped in great animations (though a bit edged at times).
They also do well with playing with the viewers emotions.
When I first watched it, I didn’t really know what I should feel, when the scene moved on to the next big thing after the previous one had just happened.
You could argue that the movie therefore is a bit rushed, but I’d still say it was the pace needed to properly tell the story – even though the characters themselves did not really get time to process things or have much time for development, but you could say the movie portrays a war and you don’t really have much time in those either.

Regardless of the fact that it is a children’s movie does it have the potential and the ability to capture an older audience with its charms and jokes as well. Awws and laughter could also be heard from adults as much as from children, though not as loudly. 😉

Simply put: I really enjoyed the movie and I gladly bought the DVD, to watch it again whenever I feel like it. Even though some scenes don’t work as much as they used to during the first time watching, as you know what will happen later on. 😉
And I am curious about the books and comics accompanying it, but it’s always quite annoying to buy something in a different currency as I am not sure whether they are even available in Germany. But maybe will I get my hands on them anyway sometime. 🙂

Stuff I’d like to add

For those who didn’t know: „Mare“ is an old word for a female horse, so Nightmare basically means Night-horse and do you remember what shape the Nightmares had? 😉 It is a bit more complicated than that, seeing that the word derives from a creature called „Nachtmahr“ in German that sometimes was portrayed in the shape of a horses head, but that’ll get too off-topic.

What also is too off-topic but what I still would like to add is a bit about my experiences with these characters/guardians in my childhood.
So you can look forward to that some time in the future. 😉

PoiSonPaiNter

© Rights for the poster and the figurine belong to Dreamworks (the latter probably also to McDonalds).

Grimm

What else to do while waiting for Once Upon A Time to continue than to watch another Fairytale-related series?
Well, basically a lot of stuff, but I was still curious if OUAT really was a rip-off of that show as a bunch of people claimed.
And as you can see in the title: I am talking about NBC’s Grimm.
Grimm is a crime show about Nick Burkhardt, a homicide detective that has a certain ability. He is a Grimm. He can see the real nature of creatures called „Wesen“ that are able to pass as normal humans otherwise. The show shows how Nick is more and more able to cope with this and what obstacles he has to overcome along the way.
First of all, I’d like to say that I watched the series both in English and in German, so I’ll even be able to show you some of the differences between them.
The series has a small circle of main characters.
Alongside Nick we have his partner Hank Griffin, Captain Sean Renard and Sergeant Wu in the Portland Police Department and at home his girlfriend Juliet.
In his first case after discovering his ability he meets the Wesen Monroe, a „Blutbad“ that he accuses of having kidnapped a little girl. After their first differences he becomes Nicks friend and very own „Grimm-o-Pedia“. 😀
Later on a „Fuchsbau“ called Rosalee and a „Hexenbiest“ named Adalind Schade join the cast.
As I said Grimms are people with the ability to see the real nature of Wesen.
But what exactly Grimms are has not yet been told.
What we know so far is that they collect data on Wesen and are successors of seven families that  all have the same „gift“.
As some of the words mentioned above suggest, this series uses quite a bunch of German words.
This is due to the fact that among the most famous – and openly known – „Grimms“ where the Brother’s Grimm, Jacob and Wilhelm; the German Fairytale collectors.
Or so we think.
In the world of Grimm, just as in OUAT, these Fairy Tales are real.
They are the way of telling the people what they aren’t aware of.
They tell them the stories of the Wesen.
And of course warn the humans about them.
For example the „Blutbaden“ (official plural of Blutbad) are what later became the Big Bad Wolf in the brother’s Children and Houshold Tales. (Funny side note: There is a Wesen-version of these tales called: „Albträume für Wesen Kinder“ [original title; English: „Nightmares for Wesen children“])
Regardless of the fact that it is pretty cool to have different languages in a show (not all Grimms were English or German, some wrote their notes in Latin, Japanese or Spanish) I do occasionally struggle with the grammar they chose…
For example „Blutbad“ is the German term for „bloodbath“.
„Blutbaden“ however doesn’t really exist…
The „Blut“ would still be „blood“ but the „baden“…well it does suggest that it is the action of bathing in blood, making the translation „bathing“, but that does not really make sense.
So basically the plural of a blood bath is the action of bathing in it. Obvious isn’t it?
Or the „Rumplestiltskin“-dude from the episode „Nameless“ in Season 2.
He is a „Fuchsteufelwild“. That is no German word either.
Well, „fuchsteufelswild“ would be, but that would be an adjective meaning „mad as hell“ or „hopping mad“.
So they either took somewhat fitting German nouns or adjectives and stitched them together.
Let’s just say: If the actual brothers would have really given the creatures their German names, their works would have never been able to become a literary classic….
But „worse“ than the grammar – though more funny – is the pronunciation of the words.
I know it is not easy for an American native to pronounce German words, as our language is quite „harder“ (in means of sound) as English, but they could a least try a tiny bit more…
I mean, the most used term „Wesen“ is totally mispronounced.
No German-native would understand it. It took me a while to do so at least and I had to read it at some point before it made sense to me.
The way the cast pronounces it, the word means „whose“ not „creature“.
They add an extra „s“ to it and make it a (possessive) question, rather than a noun…
Anyway, I still think it is great that they even try.
If you watch the German version of the show one thing becomes clear: They do not like the grammar either.
They bluntly change the names to something that would – in their opinion – make more sense in German. E.g. Blutbaden became „Blutbader“ (Which would more or less translate to „Bloodbather“ – someone who is bathing in blood. Trying to find a translation for „bader“ I discovered that there was a medieval profession by that name, someone that had some kind of medic role for the poor people. Look for „Barber Surgeon“ for more information.) and the „Ziegevolk“ (proper German: Ziegenvolk) became the „Ziegendämon“ (Goat Demon“), while still portrayed as the original version in the Grimm Diaries (notebooks of the Grimms about the Wesen and mostly how they killed them) that Nick inherited from his aunt Marie at the beginning of the series.
Makes just as much sense.
A bit more sense makes translating some of the things said in German in the original into Mandarin.
Yes, Mandarin.
The „Woge“ – the transformation from humanoid to Wesen, gets a Madarin term.
The German saying „Alles hat eine Ende nur die Wurst hat zwei.“ that Monroe – whose quite adept at several languages and especially at German thanks to his ancestors – uses in the Episode „Big Feet“ was translated into that as Nick asks what it meant „because it sounded nice“ and that question wouldn’t make sense if it was said in German…
So apart from language mutilation what does this series have?
Well, it’s a crime show that shows you a new Wesen each episode, just as we are used to from old Buffy times, with a whiff of Supernatural.
The character development is in my opinion quite slow.
While we have an awesome character with a certain depth to him with Monroe (being a Wieder Blutbad he is the vegan among wolves) right from the start, Nicks progress drags on into the second season with baby steps.
In the first season the story mostly centers around the crimes committed by various Wesen, the greater scheme is only slowly revealed. It is kind of like the viewer learns new things in the same pace as Nick does. Which is a good thing, but drags the story on without really having to. But this changes with the second season, where the story turns its focus onto the Grimm instead of the criminal Wesen.
At first I nearly gave up on the series, but the more it advanced the more colours it gained.
You had Nicks struggle of not being able to tell anyone and all the other problems he was faced with. But you also had different approach at how to treat Wesen.
In the finale of Season 1 you see a second Grimm, that doesn’t believe in Nicks way of befriending them – the good ones at least – and that sticks to the old ways of simply killing them off. So you do not have this general black and white thinking here. Which is really nice.
So by now I am quite curious where Nick’s journey will lead him and his affiliates.
Also the characters become better – especially Monroe and Rosalee.
Though Monroe was one of my favourite characters from the get go. His humor’s just great. Unfortunately they aren’t really able to completely capture it in the German version.
Well, and as I said he speaks German and can at least translate it just by reading through it.
But I also already mentioned that you can’t see this that good in the German version (hence the Mandarin).
And to show what else is different have some trivia regarding the different versions and bits I consider funny.
Throughout the two season there are several scenes in bars, some of them even in German bars. The music that is played there is quite disturbing for a Metalhead like me, but one song in particular caught my attention.
In Episode 14 in Season 2 „Natural Born Wesen“ Monroe walks into a Wesen bar and what is played? „Bück dich“ by Rammstein. One of the most contrary bands in Germany. (A band I’ll be seeing live in a week from now at the Wacken Open Air 😉 ) Though in my opinion their song „Mutter“ would have been more fitting in regards to the episodes title.
Apart from their musical choices I like the way the creators treat finale cliffhangers, when after the last scene the message: „To be continued“ writes itself and after a moment „You knew this was coming.“ is added. 😀 They at least know how to make things funny for their audience.
And as we already are with writings: As interesting as the intro texts are, as awesome is it that the German voice actor Thomas Fritsch is reading them, while in English they are only shown and faded out again. He has just the right voice for a storyteller and he already has some experience with that. 😀

Another thing that is again typically German – beside strange translations: Censorship.
In the second Episode („Bears will be Bears“) Monroe keeps an eye on Nicks aunt.
In the original you can see how he rips of the arm of one of pursuers and later see the same guy in a sickbed with a red spot at shoulder height being wheeled past him when Monroe calls Nick in panic and claims that he might have overdone it.
In the German version they skip right from the fight to the bed-scene, so you can not really make the connection to the bloodstain.
I might have looked away at that moment, but I think I remember that there was another scene where he was holding the arm and looking at it in horror before he fled the scene that wasn’t shown either.
Additionally to that:
German television magazines often named Monroe „Eddie“, as they had picked up somewhere that that would be his first name. By now it is even on some other (English) sites, but officially it was never said whether „Monroe“ is the first or the last name and what the other is. (Eddie was a draft name if I remember correctly, though.)
Anyway, to conclude all this:
I think Grimm is a rather good series.
It is a bit slow when it comes to character development and has this monster-of-the-week flair from Buffy, but it still has potential to grow.
And it is interesting to see how it will continue, especially with the characters and how the writers will manage to continue to build in new Wesen and stories/fairytales – even though this faded quite strongly into the background by now.
It is always interesting to see how the supernatural cumulates at a place as soon as you have to do with it. 😀
In my opinion the rumor that OUAT is a ripp-off of Grimm is far-fetched. The sole thing they have in common, is that they integrate the Grimm’s Fairytales…but they portray it completely different. (OUAT does a better job at that I’d like to add. Besides I am kind of inclined to write a continuation for my post about them, not sure if I’ll actually do it.)
However, this concludes the post for July.
Last year I did not manage to write one for August so I at least managed to not do the same with this month…
And as I am off to another Journey around Germany I wont be able to write anything more until the middle of August.
So, stay tuned for my travel log and some festival reports in the following months. 🙂
PoiSonPaiNter

Avantasia – The Mystery of Time

Something different for a change as I’d like to write about my thoughts on the newest addition to the Avantasia releases: The Mystery of Time.
Avantasia is a side project of Edguy’s singer Tobias Sammet, who’s quite skilled when it comes to song-writing, in which he uses these skills and creates (captivating) stories and brings together many different musicians from many different bands to play and/or sing them.
I’ve talked about this project in my Wacken Reviews (just search my blog for those) and told you that I’ve been fortunate enough to see them perform on stage, twice.
But today I’d like to talk more about the „printed“ versions of the songs.

When I first heard about this project I was curious as I read that Sammet had wrote a Fantasy story and made it into a Metal Opera.
It took me a while to get my hands on the releases, but when I did I was captivated by the brilliance that are

The Metal Opera Pt. 1 & 2.

Coverart of „The Metal Operat Pt. II“

These two tell the story of the young cleric Gabriel that gets a closer look into the schemings of his brothers/superiors. They try to get their hands on a relic to close off peoples imagination forever.
When his sister is put under arrest for being a witch and he reads some documents he shouldn’t have read, everything changes. He himself is put under arrest and meets Vandroy the magician, who promises to help him in Anna’s rescue, if he in turn would bring back the artifact. So they flee together and Gabriels mind is sent into a world of Fantasy (Avantasia) where he faces many trials, while the elder stays behind guiding him.
This short summary doesn’t give enough credit to the story those two long-players depict.
And while in the first one Sammet explains the story in a lot of details, he didn’t do this in the second one – because fans were to lazy to read. I obviously do not belong to those and would have liked to have the story there as well.
But that can’t be helped and I am left with the little hope for a story-only release some day. I really liked the characterizations and thoughts he had put into the story. It’s a pity that only so little of it could be told.
As I said, these compilations were my first contact with Avantasia and when I found them the project was long since disbanded. Or so everyone thought.

Around 2007 Sammet decided to let Avantasia resurface.

The Wicked Trilogy

„The Scarecrow“ cover

As Gabriels story had been told, he now went into a different direction – not only story-wise.
Again many musicians from the first two albums like Michael Kiske and Kai Hansen (the founding members of Helloween and by now in their own projects Unisonic and Gamma Ray) joined him again, but also new additions and special guests like Alice Cooper and Bob Catley (Magnum). All in all it is always an interesting ensemble with this project and to name everyone would take simply too long.
This new version told the story of a man trying to follow his dream to become a memorable musician and is not just told in the 2008 release „The Scarecrow„, but also in 2010s double-album „The Wicked Symphony“ and „Angel of Babylon„, giving the story the name „The Wicked Trilogy„.
While the first two albums were depicted as Metal Opera’s, these were as Rock Opera’s. Describing the new sound pretty well.
But as I am a fan of fantastical stories this one didn’t really capture me, though the music did. And that was worth it. Though it made them just like any other album, without this special something they had in the Metal Opera storyline. After all the project name has the word „Fantasia“ (Fantasy) in it, but there wasn’t that much Fantasy in this one, unfortunately.
The change in sound and storytelling was strange at first, but the songs proved captive again. What also changed, was that Sammet got more and more into the focus, well he is the mastermind behind all of it, but as these three albums also held a little autobiographical background, it felt to me as if the other participants became less and less important. Though probably only in the eyes of the audience. He hopefully still sees them as what they are: amazing musicians; and not gets this whole thing over his head.
Regardless, I anticipated each release and of course the tour they had started.
This after all let to two of the greatest concerts I’ve been at so far. But I already covered those in my Wacken-Reviews.

Having said that, I have reached the point I wanted to write about in the first place:

The Mystery of Time

Again Sammet had told the people Avantasia was finished.
Again he couldn’t stop writing for it – he even turned the music of his own band, Edguy, more Avantasia-like, which is a pity as they were capable of making their own great kind of music.

The brilliant cover of „The Mystery of Time“

And thus he created a new story. This time he again tells a tale, though in a more scientific setting, as the main character Aaron Blackwell (who probably gets stuck in my head with the name Arthur o.O) argues with Science and Reason amongst others about the mysteries of time. I am personally not that much of a SciFi fan, but this story is also interesting in his „philosophical“ aspects. Where The Metal Opera dealt with the struggle of losing ones make-believe, the Wicked Trilogy with the prices that come with fame, this piece deals with the momentariness of time. What it means to use or not use a moment given to us in a situation. This again is an interesting concept and as it seems The Mystery of Time is only the first chapter of the story. I’m curious where this is headed, especially as the story itself is partly told through what seems to be diary entries (with a hard to read font) of the protagonist.
With the return to the storytelling also returned the great (cover) artwork that has been there with the Metal Operas. I kind of prefer those abstract creatures over the clearly outlined pictures they used for the Wicked Trilogy, though the Scarecrow, the (creepy) Angel and whatever it was for the third part, were done well too. Still, in the inside were only photos of Sammet, which again supports the focus theory from above…
Anyway, while there was a return to the original roots with the story and the artwork, Music-wise the long player describes itself as Rock Epic, which again fits it quite well as it is a mixture of rock tunes combined with the music of the Filmorchestra Babelsberg. I might haven’t mentioned this before, but I’m quite a fan of orchestras and orchestra elements in songs, so this was a really nice change. Surprisingly all songs are rather soothing and calm. For me it seems like an album with 10 ballads (well 11, but the last one’s an extra). Nothing really that much of an up-tempo track, at least not compared to what I listened to these past months. Where I could pin point the songs I liked right away with the other albums, I can’t with this one.
I don’t know if this is just me or the music. I have listened to it several times by now and I am only slowly getting used to the songs, but I still haven’t found any where I would say: Yes, that’s it.
I am somewhat looking for songs like „Memories„, „The Toy Master“ or „Death is Just a Feeling„, but none has a similar streak to them…Some even remind me of old or other songs…
Don’t get me wrong, the songs are great and all, but I haven’t found that special something I am looking for in a song, but maybe I will after listening some more to it. Some songs do have the potential for becoming my favourites. Simply because of the orchestra elements and the melodies. 😉

Nevertheless, the Mystery of Time is again a great piece of musical conception and storytelling. And another reason for Sammet and his people to tour again.
And as luck would have it they play a show in Berlin.
And guess who will be there to enjoy it. 😉

So, see you around

PoiSonPaiNter

[Edit: If you are interested about how the concert was, look here
© The rights for the covers belong to their respective owners.]

Once Upon A Time…

there were two writers of „Lost“ who decided to create a TV-series about Fairy Tale characters that ended up in our world.
When the series was far into its second season a random Blogger started watching it.

So here I am now waiting for the next episode and giving you my two cents on ABC’s “Once Upon A Time” by Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz.

The premise and where it leads

When the Evil Queen enacts a „horrible“ curse all Fairy Tale-characters one (possibly) knows are separated from their loved-ones and given new memories and lives in a town in our world: Storybrook, Maine. Breaking this curse is the destiny of the main character Emma Swan. And being the main character she has to face different trials throughout the season(s).

Before I start to go into the topic I’d like to note that I consider it pretty hilarious that the Evil Queen claims our land to be „somewhere horrible„. For a magic user a land without any magic probably IS a horrible place. For everyone else probably just weird and foreign. 😀

That said: I don’t really know why I started watching it in the first place, but it might have to do with the fact that I simply like hearing/reading about or watching Fairy Tales. And with OUAT you don’t just have every Fairy Tale-character you (possibly) know, but also them in a different world. Besides I’ve already was curious about it thanks to the previews for the German version of it. So I gave it a shot and was admittedly quite easily won over.

Seriously: I only needed to watch a certain scene in the pilot and they had me.
The scene I’m referring to is the Evil Queens entry scene: The music, the atmosphere, the wonderfully bizarre animation of how she “walked” down the hall towards Snow White and Prince Charming. My mind really just went “BAM, you gotta watch this”. And when later they switched to a scene with a weird sounding and looking creature kept in a dungeon prison; guess that was the very final straw to destroy all my doubts (pun intended 😉 ).

Characters and Concept

I really think this series has a great concept and great writings. It is always fascinating how the different stories (Fairy Tales) connect and how the different characters interact. As well as seeing „history“ repeat itself when the „humanized“ versions live through a similar trial in each episode as their Fairy Tale-counterpart.
And the characters are great too, well most of them. There are some that are a bit easier for me to grasp than others. The worst for understanding and stuff are probably Charming (My spell-check is fascinating: If I only write Charming it tells me to write it with lower case, if I write Prince Charming it’s all right. XD) and Snow White…I just find them so disturbingly romantic and stuff that I just want to hide somewhere so I would not have to see that…I’m no good with too much romance, sorry.
Every time they do their little “I will always find you”- conversation my mind goes: – Yeah, I know…for crying out load…oh wait, no, they cry silently, whenever they find and/or lose each other…they cry so effing much…they must have an enormous supply of onions on set…or the actors are really good at crying without a reason…
Still, they do have some good scenes – where they are close to being pretty cool instead.
In those where Charming wore his pelted cape around his shoulders I somewhat thought: Now longer hair and beard and he might have just walked off of the set of „Thor“. 😀
Well, you see I’m not really a Snow White fan, but I’ve mentioned that before when I talked about dwarves.

Speaking of those: Grumpy. 😀
He’s one of my favourites and as I said: I really like his attitude and humour. It is always fun when he’s around. His comments cause some moments to become more enjoyable. Beside that did I really enjoy the episode that featured his back story. It was fun, interesting and kick-ass, because he is kick-ass. 😀
Little Red Riding Hood was also covered in a wonderful way. When I watched her episode I had a slight feeling of what might happen, but the revelation was still well done. Additionally, her actress is just amazing…she really manages to balance being seductive without appearing slutty.

But balancing stuff is kind of a theme in the series as each character has at least two sides to them. Their Fairy Tale- and their „Storybrooke“/Real World-personification. And some even have a third part to them: The personality before the big change. And I think it is obvious, for those who have seen the series, whom I’m talking about: The Evil Queen and Rumpelstiltskin. 😀

Their development from loving daughter/father to those badass characters that are cunning, witty and „evil“ is just brilliant. And the development is quite reasonable and well explored so far – we all know that there is even more to come and the majority of us are eagerly looking forward to that. 😀
But what I like most about those characters is that they are the ones you can relate to the most. Well, at least I can. Especially with the “imp”: Pessimism accompanied by cowardice, more or less antisocial behaviour and a way with words? Sounds familiar to me. 😉
Even though many characters have one or the other insecurity those two bring theirs to a different level. Yet, it still makes sense and that’s what’s fascinating about them. They have loved; they have lost something precious and secluded themselves behind their powers. Still they are willing to do anything to regain (a bit of) what they have lost.
And they are both brilliantly portrayed by their actors Lana Parilla and Robert Carlyle respectively.

They bring so much life into their roles, it’s incredible. If I didn’t knew it better, I’d say they are enchanting the audience with their performance. But who says I do (know it better)? 😉 Especially the interpretation of Rumpelstiltskin is most fascinating. The voice, the gestures, the combination of both. Carlyle created something unique there. Combined with the well written backstories and dialogues it makes for one incredible character.
It is always fun to see how Rumpel was involved with the other stories, manipulating people into doing what he needs them to do. A trait the Evil Queen has picked up from him.
While for most characters their Storybrook-personality is not as good as the one they had in the Enchanted Forest, those two manage to combine them. It is just always fun to see what is happening to and/or with them in each episode. 🙂 I wonder if it makes me a bad person if I prefer the supposed evil characters over the good ones? o.O

A Fairy Tale background

Watching OUAT made me realize that I haven’t watched the old Disney versions of the Fairy Tales that often. Mostly only once or twice. And I probably haven’t seen every one of them (I know I haven’t watched Tangled so far). But I do have some memories of some of them: Grumpy and the witch from Snow White,  a little bid of the dragon in Sleeping Beauty, the scene where the beast fights with the wolves from The Beauty and the Beast, and probably some others if I would think some more about it.
It seems I wasn’t really into obsessively watching movies as kid, more a series kind of person. Like I still am today. 😉 Another thing is probably that my parents grew up with the German, Czech and/or Russian interpretations and Fairy Tales and taught/read/showed me those as well. I’ve seen the movies with Baba Yaga and her chicken-legged hut more often than I’ve seen any of the Disney movies. Though I don’t think that’s a bad thing, as they have a pretty fun and different tone to them. And less singing. 😀
Regardless of that I know all the stories OUAT is based on, some because they were read and/or told to me, some because I’ve seen a version or two of them and I really like the approach they made on them. (And I don’t see it as rip off of anything else, as the concepts of those other things sound different.)
It also made me realize that I didn’t know who Jiminy Cricket is (though I knew that there was a cricket in Pinocchio) and that I never really noticed that the Prince from Snow White was (nick)named „Charming“ or the witch from Sleeping Beauty „Maleficent“. Though I’ve heard those before I think…you always learn something new I guess…

The German version

As I said the show is on German television currently. They recently aired the finale of season one, which gave me a chance to shorten my wait for the new episode on Sunday (or Monday considering the time shift).
But don’t let me get started on the German voices…
Even though they made some good choices (Snow White is pretty well chosen), some are rather weird.
I mean: Couldn’t they have just let Sebastian Schulz voice Josh Dallas as he did in Thor? o.O No they chose the little boys voice instead…Aside from the fact, that Schulz sounds better, it would have been fun to have him alongside Claudia Urbschat-Mingues (Regina) like they had him alongside Oliver Siebeck ( as Volstagg ) in Thor, causing another family reunion. 😀 (Schulz voices Trunks in Dragonball Z, Urschat-Mingues is Bulma, while Siebeck is the second voice actor for Vegeta)
Also, why do voice actors always have to voice several actors? I mean as fitting as Thomas Nero Wolff might be for Robert Carlyle, my first association with his voice is and probably will be for a long time: Hugh Jackman and after that: Anthony Steward Head. Beside that is he not really able to come at least close to Carlyles Rumpelstiltskin voice…even though he is trying, but it just sounds so wrong….just like the characters German name by the way.
Even though I grew up with it, it sounds so weird when you’ve heard the English version, which has a different sound to it…though the suffix is basically the same…but in my ears Rumpelstiltskin sounds better (and even more threatening) than Rumpelstilzchen outside of the classical Fairy Tale context…no idea why…guess my ears are just weird like that…

Anyhow, the second season showed some quite interesting new turns and I am really looking forward to the next episodes. I think this format could really have a chance to last for quite a while as Fairy Tales are timeless and what Kitsis and Horowitz created is something special that contributes to that. Something you enjoy to indulge in when you’re day wasn’t the best one.
Just like a „real“ Fairy Tale would. 😉

PoiSonPaiNter

Dark Shadows

The latest Burton-Depp-Movie that had been released over here.

A movie based on the homonymous TV series/soap opera about the last descendants of the Collins family. A family that came from Liverpool into the „New World“ to settle down and even managed to built their own town, thanks to their successful fishing company.

Or rather the last descendants and one of the very first Collins. Namely: Barnabas Collins. A Vampire-turned man imprisoned into a metal coffin for nearly 200 years by the woman he had rejected. He ends up in the 1970s version of their town Collinsport and has to experience things like cars, asphalt, television, hippies, McDonalds and the nearly ruined remains of his family.

After he had been buried „alive“ the witch, who had caused the death of his parents and his beloved and basically the demise of the Collins-family, took over the business and established her own fishing company. When Barnabas learns about this he gives his all to return his family to its former glory.
And that’s what the movie is basically about.
And of course the family-intern problems.
And the love triangle vampire-witch-reincarnated human.
And stuff.

Additional to Depp and Bonham Carter, we this time also have Michelle Pfeiffer, Eva Green and former „Nightmare on Elmstreet“ Jack Earle Haley (unfortunately I only know him as Rorschach from „Watchmen“ so far…) and „Eli Stone“ Jonny Lee Miller.
Not that bad of a cast. Actually quite a good one.
Did a good job portraying those extraordinary characters.

In the following I will refrain from judging the movie.
I will not say whether it is good or bad.
I’ll simply stick with the word: bizarre.
And there will be spoilers, so you might stop reading if you haven’t seen the movie yet.

Why do I call this movie bizarre?

For once it kind of lacks the coherences Burton’s movies usually have.
The characters were roughly portrait and not really developed, but what you saw them doing was rather weird every now and then.
This might be due to people knowing them already because of the series.
Which I’ve never even took a glimpse opon…as the old version wasn’t released in Germany and the remake was broadcasted when I was far too young to watch, let alone understand it …

For example the daughter. During nearly the whole movie she looks/walks/dances like she is constantly high on whoever-knows-what.
Only during the finale she is seen with some kind of emotions – even if it is just „rage“.
When she turned into a Werwolf …
Yup, they got the Vampire first and even a wolfie …
Usually this would have been at least hinted beforehand, but this time it wasn’t or I simply missed it.

Or when the boy found Barnabas in the coffin, the thick metal coffin mind you, he just opened it. As if it was no big deal … And he somehow also managed to undo 5 to 10 centimeter thick steel chains … how ever he did that … was probably his ghost mom …

One of the oddest scenes however, was the „sex“-scene, where Barnabas and Angelique ruined her office while kissing and slamming each other from one side of the room to the other … everything else was off-screen. There was no real need to display this in my opinion.

In contradiction to the above mentioned things there where quite some funny scenes when Barnabas dealt with the „modern“ world.
A joke that I had heard or read of beforehand was when he found the McDonalds sign and mistook it for the symbol for „Mephistopheles„. Funny how I just wrote about him. 😀
I also chuckled when he sorrowfully told the hippies that he would have to kill them.
Or when he ripped out the backside of the TV station to force the tiny woman out of it.
And so forth…

Anyway, this movie has good and bad things, both dealt with in quite unusual ways.
Though we are used to this in Burton’s work, this time he approached it differently.
He created a bizarre movie, that was not always completely coherent, yet held rather humorous elements.
It even had quite a decent ending, till the cliff shot of both Barnabas and Victoria came along.
I liked the line, where the woman said, that they would do what they always had done: Survive.

I kind of doubt the aging over here was wisely chosen, however. I don’t think 12+ kids would understand some of the things I mentioned and the other things I didn’t.

Regardless of everything I said so far the movie is definitely worth watching.
But the expectations shouldn’t be too high.
It’s not your „average“ Burton.
It’s different.
It’s bizarre.

PoiSonPaiNter