Reel Advice, by Steve Anderson

Dead Above Ground
**1/2
DVD

Directed by
Chuck Bowman

Written by
Stephen J. Cannell

Cast
Corbin Bernsen .... Mark Mallory
Stephen J. Cannell .... Mr. Haddon
Robert Conrad .... Reed Wilson
Adria Dawn .... Zara
Tony Denman .... Bobby "Monster" Mooley
Adam Frost .... Chip Palmer
Lauren German .... Darcy Peters
Reagan Gomez-Preston ... Latrisha McDermont
Lisa Ann Hadley ... Dr. Brenda Boone
Josh Hammond .... Jeff Lucas
Craig Kirkwood .... Jason Johnson
Cindy Margolis ... Kari McClure Mallory
Don Michael Paul .... Tom Bradley
Kelly Britton .... Keri Lynn Pratt
Antonio Sabato Jr. .... Sergeant Dan DeSousa
Charlie Weber .... Dillon Johnson

R
90 mins

Oh, I'm scared from the very beginning on this one.

I'm not scared because of the quality of the script, or the skill of the actors. I'm scared right before I even took the video out of the box.

I'm scared because of five little words at the bottom of the box, in very small print, that you need to strain to see. And not "Lions Gate Home Entertainment production," either, scary as that usually is.

I'm scared because of this:

"Written by Stephen J. Cannell."

That's right...the guy who brought us fifty billion hackneyed crime dramas decided that, somehow, he just wasn't hitting his stride on stuff like Hardcastle and McCormick, so why not take a crack at horror?

Even worse, the select cursor on the title screen is a pentagram. That automatically loses points with me. Anyone dumb enough to use this tired, hackneyed plot device in a menu select screen just doesn't merit much respect from me. Stop using the pentagrams-puerile, pointless blasphemy like that is like a four year old running around screaming the opening rap from Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back at the top of his lungs. It's just plain disrespect to the audience.

Even ignoring these obvious problems, you know we've got a real winner on our hands, though what it wins is a big plaque laden with profanities.

So what we have here is the story of Jeff Lucas, a future Columbine Award winner from somewhere called Bay City. Jeff isn't what you'd call a popular kid, and the local popular kids seem to have forgotten the numerous lessons of school shootings and have marked Jeff for all the torment they can dish out. Things get even worse for Jeff after he makes a horror movie instead of a documentary in his Communications class.

The popular kids decide to take matters into their own hands for reasons that defy the logic of anyone with more firing brain cells than your average jar of mayonnaise, and engage Jeff in a little vehicular homicide, running him off the road in the midst of a high-speed chase.

And if you think Jeff is taking his flaming death amidst twisted metal lying down, well, you don't watch very many horror movies, now do you?

I can't believe, genuinely, that bullying of this stripe keeps going on in schools. Does nobody catch on? Does no one stop and think, "Hey, today's picked-on no-name is tomorrow's mass murderer, with me on the bad end of their daddy's gun barrel?" Okay, never mind that Jeffy's got a head like Pinhead in hair.

Never mind that Jeffy's entire personality seems to waver wildly between "nihilism" and "gleeful in a Dungeons and Dragons sort of sense."

Never mind that Jeffy really does need a severe beating rather desperately, and this is from a fellow movie geek and high school popular kid target.

Never mind that Jeffy's movie, what little I saw of it, would get precisely zero stars from me. In fact, my review of his schlocktacular title would involve choice phraseology like "the worst of low-budget crap" and "patently idiotic."

Never mind even more that the incredible doofus they hired to do Jeffy acts roughly the same way Richard Horvitz does when doing Invader Zim, except this isn't supposed to be a parody. Jeffy's over-the-top delivery of stale, overblown lines like "You will all taste the axe of reckoning!" and "You're totally unacceptable! You...are...about nothing. Mr. Haddon. Your end is nigh! You will die on the seventh equinox of maven!" just shows me how truly desperate Cannell was to drive this particular point home:

"Jeffy is a dark and sinister little goon who will be trying to kill a whole bunch of people before the end of the movie, if he doesn't get his ass kicked and sent home to his mommy with a really horrific wedgie first."

In fact, just never mind this entire movie, unless you're really interested in laughing your way through the most hackneyed of dialogues and infantile of acting, if it can even be called acting. And check him out at the twenty five minute mark--he sounds like he's lip-synching to a Danzig soundtrack--screaming gutturally for a full minute.

The ending is exactly what you'd expect from a movie like this, no more, no less.

The special features are nonexistent. There's not so much as a subtitle or deleted scene to be had in the whole mess.

All in all, as a comedy, Dead Above Ground satisfies immensely thanks to Cannell's fantastically overblown dialogue and the virtually utterly no-name cast's incredible ability for puerile acting. As a horror movie, however, this wouldn't scare a nun. Look elsewhere to get your heart pounding.

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Haven't we all felt the urge to do that to a professor?

(From Errant Story. Click on image to see full-sized image.)

I've been with Errant Story since day one. To be honest, I, like many others, started when Poe was writing and drawing Exploitation Now, though unlike some fans, I actually enjoyed it when Poe turned it from a gag-a-day strip to a storyline concerning Jordan and Bush. And sure, maybe it wasn't the happy ending people were hoping to have, but it was a good ending, dramatic, interesting.

So. Errant Story was a big leap for Michael Poe, going from a semi-erotic-comic-turned-sci-fi to a fantasy comic, starting right off on a dramatic note: an expectant mother, wondering just how her child is going to turn out, worried that this half-elven child might become... a monster, an Errant. After a short bit of prologue, we then jump ahead to a child (the same child? We aren't sure at first, and even now I sometimes wonder if Meji might be related to Sarine... who had a daughter 2,000 years before. I doubt it, but maybe Sarine looks at the young impulsive half-elf and sees the daughter that she had reflected in her eyes.

"Traditional" fantasy fiction tends to have half-elves as a fairly happy race, one that often has many of the advantages of elf-kind, and the advantages of humanity, mixed into one. Sure, they don't live as long, but they often have the drive of humankind, and compared to humans are indeed long-lived. Even Tolkien's half-elves were a breed apart, though they would be given a choice: the immortality of the elves or the afterlife of humanity. Errant Story, however, shows a different image.

What if humans and elves were not perfectly compatible, genetically? What if there were... problems? Health-wise. Mentally. Emotionally. Half-elves went from something special to potential monsters... and powerful monsters at that.

Our story is in a world after the war between Elves and Errants, with both sides having wiped out the other, and humanity filling the void left behind. It's a fantasy world... but instead of great evil warlords threatening humanity and allowing for alliances of the races... it's rather mundane. We have no great foe to fight against. No spiritual contamination threatening creation. Instead... we have a mystery, one that Poe has been careful to slowly flesh out.

Errant Story truly begins, however, with Meji's realization that she was flunking out of the Magic Academy. Oh, and that her grandfather, who was a rather powerful wizard in his own right, would pretty much kill her if she didn't graduate, or something like that. *wry grin*

The thing about Errant Story is, despite being a fairly dramatic comic, it's also funny! Yes, the humor isn't there everyday, and often has to deal with Meji getting angry at her winged cat familiar (who has to be one of the most sarcastic and delightful cats I've seen in a comic, barring Sebo of CotC), but it's still fun to read.

So it's worth reading, in my opinion. Sure, it might not be the off-color humor found in Exploitation Now... but in my opinion it's something even better. Especially as we learn more of each character. Meji herself has grown up some, learning that being a half-elf isn't all rosy and fun (not only does she look much younger than she actually is, but hey, the elves out there are trying to kill her!), and even is having second thoughts about her original plan - becoming a God, or something close to it, and "graduating" by defeating every teacher in the Academy. Jon also has been fleshed out, being more than just a sarcastic assassin with a conscience to someone with a past who has a reason for being who and what he is. And finally, Sarine... who started in the Prologue... and now seems to be searching for the demons of her past and the mysteries of her people.

But don't take my word for it. Try Errant Story for yourself. It's definitely not your average fantasy story, which is what makes it such a delight.

Robert A. Howard
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Well, when you want something done right...

(From Narbonic. Click on image to see full-sized latest strip.)

Narbonic has a long tradition of doing horrible things to Dave. Recently, we found out why. It seems that Mell Kelly, upon becoming the President of the United States (or what's left of the U.S. after she gets into office - oh, she blames Dave, but no doubt she also had a hand in this!) decided to send a message to the past and the Dave Conspiracy... to have them kill the Dave we know and love.

Of course, in the previous time-travel storyline, we already knew the world was cinders and Dave was responsible, somehow, for it all. But... now things are starting to fall into place. Dave has the mad scientist gene, but hasn't gone over yet. Further, Dave has been killed, zombified, cloned and brought back, turned into a woman, kissed by his boss when she was a man, and more. And yet none of this has caused him to crack.

And now Mell Kelly is going back home... believing that her future self sent her a message. A message to kill Dave. Which will probably cause him to crack.

Future Helen had never forgiven Mell... nor had she forgiven Dave. Dave didn't love her enough. But enough for what? Enough not to go mad? Enough to let her go when her body died?

Oh, and did I mention that to send the message to the past, along with enough extra bits to convince the Dave Conspiracy that this is real, that President Kelly has to destroy the universe, the ENTIRE universe, to get the energy to do it? And she says she's doing it for Artie! *wry grin*

It's a year and a half to the end of it all. And Mell Kelly is on the warpath... believing that the way to save the world is to kill Dave. And oddly enough... Artie knows too. Artie, who has a noble streak a mile wide, Artie, whom President Kelly claimed she was ending the world for. Artie, who wants to see a resolution of stuff, with Dave knowing about his potential and of Helen's research and all of that. Artie, who is growing old, and who knows he isn't going to live more than a couple more years. Oh, and Mell doesn't know that Artie is watching with her!

No doubt the strip is going to end soon after Artie dies, having saved Dave and Helen... and maybe even Mell... from themselves. And I don't know what is going to happen on the way there, but this looks to be a truly magnificent ride to the end.

Shaenon? You get a nromlicious homemade oatmeal cookie.

Robert A. Howard
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