Vive le Shadowmen!
Tales of the Shadowmen,
Vol. 3: Danse Macabre
1. “The Heart of the Moon” by
Matthew Baugh
Matthew Baugh continues his growth as a storyteller with this darkly comedic tale of a group of vampire hunters on the path to Paul Feval’s vampire city Selene. Told from the perspective of Yvgeny, Baugh’s original vampire character who’s not nearly as smooth and mysterious as he would lead us to believe, Baugh delivers several clever and humorous potshots at the tropes of vampire fiction. To describe each misfortune that befalls Yvegny throughout would spoil the fun, but suffice to say that Baugh creatively (and hilariously) finds ways to keep him involved with the band of vampire hunters that include Solomon Kane, Captain Kronos, Doctor Omega and Maciste, to name a few. The beginning is so much fun that it’s a little disappointing as the story reaches its conclusion and becomes more of a standard action/adventure story, but Baugh fills it with enough pulpy goodness that the proceedings remain exciting enough. Most especially of interest are the various theories of the vampire species origins, and the temporal explanations by Doctor Omega of their various powers. All in all, a great way to open this third Shadowmen volume.
2. “Long Live Fantomas” by
Alfredo Castelli
For his story, Alfredo Castelli attempts to explain a
discrepancy in Marcel Allain’s Fantomas of Berlin, wherein it is hinted
that there was another Fantomas tormenting the world years before his first
appearance in 1910. Castelli rushes through time to portray horrific scenes of
this first Fantomas, who’s implied to be Jack the Ripper, freshly arrived in
Paris from Whitechapel and looking to start another spree of terror - all the
while being chased by the Black Coats’ aging leader Saladin. The original
Fantomas soon grows old, and finds a sadistic young man by the name of Gurn who
seems to be the perfect fit to take his mantle - perhaps a little too perfect,
as the aging Fantomas finds out too late. Castelli weaves an interesting tale
that moves at a blistering pace, and will likely leave readers not as familiar
with the works of Feval and Allain somewhat perplexed. But that’s okay - those
readers should do themselves a favor and track down the original stories to get
fully caught up.
3. “Next!” by Bill Cunningham
Bill Cunningham returns for this volume with another
extremely short piece of fiction, and it’s to the writer’s credit that he’s
able to pack so much wit and personality in so few words. This playfully erotic
tale concerns the Queen of the Spaceways herself, Barbarella, on a mission to
create the ultimate superbeing by coupling with some of the greatest heroes of
genre fiction - the first of which is an utterly baffled (but no less horny)
James T. Kirk.
4. “Au Vent Mauvais…” by
Francois Danaurdet & Jean-Marc Lofficier
Yet another short piece introduces the western world-hating Madame Atomos to the Shadowmen oeuvre, as she and Zemba III watch on as Neil Armstrong becomes the first man to walk on the moon. It seems at first as if there’s a devious plan in motion to sabotage the famous moon-landing, but a last minute twist reveals the plan to hit far closer to home. There’s not a whole lot to the story itself, but the characterizations were excellent, as is the real-life detail paid to the 1969 launch.
5. “Return to the 20th
Century” by Paul DeFilippo
Paul DeFilippo’s tale is a cheeky piece of fetishized
adventure, although from the author’s style it’s hard to discern just how
serious he was when writing it (my guess is, “not very”). The story meshes
Albert Robida’s 20th Century with Roy Hamilton’s Cat Women of the
Moon, but the most fascinating character DeFilippo utilizes was actually a
real-life person: “Jungle Alli” aka Alice Bradley Sheldon, a famous science
fiction author who wrote under the pseudonym James Tiptree, Jr. and had a life
almost ripped from the pulps herself (readers not familiar with Bradley should
look her up immediately). It’s a fun romp, filled with all sorts of kinky and
playful adventure, but I can’t help but feel it was lacking in just one more
dimension that would have made it even more enjoyable.
6. “Les Levre Rouges” by Win
Scott Eckert
Win Scott Eckert’s continuing chronicle of the saga of
Doc Ardan is a much more successful bit of cheesecake, as Eckert picks up where
his last Shadowmen tale left off,
continuing the infatuation between Ardan and Arsene Lupin’s daughter Adelaide,
whom Ardan has to rescue from the immortal and vampiric Elizabeth Bathory. It’s
a really fun story, and Eckert continues to expertly utilize other elements
from popular fiction, such as Casino
Royale’s Le Chiffre and H.P. Lovecraft’s fish-men.
7. “Beware the Beasts” by
G.L. Gick
Another short offering, G.L. Gick’s tale feels more like
the epilogue to a story we don’t get to see, but is filled with enough humor
and pathos to make it a worthwhile read. After saving their planet Soror, Dr.
Omega has tea with the inhabitants Jinn and Phyllis, where he remarks that
their society can never be perfect until they allow the inclusion of all
denizens, including the savage beasts on the outskirts of civilization - the
twist being that Soror is actually a planet full of intelligent apes and the
“beasts” are wild humans. Yes, it’s a Planet of the Apes, although Gick bases
it here on the original Pierre Boule novel rather than its more famous
counterpart.
8. “The Ape Gigans” by Micah
Harris
One of the neat things about the type of Wold Newtonian-styled fiction collections like Tales of the Shadowmen specializes in is the various ways different literary worlds can intersect and blend together. Micah Harris here combines the differing mythology of Jules Verne, Edgar Rice Burroughs and King Kong in several creative ways, as we learn that the reason Skull Island is home to so many prehistoric creatures is because it houses a portal to Pellucidar. Into this midst Harris thrusts his protagonist, Vanity Fair’s Becky Sharp, into the action, and it’s a good bit of fun having a heroine whose morals are somewhat less than scrupulous. The recreations of scenes in the original King Kong are a little too on-the-nose, and kind of drag the story down in places, but otherwise “The Ape Gigans” makes for an excellent story.
9. “A Dance of Night and
Death” by Travis Hiltz
Travis Hiltz’ story concerns a deadly encounter between those most famous of French villains, Fantomas and Irma Vep, on the rooftops of Paris, and is a perfect example of what makes Tales of the Shadowmen such an enjoyable collection. Writing action or fight scenes in prose is a tricky proposition, as you don’t want to overburden your reader with detail, while at the same time giving them just enough to go on to understand the stakes, but Hiltz succeeds wonderfully in portraying his “dance” between these devilish characters.
10. “The Lady in the Black
Gloves” by Rick Lai
The type of crossover fiction that appears in collections
like these always walks a fine line between telling a story or ticking off
boxes on a check-list, the latter of which Rick Lai comes dangerously close to
falling into for his contribution this time out. Lai has been carefully assembling
his own mythology throughout the Shadowmen
series thus far, meshing Maurice Leblanc’s Lupin and Josephine Balsamo with the
old Spanish horror film The House that
Screamed, and this time adds the criminal organization The Black Coats to
the fray. It’s mostly entertaining, although the author has a tendency to have
much of the action told to the characters through lengthy dialogue scenes which
kind of drag the story back a bit. But it has an excellent ending, which
provides a nice and effective coda to the whole affair.
11. “The Murder of Randolph
Carter” by Jean-Marc Lofficier
Editor Jean-Marc Lofficier transplants Agatha Christie’s
Hercule Poirot within a dizzying intersection of various characters from the
Lovecraft mythos in a rather short but no less engaging murder mystery. It’s a
classic set-up of the famous detective explaining the various ins and outs of
the case to a stunned audience after-the-fact, and executed well, although brief
and a perhaps in need of slightly more detail.
12. “A Day in the Life of
Madame Atomos” by Xavier Maumejean
Xavier Maumejean’s Shadowmen
contributions are often among the highlights of the collection, as his
offering here, following supervillain Madame Atomos throughout an ordinary day
in her life, will attest. There is much comedy and excitement to be found
throughout, as Atomos routinely fends off attackers and makes plans for revenge
against the ignorant Amercians while going about normal, everyday tasks.
Everything from Marvel Comics villains to Fu Manchu to real-life Japanese
holdouts from WWII play a part, all culminating in an excitingly clever
story.
13. “Bullets Over Bombay” by
David A. McIntee
David A. McIntee has a novel and original idea in
combining the usual Shadowmen
histrionics with Bollywood musicals, but his greatest inspiration for his entry
is the “Great White Hunter” trope, as H. Rider Haggard’s famed tiger-hunter
John Good teams with Docteur Mystere in hunting down a pack of leopards
responsible for killing a wedding party. Readers averse to such stories may not
be as taken with McIntee’s tale, the climax of which features the two heroes
mowing down dozens upon dozens of feline foes. And although it’s revealed the
leopards were under the control of a Kali-worshipping assassin the whole time,
the story still can’t help but leave a bitter taste in the mouth once all is
said and done.
14. “All’s Fair” by Brad
Mengel
Mengel’s entry is another bit of flash fiction, and
another exemplary effort of packing in both literary characters and a decent
plot whilst still being barely a thousand words long. The main centerpiece of
Mengel’s tale is the constant thorn in Will Eisner’s The Spirit’s side, P’Gell,
and her various machinations and manipulations of some of the spy world’s
greatest heroes - chief amongst them none other than Commander James Bond and
his French counterpart, OSS 117. A fun ride, all in all, and over in the blink
of an eye.
15. “The Affair of the Bassin
Les Hivers” by Michael Moorcock
Any story by the legendary Michael Moorcock is usually
the best offering in any given collection, and Moorcock’s debut Shadowmen entry is no different: a
fantastic and exciting tale spun around one of the author’s favorite literary
antiheroes, Zenith the albino. Moorcock’s “Affair” breaks with tradition by
being set in the modern day, wherein Zenith resolves to solve the mystery of a
murdered, time-displaced (or multiverse-displaced, to be exact) girl. Moorcok
has a great deal of fun putting Zentih up against famous French supervillains
Vautrin and Irma Vep, while also throwing his own Una Persson into the mix.
16. “The Successful Failure”
by John Peel
John Peel’s tale is a bit of light adventure that sees a
young James Bigglesworth teamed with amateur detective Isodore Beautrelet and
their investigation of a museum robbery in which at first seemingly nothing has
been stolen. It’s a fun little mystery, and Peel takes pleasure in playing the
brashful, exuberant Bigglesworth against the far more conservative Beautrelet.
Peel also gives an impressive and hilarious account of what it must have been
like to take to the skies in a primitive airplane in the early 20th
century.
17. “The Butterfly Files” by
Joseph Altairac & Jean-Luc Rivera
This tale by Altairac & Rivera comes in the form of
an official FBI document written by one William Mulder, which the authors have
helpfully noted they acquired on the internet from a contingent known only as
“The Lone Gunmen.” That’s right: The
X-Files provides the bulk of the references here, as the X-file in question
documents the supposed origins of Madame Atomos, making her third appearance in
this collection. It’s another brief bit of business, but by utilizing X-Files mythology, Altairac and Rivera
provide a touch of uniqueness to the story.
18. “The Famous Ape” by Chris
Roberson
Chris Roberson’s story takes its inspiration not from
pulp heroes or literary adventure, but rather gentle children’s books such as Babar and Curious George; in the process turning them on their ear and
crafting an endlessly fascinating political spy thriller. The ape Zephir has
spent the last few years as an undercover agent with the elephants during a
long-standing cold war between the species. After the elephant king Babar is
overthrown and executed, Zephir becomes a political prisoner, and after many
years is finally allowed back into his own country, albeit as a traitor. The
way Roberson blends children’s characters with real-world events makes you want
to spend more time in this interesting alternate world, resulting in one of the
best tales of the entire collection.
19. “Two Hunters” by Robert
L. Robinson, Jr.
He was bound to show up sooner or later in one of these Shadowmen outings, so it’s entirely
fitting that Tarzan makes his debut amongst the TOTS pantheon alongside the
grim avenger of the night that is Judex, as the two of them conspire together
to rescue Jane from the clutches of Tarzan’s mortal enemy Nicholas Rokoff.
Robinson handles both characters well (it was especially nice reading his
descriptions of the Ape-man leaping into action towards the end) and clips his
story along at a blistering pace - perhaps too much so, as Tarzan joins up with
Judex after the two exchange nary a few sentences between them, without really
getting the chance to establish any kind of relationship between the titular “hunters.”
But brevity is the soul of wit, as they say, and it’s definitely better to be
left wanting more than less.
20. “The Child-Stealers” by
Brian Stableford
Brian Stableford continues the roman fuelliton he started in the previous volume, his pseudo-sequel
to Paul Feval’s seminal John Devil
entitled The Empire of the Necromancers.
Once again we follow the exploits of Ned Knob and Gregory Temple (more the
latter than the former, this time out), as the two navigate a brave new world where
the dead once more walk the world of the living, and Stableford continues with
the fascinating ideas brought forth in the previous installment. The revivified
dead don’t want to eat our flesh or destroy our world; they just want a land of
their own to call home. Excellent characterizations and the ideas brought forth
mean that Stableford once more closes out this Shadowmen volume with style.
No comments:
Post a Comment