Video review: "Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood"

More than anyone else working in Hollywood today, Quentin Tarantino makes movies strictly for himself. The audience’s reaction is a mere afterthought.

His latest, “Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood,” falls about in the middle of his oeuvre. It's a big, sprawling, unfocused mess that nonetheless contains moments of Tarantino-esque intensity and entertainingly unhinged moods.

The story more or less centers on the duo Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt. DiCaprio is Rick Dalton, a fading actor clutching to the last scraps of fame from a long-canceled cowboy TV show, and Pitt is Cliff Booth, a laconic stuntman who is his stunt double, driver and gofer.

Dalton is outwardly McQueen-esque bravado but is inwardly Woody Allen-ish neuroticism. Booth lives in a scrap-heap trailer and has just a dog for companionship. Their relationship is part boss/flunky, part drinking buddies, part nanny/child.

DiCaprio has the showier part, swinging through wild moods while being spectacularly unappreciative of a career that's superior to that 99.99% actors enjoy. But ultimately I felt drawn to Pitt's character, an aging cowboy tooling around in a Champion spark plug T and Hawaiian shirt slip-on, never seeming to worry about what tomorrow will bring.

The movie never really seems to focus on either character, trading back and forth on their solo movements while occasionally bringing them back together. I yearned for the latter sections and mostly suffered through the former.

The tie-in with the Manson murders seems concocted just to have something to bounce the boys off of, or give the piece a semblance of a narrative. Margot Robbie barely has any speaking lines as Sharon Tate, who lives in the house up the hill from Rick along with her husband, Roman Polanski. She is sometimes seen and barely heard.

Like "Inglorious Basterds," the historical record is used as a mere springboard for Tarantino’s fevered imagineering.

The writer/director/noted amateur podiatrist flies his foot fetish flag freely this go-round, with lots of close-ups of filthy hippie hooves. I wonder why at some point these big-name actors don't say, "Hey dude, sorry but I don't want to do this scene with some girl's feet in my face."

Hey, ya like tootsies, that's fine by me. I just find it distracting and icky to have a scene where half the screen is Margot Robbie's face reacting to stuff and the other half is her soles. And the fact that nearly every woman who appears in the movie has a scene like this.

There are certainly some entertaining parts to it, but my guess is the person who will most enjoy Quentin Tarantino’s latest movie is Tarantino himself.

Bonus features are rooted in additional scenes that pad another 20 minutes onto the film’s already ample run time, bringing it to a full three hours. There ae also five making-of documentary featurettes:

• “Quentin Tarantino’s Love Letter to Hollywood”
• “Bob Richardson – For the Love of Film”
• “Shop Talk – The Cars of 1969”
• “Restoring Hollywood – The Production Design of Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood”
• “The Fashion of 1969”

Movie:

Extras:

Review: "The Last of Robin Hood"

More than 20 years ago Kevin Kline had a lovely performance in “Chaplin” as an aging movie star playing out his last hand as a wastrel playboy. He was so good as Douglas Fairbanks that when it came time to cast someone as Errol Flynn in his declining years for “The Last of Robin Hood,” Kline seemed an obvious choice.

He terrifically captures Flynn’s fizzy, rakish persona, which showed little difference between his on-screen swashbuckling and his off-screen adventures. (Flynn chronicled them himself in his posthumous autobiography, “My Wicked, Wicked Ways.”) He spent so much time carousing, drinking and drugging, seducing young girls, sailing on his yacht and otherwise dribbling out his days, it’s hard to believe he found time to make movies.

Done up with Flynn’s signature pencil mustache and cravat-and-evening-jacket outfit, tumbler of booze perpetually in hand, Kevin makes for a pretty spot-on physical impersonation, too.

(Normally I would feel compelled to point out that, at nearly age 67, Kline is rather too old to play Flynn, who died at 50. But Flynn’s hard-charging lifestyle aged him prematurely. And Kline, in several shirtless outings, flaunts a surprisingly athletic figure that helps the age concerns vanish.)

“Robin Hood” takes its title from perhaps Flynn’s most famous role, but focuses on the last two years of life when his star had fallen and he worked only itinerantly. He notices a young starlet, Beverly Aadland (Dakota Fanning), and in the classic Hollywood seduction method, sends a flunky to fetch her.

Their initial coupling is, to say the least, brief. Not surprising, considering this is a man who was charged with statutory rape in 1942 (and acquitted) and bedded so many ladies they coined the phrase, “In like Flynn.”

But a couple of factors work to sustain the relationship beyond a one-night stand. First is Flynn’s profound self-awareness, including the thought that that his ability to attract women is rapidly waning, and he’d rather not be left alone at the end of the party. The other is a certain Machiavellian aspect to Beverly: the sense that she’s using him as much as he is her.

This is honed and encouraged by her mother, Florence (Susan Sarandon), a showbiz mom who pushes her daughter to sing, dance and act her way to easy street. In Beverly’s case, the talent is not an even match with the ambition, so when Flynn turns up offering to “help” the girl’s career, Florence offers a few perfunctory objections before signing on.

Of course, there’s more revelry than actual opportunity. At one point Errol and Beverly disappear for five months to Africa, and in the finished film she only has one line of dialogue. But the pair seem to be a genuinely affectionate couple, with Florence often tagging along as chaperone.

At some point I should mention that Beverly is only 15 when she and Flynn start dating, and just 17 when he dies. This comes as a shock to him when he finally learns it, though not so much to quit the affair. Obviously, this information puts the entire dynamic of the relationship in a different, disturbing light.

Writing/direction duo Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland tell the story from a flashback perspective, with Florence narrating her side of events to a book author after Flynn has passed and a media firestorm erupts over his teenage damsel. Sarandon paints a picture of a profoundly deluded woman, who gave up her own dreams of stardom to push her kid to unwholesome lengths.

If the movie has a weakness, it’s that Flynn and Florence are vivid, engaging characters and Beverly remains something of a cypher. Fanning does what she can with the material, but the script doesn’t lend her a lot of opportunities to reveal the character’s interior architecture.

But “The Last of Robin Hood” is worthwhile, if for no other reason to see Kline scamp and strut as the iconic bad boy. “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend,” goes the classic Hollywood line -- one that could’ve been written about Errol Flynn.

Video review: "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 2"

Before the Twihards pile on too quickly for my less-than-gushing take on the final episode in the “Twilight” franchise, I just want to state for the record that I actually have read – and enjoyed! -- the first novel of the series by Stephanie Meyer. And I even gave the third movie a positive review.

But the decision to split the last book, “Breaking Dawn,” into two parts was an unwise one. It left the entire fourth movie and the first half of the fifth feeling like an endless stretch of exposition. The filmmakers even introduce a whole slew of new characters at the 11th hour, most of who recede in the mind as soon as they wander off screen.

The final culmination itself, though, is filled with the sort of vital storytelling juices that seemed to get leeched out of “The Twilight Saga” halfway through. The story opens with Bella (Kristen Stewart) having been turned by her vampire lover Edward (Robert Pattinson) into a fellow nosferatu.

Their love child grows at an astonishing rate, but is viewed by the Voluturi, the vampire ruling clan, as an abomination. Jacob (Taylor Lautner), the werewolf Other Boy vying for Bella’s hand, must lick his wounds and contend himself with “imprinting” on her daughter, becoming her hirsute protector.

Things build toward a huge battle, where vampire heads go flying and werewolf teeth get gnashing, that is genuinely thrilling. And there are some emotional exchanges that actually pluck the heartstrings.

Much like the rest of the series, “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2” wasn’t great. But at least it didn’t completely suck.

Video extras are generous including a seven-part making-of documentary that takes you through all the aspects of shooting the final two movies back-to-back. There’s also an audio commentary by director Bill Condon, and even competing features that allow you to jump to your favorite scenes featuring Edward or Jacob.

Movie: 2.5 stars out of four
Extras: 3 stars

Review: "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 2"

The first half of "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 2" is much like the rest of the vampires-as-dreamboats franchise: tedious, sappy and filled with dialogue so gut-bustingly absurd that even George Lucas and James Cameron could be heard to mutter, "Maybe you should bring in another writer to fix this up."

But surprisingly, the fifth and last film builds to a finale that's filled with cool action scenes and meaningful emotional exchanges. It's a satisfying -- and fitting -- end to a storyline that's been epic in scope but often felt amateurish in execution.

The audience at the preview screening I attended screamed and clapped during the big battle on a frozen lake between the "bad vampires," aka the Volturi, and the good blood-suckers: Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), his newly-transformed wife Bella (Kristen Stewart) and their brood. As werewolves -- once Cullen foes, now allies -- snapped their jaws over Volturi faces and the Cullens and their crew beheaded their black-cloaked oppressors, the filmgoers cheered each gruesome decapitation.

(Well, gruesome-ish ... like the rest of the "Twilight" series, "Part 2" is kept at a reasonably safe PG-13 level of violence and sexuality, so as not to turn off their target demo or, more accurately, their parents.)

Michael Sheen as Aro, the Volturi chief, positively slithers with reptilian charm and danger. He's worried that Edward and Bella's daughter Renesmee is a violation of the vampire laws against turning children into nosferatu. She's actually something else entirely -- the product of the coupling of Edward and the as-yet human Bella. But Aro and his lieutenants are on a rampage, looking to behead now and ask questions never.

"Part I" tediously covered the subject of the duo's nuptials and impregnation, and at first "Part 2" feels like more of the same endless exposition. The narrative table is set, and we're just waiting for director Bill Condon and screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg (based on Stephenie Meyer's books) to move all the pieces into place.

This involves recruiting vampire allies to stand against the Volturi, which means introducing a whole slew of new characters just as the franchise is approaching its 11th hour culmination. Some of them make an impression, like a pair of Amazon vampiresses who have the power to blind others, while others like the Irish contingent barely register a presence.

There's one new vampire named Alistair who's constantly turning up to spout dolorous ruminations on their impending fate, but as near as I can figure he never actually does anything.

Now that the love triangle of Edward, Bella and Jacob has been resolved -- with the lycanthropic Jacob (Taylor Lautner) coming up with the short straw -- the early going loses the sexual spark that had buoyed the series for much of the way. Of course, Jacob is now "imprinted" on Renesmee -- "It's a wolf thing," he helpfully explains -- which means he will one day become her lover, I think, which is transcendently creepy, but for now he plays the role of stoic protector.

Bella doesn't take it well when they first explain the whole imprinting thing to her, especially when Jacob refers to Renesmee as "Nessie," resulting in perhaps the most cringe-inducing line of all the "Twilight" flicks (and that's saying something): "You nicknamed my daughter after the Loch Ness Monster!?!"

A few notes on powers. As a newly-turned vampire, Bella is the physically strongest of her kind, even out arm-wrestling Edward's lumbering adoptive brother Emmett (Kellan Lutz). She also learns that her special "gift" -- every vampire has one -- is to act as a "shield," i.e. she can negate the powers of other vampires. This will come in handy.

As for Renesmee. She grows at an astonishing rate, reaching the size and mental cognizance of a kindergartner after just a few weeks of life. She has her own power, too, which involves telepathic communicate by cupping someone's cheek. (It's unclear if an elbow would've sufficed, but this is supposed to be more endearing.) Mackenzie Foy plays Renesmee at every stage, with CGI effects placing her face and mannerisms on a babe and subsequent toddler.

There's a big twist at the end having to do with that massive battle, which will come as no surprise to fans of Meyer's books -- which I would conservatively estimate as 96% of my fellow audience members -- but certainly caught me off guard. It's kind of a cliched storytelling trick, but Condon and Rosenberg employ it skillfully.

Thus the "Twilight" saga is ended, with millions of adolescent feminine hearts touched and tweaked, and many a middle-aged mother's libido plucked by frequent shirtless scenes of an underage Taylor Lautner. I can't say as I've always enjoyed the long ride, but then it wasn't built with people like me in mind.

Still, I had a few fond memories along the way, and the last hour or so of "Part 2" lives up to the excitement so long promised by these movies. Condon & Co. wrap things up on a classy note, giving every actor with a significant role in the series a little face time during the credits -- even ones like Anna Kendrick who don't appear in this movie. Now that doesn't suck at all.

 2.5 stars out of four

Video review: "The Runaways"

There's a great scene in "The Runaways" that captures the essence of the 1970s girl rock band, and the movie about them.

Joan Jett (Kristen Stewart), Cherie Currie (Dakota Fanning) and the rest of the recently assembled group are practicing inside a rundown trailer on a steamy California afternoon. Their eccentric producer, Kim Fowley (Michael Shannon), thinks their performance isn't edgy enough. So he hires a bunch of local boys to pelt them with dog poo and garbage as they play.

Needless to say, the teen girls are soon pretty P.O.'d, and it shows in the anger they put into the music.

The Runaways were not a band of young women who came together to sing about rebellion, but a group assembled by a cynical, brilliant hitmaker who thought jailbait rockers could be the next big thing.

Briefly, they were.

The film, based on a memoir by lead singer Currie, focuses on her character and Jett almost to the exclusion of the other band members. The most compelling thing about it is the transformation of Currie from 15-year-old wallflower into a snarling sex siren of the stage.

Inevitably, the band becomes a sensation, starts doing progressively harder drugs, begins fighting among themselves, and we can practically start the countdown until their breakup.

There isn't a lot of soul here, but writer/director Floria Sigismondi keeps things moving along at an upbeat tempo, and the energy of old songs like "Cherry Bomb" still boasts plenty of spark.

Despite a boatload of clichés, "The Runaways" rocks on.

The Blu-ray and DVD versions come with identical extras, highlighted by a feature-length commentary by Joan Jett (who executive produced the film), Stewart and Fanning.
I haven't yet heard it -- the studio couldn't ship a review copy in time -- but just the concept of matching up the rock legend with the actress playing her sounds amazing. Too bad they couldn't recruit Currie, too.

There are also featurettes about the making of the movie and the history of the band.

Movie: 3 stars out of four
Extras: 3 stars out of four

Review: "The Twilight Saga: Eclipse"

God help me, but I actually enjoyed a "Twilight" flick.

No, the mashup of teen romance and vampire mythology ain't Shakespeare, and it doesn't pretend to be. Screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg does a fairly decent job of translating the uber-popular novel by Stephanie Meyer about a glum girl and the immortal blood-sucker who loves her ... and the shirt-resistant teen werewolf who also loves her.

But even the Bard himself couldn't do much with dialogue like this: "Your alibi for the battle is all arranged!"

For the third installment, new director David Slade is brought in to replace Chris Weitz (who in turn took over for Catherine Hardwicke), and he brings a welcome harder edge to the material. He previously made "30 Days of Night," a truly hardcore vampire flick, and while the noferatu-vs.-lycanthrope action stays safely within PG-13 bounds, "The Twilight Saga: Eclipse" at least can boast more visceral thrills than the first two movies combined.

And Team Edward gets to do battle with Team Jacob as well. Whenever the movie isn't concerned with the impending arrival of an army of newly-made vampires, all the attention is focused on Edward (Robert Pattinson) trying to prevent his human lady love, Bella (Kristen Stewart), from falling into the occasionally hirsute arms of Jacob (Taylor Lautner).

For those who haven't been following the score: Bella is in love with Edward, part of a coven of "vegetarian" vampires who only feast on animals in the area around the soggy town of Forks. After successfully fending off multiple attempts on Bella's life by a rogue vampire, all is more or less well.

Bella wants to have sex, but Edward doesn't because his vampire super-strength might kill her in the midst of their, uh, labors. Also he's an old-fashioned dude -- literally, since he's about a century old -- and demands marriage before coupling. (This, incidentally, is enough to tell you that Edward is the figment of a female imagination and a horde of adolescents lapping it up.)

Edward agrees to turn Bella into a vampire, but only after they're married. This doesn't sit well with Jacob, who loves Bella himself and is a leader of the local American Indian tribe, who can turn into wolves. The tribe and the Cullens honor an uneasy truce, which the squabbling over Bella threatens to overtune.

Trouble threatens with rumors of mass disappearances to the north in Seattle. The Cullens suspect someone is building an army of "newborn" vampires, and suspect Victoria (Bryce Dallas Howard), the mate of the foe they defeated in the last movie.

There's also the Vuluri, vampire royalty who lurk about the edges of the conflict.

But really, the main dynamic is the love triangle, and for once it seemed to have a little substance beyond a whole lot of Edward and Jacob strutting and threatening.

There's even room for a little humor, as when Edward and Bella meet with Jacob to discuss an alliance, and Jacob typically shows up bare-chested to show off Lautner's recently-acquired muscles. "Does he have a shirt?" Edward asks.

And who can resist the entendre when Bella is freezing to death, and Jacob offers to heat her up with his body -- something the undead Edward cannot. "Let's face it," Jacob insists. "I am hotter than you."

I also liked that some of the other Cullens, Rosalie and Jasper, are given a chance to show a little of their backstory and deepen as characters. Both stories are surprisingly dark and dreary.

Could it possibly be that, after three go-rounds, the "Twilight" movies are actually growing up a little?

3 stars out of four

Review: "The Runaways"

"The Runaways" is a manufactured movie about a manufactured band.

The all-girl rock 'n' roll band was a '70s gimmick designed to peddle teen sex appeal -- and yet the songs they produced ("Cherry Bomb," "Queens of Noise") have a brash energy that's hard to deny.

Similarly, the movie about them wades through every cliché of the rock biopic genre, but is still an entirely watchable and fleetingly engrossing glimpse at Joan Jett, Cherie Currie and the gang.

I say "and the gang" not because I'm trying to minimize the contributions of Lita Ford, Sandy West and Jackie Fox (and several other bassists whose tenures with the band are not depicted). But since it's based on a memoir by Currie, and executive produced by Jett, it's not surprising they're in the spotlight.

Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning make for believable teen rockers who got caught up in the manipulation and excesses of the music biz. Joan (Stewart) is the purist, a tough girl who buys a man's leather jacket, spends her idle days huffing to get high, and refuses to accept a music teacher's admonition, "Girls don't play electric guitar." She was born with rock 'n' roll in her bloodstream.

Cherie is more of a dreamer who has to be coaxed out of her shell into becoming a vicious stage vixen. As adroitly played by Fanning, Cherie is like a million other girls searching for an identity, and using her broken home as a crucible in which to forge a steely persona.

They're brought together by Kim Fowley (a terrific Michael Shannon), a strange but legendary producer who sees in the teen girls a chance to create something new: Hard rock performed by sexy, underage girls. (Upon learning that Cherie is only 15, he raises his fists triumphantly: "Jailbait!")

This is the movie's strongest section, as Fowley sets about forming a band and toughening them up to withstand hecklers and the media glare. With Joan and the rest of the musicians already assembled, Fowley decides they need to inject a little more sex into the mix.

In a great scene, he goes trolling through a local nightclub, picks Cherie out of the crowd because of her brazen stare and Bowie-meets-Bardot look, and offers her a spot in the band.

They rehearse in a run-down trailer, and Fowley composes the song "Cherry Bomb" on the spot for Cherie's audition. (Sounds like a fake Hollywood moment, but various accounts say it really happened.) It's fascinating to watch Cherie, and Fanning herself, transform from innocent little girl to fire-breathing sexpot in a matter of minutes.

Fowley's tactics are a far cry from politically correct, even for 1975 -- he calls the Runaways "kittens" and "little bitches," and even recruits neighborhood boys to hurl tin cans and dog feces at them to make their performance angrier.

The Runaways go on the road, do progressively harder drugs, make the big time, face hordes of fans, and the movie enters the inevitable, dreary decline-and-breakup phase that seems to be genetically embedded into every rock 'n' roll movie.

Writer/director Floria Sigismondi handles the material without a lot of depth, but keeps the film from spiraling into a torpor. She also employs coy camera tricks in tackling the possibility of a lesbian encounter between Cherie and Joan.

Like the band it chronicles, "The Runaways" is mainstream entertainment waving a rebel flag. It still kinda rocks, though.

3 stars out of four

DVD review: "Coraline"

"Coraline" is a delightful movie, and it's always a delight to see a film get a first-class video release right out of the gate.

The two-disc collector's edition DVD has almost everything a fan of this stop-motion animation gem could desire. To start with, it includes both 2-D and 3-D versions of the film. (Four sets of cardboard 3-D glasses are included with the DVD, though they're a bit flimsy. Far be it from me to suggest swiping sturdier plastic ones from a current showing of "Up.")

It also includes a digital copy of the film for legal downloading to your portable video device -- something that should be standard issue with DVDs, as far as I'm concerned. Luckily, studios seem to feel the same way and are including it with more DVD releases, and on most Blu-ray discs.

A 35-minute making-of documentary details the painstaking way in which animators move puppets frame-by-frame to lend the illusion of motion. There's also a featurette on casting the voice actors -- I hadn't even realized that John Hodgman (the "I'm a PC" guy from those TV commercials) supplied the graceful voice of the father -- and several deleted scenes.

A commentary track by writer/director Henry Selick and composer Bruno Coulais provides plenty of behind-the-scenes details. Selick says he was pressured to do the film in a half computer-generated/half stop-motion format, but successfully resisted. And he reveals that Dakota Fanning was nine years old when she was cast as Coraline, but was 14 by the time they finished.

The story, based on the novel by Neil Gaiman, is about a girl who moves with her two workaholic parents to a dreary boarding house. She discovers a passageway to an alternate world where her "Other Mother," "Other Father" and all their neighbors are much friendly versions of themselves -- except for their creepy button eyes, which portend sinister developments.

In the mold of Selick's "The Nightmare Before Christmas," "Coraline" relies on gloomy imagery to weave a joyous tale of visual splendor.

Movie: 3.5 stars
Extras: 4 stars

Review: "Push"

There are super-heroes among us -- scuzzy heroes with amazing powers and bad hair.

"Push" is the latest in a line of movies not directly based on a comic book, but with a comic book vibe. In my preview of what I was going to review this week, I referred to "Push" as "this year's 'Jumper'" -- typical of my snarky sense of humor. Turns out I was pretty spot-on with my assessment. This movie starring Chris Evans and Dakota Fanning plays out in much the same style, and with about the same modest level of success.

The set-up is in the "X-Men" vein -- strangers walk among us who have strange and terrible abilities that they were born with. A shadowy government division -- named, simply, The Division -- hunts them down so they can experiment on them and exploit their powers. For some strange reason known only to Hollywood casting agents, all the heroes are under the age of 25 and really good-looking.

The interesting twist here (from screenwriter David Bourla) is that the super-powered fall into many specific categories. For instance, Chris Evans plays Nick, who is a Mover -- meaning he can move stuff around through telekinesis. His sidekick is Cassie (Fanning), a Watcher who can foretell the future, with varying reliability. Both have hair that looks like it hasn't seen any Pert in a few months, with Fanning's decked out in an array of pink and blue stripes.

A Pusher, by the way, is someone who can control other people's minds by pushing, or implanting thoughts in their head. For example, they can approach a total stranger and get their help by making them think they're old friends. They can even convince the weak-minded that they can put a loaded gun in their mouth and pull the trigger without any ill consequences.

There are two Pushers in the story: Kira (Camilla Belle), who escaped from The Division after getting injected with a power-boosting drug that killed all the other guinea pigs; and Carver (Djimon Hounsou), the Division chief who hunts her. Carver's right-hand man (Neil Jackson) is a Mover who's so talented he can even stop bullets.

This begs two questions. First: Since neither of the main characters is a Pusher, why isn't this movie titled "Mover" or "Watcher"? (Probably because they're not as catchy.) Second: Since The Division seems to be populated entirely by people who have the same powers as the people they're hunting, what is their ultimate aim? There's no talk about taking over the world, etc. All they seem to do is recruit or hunt other Movers, Pushers, etc. Are they just going for the biggest all-mutant list of Facebook friends?

The action takes place in Hong Kong, with Nick and Cassie trying to find Kira while avoiding Carver and a family of Chinese criminals who all have powers. It's a lot of chase-chase, with the future shifting as their actions do. Cassie keeps foreseeing their deaths, so they're trying to do something, anything, to keep that from happening.

At first I liked the idea of an underground society of mutants with different castes divided by powers. You've got Stitchers who can heal the wounded, Screamers who emit deadly sonic waves, Shifters who can temporarily change objects into other things; Sniffers who can track people by the things they've touched, and even Shadows who can keep people from being detected by Sniffers. It goes on and on.

But then I realized the limitless array of powers is essentially a storytelling crutch. It's like the ever-expanding list of spells and magical objects in the "Harry Potter" series. Whenever Harry & Co. encounter a new obstacle, there's always some new spell we've never heard of before, or some magical trinket, to solve their problems. There are no horizons on their abilities, which allows the storyteller to get into and out of sticky spots with minimal effort.

The same goes here. As soon as Nick and Cassie are in trouble, a new type of mutant is introduced to save the day. I half expected them to introduce a guy called The Plot Thickener whenever the action slows down.

1.5 stars out of four.