by Paul Summerhayes | Dec 21, 2019 | Review, Weird Western
Jonah Hex (2010 movie)
Director: Jimmy Hayward
Writers: Mark Neveldine (screenplay), Brian Taylor (screenplay)
Stars: Josh Brolin, Megan Fox, John Malkovich, and Michael Fassbender
Movie Blurb (Google):
After his family is murdered by the terrorist Turnbull, a nearly dead Jonah is revived mystically and gains supernatural abilities. Later, the president seeks his help to stop an attack by Turnball.
My Review (no spoilers):
Prior to watching this movie, I was aware of the Jonah Hex comics and TV series, but I hadn’t read or watched it. Jonah Hex’s first appearance in comic form was in 1972. According to Google, this movie lost money at the box office, which makes me wonder how well it was distributed/advertised (it wasn’t shown in my home town).
Story: The story starts in a post-civil war American (wild west) with the movie’s protagonist, Jonah, and his family being attacked by the main villain. The movie quickly established this will be a revenge story (also noted on the movie poster above), pitting Jonah against the villainous Turnbull. The story pace is good and there are plenty of things happening on screen to entertain its target audience. I did have a few moments where I thought what the ???, which is fine as we do expect weirdness in our beloved Weird Western genre after all. I also love characters who are over the top, and this portrayal of Jonah Hex is definitely that. While the acting was good, no one was outstanding. I was pleasantly surprised by the well-known actors appearing in this movie.
Photography and Special Effects: This movie was made in 2010 and at the time of this review it is now 9 years old. For its age, this movie’s appearance is fair with its sets, costumes and special effects of good quality. It doesn’t look or feel like a blockbuster production though, and its USD$47 million budget reflects this – for comparison; Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows Part 1 was released the same year and it had a USD $250 million budget.
After the opening scene, there is a short animated story sequence showing some of Jonah’s back story. This animation is well crafted and styled and is a great addition to the storytelling. I preferred this animation over the awful ‘red filtered flashback’ scenes which looked cheap and nasty. Why didn’t they just add more cool animations instead?
Overall, I enjoyed this movie and I give it 3.5 out of 5.
My Ratings:
Photography Quality and Special Effects: 3
Quality of the Story: 3
Weird Western Theme: 4
Entertainment: 3.5
Overall: 3.5 Stars!
Rating Scale:
- 5 Stars: Awesome! I couldn’t put it down
- 4 Stars: Fantastic. A real page-turner
- 3 Stars: Enjoyable. A good read
- 2 Stars: Not fun. A struggle to read
- 1 Star: Not recommended (no hate)
DC comics
by Paul Summerhayes | Sep 13, 2018 | Novel, Review, Short Story, Weird Western
Dead Man’s Hand: An Anthology of the Weird West
Edited by John Joseph Adams Link Here
Blurb:
From a kill-or-be-killed gunfight with a vampire to an encounter in a steampunk bordello, the weird western is a dark, gritty tale where the protagonist might be playing poker with a sorcerous deck of cards, or facing an alien on the streets of a dusty frontier town.
Here are twenty-three original tales—stories of the Old West infused with elements of the fantastic—produced specifically for this volume by many of today’s finest writers. Included are Orson Scott Card’s first “Alvin Maker” story in a decade, and an original adventure by Fred Van Lente, writer of Cowboys & Aliens.
INTRODUCTION John Joseph Adams
THE RED-HEADED DEAD Joe R. Lansdale
THE OLD SLOW MAN AND HIS GOLD GUN FROM SPACE Ben H. Winters
HELLFIRE ON THE HIGH FRONTIER David Farland
THE HELL-BOUND STAGECOACH Mike Resnick
STINGERS AND STRANGERS Seanan McGuire
BOOKKEEPER, NARRATOR, GUNSLINGER Charles Yu
HOLY JINGLE Alan Dean Foster
THE MAN WITH NO HEART Beth Revis
WRECKING PARTY Alastair Reynolds
HELL FROM THE EAST Hugh Howey
SECOND HAND Rajan Khanna
ALVIN AND THE APPLE TREE Orson Scott Card
MADAM DAMNABLE’S SEWING CIRCLE Elizabeth Bear
STRONG MEDICINE Tad Williams
RED DREAMS Jonathan Maberry
BAMBOOZLED Kelley Armstrong
SUNDOWN Tobias S. Buckell
LA MADRE DEL ORO Jeffrey Ford
WHAT I ASSUME YOU SHALL ASSUME Ken Liu
THE DEVIL’S JACK Laura Anne Gilman
THE GOLDEN AGE Walter Jon Williams
NEVERSLEEPS Fred Van Lente
DEAD MAN’S HAND Christie Yant
My Review:
As you can see, there is a lot of big-name authors and 23 stories in this anthology, making it hard to give a review of each story. Therefore, this review is for the whole anthology and not every individual story.
I have to start by saying, wow, there are some real gems in this book. Like all anthologies, not all of the stories will be to everyone’s taste, but there is enough variety here for even the fussiest reader. Some of the lesser known authors’ (to me) story stood out as great examples of the weird west genre.
Here are my comments on two of the stories. The first of which is Joe Lansdale’s ‘The Red-HeadedDead’.
The Red-Headed Dead is the first story in this publication and it’s a great way to start! It is easily one of my favourites and I would have bought this anthology just to read this one story. This was the first story of Mr. Lansdale’s I’ve read (I have corrected that error now) and my introduction to his Reverend Jebediah Mercer. The good reverend is a gun-wielding, demon slaying priest with an attitude and too many personal issues. This story has a real pulp horror feel and it follows Mercer as he hunts a monster in the wilderness. Mr. Lansdale is considered by many to be the modern father of the weird west genre (R.E. Howard being the grandfather) and this story showcases his writing skills. In fact, I enjoyed The Red-Headed Dead so much I immediately bought all the Reverend Mercer’s books I could find (a review is coming for them soon).
Hellfire on the High Frontier by David Farland. I enjoyed this story of a lawman chasing down a clockwork fugitive and the unusual place it eventually leads him. I would really love to see some more this stories set in this world, it was captivating. Please, Mr. Farland, write more!
Would I recommend this book? Yes. I stated in a review (Goodreads) that this was the best read of 2017 for me, and I meant it. This is an awesome introduction to these fine word wranglers, and also the fascinating weird western genre. If you haven’t read it, do yourself a favour and buy/lend/read it today.
My Ratings:
Variety of the stories: 4
Quality of the stories: 4
Weird Western Theme: 5
Entertainment: 4
Overall: 4 Stars!
Rating Scale:
- 5 Stars: Awesome! I couldn’t put it down
- 4 Stars: Fantastic. A real page-turner
- 3 Stars: Enjoyable. A good read
- 2 Stars: Not fun. A struggle to read
- 1 Star: Not recommended (no hate)
by Paul Summerhayes | Aug 13, 2018 | Comic, Review, Weird Western
by Eric Powell, Kyle Hotz (Illustrator). The link is here.
The Blurb:
The world believes the notorious outlaw Billy the Kid was killed by Pat Garrett, but in reality, the Kid is very much alive, the hired gun of Fineas Sproule’s traveling spectacle of biological curiosities-or “freaks,” as Billy calls them. Follow Billy with this crew of oddities, searching for mystical gems, taking on a fiendish freak-killer, and rescuing an alligator man from clutches of the Loch Ness vampire! Now all three tales are presented in one gunslingin’ omnibus!
My Review:
I have to start by saying that I have not read a comic or graphic novel in years. In my youth, I collected many comics (Spiderman and Conan being among my favorites), but I stopped collecting about twenty+ years ago. The reason I picked up this book was to satisfy my weird western hunger and a desire to try comics again (kindled by my son). I must say, I was not disappointed with this purchase.
The book’s artwork is stylised (and awesome) and gets across the weird theme perfectly. The monsters have unique appearances, some of them in what I would call a ‘Cthulhu’ style (eyes, teeth, and tentacles).
The story is an enjoyable read, very entertaining and flows well. The plot and characters are interesting and in the 150+ pages, the author has also included both humor and gun action aplenty. This book left me wanting more and I will be on the search for more stories by Mr. Powell soon.
Would I recommend this book? Hell yeah, in an instant.
My Ratings:
Story: 4
Illustrations/Art: 5
Weird Western Theme: 5
Entertainment: 5
Overall: 5 Stars!
Rating Scale:
- 5 Stars: Awesome! I couldn’t put it down
- 4 Stars: Fantastic. A real page-turner
- 3 Stars: Enjoyable. A good read
- 2 Stars: Not fun. A struggle to read
- 1 Star: Not recommended (no hate)
by Paul Summerhayes | Aug 13, 2018 | Gaming Industry, Novel, Review, Short Story, Uncategorised, Weird Western, Writing
Hi guys,
I have decided to do my bit for the weird western genre by listing and reviewing weird western books, comics, games, TV, movies etc.. Why? I hear you ask. Because I love the genre and I would like to do my bit to promote this cool genre.
How will I review a product and what will it contain? The reviews will be short and may contain things like:
- A book cover, picture or screenshot of the product
- A brief description or book blurb
- A link to the product (Goodreads, Homepage etc., but not an online seller if it can be helped)
- My personal opinion of the product
- My personal scores for each aspect of the product as defined by me (well it is MY review)
- My personal overall rating out of five stars
- 5 Stars: Awesome! I couldn’t put it down
- 4 Stars: Fantastic. A real page-turner
- 3 Stars: Enjoyable. A good read
- 2 Stars: Not fun. A struggle to read
- 1 Star: Not recommended (no hate)
If you are interested in the weird western genre and most intelligent, good-looking people are, then check back with my blog regularly.
The reviews will be title; Review 1, Review 2 etc.. Yeah, I know. It’s a brilliant naming convention and I should patent it…
