By the time I reached the end of this, what stood out most is how far we had come from the initial scenario. We start way out in deep space, where the crew of the Váli are awoken from their cryo stasis after the ship suffers significant damage as a result of a hull breach. By the end, everything has changed dramatically. The situation back on Earth, the mission of the Váli, and the very nature of the heroine, 25-year-old comms and electronics specialist, Daisy Swathmore, are are all radically different from what they initially seem to be. It’s basically a dramatic arc for the entire human race.
It begins with Daisy adjusting the setting of her neuro-stim. It’s designed to allow learning while the wearer sleeps. But she disables the firewalls which are there to stop the brain being overloaded. She becomes a lot more knowledgeable and skilled – but also incredibly paranoid, believing the cyborgs and enhanced human colleagues are plotting… something. Daisy is already prejudiced against those who are not entirely human, but are her concerns the result of mental illness, or is there something genuinely going on? She eventually decides to go AWOL, hiding out in the bowels of the ship as she digs for the truth, becoming a one-woman human resistance, before leaving in a shuttle and making her own way back to Earth. Where things are certainly not as she expected to find them.
Baron does an excellent job of engaging the viewer from the very first page. The opening line is, “Should we wake them? I mean, the ship is on fire, after all,” and if that doesn’t get you interested in reading on, I don’t know what to say. It’s an interesting exercise in reverse world-building, in that it starts out at the small and personal level, only gradually opening up to reveal what’s going on in the universe at large. Getting there involves going along on the heroine’s paranoid journey, and in the middle I was increasingly convinced that her fears were justified. They are. And they aren’t. That’s a tricky task to pull off, but the author manages it.
The neuro-stim is a nice Macguffin, which allows Daisy to have the necessary talents for the plot, but Baron doesn’t just rely on that as a crutch. For example, this allows her to build a scanner that will tell her which crew-mates are human and which are cyborg. However, just as tricky is then having to get them to pass through it. The book occasionally feels like the text of a space-based adventure game, with a cycle of problem > solution > progress > problem. Yet this keeps the narrative moving forward, and we learn alongside Daisy the truth about the situation. While ut comes as much of a shock to this reader as it does to her, the facts seems to fit the preceding elements. Well done, Mr. Baron. I think we’ll be revisiting Daisy down the road.
Author: Scott Baron Publisher: Self-published, available through Amazon, both as a paperback and an e-book Book 1 of 6 in the Clockwork Chimera series.
There are times where I regret my choice of pastime. It means I end up watching things for this site that I would never give the time of day, given the choice. This is one such, having endured the almost physically painful experience which was Hellfire, starring the same three lead actresses, and to which this appears a loose sequel. In this case, Mercedes also took over directorial duties, and… it’s actually somewhat of an improvement. Still not good, by any objective standards, let’s be clear. Yet there’s a punky and unrepentant attitude that clearly doesn’t care what I, or anyone else, thinks. Put it this way, if you want a film which includes close-up shot of the director having a pee, here you go. Offense is its raison d’etre.
The story has (loosely) Greek goddesses Lilith (Divine), Athena (Peach) and Toxie (Mercedes) roaming the blasted hellscape of Tromaville, taking on the evil forces of misogyny and white supremacy, mostly through the superpowers of really bad acting and highly deliberate offense, it would appear. This probably teaches its peak with a recreation of the assassination of John F. Kennedy in a strip-club. It feels as if Mercedes simply threw every idea of questionable taste she could come up with into her script, and filmed the result, largely using her pals. If you want a puppet, voiced by Troma movies head honcho Lloyd Kaufman, sitting on the toilet and delivering a lecture on artistic freedom. Again: here you go.
There’s even stuff here I can’t describe, without getting down-ranked by Google for explicit content. Trust me. There is certainly an aesthetic here, and it’s one to which Mercedes is clearly 110% committed, and personally too. [Is it exploitation if you’re doing it yourself?] But it’s not a style which overlaps more than fractionally with my tastes. I’ve been a fan of Troma since back in the days of Toxic Avenger (its star Torgl has a supporting role as creepy motel owner N. Bates). That looks like a Christopher Nolan movie in comparison to Divide & Conquer. Philosophically, I tend to have a different view of empowerment. To me, it doesn’t mean women copying the worst of male behaviour, as seems too often the case here e.g. rape.
There are times when restraint is not necessarily a bad thing. If you drop F-bombs every second word, eventually people are going to tune you out, and this is pretty much the cinematic equivalent. About half way through, as the story meandered its way to, then past, a confrontation with a geriatric Adolf Hitler and his pet werewolf (there’s a phrase I didn’t expect to be writing today!), I simply lost interest. There’s only so much toilet humour, potty-mouthed dialogue and amateur acting I can take in one sitting. This provides an all-you-can-handle buffet of those things, with enough left over to feed your entire family the next day. I prefer something a little less in your face. Quite often here, literally.
Dir: Mercedes Star: Irie Divine, Knotty Peach, Mercedes, Mark Torgl
Over on our Facebook page, we regularly post girls with guns images. These are the photos which have been the most popular there over the past year – one for each month, and a couple of wild-card entries. We’re currently voting for the best pic of 2023 there, so come and cast your vote! Otherwise: enjoy; use the arrows at the bottom to scroll through the pics…
Let’s be completely clear. 2023 was a dismal year for the genre, probably the worst in the decade or so I’ve been doing these annual previews. Of all the films listed in last year’s piece, there was not a single one – of those which actually showed up – that was half-way decent. Mind you, I haven’t seen TheMarvels yet. I kinda lost the will to live for that one, having failed to complete the necessary homework of all those TV series on Disney+. I’ll maybe get round to it… eventually. It was a dismal flop at the box-office, but still remains the closest thing to a hit for an action heroine this year, albeit barely reaching the year-end top thirty. After that? The holdover of Everything Everywhere All at Once was the only other in the top hundred. At #100.
Will 2024 be better? I think it might be, albeit partly because it would be hard pushed to be any worse. There is one obvious tent-pole entry, though I have some qualms about it, and below that, the usual slew of maybes and possibles. Let’s tear in, with the usual caveat that all release dates are vague, approximate and subject to change at a moment’s whim. I’ve also not included a few entries which are apparently scheduled for next year, but about which little or nothing is known, such as The Old Guard 2.
Ballerina (June 7)
Not to be confused with the Korean movie of the same name, this is the John Wick prequel, focusing on Eve, played by Ana de Armas. The storyline revealed so far seems largely boilerplate: “A young female assassin seeks revenge against the people who killed her family.” However, its presence in the Wick-iverse certainly elevates it, and the director is Len Wiseman, best known for his work on the Underworld franchise. So he clearly knows his way around an action heroine. Hell, he married one. :)
Breathe (TBA)
You had me at Milla Jovovich. “Air-supply is scarce in the near future, forcing a mother and daughter to fight to survive when two strangers arrive desperate for an oxygenated haven.” Neither mother nor daughter are actually Milla, however, so I’m going to presume she’s one of the strangers. While we’re on the topic of Jovovich, what happened to George R.R. Martin adaptation In the Lost Lands, starring her and Dave Bautista? It’s supposedly has been in post-production since last January, but the IMDb doesn’t even give it a year any more. Weird.
Christie the Movie (TBA)
This one is still listed as being in pre-production as of September, and the cast list on the IMDb doesn’t even mention the lead actress (which a still shows as Janessa A. Morgan). But what’s interesting is that this is based on cult series Get Christie Love! which originally aired on TV in the mid-seventies: we reviewed the pilot here. I’d certainly not mind seeing a movie version, but the general lack of information leaves me doubtful this will see the light of day next year.
Damsel (March 8)
Dieter brought this one to my attention, and after the trailer looked somewhat ho-hum for much of its running time, the end – more or less, the still at the top of this article – did get my attention. It will star Netflix’s favourite young woman, Millie Bobby-Brown (of Enola Holmes), as “A dutiful damsel [who] agrees to marry a handsome prince, only to find the royal family has recruited her as a sacrifice to repay an ancient debt. Thrown into a cave with a fire-breathing dragon, she must rely on her wits and will to survive.” The last time we saw one of those subversive fairy tales, it was The Princess, and was great. So fingers crossed…
Echo 8 (TBA)
“An assassin flashes between a nightmarish dream and her reality at a secret underground organization. When her latest mission involves killing a grieving mother, she discovers her target is closer to home than she realizes-much closer.” This is a low-budget labour of love for star Maria Tran, who also co-directed (with her husband Takashi Hara), edited, produced and worked on the fight choreography.
Furiosa (May 24)
There it is. The prequel to the god-tier work which was Mad Max: Fury Road, though with Anya Taylor-Joy replacing Charlize Theron. The trailer for this came in for some criticism when it came out, in particular due to the shaky nature of some CGI elements. Given how the practical approach of Fury Road was one of its outstanding elements, this is understandable. Hopefully it’s something they can fix in post-production. My other concern is Taylor-Joy, who doesn’t have much pedigree in action, and based on the trailer, does not have the same physical presence as Theron. However, it is an origin story, and I would expect the character arc to reflect this. In George We Trust. This may end up being a rare cinema trip for us.
Griselda (January 25)
I’ve not typically included TV series in this feature, but feel this one deserves an exception. We’ve previously a number of films regarding drug-lord Griselda Blanco, both dramatizations of her life and documentaries. This is the former, being a Netflix miniseries, with Sofia Vergara in the lead role. This feels a bit of a double-edged sword. She’s Colombian, like Griselda. But she’ll always be Gloria from Modern Family to us. I think this one might be just a little more blood-spattered though, coming as it does from the makers of Narcos.
Mr. and Mrs. Smith (February 2)
As with Griselda, the TV series remake of the 2005 movie of the same name deserves inclusion. Maya Erskine and Donald Glover star as the marriage couple who are also spies, though based on the trailer, it seems like it begins with them separate. The synopsis offers a different direction too: ” Two strangers land jobs with a spy agency that offers them a life of espionage, wealth, and travel. The catch: new identities in an arranged marriage.” Erskine isn’t exactly Angelina Jolie, so we’ll see.
Rebel Moon – Part 2: The Scargiver (April 19)
The follow-up to part one looks set to continue the story of Kota, who has now assembled her band of rebels to take on the evil empire of the Motherworld. I imagine we can expect more of the same as what we’ve seen so far. Which would be spiffy visuals, albeit accompanying a plot which could use rather more originality. The jury is likely still out on whether Zack Snyder will get his desired cinematic universe of this. Didn’t work out too well for Army of the Dead.
Seize Them! (UK April 5)
The synopsis sounds promising: “Queen Dagan is toppled by a revolution led by Humble Joan . The Queen becomes a fugitive in her own land, and must face hardship and danger as she embarks on a voyage to win back her throne.” However, it is a comedy – the cast include Nick Frost and Jessica Hynes, both out of the Edgar Wright nexus. So how much actual action will be involved here is uncertain: I’m still going to watch it.
The Street Avenger (December 24)
“When a young girl being raised by a single father loses him to gang violence, she tries to take the law into her own hands and finds out being a vigilante is nothing like she reads about in the comics… This is a raw, action-packed adventure that shows the inner strength of a young woman that will stop at nothing to avenge her father.” Okay, I am interested. But let’s see if the makers can deliver on everything the promised in that synopsis…
Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft (TBA)
Another Netflix series, this will be an animated show, with Hayley Atwell voicing Lara. Not much information, beyond that the series “Follows heroine Lara Croft as she explores new territory.” There is a “First Look” video available, which is included as part of the watch-list below: the animations looks quite nice. Hopefully it’ll be an improvement over the underwhelming Alicia Vikander version of the character.
Trigger Warning (TBA)
Out of the “long in production” file comes this Jessica Alba vehicle, with the following synopsis: “A traumatized veteran who inherits her grandfather’s bar and faces a moral dilemma after learning the truth behind his untimely death.” Filming on this apparently wrapped back in October 2021, so quite what the hold-up, I don’t know. It’s supposed to be a Netflix release, but we’ll see.
By the time I reached the end of this, what stood out most is how far we had come from the initial scenario. We start way out in deep space, where the crew of the Váli are awoken from their cryo stasis after the ship suffers significant damage as a result of a hull breach. By the end, everything has changed dramatically. The situation back on Earth, the mission of the Váli, and the very nature of the heroine, 25-year-old comms and electronics specialist, Daisy Swathmore, are are all radically different from what they initially seem to be. It’s basically a dramatic arc for the entire human race.
There are times where I regret my choice of pastime. It means I end up watching things for this site that I would never give the time of day, given the choice. This is one such, having endured the almost physically painful experience which was 
Let’s be completely clear. 2023 was a dismal year for the genre, probably the worst in the decade or so I’ve been doing these annual previews. Of all the films listed in 
Ballerina (June 7)
Furiosa (May 24)
Griselda (January 25)