Ménage à Monster

These It Came from the DVR articles are going to be a little bit different.  As an early Christmas present to myself, I picked up a festival pass to the Toronto After Dark film festival.  So the first difference is that these are new movies, on the big screen, instead of old ones and niche programming on the small screen.  The second difference is that these are going to be short.  I’ve got eighteen films to see in seven days (as well as dressing up for the annual zombie walk), so I’m not going to have a whole lot of time to write, and I want post these while the blood is still fresh.
Toronto After Dark is a horror and genre film festival oozing with gobs of monster and rpg inspiration, but most of the films it showcases won’t see wide release – so in addition to extracting some rpg goodness from each movie, I’ll also give them a bit of a critique, so fellow gamers can know what they need to track down and what to avoid.  I’ll try and keep spoilers to an absolute minimum.

Absentia

The story begins with Tricia, grappling over the decision to declare her husband ‘dead in absentia’, after he mysteriously vanished without a trace seven years ago.  The legal declaration seems a first step to healing and moving on with her life but, instead of helping Tricia put her life together, she is tormented by the apparition of her missing husband.
Things are complicated by the arrival of Tricia’s younger sister, Callie, come to lend moral support but has problems of her own.  It isn’t long before Callie finds an eerie pedestrian tunnel that she believes is connected not only with Tricia’s missing husband, but with a much older pattern of disappearances.

Creepy, Instant Indie-Horror Classic

I’m not one of those jaded horror fans that claims not to be frightened by movies.  When they are good, scary movies scare me, which is why I go and see them (honestly I’m not sure why people who aren’t scared like horror movies – it’s a little like being an aficionado of tear-jerkers but never feeling sad).  A good horror movie gets your blood racing in the theatre, but a great one stays with you as you leave and makes you walk a little faster on your way home from the subway station.  Absentia had me hyper aware of all the weird little noises my house makes for a few days.
Part of what makes Absentia so effective is Mike Flanagan’s blending of the best parts of a ghost tale and a monster story.  The ghost story elements give the film its melancholic atmosphere and sense of building dread, while the monster provides the clammy handed fear and jump scares only a creature skittering in the dark can.
Flanagan also knows how to really take advantage of the isolation one feels in the suburbs.  Speaking as someone who grew up in the ‘burbs, I can attest to the strange quality they possess – at certain times of day, even if your rational mind tells you the rows of houses are filled with people, you feel like the last man on earth – a quality Absentia captures.   Incidentally, my neighborhood also had a scary pedestrian tunnel (which I had to brave in order to get to my friend’s house), so the focus of the film had my inner childhood fears working overtime.
With a tiny budget (the movie was funded by kickstarter, which should be familiar to gamers as the funding source of choice for rpg start-ups), Absentia wisely leaves the heavy lifting to the excellent cast rather than special effects.  I was especially impressed by the portrayal of sisters Tricia and Callie.  Actresses Courtney Bell and Katie Parker did a great job filling their portrayal with the kind of knowing barbs (as well as loving support) only adult siblings can throw at each other.   It had the added benefit of having their relationship to unfold for the viewer rather than artificially laying it out at the beginning of the film.
The concept of Absentia’s monster is very clever, and it unfolds in much the same way as the characters.  Flanagan could have easily used a long expository scene (complete with a convenient scholarly expert opening up a giant tome full of woodcuts) in order to drive his ideas home, but thankfully resisted the temptation and took a much less forced approach.
Absentia is strongly recommended to all horror fans.  The creep factor is in high gear and reminded me of the best parts of Insidious (the parts before the spirit world).  Watch it with the lights off, and see how long you can sit in the dark alone when it’s finished.

SPOILER ALERT
I do have one criticism of Absentia, and I hate to bury it under a spoiler tag (like I did with Some Guy Who Kills People) since it has nothing to do with the plot, but I really don’t want to take any of the threat of the monster away from those who haven’t seen the film yet.  Absentia left me needing to see more of the monster, enough that after the last scene I felt a tiny bit ripped off (just a bit – nothing like how ripped off I felt not seeing any aliens in Contact).  I didn’t want to see the creature in broad daylight, I think that would have ruined it, and I understand why Flanagan didn’t include the traditional monster movie ‘reveal’.  I’m not sure if it was entirely an editorial decision or a budgetary one.  I just needed a little bit more.  I realize a love of monsters is one of my idiosyncrasies, so it might not bug others like it did me.  Ultimately, showing too much would have weakened the film so, even though Flanagan was stingy with the creature, he came down on the right side of that decision.

RPG Goodness

There is a definite trend in modern D&D products to move the fey away from their 1e roots as benevolent (or at worst neutral) forest spirits toward something much more dangerous and sinister.  This trend can be seen in WOTC’s recent Heroes of the Feywild, but stretches back at least to the end of 3.5e with Paizo’s Carnival of Tears adventure.  It’s a trend I happen to like, and one that might also be playing out on the stage of popular culture if Absentia is any indication (as well as Grimm and Lost Girl).
Without spoiling the clever ideas that I alluded to in my review of the film, Absentia is required viewing for any game master that wants to see how frightening the fey really can be.  At first I thought the move to make fey dangerous was purely a pragmatic one – combat is a major component of the game, so it seems a waste to include game statistics for a bunch of flower sniffing pixies you aren’t going to get in a fight with.  Other than harassing my players with some leprechauns (they appeal to the same side of me that thinks Snoti the snotling champion is awesome), I don’t think I’ve ever used a blink dog, brownie, or killmoulis in any edition of the game, so there might be something to that theory, but I don’t think it’s the whole story.  While watching Absentia, I was reminded that the recent thematic transformation of the fey might actually be a revival of a much older view of faerie creatures.
Gary Gygax’s (and the rest of western culture’s) perception of the fey was probably informed by their Victorian interpretation (he did include Lord Dunsany in his list of inspirational reading, appendix N) as whimsical, fun-loving, child-like beings.  However, there is an older interpretation of the fey, one that places many of the faerie creatures in the same mythological niche as vampires, ghosts, and demons.  It is that tradition that I think Absentia and recent D&D products are tapping into.
Through this lens even the most benevolent fey of D&D’s past are transformed from innocent practical jokers to wild creatures filled with alien emotions and dangerous magic.  As a DM you can play this up for full effect.  Perhaps there is a sigil, or special herb the common folk put on their doors to ward against Eladrin, whom they view as unpredictable and dangerous – barely a step up from the murderous drow.  A leprechaun’s legendary treasure is actually a pot filled with gold teeth, pilfered from corpses during the faery’s nightly grave robbing (a habit that puts them in close associating with ghouls).  Brownies may help a desperate cobbler make shoes, but there is no telling what payment they may demand later on (anything from a silver plated laugh to the cobbler’s first born).
In such a world, making a pact with an arch-fey is just as dangerous as signing a contract with a devil or studying the maddening portents held in the movements of the stars and planets.

Random Fey-Pact Events

For those who have seen the feywild, its colours and smells are so vibrant and real it makes the mortal world seem like a sad reflection.  It is no wonder the immortal beings that thrive in that atmosphere, the arch-fey, are so difficult to understand.  Whatever their inscrutable motives for doing so, the arch-fey are known to lend some of their arcane secrets to mortals who interest them.
Unlike devils who frequently draw up well delineated contracts (if confusing and opaque) to entice mortal Warlocks, the unpredictable and mercurial arch-fey hold little stock in formal agreements (and frequently have a different understanding of them than mortals).  More often than not, fey Warlocks aren’t even aware of the agreements they’ve entered into.  The boundary between the worlds is thin in some places, and at these locations a mortal may accidentally leave a ritual offering or violate a sacred space, attracting the attention of an arch-fey.  The fey Warlock walks a dangerous path.  The relationship responsible for their newfound arcane powers is governed by alien whims and strange protocols.  There is little the mortal mind can do to predict these fluctuating patterns.  Instead the fey Warlock must learn to cope with the intrusion of the faerie world into their life, just as an infernal Warlock must learn to live with the eventual loss of their soul.
DM’s should roll on the following table every 2d6+2 days to determine the effects of the warlock’s arch-fey patron on the mortal world.  Optionally, this table can also be used for Witches and other characters that have attracted the attention of an arch-fey, such as those with the Tuathan and Unseelie Agent themes (all from Heroes of the Feywild).

These It Came from the DVR articles are going to be a little bit different.  As an early Christmas present to myself, I picked up a festival pass to the Toronto After Dark film festival.  So the first difference is that these are new movies, on the big screen, instead of old ones and niche programming on the small screen.  The second difference is that these are going to be short.  I’ve got eighteen films to see in seven days (as well as dressing up for the annual zombie walk), so I’m not going to have a whole lot of time to write, and I want post these while the blood is still fresh.
Toronto After Dark is a horror and genre film festival oozing with gobs of monster and rpg inspiration, but most of the films it showcases won’t see wide release – so in addition to extracting some rpg goodness from each movie, I’ll also give them a bit of a critique, so fellow gamers can know what they need to track down and what to avoid.  I’ll try and keep spoilers to an absolute minimum.

Midnight Son

In this urban vampire tale, Jacob is a security guard stuck working the long, lonely hours of the nightshift, thanks to a rare skin condition that has left him dangerously sensitive to the sunlight.  After a chance meeting with a troubled and beautiful woman named Mary, it looks as though Jacob has finally made the human connection he longs for.  Unfortunately, Jacob’s disease hasn’t finished with him yet, and avoiding the sun is only the first stage of the illness’ metamorphosis.  As Jacob’s condition and his relationship with Mary evolve, things quickly begin to spiral out of control.

Engaging, Low-Fi, Addiction Drama

Whenever I think that vampire stories have been played out and are as bled dry as a buxom blonde in a Hammer film, a movie like Midnight Son (or a few years ago, Let the Right One In), comes along and reminds me why these monsters stay relevant and will continue to be in the years to come.  Vampires, even with their generally accepted genre conventions (rules if you will), represent a whole grab bag of subconscious fears and, with a little tweaking and liberal recombining, there is no limit to the stories they can be featured in.  I blame slumps in vampire culture not in the limitations of the potential of the vampire story but in the limitations of the vampire stories that are made.
With all that out of the way, I found Scott Leberecht’s Midnight Son refreshing.  The film doesn’t totally reimagine the vampire (although there are aspects to Midnight Son’s nosferatu that are unique), but it does reject the storytelling of at least a decade of Hollywood vampire movies.  Midnight Son is low-fi in the very best sense of the term.  There are no flying vampires, super speed, animal metamorphosis or over the top effects.  Instead, my interest was held by the characters – not beautiful and brooding dark princes, or fake angsty teenage heartthrobs – believable, lonely people trying to cope with their problems.  The plot is simple and straightforward and, although some characters may make bad decisions (it wouldn’t be much of a story if they didn’t), they are understandable decisions that still make sense (refreshing in a horror film).
You really feel as though you could run into the characters of the film on the street, which speaks both to the actors’ performances (again, it’s refreshing to see good acting in a vampire film), as well as the look of the film (no impossibly leather clad models posing and pouting in a club filled with choreographed dancers).  In the same vein, I have to comment on Leberecht’s ability to capture the atmosphere of a city at night.  Sure you’ve got plenty of darkness, but there is just as much light; just not the kind of light that leaves you comforted and safe – washed out fluorescents, and yellow tinted sodium streetlights that give even the healthiest specimen an unearthly, undead pallor.  It isn’t a look that many films get right (the lighting reminded me of Collateral – love or hate that film, the look of the nighttime lighting is spot on).
Midnight Son has plenty of horror, but isn’t what I’d call a scary movie.  Jacob’s vampirism works as an exploration of addiction and the sometimes crippling baggage we bring to relationships, with a little bit of body horror thrown in there as well.  There’s blood, but gore hounds will be disappointed by the low body count and unspectacular kills (which, as much as I love a splattery neck bite, would feel out of place in Midnight Son).  The second half of the film is quite tense and builds up to a nice climax, but some viewers might get bored by the slower pace at the beginning.  It didn’t bother me, but if you’re expecting a certain kind of vampire film, you’ll be disappointed.
If I had to compare Midnight Son to other movies, it would be to the addiction dramas of the nineties like Rush and the Basketball Diaries… only with vampires (if that makes sense).
Midnight Son is recommended, especially for those fleeing certain overwrought, sparkly undead and are looking for something a little more grown up and gritty.

Note: I have to mention this, because I collected the comics in the nineties, that the film Midnight Son has nothing to do with Marvel’s team of supernatural heroes, the Midnight Sons.  When I saw the title I was excited to see an indie version of Ghost Rider, but about two seconds of reading the description set me straight (although Jacob and Morbius do share some similarities).  Fans of the comics have to hope that Nicolas Cage’s next kick at the can is better than the first.

RPG Goodness

Midnight Son is a great example of a protagonist transforming into a monster and trying to cope.  It’s an excellent resource for anyone running a World of Darkness game that is looking for pointers on role playing a newly transformed kindred trying to understand their powers and place in the world.  I talked about players’ desire to ‘be the monster’ in rpg games as part of my review of Dead Heads, so I won’t retread that territory here.  Where Midnight Son takes the discussion a step further is its use of transformation through contagion – specifically the spread of vampirism through lapses in judgement in the pursuit of addiction (HIV spread through shared needles perhaps?).  Not only is the protagonist transformed into a monster, but he risks transforming others into monsters as well.
This seems like an excellent plot device to incorporate into a campaign using the vampire class from last year’s Heroes of Shadow.  While the method for spreading vampirism is pretty cut and dried in other games that feature vampires as PCs (I’m thinking about World of Darkness and Rifts in particular since I’ve played them), Heroes of Shadow leaves it intentionally vague.  This can work to the DM’s advantage.
Instead of telling the player how vampirism works, have them be unsure exactly how they became what they are (and how it is spread).  Maybe the PC has had the memory of the bite that infected them psychically wiped from their brain, or perhaps they were simply born a vampire and now act as a Typhoid Mary, spreading the disease to others they come in contact with.  Whatever the case, start having major villains who die after being targeted by the blood drain power return to the campaign as vampires, out for revenge against the party who slew them.   The players might not immediately clue in to the cause (they might suspect a rival vampire or necromancer is rejuvenating the undead villains), but once they do, will likely begin to take precautions against further vampiric resurrection (which is fine – it rewards problem solving and prevents the plot twist from becoming stale and overused).
Vampirism as an infectious disease can be just as useful in the reverse direction as well, to introduce material from Heroes of Shadow into an established campaign.  Instead of breaking immersion and introducing a new PC into the storyline, have a character who wants to try out the vampire class become infected with the ‘haemophage disease’.

Haemophage

There are many myths and superstitions regarding the spread of vampirism.  Most hold it to be a supernatural curse of some kind.  Few realize it is a terrible disease, spread like rabies or filth fever, through the bite of the infected.

Note:

This is a difficult and deadly disease by design – after all, if the PC wants to try out the vampire class, they want the disease to progress.  I considered having vampire characters spread the disease to fellow party members through the blood is the life class feature (emulating the film), but it takes away one of the vampire’s few avenues for healing (and before long would result in a party filled with vampires).

These It Came from the DVR articles are going to be a little bit different.  As an early Christmas present to myself, I picked up a festival pass to the Toronto After Dark film festival.  So the first difference is that these are new movies, on the big screen, instead of old ones and niche programming on the small screen.  The second difference is that these are going to be short.  I’ve got eighteen films to see in seven days (as well as dressing up for the annual zombie walk), so I’m not going to have a whole lot of time to write, and I want post these while the blood is still fresh.
Toronto After Dark is a horror and genre film festival oozing with gobs of monster and rpg inspiration, but most of the films it showcases won’t see wide release – so in addition to extracting some rpg goodness from each movie, I’ll also give them a bit of a critique, so fellow gamers can know what they need to track down and what to avoid.  I’ll try and keep spoilers to an absolute minimum.

The Theatre Bizarre

The Theatre Bizarre is an old-school horror anthology and pet project of some of the genre’s most recognizable names.  A young woman is mysteriously drawn to a broken down old theatre where a disturbing half-man, half-puppet presents six spine-tingling tales: The Mother of Toads (Richard Stanley), where a newlywed couple encounter an ancient Lovecraftian religion dedicated to a horrible monster; I Love You (Buddy Giovinazzo), a meditation on a relationship poisoned by mistrust and obsession; Wet Dreams (Tom Savini), features an unfaithful husband getting his just deserts in this reality and others; The Accident (Douglas Buck), a glimpse of the life and death horror of the mundane world as told to a child;  Vision Stains (Karim Hussain), follows a junkie who chronicles the memories of her murder victims, which she re-lives after injecting their vitreous fluid directly into her eye; and Sweets (David Gregory), where a couple find that their relationship based on binge eating takes a strange turn.

Horror Buffet – Take What You Like and Leave the Rest

I’m not sure why anthology films have fallen out of fashion in North America, but growing up Creepshow, Creepshow 2, and Tales from the Darkside: the movie had a big impact on my imagination, and I miss the format (I even saw Creepshow 2 in the theatre – which not only dates me but also how long it’s been since an anthology movie got wide release).  Because of that, I was looking forward to the Theatre Bizarre and only slightly concerned that the movie’s six stories would be too short for the filmmakers to do anything with.  While I didn’t enjoy every tale, I liked the majority.  I suspect most of the crowd felt the same, though I’m sure everyone had different opinions on which segments they liked and disliked – that, I think, is the strength of the anthology structure.
The other strength of anthologies is that they are the filmic equivalent to short stories, a format perfectly suited to the horror genre (and not just because it’s my favorite way to read horror stories – I love Clive Barker’s Books of Blood and Stephen King’s Night Shift is the book that got me interested in horror).  I like to think that horror is about infecting someone with a disruptive idea, an idea that hides in their brain and won’t go away (often remembered at such inopportune times as walking down an empty street in the middle of the night).  Short stories are such an effective delivery for horror because they deal with a single idea, stripped of any distraction, and freed from the need to dilute it over the course of an entire novel (or film).  During the question period after the screening, it was nice to hear the filmmakers were given complete creative freedom over their segments, and I think each of them took advantage of the format to tell focused short stories (even the ones I wasn’t crazy about).
The wraparound story (featuring genre perennial Udo Kier) that ties the segments together does its job of moving from one section to the next smoothly.  It doesn’t stand out, but I think that’s the point, as it would distract from the other stories.
The Mother of Toads is a great little monster story.  The set-up is creepy (with an excellent performance by Catriona MacCall as the old woman), the monster looks fantastic, and the ending pays off.  That it has a liberal helping of Lovecraft mythos is just icing on the cake.
I Love You is also a strong entry.  It reminded me of the clever storytelling of the Twilight Zone – only with good acting, and modern dramatic sensibility (no offense to Rod Serling – it will always be a classic).
I didn’t care for Wet Dreams.  Maybe it was the similarity in theme to the superior I Love You that makes it seem flat in comparison, but I felt Tom Savini’s entry lacked any emotional depth and came off cheesy (it looked good though).  If I Love You is a great chapter in the Twilight Zone, Wet Dreams is a bad episode from Tales from the Crypt (which is why I’m sure some people will love it).
The Accident really stands out from the crowd for its complete rejection of any supernatural or traditional horror elements (and for that audacity alone this might be my favorite segment).  The story is so simple, but so effective at reminding the viewer that we tell scary stories to distract ourselves from the terror of everyday life.  I’m sure I wasn’t the only one in the audience who had painful images from childhood come bubbling back to the surface after watching this.
Vision Stains has one of those ideas at its heart that you absolutely want to steal, and completely lived up to its promise (the double edged sword of any great idea).  Its narrative, about our obsession to know everything, hit home (as I’m sure it will for others in our Google and Wikipedia age).  Vision Stains also boasts some of the gnarliest (and well done) eye injuries I’ve seen, so fair warning to the squeamish (and those who have a hard time watching others put in contact lenses).
I’m on the fence about Sweets.  On the one hand the vivid, surreal feel of the segment is fantastic.  On the other, I felt the impact of the ending was blunted by relying on a series of gross-outs.  At this point in the day of screenings, I was starving, and in spite of my hunger Sweets had enough of an effect on me that I didn’t make a trip to the concession stand, so in the final analysis I guess I have to judge David Gregory’s work a success.
The Theatre Bizarre is recommended (especially for those who remember films like Creepshow and Tales from the Darkside with fondness).  The film’s discreet segments make it perfect to throw on next Halloween, and watch between bouts of handing out candy.  I can’t guarantee you’ll enjoy every part (or even that you’ll like the ones that I did), but there’s enough quality storytelling in the Theatre Bizarre that it hits more than it misses (and the segments are short enough you won’t mind sitting through the misses).

RPG Goodness

Watching Vision Stains, I couldn’t help but think the whole eye-injection thing would make a very creepy way to cast the spell speak with dead in a dark steampunk game or a twisted version of Eberron.  With much of D&D fandom, myself included, showing a renewed interest in the game’s pulp fiction/sword and sorcery roots, there’s a general feeling that D&D’s magic system (of any edition) is too ‘high fantasy’ to gel with that approach.  Rather than scrap the whole magic system, I think Vision Stains demonstrates that something as simple as cosmetic changes to the way that spells are cast (the somatic and material components in 2e and 3e) can completely alter the tenor of even the most innocuous magical effect (in the case of the film, humble information gathering).  The following are a small sample of common spells altered to add an element of the dangerous, weird and horrific to magic in D&D games:
Bear’s Endurance, Bull’s Strength, Cat’s Grace, Eagle’s Splendor, Fox’s Cunning, Owl’s Wisdom – the recipient of the spell consumes a pickled organ (usually a heart to improve physical attributes or a pineal gland for mental attributes) belonging to a creature with a higher score in the appropriate statistic.  This makes finding suitable component sources difficult for individuals who want to improve an already fantastically high score.
Cure Wounds – the wounds of the living are healed by grafting chunks of flesh from the bodies of the fallen.  Discoloration due to a difference in species between donor and recipient fade after twenty-four hours.
Detect Magic and Identify – the caster enters a deep trance through the use of an inhaled or injected drug.  This drug is harvested in an unsavory manner or from an unpalatable source such as illithid brain juice or powdered grave mushrooms.
Floating Disk – the material focus for this spell is a metal or wooden lip disc that must be worn for the spell to function.
This wouldn’t be much of a monster focused blog if I didn’t mention the Mother of Toads again.  While watching the film it struck me that the creature in Richard Stanley’s segment was a lot like a D&D bullywug, and a Cthulhu mythos connection to this monster (which I’ve always felt was under-appreciated) would go a long way in redeeming its appearance on the Dungeons and Dragons cartoon (where they were lamely defeated by giving them giant flies to eat).  Well, after a little research, it turns out there is a connection (that’s actually a little tangled back and forth).  The Mother of Toads is inspired by a Clark Ashton Smith story of the same name, written as a part of his Averoigne cycle, a collection of tales that also inspired the classic module Castle Amber.  Just as likely, bullywugs could have been inspired by Clark Ashton Smith’s more famous addition to the Cthulhu mythos, the frog-like Tsathoggua (the man liked his frog beasties).
Either or, the best way to make the connection concrete is to immortalize the mother of toads in monster form…

The Mother of Toads

“Pierre awoke in the ashy dawn… Sick and confused, he sought vainly to remember where he was or what he had done. Then, turning a little, he saw beside him on the couch a thing that was like some impossible monster of ill dreams; a toadlike form, large as a fat woman. Its limbs were somehow like a woman’s arms and legs. Its pale, warty body pressed and bulged against him, and he felt the rounded softness of something that resembled a breast.” – Clark Ashton Smith, Mother of Toads.

Lore

Nature DC 10: The mother of toads is an agent of the fetid and swampy primordials that created the bullywugs, and is worshipped as a deity by all the batrachian creatures of the marsh.
Nature DC 15: Some rumors hold that the mother of toads is incredibly ancient, the first bullywug hatched from the original god-egg that spawned the race before it could breed true.  Since she is unable to reproduce with other bullywugs, the mother of toads mates with degenerate cultists and human captives.

The Mother of Toads in Combat

The mother of toads takes perverse pleasure in using illusions to lure unwary travelers into her embrace while her pets and servants hide nearby.  In the event of combat she reveals her true, disgusting form, immobilizing foes with swarms of frogs, and weakening them with a spray of secreted slime.  The mother of toads usually chooses the strongest and most virile looking male to control with her hallucinogenic saliva – committing unspeakable acts with the mind controlled slave once his companions have been eaten.

Encounters

The mother of toads dwells in a rustic cottage at the edge of a wild and dangerous swamp where she poses as a friendly herbalist and healer.  The swamp is littered with weird and sinister primordial idols from the time before the dawn war.  The mother of toads children (bullywugs, as well as giant frogs and toads) are never far off and always heed her commands.

These It Came from the DVR articles are going to be a little bit different.  As an early Christmas present to myself, I picked up a festival pass to the Toronto After Dark film festival.  So the first difference is that these are new movies, on the big screen, instead of old ones and niche programming on the small screen.  The second difference is that these are going to be short.  I’ve got eighteen films to see in seven days (as well as dressing up for the annual zombie walk), so I’m not going to have a whole lot of time to write, and I want post these while the blood is still fresh.
Toronto After Dark is a horror and genre film festival oozing with gobs of monster and rpg inspiration, but most of the films it showcases won’t see wide release – so in addition to extracting some rpg goodness from each movie, I’ll also give them a bit of a critique, so fellow gamers can know what they need to track down and what to avoid.  I’ll try and keep spoilers to an absolute minimum.

Love

Set in the near future, this film focuses on the life of astronaut Lee Miller during a solo mission on board the International Space Station.  Shortly after his arrival, something goes terribly wrong on the planet below and all communication stops.  Alone, Miller must deal with crushing loneliness and the dangers of the aging space station.  Hidden amongst the junk of previous crews, Miller finds an old journal written during the American civil war that hints at a profound secret.  As the astronaut begins to lose his mind, fantasy, reality, and the mystery of the journal begin to bleed into one another.

Visually Stunning, Emotionally Charged

Love is not a film people are going to feel ambivalent about.  Standing in line for the movie that followed the screening, it was apparent that festival goers who had just seen Love had very strong opinions about it.  I enjoyed Love immensely, and I’m not sure if it was the lack of sleep this far into the festival, but the movie had a pretty big emotional impact on me as well.
Before I go into Love’s merits, I think a good litmus test on whether you are going to hate this film depends on what you feel about 2001: A Space Odyssey – If you dug the second half of that movie (when Dave is alone on the ship, up to and including the funky space warp with the monolith), then I think that Love is for you.  But 2001 isn’t for everybody, and neither is Love.  I should also confess that I like the movie Solaris, so if that throws my judgment into question, I’ll understand.
Before making Love, writer and director William Eubank worked as a cinematographer, and it shows.  Love is absolutely beautifully shot.  There were moments, especially the civil war battle scenes, that I can honestly say are some of the best looking filmmaking I have ever seen.  After the screening Eubank announced that the film is being distributed on iTunes, and I’m glad it will reach a wider audience, but it also pains me to think it won’t get a proper theatrical release because I’m not sure you’ll be able to see the depth of detail on the small screen.  One scene in particular stands out in this regard – an amazing slow motion shot of a charging soldier where you can see the individual particles of dust being blown off his uniform by the shockwave of a nearby exploding mortar shell.  Amazing stuff.
Contrasted with the wide open, vividly colored civil war and fantasy scenes, Eubank creates a space station whose muted colors and oppressive atmosphere are cranked up to a Das Boot level of claustrophobia.  Actor Gunner Wright takes full advantage of this in his role as the astronaut (which is good since he’s on screen for the main chunk of the film).  His performance pulled me into Miller’s world, and aside from a few hiccups (he’s been in space how long?), kept me there for the full hour and a half.
The most incredible thing about Love though, and I still find it a little hard to believe given how good it looks (have I gushed enough yet?), is that the entire thing was shot in the back of Eubank’s parents’ ranch, with all the sets built by Eubanks in his spare time.  Even if you hate the movie (and I’ll admit there were quite a few haters in the audience), you have to be impressed by what the filmmaker was able to accomplish with the little he had.  Did I also mention it was shot with borrowed cameras?
I referenced 2001 earlier, and the DNA of Kubrick’s heritage is strongly manifest in Love.  There will always be cries of rip-off when a film wears it inspiration on its sleeve like Love does, but I feel it just manages to steer shy of being derivative and say something new.  Love shares many of 2001’s themes (isolation, madness, the meaning of humanity), as well as some superficial elements (most of which are spoilers), but goes about exploring them on a tangential course.  Ultimately, Eubanks has very different things to say about people than Kubrick does, and each film elicits a very distinct emotional response.
Love is recommended, especially for fans of 2001 who want to see a different reading of similar themes.  Even if you aren’t a fan of that kind of film, I recommend tracking down the civil war scenes and watching them on as large a screen as you possibly can.

RPG Goodness

Unlike most stories, which use clues or revelation to propel the plot, the driving force of Love is the absence of information (communication with earth ceases).  It might be counterintuitive, but I think it’s a technique that can be applied to rpgs both to foreshadow future adventures and to inject a little verisimilitude into the game world.
Beginning with the rumor table in the venerable Keep on the Borderlands (Bree-Yark means ‘I surrender’ in goblin language), and evolving into skill checks to gather information (or Streetwise or Conspiracy), D&D adventures have a long history of enticing players to progress to the next stage of the plot with packets of information.  I think that the absence of information can be just as motivating to players, driving them to seek out the answers.
As an example, instead of introducing the module Against the Giants with the Grand Duke informing the players that an alliance of giants has overrun the western portion of his dominion, pique their curiosity by telling them the grand duchy hasn’t heard from any of the villages bordering the Crystalmist Mountains in weeks.  The PCs, dispatched to find what has happened, can find evidence of giant attacks and as the adventure progresses, will come to realize the attacks are the result of a sinister group of masterminds organizing the disparate races of giantkind.    By starting with nothing, and uncovering the facts of the mystery themselves, the PCs ‘own’ the information, and are much more motivated to advance the plot of the adventure than if they felt the mystery was someone else’s (and therefore someone else’s problem – sorry Grand Duke, not interested).
Providing the players with gaps of missing information also works well when introduced into the campaign in the middle of a different adventure.  That way the mystery stays at the back of the players’ heads while they deal with more pressing matters, and when the issue comes up again later in the game (or escalates) it seems more organic and less like a video-game series of quests to tick off (thank-you for collecting eighteen squirrel tails, now I need a letter delivered…).  The absence of information can sometimes be just as important as a rich background for making the game world come alive.
Love also tackles the theme of isolation, which is difficult to apply to rpgs in an existential sense, but when thought of more practically, is a powerful tool in the DM’s arsenal (so powerful in fact, that it should be used sparingly or it will grow old very fast).  The old adage, ‘don’t split the party’ is true for a reason, and nothing panics a group of adventurers like being isolated against their will.  Pits (the Dungeon Master’s Guide has the standard example but my favorite is the pivoting floor and wall from Pyramid of Shadows), portcullises (from Dungeon Master’s Guide II) and conjured walls (just add the wizard class template to a monster and choose wall of fire, wall of ice or the forcecage power) are all excellent devices to separate members of the party from one another, especially when combined with a combat encounter.  If you are feeling extra devious, use this tactic while toying with the players’ impatience – stagger the combat encounter so the panicking players waste their most powerful abilities and resources on weaker creatures before the ‘big bad’ shows up (to reiterate, use sparingly if you don’t want to be pelted with dice).
The falling cage is a staple of evil throne rooms, does an excellent job of separating the party without separating them from the action, and I have yet to see one in a 4e adventure.  For that reason I present my own take on this classic trap.

Falling Barbed Cage

This trap works best in a combat encounter where the pressure plate is located between the party and a controller or artillery type monster, optimally along an obvious path of least resistance.  Alternatively, you can give control of the trap to one of the monsters, who waits until the characters are in position to activate the trap.
The falling barbed cage doesn’t inflict very much damage on its own, but is excellent at occupying and pinning down strikers and defenders that rush forward to attack soft targets.

These It Came from the DVR articles are going to be a little bit different.  As an early Christmas present to myself, I picked up a festival pass to the Toronto After Dark film festival.  So the first difference is that these are new movies, on the big screen, instead of old ones and niche programming on the small screen.  The second difference is that these are going to be short.  I’ve got eighteen films to see in seven days (as well as dressing up for the annual zombie walk), so I’m not going to have a whole lot of time to write, and I want post these while the blood is still fresh.
Toronto After Dark is a horror and genre film festival oozing with gobs of monster and rpg inspiration, but most of the films it showcases won’t see wide release – so in addition to extracting some rpg goodness from each movie, I’ll also give them a bit of a critique, so fellow gamers can know what they need to track down and what to avoid.  I’ll try and keep spoilers to an absolute minimum.

Some Guy Who Kills People

In this dark comedy, all of Ken Boyd’s problems can be traced back to the traumatic bullying he endured during high school.  It drove him to attempt suicide, which led to a stint in a mental hospital and now the only work he can get is a humiliating job at an ice cream parlour.  Living with his bitter and sarcastic mother, Ken trudges along the rut of his life… but everything changes when his estranged teenage daughter comes to stay with him and Ken’s tormenters start dropping like flies.

Dark, Sweet, and Funny

I expected Some Guy Who Kills People to be dark (it pretty much spells things out in the title), and funny (the trailer was hilarious) – and the film delivers.  What I didn’t expect was how sweet Some Guy Who Kills People is.  It’s rare to find a black comedy without a cynical bone in its body, but this film makes it work.  Maybe the murder and revenge keep the movie from descending into corniness and the sweetness keeps it from sliding into ironic despair.  I’m not sure, but it’s a nice balance.  You could call it ‘dark chocolate for the funny bone’ (eat your heart out Chicken Soup for the Soul!).
That balance that I mentioned takes great acting to pull off, and Some Guy could have been a disaster without it.  Kevin Corrigan is wonderful as the painfully awkward Ken, but isn’t so unreachable that you don’t feel sympathy for the guy when he has to cater the birthday party of one of the bullies dressed as a giant foam rubber ice-cream cone (and if it wasn’t painful it wouldn’t be nearly as funny).  Karen Black also does a good job as Ken’s harpy mother with a heart of gold (if you watch Burn Notice imagine Michael Weston’s mom, but instead of growing up to be a super-spy he had a dead-end job and still lived at home).   Barry Bostwick is hilarious as the bumbling local Sherriff (although bumbling isn’t really the right word – more like ridiculous) – anchoring much of the movie’s humour with straight-faced certainty and absolute deadpan delivery.  Holding her own amongst these veteran actors (shining even) is Ariel Gade as Ken’s young daughter.  I think I might even go so far as to say that her sincere performance, filled with spunky optimism, is the heart and soul of this film.  I see from her IMDB page that she’s been in a few movies I’ve watched (Dark Water, and Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem), but I have no memory of her (sorry).  If Some Guy gets wide release, her relative anonymity will change, because it will catapult Ariel Gade’s career like Little Miss Sunshine did for Abigail Breslin.
I’ve focused on the lighter elements (because they really stand out in a festival like Toronto After Dark) but it isn’t all gumdrops and lollipops, there’s also murder and death.  The kills are creative and funny, though I would have liked them to be a little bloodier (not Saw level violence mind you, but a little absurd, over the top arterial spray would have added something).
Some Guy Who Kills People is recommended.  It’s  a nerd fairy tale; watch it when life’s got you down and you want a revenge fantasy with your happily ever after.

SPOILER ALERT
I really only have one criticism of the film, but it’s wrapped up in a spoiler so I wanted to put it down here.  I won’t give too much away, but towards the end of the movie is a big plot twist (which is a spoiler if you’re looking for it the whole time).  At the end of the day it felt sort of awkward, as the mystery is one of those reveals, which is full of information that isn’t given to the audience prior to the twist.  I also felt it undermined what the filmmakers were doing with one of the main characters, since you cheer for him in spite (maybe because) of the murders.  It doesn’t ruin the movie; it just felt like they pulled their punch a little at the end.

RPG Goodness

Although the murders in Some Guy Who Kills People are funny (and the victims are unrepentant douchebags), they are also unequivocally ‘bad’ (as in ‘not something a good person would do’).  Watching the film with rpgs on the brain, I couldn’t help but think that the actions of the serial killer in Some Guy would not be out of place on the tabletop, and might not even be considered all that bad depending on the context they were committed within.  If the bullies happened to be a cabal of evil wizards in a dark tower, the PCs wouldn’t think twice about breaking into their home and slaughtering them in cold blood.  If though, like in the film, the bullies were just a bunch of 0-level commoners from town, things should be different.
The context of the PCs actions in both scenarios is informed not only by the morality of their alignment, but also by what I like to call the ‘frontier mentality’ (since it plays out very much like a western).  Things are dangerous in the wastelands and dungeons outside of civilization and the stakes are life and death.  Though mercy is expected of the noble, hostility is most often met with brutal violence.  On the other hand, once back behind the walls of society (‘in town’), adventurers need to heed the law and start acting civilized again.  The frontier mentality is something I like to play with in my games, by placing NPCs in town that I know will get the goat of the players, just to see if they can keep their swords in their sheaths (hey, DMs are allowed to have fun too).  I think using the scenario of the film (the PCs running into childhood bullies in town) would make for an exciting and tense encounter, especially if the bullies pose no physical threat (can the PCs resist the temptation?).
The arrival of Ken’s teen daughter in the film got me thinking – what would the PCs do if they had to bring a young dependant along with them on their adventures?  Instead of being a hassle, what if it was actually a reward?  The appearance of a young companion or sidekick that the hero is responsible for is a staple not just of comedies but also of action/adventure movies and comic books.  In spite of this, the only similar situation I can recall in my own games was when we made use of a table in 2e’s Complete Book of Bards– if a bard’s fame score was high enough a number of special events could occur, one of them being an obsessive 0-level fan that followed the character into dangerous situations.  While the crazed fan proved to be a lot of fun, he was hardly a benefit to the party.  I think that sidekicks can be both a boon and a liability (as they are in comics and films), so here I present guidelines for ward characters in D&D.

Ward Characters in D&D

After the hobgoblins of the red hand destroy your village, you must escort your feisty nephew to safety, out of the reach of the war.  Your renown has brought you to the attention of the indulgent Baron of the Nentir Vale, who volunteers you to take his headstrong daughter with you on your next adventure.  In order to fulfill your obligations to the University of Magical Arts you must train an apprentice, and there is no better classroom of magical lore than the ancient tombs and ruined temples of your frequent delves.  These NPCs are all examples of ward characters – inexperienced young men and women placed in your care, that, while not yet full-fledged adventurers, still have something to offer.
Ward characters are similar to companion characters, but lack the full suite of attacks and hit points of the latter.  They follow you on your adventures for a time, but don’t demand a salary like a hireling or take a share of the XP like a henchman.

Gaining a Ward

Ward characters cannot be bought like a piece of equipment or acquired through training like a feat.  A ward is added to the party either as a result of your character’s actions in an adventure, or as a story reward.  Once gained, a ward stays with the party as long as it makes sense: until your nephew is safe from the hobgoblin war, the Baron’s daughter grows tired of the hardships of adventuring, or your apprentice has learned your tuition.

Running a Ward

The DM introduces the ward into the game and controls their actions outside of combat according to their individual personality.  Generally, a ward has the same level as the party.  The ward forms a special bond with a single character in the party who controls their actions during combat.  The ward acts during your initiative in a manner similar to a wizard’s familiar, through the sacrifice of your actions.  Optionally, depending on the motives of the ward character, after each short rest the ward may form a bond with a different ally (for example, your nephew probably won’t follow anyone but you, but the Baron’s daughter might).  A ward can only be bonded to one character at a time.

Ward Characters in Play

A ward has two modes in combat that you can switch between by expending a minor action (by calling for help or giving an order): active and passive.
Passive: a passive ward is not participating in the combat.  Perhaps they are hiding in a nearby cupboard, have fled to a safe distance, or are taking refuge in your bag of holding.  In this mode the ward does not take up any space on the battlefield.
No Targeting: A passive ward cannot be targeted by any effect.
No Damage: A passive ward cannot be damaged by any effect.
No Benefit: A passive ward’s traits have no effect on any creature.
Active:  an active ward appears on the battlefield within 5 squares of you.  An active ward listens to your advice and moves around, although they are too inexperienced to make attacks. Unless their description states otherwise, the ward cannot flank an enemy.
Movement: By using a move action, you can move your ward her speed.
Range Limit: Unless otherwise noted, a ward isn’t confident enough to move more than 20 squares away from you.  If at the end of your turn the ward is more than 20 squares away, she immediately enters passive mode.
Actions: A ward can take actions (other than attacking) as normal, or use a skill from its skill list, but you must use the relevant action for her to do so.

Ward Character Statistics

All ward characters share the following statistics:

Additionally each ward also gains a special benefit.  When the ward is introduced, choose an appropriate role and add the traits to the statistics block:

Notes:

Since I wanted ward characters to be more than just a liability, I looked to existing D&D rules for ‘helpers’ as inspiration.  I liked 4e’s approach to familiars (giving up actions for them to do things and their death wasn’t as much of a burden as it was in other editions) and the modular nature of hirelings, so I basically hacked the two systems together.  This method might be a bit too gamist for some (the active and passive modes might annoy those who like less abstract NPC mechanics), but I think if it’s run right (the ward whimpering and running off to hide when reduced to 0 hit points for example) it can be fun and won’t break immersion.

These It Came from the DVR articles are going to be a little bit different.  As an early Christmas present to myself, I picked up a festival pass to the Toronto After Dark film festival.  So the first difference is that these are new movies, on the big screen, instead of old ones and niche programming on the small screen.  The second difference is that these are going to be short.  I’ve got eighteen films to see in seven days (as well as dressing up for the annual zombie walk), so I’m not going to have a whole lot of time to write, and I want post these while the blood is still fresh.
Toronto After Dark is a horror and genre film festival oozing with gobs of monster and rpg inspiration, but most of the films it showcases won’t see wide release – so in addition to extracting some rpg goodness from each movie, I’ll also give them a bit of a critique, so fellow gamers can know what they need to track down and what to avoid.  I’ll try and keep spoilers to an absolute minimum.

Redline

Redline is the animated magnum opus of writer and character designer Katsuhito Ishii, better known in the west as the man responsible for the animated sequences of Kill Bill Vol. 1.
Set in the far flung future, the film follows racecar driver ‘sweet’ JP as he works to qualify for the titular race and move past his days of throwing competitions for the mob.  The redline grand prix is deadly, there are no rules and contestants vehicles frequently sport missiles and other weaponry.  Because of the collateral damage it causes, redline is held on a different planet each race, the location kept secret until days before the meet.

This Is Your Brain.  This Is Your Brain on Redline.

Wow.  I wasn’t sure if I was going to make this screening, as it happened smack in the middle of the zombie walk, but I cheated a little (transforming into a fast zombie for a few blocks), and I’m really glad I made it.
I used to be a huge fan of anime, but over the years I’ve sort of drifted away, and haven’t been as zealous keeping up with the latest series and movies.  Redline re-ignited my interest and reminded me of the best of what the genre has to offer.
First of all, it’s absolutely beautiful to look at.  The highly detailed, hyper-stylized world is full of lurid colors that match perfectly with the high adrenaline story being told (‘high adrenaline’ isn’t quite a strong enough descriptor – more like ‘crank fuelled heart attack’).  If you can, see it on the big screen (or at least a big TV) and turn up the volume (the soundtrack was appropriately ‘high energy’).  We’ve all heard about seizure inducing anime before, but Redline was the first time I actually thought it could happen.
One more note about the animation.  It’s all hand drawn.  That means no computer generated vehicles.  Honestly, the movie is worth seeing just for that alone (seeing CGI and classical animation jammed together is one of my pet peeves – like a grain of sand in your eye).
Because they share a similar subject matter and medium, the obvious comparison for this film is the classic Speed Racer series, but I think a much better analog is the original Roger Corman classic, Death Race 2000.  Both films feature a dystopian future where the race is seen as a way to transcend an oppressive regime, both are light on plot but heavy on the interplay between larger than life racers with tricked out gimmicky cars, and (most importantly) both films share the same sense of fun.  The main difference being that Redline pulls off stuff Corman wouldn’t have thought of in his wildest dreams.
Yes, Redline is ridiculous, but the movie keeps on pushing until it becomes sublimely ridiculous.  I counted at least four moments during the screening when the whole crowd burst out into spontaneous applause, and I can’t remember the last time I ever saw that during an animated feature.
There isn’t a boring racer in the pack (which is an achievement for any racing movie): bosozoku inspired JP, a cyborg that’s a part of the car, a pair of magical (yes, magical) pop stars that ride in their anthropomorphic vehicle’s boobs, a pair of bounty hunters (one of whom looks exactly like Zoltar from Battle of the Planets) – the most vanilla of all the drivers is love interest Sonoshee and her nickname is ‘cherry-boy hunter’!
Redline is highly recommended, not just for anime fans, but really anyone who wants to see how you can do gonzo right.

RPG Goodness

There is a lot of inspiration crammed into Redline’s 102 minutes.  Character concepts, crazy names (my favorite: a Godzilla sized bio-weapon codenamed ‘Funky Boy’), and interesting weapons (the Zoltar-esque bounty hunter has a siege sized grappling gun that tethers his vehicle to faster ones with a chain).  All are prime fodder for the rpg table, but the core of Redline is the race, an element that isn’t featured in too many tabletop rpg adventures, despite it being a staple of the action/adventure genre.
Adding a race into D&D is a perfect opportunity to make a skill challenge.  I know there are mixed feelings about skill challenges for 4e, but it’s a subsystem that I think is robust enough to both represent a wide variety of activities and also survive judicious tweaking (making it a kind of ‘mini-game’, at the risk of using a dreaded video game term and giving the 4e haters some ammunition).
I should note this skill challenge is a bit different than most, in that it includes a random table and isn’t resolved by the traditional successes vs. failures format (by its nature a race is a competition between individuals).  I thought adding some random mayhem into the challenge would be fun and would reflect the craziness of the film.

The Great Race

“It only happens once a decade – a race so dangerous that simply surviving to reach the finish line is a goal worthy of glory.  There are no overseers.  There are no rules.  There is only speed and the blood of the fallen on the dusty road.”

Setup: First, determine the enemy racers.  These should equal the number and level of the PCs participating in the race (higher level monsters can be used for a harder challenge, and the number of enemy racers can be decreased if an elite or solo monster is used, or increased if minions are included).
Second, determine the length of the race.  Short races are 5 rounds, long races are 10 rounds, and grueling endurance matches are 15 rounds (expect most racers not to finish).
Level: Award XP equal to the value of the monsters used as enemy racers.  In long races add additional XP equal to a single monster of the party’s level.  In endurance matches add additional XP equal to a pair of monsters of the party’s level.
Running the Challenge: During the first round of the race, roll initiative as normal.  In subsequent rounds initiative order is determined by track position, with pole position (1st place) acting first.  Using miniatures to determine track position is helpful, but remember, the position on the track is an abstract way of determining where the racers are, not an accurate measure of distance in squares.
Each round, roll on the random event table to set the tone for that leg of the race.  Effects from the random event table are applied to racers at the start of their turn.
During their turn, a racer can either advance, block, attack, or recover.
To advance, a racer attempts a moderate skill check.  Success indicates the racer has moved up 1 position.  Racers who fail this check do not move.  If the racer is attempting to move into a position with an enemy blocking creature, the skill check is instead hard.  Appropriate skills to advance include (but are not limited to): Acrobatics, Athletics, and Nature (In Gamma World use Str/Con, Dex/Int, and Mechanics checks instead).
Racers can use their turn to block.  This makes it more difficult for other racers to enter their position, but also makes it difficult to avoid enemy attacks.  Any creature actively blocking grants combat advantage.
A racer can try and attack his opponents to eliminate the competition or settle a personal grudge.  A creature can make a melee attack against a racer in the same position, a close attack against a racer in the same or an adjacent position, or a ranged/area attack against a racer one position distant or an adjacent position.
Finally, a racer can take their turn to recover.  This allows a racer to take a second wind (allowing the racer to spend a healing surge and granting a +2 bonus to defenses for the round).  Unlike the previous actions, a racer can only recover once a race.
At the end of the final round of the race, the racer in the pole position wins.  In the event of a tie, all racers in the pole position make a final skill check to advance, and the racer with the highest score wins.
Since the PCs will likely be working together, don’t have the monster racers attack one another (it would become too easy), but don’t have them cooperate in coordinated group attacks either (unless you divide the monster racers into ‘teams’, in which case each team will work together as much as possible).
Optional: If you want the race to be more involved, include the mounts and vehicles for each racer (especially if one or more of the PCs has the mounted combat feat).  In this case, close and area attacks affect both racer and mount, while melee and ranged attacks affect either the racer or the mount.
If a racer uses an action point they are able to take two different actions during their turn (but not two of the same action).