I have
stumbled upon something truly awful here, haven’t I? I went to http://awholenewworldofarronredbeard.weebly.com (I was searching for song lyrics, got
lost somewhere) a site which hosts a collection of ‘fanfic’ series. Unlike
traditional fanfics, this uses characters from DC, Marvel and some other
properties but holds no delusion that it’s cannon to any particular show or
in-comics, in fact, it’s part of its own universe.
So what
makes this story so bad. Let’s dig into the opening 3-parter and find out.
We open into
the “Sarrahian Weapons Gallery” and I’m confused, we find out later that Sarrah
is the name of a planet, it only has one weapon’s gallery? Whereabouts on
Sarrah is it? And why in the name of all that’s holy do you name your Planet
“Sarrah” anyway? Our protagonist, Arron (why that spelling, isn’t Aaron more
traditional) jumps through a window having robbed the place. He narrates to
himself that “this wasn’t supposed to happen” what, was robbing the weapons
gallery not supposed to result in the guards attacking? That would be weird.
Anyway, a
guard radios the police, as Arron takes a bike he had stashed and drives away but the Police chase after him, in fact they teleport right in front of him. The
leader of the group, Galivagar, tells Arron to stop, but instead Arron heads
off road where the Police’s vehicles will struggle to follow (and yet now they
can’t teleport in front of him for some reason) two police use hoverboards
(wait, I thought he just said their vehicles can’t go off road, the hover-boards
are clearly a form of transport) to pursue, Arron quickly dispatches them with
a trip wire, the hoverboard evidenally cannot hover a couple of extra inches.
Arron drives
out the forest to find Galivagar waiting for him, so wait, they did have
teleport? Why didn’t they just use that? Arron activates jets in his bike,
launching him over the police, they now pursue on vehicles, Arron heads to the
docks where he drives his bike into the water, knowing that standard police
protocol was to attach a tracer to bike. He manages to teleport out of the
water, whilst the Police search for him. Wait, what? Why the f*ck didn’t he do
that earlier. Did he want to get caught? Also, what kind of place is this if
everyone has access to that? People could get away with just about anything.
He takes his
haul down into the warehouse where he receives communication from Ragnarok, the
Norse equivalent of the end of the universe but here he’s a gun smuggler/crime lord, it’s
almost like the guy knew nothing of Norse Mythology when he came up with that
name. Arron asks when he’ll complete his side of the bargain but Ragnorok says
it’s an opportunity he intends to milk
Arron
flashes back to when this all started. He was a member of the Sarrahian Police
Force (there’s only one of them apparently) It also has a stupid name, the S3PF,
go figure. Anyway, he’s present when
Commissioner Geopold (who he’d earlier said had been responsible for some of
his advanced driving practice) introduces Galivagar onto the force. Galivagar
attempts to remove the mask that Arron wears but Arron stops him. Geopold
explains the mask is a medical requirement because of an old wound. He praises
Arron for being responsible for the bust of gang lord Ragnarok that’s about to
take place and calls him “one of the bed officers on the force” could be an
alien language thing, but I think he means best. Tsk tsk.
We cut to
the Red Forest Casino, where Ragnarok is, henchmen begin to fire on the police but they’re wearing Kevlar and are bullet proof. Ragnarok escapes but Arron
uses infra-red to track him down and he knocks him out. The next morning (or at
least I’d think it’s the next morning, they don’t give us a time stamp) Geopold
informs Arron that one of his old friends, Anut, has gone missing. He also
informs him that Ragnarok has been cleared of all charges. Arron suspects foul
play but it couldn’t be a member of Ragnarok’s crew because no-one working
for Ragnarok could talk to the judge or jury. (How would they know if they’re
in disguise? There are ways around this)
Arron returns
home and finds Ragnarok had broken in. Ragnarok tells him that Anut was
kidnapped by him and if Arron wants to see him alive, he’ll follow Ragnarok’s
orders. And so the first story ends with Ragnarok giving the order for Arron to
break into police headquarters.
Each story
comes with a co-feature, I’m not gonna be covering them, because there’s enough
with the main story.
Part 2
continues where we left off. Arron asks why, and Ragnarok states that the
weapons that were recovered during the raids were impounded there. Reminding
Arron, that he has Anut captive, Arron accepts the mission (calling him a son
of a *****, rather than the usually designated sonuvab*tch) so Arron breaks in
using ‘silent plungers’ (yeah, I know, sounds stupid to me too) and overhears a conversation between Galivagar and
Geopold, Geopold is sceptic about Arron’s doings and suspects there might be
more to it than they know.
He enters
the room where the impound is and it seems like it’s a room for Gotham City in
the Arkham games, with convenient gargoyles everywhere, multiple layers, etc.
Arron takes out all of the guards and enters the vault, he takes some things
but is confronted by Geopold and Galivagar. He teleports away, but Galivagar
managed to get a tracer on him. Back at the warehouse Ragnarok orders that the
weapons be brought straight to him (wait, you know where he is? Do what you did
at the Police Station there, take out the guards, then him quickly before they can kill your friend) and Galivagar calls upon the
entire police force to pursue. And that’s it. That’s all of part 2. Don’t you
just love inconsistent pacing? Makes you want to take the nearest living
creature and throttle it. But I digress, part 3
On the
‘Sarrahian streets’ (who cares where, it’s on Sarrah) Arron watches as the
police recover his bike) Arron sets up a trap to steal it back but the officers
came prepared to ambush him. Arron uses a burst of super-speed known as a
reflex (which he hasn’t used before now, because reasons) to take out the big
gun, held by Galivagar, then creates a smoke-screen to disorientate the others
whilst he escapes on his bike.
Of course
rather than using their teleport powers, they decide to chase him on
hoverboards. Arron knocks two of them off with balls (was that
supposed to be bolas? Would make more sense but then he’s being chased by
people on hoverboards, sense had long since gone out the window) the Police
begin shooting, in the middle of the road, where they could easily hit someone
else, so Arron takes a back alley, setting traps for more hoverboarding
policemen. A shot narrowly misses him from Galivagar, Arron comes back and
warns him that firing that weapon in a built up area could kill people (no sh*t)
Arron gets away.
Galivagar
reports to Geopold of the events, and Geopold is bemused. He goes to the
compound to check what had been stolen (which he should’ve done immediately
after Arron got away from the compound)
Arron
arrives at Ragnarok’s headquarters and hands him a briefcase, it contains a
teleporter to teleport the weapons to him, so Arron didn’t have to carry them
(wait, in an earlier scene the police passed straight through, they could’ve
recovered the weapons!) Using Anut, Ragnarok forces Arron to teleport the
weapons over and because the police are stupid, they do. Anut is released, but
they both point guns at Arron. Anut had taken to gambling again and needed the
money to settle his debts. They try to fire but nothing happens. Arron had set
them up.
Back at
police HQ, Geopold discovers that rather that nothing had in fact been stolen
from the vault, in fact the Plasma Rifle Arron had stolen from the weapons
museum had turned up. Geopold realises Arron’s plan and contacts Galivagar. The
plan was always to covertly replace the real weapons with a box of fates, Arron
left the security footage of the vault on just long enough so that Ragnarok
would see the switch, he then deactivated the camera and switched them back.
The Police blast through, and we get a repeat of the scene from the first
episode, pretty much note for note. The only difference is Anut is disarmed by
Arron and left (I assume he’s arrested, but he wasn’t knocked out, he had an
opportunity there) and that Ragnarok is left with broken wrists
At police
HQ, Arron tells Ragnarok he knows that it was he who bribed the jury for
Ragnarok’s original release (and if you’re wondering, no, we never find out how
he knows that, so he’s just an a**hole) and Arron gets his reward for reckless
endangerment, injuring several police officers, some severely, and breaking and
entering. He’s part of the secret service. Yay…!
This gives
me rage issues!
Want to know
a secret
Yes, I was
the writer behind this opening and actually every story written on that site.
Apologies for the deception, but it’s worth being honest and showing that I can
criticise my own works, not just the works of others. Not to mention. April
Fool
Just to get
a couple of the plot-holes sorted
1) Arron had
a teleport pad said up at the warehouse, he’d be teleported to that exact
location, once he’s in range. Teleportation does leave a trace (hence why
criminals are able to use it) so better for them to assume he’d been killed in
the water
2) The
Police’s teleport system is a bit more advanced, not requiring a pad, it’s
still requires some computing, so it’s not quick enough to keep up with a
moving vehicle like the hoverboards were
3) No, I
didn’t really relate the name Ragnorok to the Norse term at the time
4) I won’t
defend any spelling errors, but I will point out that I’m much more thorough in
checking my current stories.
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Images used in this review belong to their respective owners. All images in this review are subject to fair use.
For more reviews click here
Images used in this review belong to their respective owners. All images in this review are subject to fair use.
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