KCR: Strikemasters (novel, military)

Strikemasters ranks among the worst books I've read. It is formulaic, presents military in impossible terms, is a blatant copy of already existing plots, and is basically a joke all around. I've read most technothrillers, from Harold Coyle to Tom Clancy to Dale Brown and plenty of people in between. Bill Kellan, in his "Strikemasters" attempts to emulate the style, but came up miles short.

Premise: US have a secret of secrets base, hidden even more than Area 51... called Area 153 (three times ore secret than Area 51, get it? 51x3? Ha-ha). Test pilot "Gunn" was sent on secret orders to join this group of misfits... flying three modified C-17's, which is so stealthed, it's even SOUND-stealthed (think Blue Thunder) and visually stealthed (smart-skin). One's the gunship, one's a dropship (paratroopers) and one's a tank landing ship. When Al Qaeda offshoot kidnapped 5 USAID workers in Pakistan and want to execute them on TV, Strikemasters are called in to deal with them... by the program's leader, because one of the hostages was his daughter.

Do you see the problem? I don't mind a bit of tech. I am a BIG fan of science fiction. However, putting super-stealth technology on a TRANSPORT PLANE? AND technology that just WORKS without ANY sort of explanation? It's impossible to sound-stealth a jet, even with active sound cancelling. You certain't can't quiet the rush of air. Smartskin is possible but a plane is impossible to keep absolutely clean, and any dirt will make the smartskin active camo useless. The premise of the leader of the program sending in the group as a private army is even MORE ridiculous. This guy is even more reckless than Rambo.

Let me describe a scene, and you tell me if it makes any sense. The tank-carrier plane intercepted a corp jet and through some sort of impossible eavesdropping tech, determined that UBG (ultimate bad guy) is onboard, but this jet doesn't have weapons. So what they did was... the stealth plane overtook the jet, still stealthed, then opened the rear ramp, so the tank use the main cannon to shoot the other plane out of the sky.

WTF?! Haven't this guy heard of wingtip vortex turbulence? You can't fly in front of the other plane without the other plane knowing it, even if you are positively CLOAKED! And haven't this guy heard of COAX machine gun? WTF?!

This guy reads like someone who wrote a technothriller without doing ANY research except what he *think* the military ought to operate like, then proceed to throw laws of physics out the window. There's a ton more impossible situations in the book that defies logic.

All being said, this is one of the most idiotic books I've read. Good thing I only paid a buck for it, and even then I felt it's sorta wasted.

Rating: Avoid it like the plague

KCR: Sky Crawlers (anime movie)

Image via WikipediaSky Crawlers is not what it appears to be at first glance: an anime movie about aerial dogfights. Instead, this movie is about what is war, and what are the effects on the warriors, and how a society can be structured around war.

The Setup: two planes are on patrol when they were ambushed by "the Teacher", an enemy ace that had NEVER been defeated. Later, a new pilot, who looked like a kid, arrived at the base as replacement. Somehow he had a sense of deja vu... as if he had done this before. What sort of secrets is this airbase hiding? Why does the commander look so hostile and tender at the same time, almost as if she recognized him?

The animation itself is gorgeous, the flight sequences beautiful. It is hard to further discuss this movie without spoiling the plot, suffice to say that this makes a huge political statement about the necessity of war, and its effect on the warriors.

Rating: Worth watching at least once

KCR: Tom Clancy's HAWX

This book is simply poorly written, and it's clear that David Michaels is not a single person, but a pseudonym assumed by a variety of writers hired by Ubisoft to pump out novelizations in order to capitalize on their own games. Some of the Splinter Cell novels are quite good. This book simply is lousy.

The plot, created by Tom Clancy and his minions, are a bit of alarmist but fine... Basically, private military corporations, i.e. mercenaries, are made legal and takes over quite a bit of actual operations... at a price. A certain air force pilot was RIFed (i.e. let go) he joined a PMC called Firehawk, then CIA asked him to keep an eye out on Firehawk, which may not be quite up and up. What he finds out later will have serious consequences not only for himself, but for the entire United States...

The plot makes sense, but the characters are shallow, and some of the technical details are wrong. Clearly, Ubisoft and Red Storm have no technical editors to spare on this project. This book is a major disappointment.

KCR: Black Lightning (movie, scifi, superhero)

Black Lightning's real title is Chernaya Molniya. It's a Russian movie about a super-car, and it shamelessly rips off Spiderman and Transformers, with a few bits from the Matrix as well.

The short of it... This poor kid is having problem getting girls and keeping good grades. To cheer him up, his dad bought an ANCIENT Volga for him. It was through an accident that he discovered that this Volga is special... It can actually fly. When his dad was killed by a street thug, the kid turned into "Black Lightning", the flying car vigilante. Unfortunately, this also brought him the attention of the local gazillionaire, who wants the special energy source in the car to power his nefarious scheme. There will be a flying car showdown...

There are parts shamelessly ripped from Spiderman (death of Peter's uncle at the hands of the thug, because Peter Parker didn't care enough to stop the thug, for example), and bits from the Matrix (that huge "drill", for example) that the movie appears to be a bit too much of a mishmash. They also thrown in bits about the kid's personal life (trying to get a girlfriend, and deal with his rich friend Maxim), so the movie is getting a bit disjointed. The car itself also seem to have little personality, if any.

Supposedly the director is getting a budget to shoot an American remake slated for 2012 release. We'll see if this one is any better.

I wouldn't pay $22.95 for it (It's on Amazon with English subtitles) but it you can rent it for a few bucks it may be worth checking out.

Rating: Try it (rental or single view)

Black Lightning DVD on Amazon

Related articles

• Black Lightning International Trailer (screencrave.com)  (video link is dead)
• Black Lightning Poster and Trailer (filmfilia.com) (this Russian preview works)