Author of adventure/thriller and horror fiction

THE LAST OF US

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Based on the popular computer game and shot in my hometown and surrounding areas, THE LAST OF US is a post-apocalyptic HBO show about a man tasked with transporting a girl, who may be humanity’s last hope, across what’s left of the United States. In my view, this is an almost perfect apocalyptic series.

Twenty years after the world ended due to a rampant pandemic of fungal infection that turned its victims into monsters, Joel (Pedro Pascal) has lost what was most important to him and lives as a hardened survivor in a quarantine zone. When he’s contacted by the leader of a local rebel organization called the Fireflies to transport a girl named Ellie (Bella Ramsey) across the country to a research facility, he resists at first but takes on the burden. For humanity, the stakes couldn’t be higher, as the girl is immune. The story rolls out as a series of encounters on the road, with substantial flashbacks and back stories that slow the pacing but ultimately enrich the overall story and world building.

From every angle, this is my favorite kind of apocalyptic story. Realistic, gritty, savage, inhabited by an evolving and monstrous predatory enemy, full of horrifying moral choices, and showing that humanity doesn’t just come to an end but is holding out in small tribes and in old government quarantine zones now run by a brutal descendant of the military under endless martial law. What used to be that rare breathtaking money shot is everywhere now thanks to cheaper effects, presenting communities and survivors living in the crumbling ruins of American civilization. This is an apocalypse that is hazardous, beautiful, has its own rules and logic, feels real, and looks lived in.

The casting is solid. I had to get past Bella Ramsey looking so different than the Ellie in the game, but she grew on me as the show progressed, and she’s a great actor with a lot of range, portraying a girl who is tough and brassy but also vulnerable and longing. As for Joel, I couldn’t have asked for better than Pascal, who fully inhabits a man who is a true survivor and killer but haunted by trauma and the physical effects of decades of rough living, from minor hearing loss to aching knees. He’s no superhero like in the game, but instead a worn-out, traumatized, bitter survivor who does what it takes and knows how to kill.

The moral choices are absolutely terrific. The organization the government morphed into has eradicated individual rights and freedoms, but they’re also the only thing holding the infected at bay. Soldiers must make a choice to kill refugees, because if they don’t, they may end up fighting them later. A group resorts to cannibalism, but it was either that or die by starvation. It all culminates in the last episode with an ultimate moral choice that may appear to most viewers to be the wrong one even if it is for some good reasons. In this series, there are few heroes and villains, just people trying to survive in different ways, with survival itself meaning different things to different people.

Overall, I loved THE LAST OF US and highly recommend it.

DESERT CREATURES by Kay Chronister

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I recently enjoyed Kay Chronister’s DESERT CREATURES, a novel about a future slow apocalypse due to environmental catastrophe.

In this story, toxic rain has driven humanity into the desert, where clever businessmen have set up a religion based in Las Vegas to establish and maintain their power and wealth. In this dangerous and evolving world, Magdala, a child, struggles to survive and wants to make a pilgrimage so that a saint will heal her clubfoot, a deformity where the foot is turned inward. The novel follows her life in a world that is slowly dying along with a heretic priest who may be able to perform miracles.

This is an odd one, I have to say that first. The environment is hostile but also evolving, developing new strange life forms and imposing escalating pressure on human biology and society until it is barely subsisting and seems ready to simply join the desert itself. There is a lot of religion. The narrative jumps protagonists and then forward in time, with a lot of wandering and frustrated hopes and no clear theme, making the story feel a little disjointed with some readers likely wondering, what’s the story here, and where is this all going?

Yeah, okay, but I liked it. It’s less one thing than a collection of things, and the mosaic they formed caught me. The new desert life in particular was interesting and weird, I liked the adaptation of Christianity to cowboy saints and casinos, the ongoing degradation of society is pretty bleak, and the story drags you through the dirt and dust while maintaining a mythic feel to it, with some fantasy elements as strange as the landscape.

Overall, I admired what Chronister was trying to do here in this ambitious, different novel. It didn’t quite come together for me as a reader to make it a favorite, but I enjoyed the aspiration and what I received, enough to say, hey, take a look and see if this one might be for you.

THE DRIFT by C.J. Tudor

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C.J. Tudor’s THE DRIFT is a terrific apocalyptic thriller with clever construction, a cascade of page-turning thriller elements, and a strong thematic focus on how crisis brings people together and tears them apart.

The story follows three main narratives, each with its own protagonist. Hannah, a student at an elite Academy, awakens on a crashed bus that was evacuating the school to a secure mountaintop facility called The Retreat due to an outbreak of a viciously persistent disease that is slowly destroying the world. Former detective Meg awakens with several strangers on a cable car suspended above a snowstorm; they were on their way to The Retreat, but the power is out and they’re stranded. And Carter, who works at The Retreat, struggles to survive with a small band of other survivors, but there may be a murderer in their midst.

Tudor proves herself a thriller master, as each of these storylines quickly portrays clear, easy-to-remember characters, sets up a locked room and ticking time bomb, and then bombards them with an avalanche of obstacles, problems, and escalating threats. By the end, we get to know their backstories and why they’re here, how the narratives tie together, and what it’s all adding up to.

I liked almost everything about this book. The pandemic is handled in an interesting way, the thriller style keeps the pages turning at a swift pace, there is some engaging reader detective work about how the storylines tie together, and there’s a solid thematic focus on how crisis unites and then breaks societies. As a fan of apocalyptic fiction, I’ve always been interested in how people would react to something like say zombies. I’ve always been a believer that humans are primarily cooperative animals and that this trait helped us reach the top of the food chain. This cooperation, however, is based on the principle of reciprocity–if I do for you, you do for me. Eventually, that principle may break down, and then it’s every person for themselves.

One potential downside for readers, particularly apocalyptic fiction fans, is there isn’t a lot of backstory on the state of the world and the pandemic itself. Almost all the events in the book happen in isolation, with the story’s focus being on these characters and their immediate survival. And if you’re new to thrillers, be prepared for a veritable kitchen sink of sudden obstacles.

Overall, I really enjoyed THE DRIFT and will be keeping an eye out for future works by this author.

VESPER (2022)

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In VESPER, civilization has collapsed due to environmental catastrophe, resulting in humans struggling to survive in a world filled with parasitic and poisonous flora. Despite the plotting being stretched to the breaking point, it’s a remarkable film for its fantastic world building and strong characters. I liked this one quite a bit.

I’ve always been fascinated by the idea of an apocalypse caused by a radical ecological transformation resulting in humans no longer being at the top of the food chain. In VESPER, humanity resorted to using genetically engineered organisms in an attempt to save itself from climate disaster. Unfortunately, the organisms ran amok and displaced most of the flora while consuming all of the animals and most of the humans. In this depopulated world overrun with monstrous plants and insects, most of the survivors eke out a living in small communities, while a lucky privileged few live in advanced communities called Citadels, where they started genetically engineered themselves to live forever. Each year, the Citadels sell seeds to the people outside, which enables them to grow enough food to survive, but the seeds expire at the end of the growing season, keeping them dependent and selling their blood that is used for life extension.

It’s an utterly ruthless world where everything uses or outright consumes everything else, a status quo that seems impossible to change. That doesn’t stop 13-year-old Vesper from imagining something better. Though a child, she forages for food, pulls together power to keep a machine running that in turn keeps her father alive, craves the love of her missing mother, and does her own genetic engineering projects. When a mysterious stranger arrives, she believes she can get a better life. But the place the stranger came from and the local chief will fight her.

The trailer suggested the story would be about a journey, but that’s only a small part of it. Most of VESPER deals with the girl fighting to keep her hope alive, in particular against the local chief, who makes a fantastic villain. He doesn’t want things to change, as in the status quo, he is in control of the world as he understands it. He is what she will become if she surrenders hope that things can change for the better, which makes him such a great antagonist. He’s monstrous, but he came by it honestly, informed by a rational worldview.

The last act kind of breaks down in how far it made sense to me, but the ending is pretty clear in its intentions, and by then, I’d gotten so hooked on this fascinating, exotic, and harsh world that I was good with it. Overall, I liked this one a ton. It’s imaginative, affecting, and for its budget, it created an extraordinary world that felt both bizarre and real, lived in by characters who are the product of it and must make their way within its rules.

MOTHER/ANDROID (2021)

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In MOTHER/ANDROID (2021), a pregnant woman and her partner struggle to survive the android apocalypse. Critics and fans alike seemed to dislike this movie, based on Rotten Tomatoes ratings, but, well, I liked it. Though it doesn’t really add anything new to the apocalyptic genre and the drama at the climax didn’t hit me the way it was supposed to, there is a pleasure in a simple story well told, and this is one such story.

It’s the future, which looks like ours except many people now have android servants. The story basically begins with Georgia (Chloë Grace Moretz, usually not my favorite actor but she does a terrific job here) telling Sam (a calmly understated Algee Smith) that she is pregnant on Christmas Eve. When they go to a party, things don’t look good for the couple, who bicker over whether she should have a drink. Unfortunately, a catastrophic event is about to eclipse their issues: a mysterious signal blasts the country, triggering all androids to kill humans. Whether the signal freed them to do what they wanted or ordered them to kill, we don’t know, but the effect is the same. We’re all screwed.

Fast forward nine months, and a very pregnant Georgia is still with Sam, traveling in remote areas trying to figure out a way out of the country. They learn that there are boats in Boston still evacuating refugees and decide to take the risk of crossing no-man’s land to get there.

This movie offers everything I like about the apocalyptic genre: characters I care about, the blitzkrieg panic of the shit hitting the fan, some apocalyptic money shots, a scary monster-as-machine adversary, a simple point A to point B mission, and plenty of tough choices along the way between options that range from really sucking to only mostly sucking. I also particularly enjoyed that this wasn’t a story where everyone is dead except for our heroes and a few crazed survivors; America is still fighting, only it’s slowly losing. Oh, and the acting is solid.

On the downside, there could have been a little more action, it would have been nice to find out the real reason the androids revolted, and the ending didn’t hit me in the feels the way the filmmakers wanted it to. Georgia doesn’t seem to have much of a character arc where she changes or overcomes some flaw or misbelief, giving the film a kind of “well, that happened” feeling at the end. Overall, again, this movie didn’t really add much new to the apocalyptic genre.

All that being said, if you’re a fan of apoc films like me, I think you’ll find plenty to appreciate in MOTHER/ANDROID. It’s a simple story well told, that’s it. Overall, I liked it.

STATION ELEVEN

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Based on the novel by Emily St. John Mandel, STATION ELEVEN (HBO) is a miniseries about a group of connected people experiencing the end of the world due to a superflu and the efforts to carry on and rebuild civilization in the aftermath. Beautifully directed, well acted, and emotionally powerful, the effort fell a bit short for me in coherence and believable character motivation, resulting in a show that seemed to say, “Don’t think too hard, just feel.”

I’d read the novel and found it very well written and rich in nostalgia and feeling even if I wasn’t sure what it was all for or trying to do other than say we’re all connected and don’t want to be alone. The story just sort of ends without really tying it all together other than in a very general theme. So I was curious about what direction a screen adaptation might take.

During a presentation of Shakespeare’s KING LEAR in Chicago, a famous movie actor playing the star role dies of a heart attack just before the world begins to fall apart in a mass die-off due to a new superflu that mutates, becoming highly contagious and lethal. What we see is a group of people all connected to this actor and a graphic novel his estranged ex Miranda created, titled STATION ELEVEN, as they live their lives before the flu, suffer the end of the world, and survive in the aftermath.

There is no single main character, though if one were to be chosen, it would fall on Kirsten, who at the age of eight served as the actor’s understudy for KING LEAR, survived with two brothers, and years later is a performer in an acting and musical group known as The Traveling Symphony, which tours settlements each year performing Shakespeare. Trouble arrives when a settlement calling itself the Museum of Civilization wants them to come perform, while a mysterious group of children led by a man called The Prophet seemingly wants to destroy all vestiges of the old so the world can renew itself with a clean slate.

It starts off like a literary and apocalyptic dream, quite beautifully directed with numerous artistic touches and plenty of attention for detail such as an apocalyptic Chicago. The show writers made some directions that went off the novel that I thought were fairly worthwhile, fleshing things out and tying the people together more closely while more deeply exploring the ideas of Shakespeare’s HAMLET, about a young man angry at his absent father and resorting to destruction to make his own mark. (With the exception of a young Kirsten, the young do not come off well in all this, deranged and angry and lashing out at being denied an inheritance their elders know but they themselves don’t even understand.) Unfortunately, the way it comes together in the last act felt forced for me as I puzzled over character motivations and became uncertain even about the story’s coherence. As a result, a lot of the soaring emotional impact the show intended to deliver in the last act was kind of lost on me.

Overall, I liked STATION ELEVEN–loved it, actually–for its better qualities. I just wish its conclusion realized its ambition by coming together with greater clarity.