Father Malone's Weekly Roundup - The Crow 1989, The Crow 1994, The Crow 2024

We're talking about the comic. We're talking about the nineteen ninety four flick, and we're talking about the newly released remake, reimagining adaptation that's in theaters now. It's got penny Wise horror Fiends. This is a series of films and its inspiration that are positively drenched in tragedy. The Crow started out as a comic series on the Caliber label. They were all written and drawn by the excellently named James O.

a look at the source material. I find little things like antecedents to be important, especially when there seems to be a whole fan base who've decided anything other than that Brandon Lee movie simply will not do when it comes to interpreting these comics. And we're going to get there too. The comic was a four issue series came out in nineteen eighty nine, and it is about an auto mechanic, not a musician, named Eric, no last name.

He returns from the dead a year later, we're told, and he immediately sets out hunting down criminals, pumping them for information and then dispatching them in brutal and not really outlandish at all.

to take you away. No, they don't have to take you away. All breaks two cops. Sarah the little girl who narrates the film. She's in one scene in the comic. You know how a movie is usually like a strip to the bone version of a novel. The comic is like a strip to the bone version of the movie. And it's told in this maddening flashback structure where it isn't revealed until the end that Eric in Shelley's car breaks down and there happened upon by T Bird's gang.

It's all totally random. Also, the Crow in the comic is not the source of his power. It's nothing but a guide. It in fact speaks to him, something none of the films have ever attempted, which is weird because every film ends up employing a narrator or some sort of audience proxy so we can find our way through that universe if only the original comic had a solution to that. But which character in the Crow could be

counted on for that sort of thing? Oh yeah, And in the comic, the Crow, like I said, he can talk to Eric, and he's kind of a dick. He's constantly chiding him that he's wasting time with his memories of Shelley. Oh, it's a fun relationship. And oh at the end, there's no fancy supernatural twist when it comes to dispatching T Bird. Eric doesn't pour the pain that Shelley endured for thirty six hours in intensive care into

the villain. In the book, Shelley dies on the scene, and it's Eric who clings to life before dying and joining her here. The finale is t Bird crashes his car trying to elude Eric, and then Eric walks up with a hammer and bashes his skull in. It's that kind of comic. It is a less nuanced punisher. If I'm being totally honest about the comic books, it's the later stuff than I found interesting. That's when the Crow

would assume many different forms. It's not just Eric, it's different figures through history, like there's a cowboy who is resurrected after one hundred years to settle up with the descendants of his murderers. That one's actually a favorite. But the entire series is hamstrung by its premise because it's always revenge. It's always the Crow leads somebody back to murder the people who murdered him. Basically, though, I will say o Bar became a lot more adapt with his

artwork as the comic continued. I loved how grubby the first run of it was when I read it, but I'm glad he's improved. It is an angry book, and I hope it helped mister Obar exercise some of his demons. Me I loved those books, as did a cyberpunk author John Shirley and producer Jeff Most, who were the once who wrote the initial drafts of the script for The Crow together, though only Shirley is credited due to a WGA rule against producers taking a credit. That's a pre

nineteen ninety five rule. No producer could take a writing credit where their script would be rewritten by splatterpunk author David Scow, who brought the supernatural more to the forefront and sharpened a lot of the dialogue. And that pretty

much brings us to nineteen ninety four starring Brandon Lee. The Crow.

the movie. No film is made in a vacuum. But those four are responsible not only for your continued love of the Crow, but I dare say that the current state of goth culture begins with these four. I know Lydia Deeds and Tim Burton are obviously huge accomplices in the subcultural explosion. But Alex Proyus, the director, al McDowell, the production designer, Arian Phillips costume designer, and Joelne Cherry the music supervisor. These four, those sets, those models, those outfits,

that look, those sounds. Troyes turns this film into a comic book in ways the comic book couldn't. Detroit and the Crow is a dream world. It's burned out architecture, burning architecture, every street is wet, every shadow is everything is big, outsized. The crimes, the criminals, oh and such criminals. I knew I was gonna like this movie once a Caesar cutted cigar chomp and David Patrick Kelly showed up.

But I knew I was gonna love the movie. When Michael Wincott in a Crystal Gale wig arrived, Good Lord. They say, your hero is only as good as your villains. Our hero ought to be fucking awesome, and he is. In the comic Eric is just unable to die. He has no special skill beyond that. Eric Draven is a martial art zombie. And watching Brandon Lee decimate room full of goons is breathtaking. Brandon Lee jumping from rooftop to rooftop is breathtaking. Hell, Brandon Lee laying in a dumpster

in the rain is breathtaking. It's a goddamn shame, but goddamn it, the performance and this film continue to live on.

In nineteen ninety four, when this movie came out, I was living in Los Angeles. I saw it opening night in Westwood, California, at the Man National. They tore that theater down in two thousand and eight, which is a drag. It was a massive, one screen with eleven hundred seats. Beautiful.

I saw Bram Stoker's Dracula their opening day first show. Anyway, I'm waiting in the queue and there's a protester moving down the line of moviegoers, handing out flyers telling us how horrible we were for supporting the murderers of Brandon Lee. And I said to the guy, I've seen interviews with Brandon Lee about this film, and he was fucking stoked, and you'd prefer no one ever to see it. This film. He literally died making this testament. I shouldn't go in

there and honor him. He just moved away. I wonder sometimes if that was the right thing to say, or if I was complicit in supporting an industry that is too cavalier with its workers' safety. I don't know. My other brush with the Crow involved this soundtrack. I'm not talking about that phenomenal fucking mixtape that became everyone's soundtrack the summer of nineteen ninety four. No, I'm talking about

the score by Graham Ravel. My friend Ramone was a sound engineer and it was his jump to burn the final master for the CD score for the film. It came in these chlorophylled discs, the CDs that were all green from chlorophyll, and you have to watch the laser burn it and it was amazing. Actually, in order to do this mastering, whatever the hell they were doing, you'd have to actually sit and listen to the tracks in real time. He invited me to go listen, and god damn,

what an experience. That score has some high melodrama in spots, but the Middle Eastern strings and percussion are sweet, and the darker portions of it are pretty remarkable. Speaking of remarkable, I mentioned the cast. There's a lot of great performances here, but I'm gonna mention him again, David Patrick Kelly. He plays t Bird in the movie. I'm talking about him again because there are simply not enough performances by this man here. He is in the.

I'm talking about all the fire effects on Devil's Night, Oh man, I'm talking about that horrible shot of Skang falling out of the club. I'd say they didn't age well, but I was there and I saw them on the big screen. They were unacceptable then, but everything else was so goddamn cool that you didn't care. I care now. But the practical stuff is still so disarming. It's like Wes Anderson's The Crow. Oh we can move on now, Okay, cool, So let's go ready, The Crow City of Angels. All Right,

I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. Jeez. That movie would be acceptable if the first one didn't exist, sincerely, because it's just the same goddamn movie, you know what. Actually, I want to mention two things about that film. I think it's really well directed by Tim Pope, the Cures longtime videographer. By that, I mean he made all of their music videos, not that he followed them around with a video camera. He made a brilliant choice in that film, which is he made it a world without a moon.

That entire film basically takes place at night in it's all sodium arc lamps creating artificial moonlight. I love it. The other thing is Iggy Pop is in the film. That's because scheduling prevented him from staring in the first Crow. He was supposed to be fun Boy. That's the part Michael Massey played. It was that character's gun that fatally wounded Brandon Lee. In another universe, Iggy Pop killed Brandon Lee. Wait, that was two, So actually I have three three things

I want to mention. I almost laugh. I almost laughed, like the count there, I'm not going to do that, Okay. This film also has some fucking awesome model work, particularly the city scape in the opening scene The Crow. It's the Crow's point of view. It flies past a Jesus Save sign where a clutch of the neon letters are burned out, so it reads save us. Look, maybe I'm easily impressed, but I thought that was super fucking cool to have an entire city pleading via a misappropriated religious ad.

It foretold a level of greatness that the rest of the film could not live up to. But wait, you know what, there are more sequels? No, there aren't. How about that TV show? What the fuck are you talking about?

To date, in my opinion, there have only been two other cinematic incarnations of The Crow, City of Angels and the current remake. Once again, this is the Crow.

because I'm actually talking about fan bases. Maybe I should just check out from social media, because fans of The Crow seem to be acting just like the Mad Max fan base, like the Star Wars fan base, just like they. Well, no one's as horrible as the Snyder fan base, so at least as a hierarchy to all is awful to see Crow fans so vocally derisve of something they haven't seen when there's a Crow movie out there starring Edward Furlong.

Is very disappointing and as far as remikes go, this movie might not be the thing, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. There are lots of problems, but then there's also a lot to recommend it, first and foremost being the relationship between Eric and Shelley. For one thing, there is a relationship between Eric and Shelley. The first act of the film has plenty of intrigue, but it's less interested in the supernatural and it's more interested in these two characters

finding each other, and it's lovely. The two leads I mentioned Pennywise, Bill skarsguard at the as Eric and British singer actress Fka Twiggs is Shelley, luminous and just as fucked up as Eric. Oh they're not happy go lucky kids in this one. Shelley is involved in all sorts of infarious dealings with some bad folk and finds her in a co ed correctional facility where she meets Eric. They break out and have a pretty phenomenal romance on the run. But this is the Crow, so that ain't

gonna last. The film follows the same structure as the comic and the original film for that matter. Eric is returned from the dead with a crow to guide him, and he cannot die. That is his only power. He's self healing, which, by the way, it looks astonishingly good. The effects overall are used sparingly, but when they do, they pack a punch. Speaking of punches, this Eric doesn't come back a kung fu master. He's just a guy, and the fights start out stumbling and awkward. They get

a little more nuanced by the end. Now actually they're not nuanced. He becomes a better fighter by the end. The fights do not become nuanced at all. They maintain a level of brutality that echoes the book in ways. The first film only hinted at I'm serious a couple of times. I actually looked away an aging gorehound like myself. You can be a gorehound, but that would have to be your official designation. You wouldn't a pug anymore, all right, we think about it, This is the Crow that New

Line Cinema would have made in nineteen ninety four. They did try to buy it outright from James Obarr, but would have cut him out completely. So that's why he went with Jeff Most and John Shirley. And had this been made in nineteen ninety four, we would be talking about it right now as if it were a classic. But it's thirty years later. And while I don't feel like comparing the two films, the lingering ghosts of the first film's villains cannot be banished. The villains in this

film are completely serviceable. There's nothing wrong with them. They're very well acted, and they're perfectly suited for this very real world to take on the Crow. The problem is even the comic book doesn't feature a real Detroit. That's fantasy Detroit, just like it was in the first film. Just like La was a nocturnal nightmare in City of Angels, all three had tons of character. This film takes place in nondescript major American city. I couldn't tell you if

there was a coast involved or mountains, prairies. I have no idea. It shouldn't matter, but it does because, like I said, that first act is so endearing. I love these two kids. I'm rooting for them. I'm shattered when they're murdered. The rest of the film is fine. In fact, there are elements at play here that are superior to any iteration of the character so far, but those would be spoilers, and we shall not spoil lest the Crow showed up or the skull cowboy. That's a deep dive character,

but insummation for that. I just want to say, fuck all the haters and fuck all the bad reviews. I was dismayed by the trailers for this film, just like you. It's because this setting seems so contemporary. Trust me, this is a fucking good movie and it tells a complete story, and I dig it. I'm not suggesting you spend any money. No no, no, no, no no no no, don't even rush. I'm just saying, sooner or later, there's gonna be a whole lot of Hey, this wasn't so bad all over

social media. You mark my words.

midnight viewers for joining us here at Father Malone's weekly round up. You want to tune in This coming Friday, we have Midnight Viewing the Horror Anthology podcast. We're taking a look at the next two episodes of Tales from the Dark Side. Until then, where can people find you? Ripley, don't stare at me, I'm just playing. You can find her here. You can find me here, and you can find me at Weirdingwaymedia dot com. And you can also find us at Patreon dot com slash Father them alone.

If you want to support the show, get you episodes early in commercial free and some bonus episodes and such and such. Until next time, I'm gonna leave you with a line from the first filmed iteration of the Crow.