Where 2004's Hellboy suffered from the origin-itis common to comic book movies (I mean no one ever bothered to tell Indiana Jones' origin story in Raiders of the Lost Ark and why would they), HELLBOY II: The Golden Army, freed of the necessity of establishing the characters and the universe, kicks it up a notch with a wildly imaginative, visually compelling episode in the annals of Hellboy and the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defence that combines the best of Hellboy creator Mike Mignola's hard-boiled heroes meet the supernatural stories with director Guillermo Del Toro's eye for the surrealist and fantastic.

In many ways a direct successor to Pan's Labyrinth, The Golden ArmyI pits the BPRD against the sociopathic Elven prince, Nuada, determined to avenge his people and all monsters, goblins, trolls and fantastical creatures on the greedy, encroaching, destructive Human Race. The only ones who can stop Nuada's plans to raise the Golden Army, an unstoppable force of mechanical warriors, are the resident freaks and outcasts of the BPRD, led by its resident demon-spawn, Hellboy.


With The Golden Army, Del Toro makes the Hellboy universe his own, adding not only a quintessentially Del Toro collection of creatures to the story, but a depth of humour, romance and pathos not normally seen in Hollywood comic book movies. The Golden Army is, for example, laugh-out loud and laugh-a-lot funny in several places where Hellboy was merely humourous (and Batman Begins barely cracked a smile) and takes a run at swoony romance as Liz and Hellboy try to make their relationship work (the problem is that Liz is the one doing the most of the work). Meanwhile, the bitter and deadly Prince Nuada (Luke Goss) carries himself with a nobility that gives weight, however misguided, to his desire to save the world from the humanity.

The Golden Army is not perfect, however, at times veering into a steampunk meets The Lord of the Rings pastiche and the tonal shift - from action to romance to drama to comedy - seem dissonant against a four-colour backdrop. Nevertheless, like its predecessor, I expect that The Golden Army will wear well on repeat viewings. I was busy death-looking the idiot across the aisle with the ringing phone so I missed some of the opening sequence and already anticipate a second viewing.

If Wanted represents one extreme of the current tide of comic-book movies swelling out of Hollywood, insubstantial and unmemorable as a piece of popcorn, HELLBOY II: The Golden Army is the other, full of imagination and wonder worth that leaves you giddy and savouring the adventure long after the movie itself has ended.

Those who follow the ever cool, ever useful, ever hysterical romance novel blog Smart Bitches Who Love Trashy Books know that over the past few days they've discovered a systematic pattern of plagiarism in the works of Cassie Edwards.

They posted what they found (through the work of a third party who found something hinky in the tone of some of the narrative) and the whole thing snowballed from there as more readers got in on the action. I believe the series is now up to five parts, demonstrating habitual plagiarism from secondary sources about Native American life, tribal culture, practices and, I think, flora and fauna of the American West. To be fair to Edwards, she isn't the only author to get hit with this - even Ian McEwan was accused of plagiarizing from the memoir of a WWII nurse-trainee. Quite often in the process of writing, authors will absorb details from real life and spit them out again in prose and the question of what constitutes plagiarism when fact is mixed with fiction is an ongoing debate (see Malcolm Gladwell's "Something Borrowed" from the New Yorker). Personally, I fall down on the "if you use someone else's words, you're copying. If you rewrite someone's words without attributing them, you're copying" side of the line - basically, if my philosophy prof would fail me for it if I did it in an essay I'd handed it, it's plagiarism and it's not on.*

But in the eyes of fellow romance-writer Jennifer Crusie, whether or not Edwards is a plagiarist is not the issue. What's at issue, in Crusie's mind, is whether or not Smart Bitches is being mean to poor old Cassie Edwards. What Crusie wants to know is not whether or not Edwards has been systematically ripping off the work of other authors but whether or not Edwards ran over their dog because we all know that what really counts in the world of journalism, which I submit the Smart Bitches posts are, is whether or not the journalist likes the subject.

Edwards, who writes those buckskin and feathers bodice rippers where a pure-hearted Native American stud brings the joy of good sex to misguided white pioneer women across the Southwestern United States that every girl I know read at least once in high school, is regularly slated on the blog for being, well, not a very good writer. And she isn't, not even by the somewhat bell-curved standards of the genre. Then again, Smart Bitches Who Love Trashy Books is a blog who's stated raison d'etre is no bullshit reviews of romance novels. My favourite section of their blog (after the semi-weekly round-up of cover art horror perpetrated by romance publishers worldwide) is called "Good Shit vs. Shit to Avoid". My point is that the collected oeuvre of Cassie Edwards is an egregious offence against the canon of English literature but she's hardly the only author who's ever gotten a bad review on their site, even if they did call one of her books the worst book ever and another "the literary equivalent of maggot infested cheese". Smart Bitches is a review site, this is the internet, people say mean things and, seriously, anyone who thinks that the Smart Bitches treatment of Cassie Edwards is unfair have never read an English gossip column because, holy hell, they make Candy and Sarah look like kittens.

Crusie's statement that Edwards "doesn't deserve the constant humiliation this site heaps on her" irrespective of the fact that any humiliation derived from the latest series of posts is entirely down to Edwards own shoddiness in failing to properly attribute her sources or her own outright mendaciousness is boneheaded, logic-free bullshit and, frankly, I'm surprised at Crusie for perpetrating it. How Smart Bitches feel about Cassie Edwards is irrelevant to the issue at hand: either she's a plagiarist or she's not and whether or not anyone thinks Savage Moon is the greatest work of fiction ever or something one would normally expect to find only after it has passed out the working end of a sheep is neither here nor there. Shame, Ms. Crusie, shame.

Luckily for me and the Intertoobz at large, we have Nora Roberts, speaking for the forces of reason and sanity and hot monkey sex with Irish multi-billionaires (if she made Rourke a Scot, I'd probably spontaneously combust):

Reporting isn’t bashing, and very often reporting isn’t nice.

I don’t know Cassie, and would never bash her. But I will bash, again and again, the act of any writer copying another’s work--and calling the work his/her own.

Tolerating it or defending it isn’t standing up for the writer, it’s standing up for the act of copying.

(care of Fandom_Wank)

No love from Queen Street for you, Ms. Crusie. I am officially rededicating the portion of my fiscal planning otherwise reserved under "oooh, does Jennifer Crusie have a new book out I might find cool" to Nora Roberts who is, as Stephen King said, ice cold and continues to be a one classy and stand up lady.

Ms. Roberts, you are made of awesome.

Tip of the hat to the ever linkalicious cleolinda for the original FW link.

*FWIW, McEwan did acknowledge the bio he cribbed his line about 'daubing Valerian on ringworm' or some such from. Whether or not that constitutes sufficient attribution is an argument that pro- and anti-McEwan critics have been banging on about for six years now (this is England, Tall Poppy Syndrome is definitely a factor). I do not know what, if any, attribution or credit Edwards gives the secondary sources she borrowed from.

Three words: Bloody fucking brilliant, mate (oops, that's four).

Two More: Sam Tyler.

Brilliant.

Anyone even remotely familiar with Doctor Who couldn't have been cheered with delight when the guy with the thing demanded you-know-what. I'd called it when I saw the whatsit but it didn't detract one scintilla of pleasure from the reveal.

That's three in a row, guys. Keep it up.

... Is huge chucks of my childhood whistling past.

God I remember watching that live and being confused about Mark Hamill and Luke Skywalker - it was kind of like the Easter Bunny in that I was 95 per cent sure someone was having me on but there was that five per cent of my eight-year-old brain that didn't yet understand satire and farce and wasn't quite prepared to rule out the possibility that it could be so....

And this here also... and, of course, the ever classic, ever awesome, ever slightly disturbing when sung in public by grown ups at seemingly random intervals MnaMna.

Realize that I watched these all live when they first aired. I am that old - I remember the 70s.

Eta - OMGWTF - the Muppets, "Clocks" by Coldplay.