So, my first review is of the third movie in this series.
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Normally, when you have a well-intentioned director with a low budget, self-funded movie, the best case scenario is something like “The Room”, where the pure intentions lead to unintentional hilarity. Although, frequently, you end up with a mildly watchable pile of meh. The “Mythica” series really bucks that trend. The adventures of Marek the mage, Dagen the rogue, Teela the cleric (played by movieshyte favorite Nicola Posener from “The Royal We”! Since she’s a movieshyte favorite, Nicola actually gets a shout out, unlike the other actors who I won’t bother to look up even though they’re actually pretty decent actors) and Thane the warrior (yes, we have a full-blown classic dungeons and dragons party) (don’t have more than a single parenthetical in the same sentence, it’s confusing) are actually charming and fun to watch. Despite the lack of a budget, the enthusiasm that all involved have, from the actors, to the costume designers (big shout out, a lot of the “Mythica” costumes are really cool), to the location scouts, to the scriptwriter, to the director... Well, you get my point. Their enthusiasm just jumps off the screen. It’s infectious, and I can’t help but feel that exuberant energy as a low budget but heartfelt project plays out.
By the third movie, however, you run the risk of some of that initial enthusiasm wearing a bit thin. I have to say, for the first half or so of “Mythica the Necromancer”, it kind of does. The plot is stale enough I won’t repeat it, although it involves Thane the warrior getting taken by a bunch of yahoo dorks who he *should* be able to gank in his sleep, but doesn’t because plot. Turns out, Thane’s kidnapper is Marek’s owner back from when she was a slave, and he essentially sends the other three party members on a pointless quest so they can level up and return and kick his ass. I guess I *did* end up repeating the plot.
For the first half of the movie, they wander a bit aimlessly. For those of you familiar with tabletop roleplaying games, it’s kind of like when the gamemaster hasn’t prepared for the game that week, and they’re kind of winging it, and it isn’t going so great. Like...
Gamemaster: As you walk down the street, you happen across a warehouse!
Party: We keep going.
GM: WHAT? There’s a warehouse there.
Party: That doesn’t have anything to do with our current quest.
GM: The warehouse is RIGHT there. There’s probably treasure inside.
Party: We don’t care.
GM: Yes you do. You feel drawn to the warehouse!
Party: There isn’t any reason to break into a random warehouse.
GM: But it’s RIGHT THERE.
And so on. I might or might not have pulled this dialogue from my personal tabletop RPG experience. Point is, the first half of “Mythica the Necromancer” feels a bit like this. Kind of... Unrelated to the rest of the films and aimless. I did appreciate them stopping by a whorehouse and paying a sex worker for information (for my rant on the criminal mistreatment of sex workers both by law and art, check out my review of “The Wiz”). The whore says, since they paid her for information, she’ll go ahead and throw in other services for the fee. Both Dagen and Teela seem DTF, but Marek is having no shenanigans so they just leave. Marek’s attitude here actually makes more sense when we get to the critical scene of the film:
Marek and Dagen are chatting it up by the romantic campfire. Teela is off praying or whatever, so they’re by themselves. Dagen leans in for the smooch he’s been wanting to plant on Marek since way back in the first “Mythica”. Marek starts to lean in, and it looks like go time... Then she pulls away, pulls out a map, and starts reading it. My bro Dagen got cucked by A MAP. I assume that THE MAP is a treasure map that leads to a Hitachi Magic Wand +3 (you go, Marek!), otherwise, what are we doing here people??
But it might be karma! You see, back in “Mythica 2 The Darkspore” during an overnight rest in the wilderness, Thane the warrior was chatting it up with Teela the cleric. All of a sudden, while they’re talking, Teela turns to Thane and drops her robe. Thane is like “?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!”, and so is the audience, because Teela is a Lan’a’thael 10 and Thane is a Minneapolis 5. However, before Thane can recover from his shock, Dagen literally steps out of the shadows and says something like “Chilly night, isn’t it?” (a fact that Thane is witness to first hand). Teela yelps in surprise and takes off running willy nilly into the night. Now, I’m not an expert in the bro code, but I think it dictates that, at this point, Thane brutally murder Dagen, and possibly wear his face. I don’t know, I would have to look up the code. Point is, Thane lets it slide (?!). As it turns out, Thane’s good buddy THE MAP would exact revenge on his behalf a film later!
Of course, while THE MAP might play a role, the real reason Marek doesn’t want to get with a sex worker or smoochy smooch with Dagen is that she’s a Necromancer, and she doesn’t have control of her powers. If she gets too excited, she might literally melt Dagen’s face off, because in “Mythica” necromancers take energy from people by melting their faces off. The thing is, Marek should just TELL this to Dagen, because Dagen would happily tell her that he doesn’t even want a face if it’s not going down on her. Communication, people. It’s important.
But, thanks to the intervention of THE MAP, the film really picks up in the third act. There’s a journey where Marek comes to terms with her powers, and an emotional climax that was so well done I was actually in tears. Despite some hiccups along the way, I was still invested enough in those characters for the scene (which, for once, I won’t actually spoil) to hit me the way it did.
That’s the thing. Even with budgetary concerns and some plodding plotting, a genuine desire to make a cool fantasy movie comes through. With a ton of big budget soulless corporate slop out there, we NEED the passion of these indie filmmakers. So, I am looking forward to watching the rest of the “Mythica” movies.
I need THE MAP to complete its hero’s journey.
7/10