Slushie Man's Animorphs Blog

Online Animorphs Graphic Novel

2010-11-16T07:58:00.001-08:00

I'm not sure how many of you remember Animorphs, but it was a huge part of my life growing up. It was a Young Adult book series that ran for 54 books (in the main series anyway. There were an additional 8 various spin-off books), and it followed a group of teenagers after they got the super power to morph into any animal they touched, in order to fight off a secret army of invading mind-controlling aliens. It was also adapted (very badly) into a 2-season TV series before that got canceled. If you're not familiar with the book series but you're interested in checking it out, have no fear as there are now plans to re-release the series, starting in May of 2011, with new covers.

Anyway, for those of us who want a bit of an Animorphs fix to hold us over until then, I came across this very awesome site. It's a project ran by one very talented woman in her spare time, in which she's currently adapting the Animorphs books into comic-form. She releases one page a week, every Monday, and she only just recently started so it'll only take a few minutes to get caught up as she is so far only has 5 pages done. So if you were an Animorphs fan as a kid, still currently a fan, or have never heard of the series before but think it's something you may want to check out, then go take a look at this free online fan graphic novel. She has a really good grasp on the story and characters from the book, and is able to include and sum up all the important information given in the book, in the very limited space of a comic page.

If you check it out, and you like what you see, be sure to also follow the progress of the project on it's Twitter page.

Book #13: The Change

2010-06-23T08:57:00.001-07:00

Plot: Now that Tobias is at ease and has gotten used to being a hawk full-time, the mysterious Ellimist rears his head to help Tobias get the power to morph once again – however his original body is still that of a hawk instead of a human but he does have the option of using his old human body as one of his morphs. The Ellimist gave him this power back in return for agreeing to help save two Hork-Bajir slaves that managed to escape from the Yeerks, which the Animorphs have to hide and help protect.

Rating: 10/10

Review: So I finally got to the second Tobias book and man, I LOVED this book. Tobias is my favorite character and I hate that they divide up his spot in the circle of narrators with Ax. Why not just give them both their fair share?

I've often found myself wondering during all the other books, just what exactly Tobias is up to when the others are living their normal lives, apart from hunting and feeding and living life like a regular hawk, and we finally get to find out in this one – he goes on never-ending reconnaissance missions such as mapping out potential entrances to the Yeerk Pool and spying on known-Controllers. I'd actually say he's probably more devoted to the cause then any other person on the team. Of course at this point in the series, he's also had the most taken away from him, so it makes sense. I also tend to love Tobias books because it's the one time we get an entire book from the P.O.V of an animal. Sure, he has a human mind, but he lives his life as a wild animal, and I always find it interesting to read just how he lives his day-to-day 'normal' life, and the mortal dangers of mother nature that come with that. I loved it back in Book 3 and I loved it again here.

One of my favorite aspects of the Animorphs series is the subtle relationship (if you can call it that) between Rachel and Tobias. It's a minor sub-plot that will span the entire series, and I'm a sucker for love stories like that – two people that have feelings with each other but can never be together, so I also look forward to Rachel and - more-so – Tobias narrated books because it has that love story aspect and it does it so well, even if its only a little hint of it here and there. And the ending to this book – quite possibly my favorite Animorphs ending yet, with Tobias using his human morph (for the first time, mind you) to watch Rachel's gymnastics ceremony, and when Rachel walks by him and then notices him in his human form once again for the first time since Book 1...I got chills.

Now, onto the two new (hopefully recurring) characters – Ket and Jara the freed Hork-Bajir. It was great to read about some Yeerk-free Hork-Bajir again for the first time since The Hork-Bajir Chronicles, and I hope these two characters pop back into the story again at some point. While I didn't particularly like them above any other side characters, they are an interesting addition to the series and with being the only two free members of their race in the entire Universe, it certainly keeps the stakes raised high for them and the suspense thick whenever they're involved in the story, so I hope they just won't be tossed aside and forgotten about during the rest of the series like Melissa and Erek were.

I also loved how it showed that the Yeerks, when desperate enough, will go to ANY lengths to win, and that includes bringing out their Hork-Bajir and Taxxon foot soldiers in broad daylight, and also burning down an entire forest. It seemed like a pretty hopeless cause there for a bit for the Animorphs and I'm really glad that unlike the last time the Ellimist showed up in a book, this time the Animorphs were able to scrape out of it alive due to their own intelligence and not having to rely on being saved by an intergalactic God-like being. I was worried there that the Ellimist would jump in at the last second and save the day like back in Book 7, but thankfully I was surprised when things didn't turn out that way.

Even though the next Tobias book is 10 books away, I heavily look forward to it as he's not only my favorite character but he's also had two of my favorite books in the series as well.

Book #12: The Reaction

2010-06-22T11:49:00.000-07:00

Plot: Rachel starts having an allergic reaction to her new crocodile morph, which causes her to start morphing uncontrollably and at random, which as you can imagine can, and does, cause quite a few very big problems for both her and the others. At the same time, the Yeerks got their sights set on a famous teen actor to infest, and have him publicly indorse the Sharing.

Rating: 8/10

Review: I ended up really liking this book, despite being just a generic filler book. Right from the get-go we get an explanation directly from Rachel explaining her so-called fearlessness that the others describe her as being, and it was a really believable explanation. But despite her saying she only acts that way cause its what's expected of her from the group, when the going got tuff, she had no problem ordering the others to leave her for dead so that they could get away so there has to be more to it then just an act that she feels she must put on. Also in that same scene, I couldn't help but laugh out loud when Visser Three totally messed up the whole 'Eeny, Meeny, Miney, Moe' saying.

I really liked them going back to the Zoo location. We haven't heard mention of that place in a long time (Book 4 I think was the last time), so it was nice to see it again as it really is a great place for them to obtain exotic morphs. It was also really kick ass seeing Rachel in superhero-mode again when she leaped over the railing into the crocodile pit to save the kid that fell down there, which BTW, was probably one of the most suspenseful scenes in the entire series so far and it was in an OPENING chapter! Most truly suspenseful parts don't come until toward the end. Just a taste of what was in store for the rest of the book.

And that was the main thing I loved with this book; the suspense. With Rachel in danger of morphing at any time, no matter where she is or who she's with, or what people are around, it caused for some very suspenseful edge-of-your-seat scenes. Quite possibly the best example of suspense seen in the series up to this point. This book also touched on some very dark and mature themes for a kid series such as suicide, and the very hilarious-but-mature scene where Rachel morphed the Elephant by accident pretty much because she was horny.

Any negatives? Nothing too major. I just found it a huge coincidence that what was happening to Rachel with the allergic reaction was solvable pretty much just by waiting for it to pass, and I didn't like the whole explanation of getting rid of the allergic DNA through creating a new being from said DNA, although it did make for a great couple chapters when a mysterious crocodile suddenly started attacking people on a Morning Talk Show, and it did screw over the Yeerk's plan to infest the teen heartthrob.

I hated though how Jake lectured Rachel on screwing up one of the missions, even though Jake himself has had his fair share of moments where he's majorly screwed up, so I don't really think he had much room to talk there. Of course Rachel doesn't have the opportunity to travel back in time and undo all her mistakes like Jake did in the previous book so maybe he let that get to his head. And one last thing, as much as I enjoyed them morphing one of their own (I.E. Cassie morphing Rachel), it confused me that Cassie was so against morphing dolphins without their permission back in Book 4, yet she practically jumped at the opportunity to morph Rachel without even asking her first. It was very out of character for Cassie.

However very few of these books are 100% perfect, and for a filler book, this one was a pretty good read, IMO.

Book #11: The Forgotten

2010-06-17T15:08:00.000-07:00

Plot: The Animorphs steal a crashed prototype of a new model of Yeerk Bug Fighter to fly to Washington and land on the lawn of the White House to show the world about the Yeerk invasion, however along the way they get into a fight with Visser Three's Blade Ship and an accident causes both ships to spiral out of control and to travel back in time by about 24 hours, and then crash into the middle of the Amazon Jungle.

Rating: 4/10

Review: Starting off, I really loved this book. It was doing something fresh and new, and I liked how it was doing it. At the beginning when the prototype ship first crashed, I loved how the grocery store that it crashed into, and thus destroyed, was Safeway – you see, when I worked at Sobeys for 3 years, Safeway was our main competition and I got a kick out of seeing one of their stores blown up, lol. It was also really cool to have Jack have these mysterious 'time-flashes'. It added an air of mystery to the first half of the book as to just what the heck is happening, and it was explained perfectly later on. I also loved reading the playful Rachel and Marco scenes as they provided both great entertainment and a nice breath of fresh air from some otherwise dark moments, although lately it seems Rachel and Marco have more chemistry together then Rachel and Tobias does which I'm not sure how I feel about that overall.

And I can't do an Animorphs review without mentioning the morphs. I REALLY found myself loving the jungle-animal morphs. Jungle animals tend to be some of my favorite on Earth (After the Wolf that is), and they were quite unique and different compared to their usual morphs. I also enjoyed most of the scenes that took place in the Amazon, mainly because I love jungle locations the most and it was really great to see the Animorphs in another location besides their hometown, but also because it was great to see them come across all the dangerous aspects of the jungle that I thought the book would either leave out or just skim over like it was nothing, but luckily they came across one major jungle danger after another, painting a pretty realistic picture of how jungles actually are. No sugar-coating here. It was also very cool seeing Jake mess up time after time, showing that he's not the invincible know-it-all leader that he's been portrayed as in the other books. He's only human, and he's only a kid at that, and thus he's bound to make mistakes.

And one last thing I liked: The countless animals that the Yeerk army were senselessly slaughtering in the jungle, terrified that any of them they may be the Animorphs, and the Animorphs not being able to do anything to save the animals without giving themselves up and getting themselves killed. It showed a much darker side of the series not often seen, and I appreciated that very much.

But then the last quarter of the book happened, which completely makes all the great things I thought about this book moot. You see, the end makes it so NOTHING in this book actually happened; none of the events from stealing the prototype bug fighter onwards and none of the morphs they obtained in the jungle actually happened come the end. Jake managed to have his mind travel back in time and have his past-self not go through with stealing the ship, so it undid everything from that point onwards. And because none of it actually happened in the end, none of them have memory of the event, which makes this book 100% pointless. Let's recap: Events never actually happened, and no memory of said events = pointless and a waste of an otherwise damn good premise.

I also found it incredibly unrealistic and out of character for them to try and fight the Blade Ship near the beginning, KNOWING it would result in their deaths, as opposed to trying to outrun it back to Earth in which case, they at least had a chance – a very very small chance - but a chance none the less. Not even Marco had any objections tot he suicide run, which would be a first for him. And while on the topic of people being out of character, shouldn't it have been Rachel that was so concerned for Tobias during the book? Yet it was Cassie that was constantly voicing her concern for him in the various situations with Rachel seemingly not giving a damn. Even Visser Three felt really out of character when he scolded his army for their jungle destruction. Why the heck would he care? He gets off on mass destruction. Hell, he's gotten mad at his minions in the past for NOT killing every animal in sight in the happenstance that one or more could be an 'Andalite Bandit'.

And just what the heck was up with the Natives being able to understand English perfectly fine?

What started off as a great book with a great idea, actually turned out to be one of the books I liked the least and the book I had the most problems with so far. In the end, it had just felt like glorified fanfiction more then an actual entry of the series.

Book #10: The Android

2010-06-15T05:52:00.000-07:00

Plot: Marco and Jake come across an old school friend, Erek, who he and the other Animorphs start spying on after they find out Erek's been going to meetings of The Sharing, the Yeerk's little boyscout-like group used to infest people. However something becomes very clear – Erek is definitely not a Yeerk, but he's also definitely not human either. In the end they must team up with him to launch an attack on the Yeerks before they activate a computer virus that will give them unrestricted control of every computer in the entire world that is connected to the Internet.

Rating: 9/10

Review: This book continues a trend I really find annoying in this series – all the wild coincidences (Tobias being Elfangor's son, Marco's mom being Visser 1, Jake's brother being a controller, and now an old friend just so happens is someone else that has been involved in this War due to other unrelated circumstances). This series is filled with more wild coincidences then Spider-Man 3! I think it would have been better had Erek been a new kid at school then someone they've known all their lives. Also, the title completely ruins most of the mystery this book would have otherwise had, as to what just exactly Erek is, which is actually not finally revealed until over half-way through. Or at least it wouldn't have been, had it not been for the title ruining it.

However, I loved everything else about this book. The hilarious banter between Marco and Rachel toward the beginning had me actually laughing out loud a couple times, the scene where they were all trying to come up with these elaborate ways to track Erek down and then Cassie just suggests the phone book was even funnier then the Marco/Rachel stuff, and of course, the funny Marco/Jake banter between which of their morphs are better.

On the more serious side, we get our first mention of what happens to all that extra mass the Animorphs loose when they morph smaller animals, and the Yeerks start gunning to take control of Marco's father due to his new job, which makes things even more personal for Marco then they already are, as that would make his entire family Controllers. Oh, and we get our first introduction to a new hopefully-recurring alien 'race', and we get some info on them as well as two other new alien races, once of which created them, the other of which destroyed their creators. This book alone is a huge step forward in the overall Animorphs mythology, and thus is a very welcomed addition to the series. Although the history of the Pemalites race is almost identical to the history of the Ellimist's species as told in [i]The Ellimist Chronicles[/i] so that did feel a bit redundant, but nothing that really bothered me at all.

The scene where Erek reveals to Marco that he knows about him and the other Animorphs is easily one of my favorite scenes in the series so far, closely followed by the scene where Erek explains his history to all the Animorphs. Erek is also now my new favorite character after Tobias, and I hope we see more of him in the future at some point and he doesn't just get dropped and forgotten about like other side characters have in the past (such as Melissa from back in Book 2).

Oh, and the chapters detailing the Animorphs and Erek storming the Yeerk-controlled skyscraper to get their hands on an alien crystal and stop them from unleashing the virus is probably the most suspenseful and thrilling mission they've gone on yet with some of the best action scenes in the series thus-far. Really great stuff there.

This book more then makes up for the lackluster installment then the previous book was and despite it's minor faults ended up being one of my favorites, and as long as they keep Erek and his clan around as recurring characters and don't just drop them out of existence, then this is also a very mythology-heavy installment that you don't want to skip out on reading.

The Animorphs Audiobook Project - Megamorphs #1, Chapter 2

2010-06-08T03:21:00.000-07:00

Myself and a group of fellow Animorphs fans from Richard's Animorphs Forum have been (slowly) working on putting together a fan audiobook project where we plan on dramatizing every single Animorphs book. I'm the voice actor for the character of Tobias.

We've started with Megamorphs #1 first though, which takes place between Books 7 and 8, just so everyone gets a good feel of narrating their characters as each character narrates several chapters in it, and then we'll be going back and starting with Book 1.

Chapter 2 has now been finished and you can read the Chapters by Right-Clicking on the links and selecting 'Save As'.

Chapter 1
Chapter 2

Book #9: The Secret

2010-06-08T03:01:00.000-07:00

PLOT: The Yeerks have discovered that there is only one forest in the area where the 'Andalite Bandits' could be hiding (the Yeerks don't know the Animorphs are humans - they think they are all Andalites), and start a giant logging operation to cut the trees down in order to look for them and remove their food source. It's up to the Animorphs to stop them and save Ax, as well as the woodland creatures, but that's harder said then done as the Yeerks are expecting them to show up and have made plans to counter that.

RATING: 5/10

REVIEW: I make it no secret that Cassie is my least-favorite character, and despite her first book being one of my favorites I still feel weary about reading any of her POV stories. However, there is a wolf on the cover, and that is no false advertising as the wolf morphs play quite a large role in this book. The wolf morphs are my favorite, as wolves are my favorite animal, so any of the books that have them is automatically on my 'Like' list for that simple little fact The new termite morph was really good as well, with an interesting twist involved once the termite brain kicked in.

Another thing this book did really well, quite possibly better then any of the books before it, is the clashing opinions and personalities of all the Animorphs, which is prevalent mostly in the Save-The-Environment kind of discussions; Cassie leading one side which wanted to save the forest and all the animals in it, Marco leading the other side that assumed it would be a trap and wanted to stay far away from it, after all, who cares about some little animals over their own lives? That very debate was a recurring theme throughout the entire book and it was nice to see them all not agreeing and not getting along because of that.

It was also nice having Cassie's parents have a bit more characterization then before, as I feel in any series you need the parents to have some screentime and characterization since the kids are who they are because of the way each was raised. Seeing Cassie and them doing their 'Save-an-Animal' thing when an almost-dead skunk was spotted and they were called in to collect it and save it was also a pretty nice scene, showing that Cassie really does care for other creatures just as much as she does humans and we get a better look into the home life of Cassie.

On the other hand, there were many things I didn't like. Main one having to do with Cassie and how she acted like the termite morph was the most horrible, traumatizing situation she had ever been in, yet it really wasn't descried that badly. While she was freaking out about it, I kept thinking to myself 'Geez, what's her problem? It wasn't nearly as bad as she's acting like it was'. Also, the Save-the-Environment theme was pushed HEAVILY in this. I don't mind having the plot we had and the debates among the Animorphs team because of that plot, but there was no need for forcing it on us like the author did. It seemed every other page was preaching to us about how important the Environment is and those who don't think so are wrong. We get it. We got it by Chapter 3, we still got it around Chapter 10, and we certainly had it by Chapter 20.

And lastly, this is a filler book and while not as dull and boring as Book 2: The Visitor was, it was also not nearly as good as the third filler book so far, Book 3: The Encounter. While one of my positive points was the better more in-depth look into Cassie's home life, that's a bit of a double-edged battle axe because it also provided much less action then the average Animorphs book and it made the middle section a bit dull. However with that said, the action scenes we did get were very thrilling and suspenseful so I have to give it props for that. Less action, but made up for that in the action scenes themselves.

In the end, while I'm not sorry I read this book its also one I could have done without and not feel like I'm missing anything. The plot wasn't very interesting nor engaging, and I felt like I was just reading this book as quickly as I could - not because it was so good but because I was just wanting to hurry up and get onto the next book. But at least there was enough good stuff in this that I liked, to keep me from getting bored and wanting to stop reading all together.

Book #8: The Alien

2010-03-23T12:49:00.000-07:00

PLOT: The Animorphs start seeing the repercussions of the events from the end of Book 7 when they destroyed the Earth-based Kandrona, and the Yeerks start dying – sometimes while still controlling a body, and thus causing very eye-turning scenes in public. But then much to the horror of the Animorphs, they discover that the Yeerks are also killing the human hosts as well, so as to keep everything as quiet as possible. While that is going on, Ax accidentally gives the human race something that could potentially launch them ahead in technology by hundreds of years, and due to Andalite laws, he must destroy it. But not before he uses it to secretly contact his race. Also, he goes off to fight Visser 3 alone to finally avenge his brother's death from back in Book 1.

RATING: 10/10

REVIEW: This is the first actual full book narrated by Ax, and IMO, its much better-done then his chapters in Megamorphs #1, as in that book he seemed exactly like a human in the way he talked and narrated, but in this one he actually seems like the alien shipwrecked on a strange planet that he is.

The main thing I loved about this book that set it above all the others before it, IMO, apart from being the first one in the actual series (None of the spin-off or prequel books) told from an alien's POV, is that we get a really awesome flashback scene in it to before Ax arrived on Earth that takes place during a couple chapters in The Andalite Chronicles but from Ax's POV of that specific event, and for the first time since Visser, we get to see some pretty good Yeerk sympathy and are shown that they're not all bad As Ax uncovers for the first time that some Yeerks can actually feel the emotion of Love and are not as cold and heartless as most of their race is, which was an interesting sub-plot that I really hope we see more out of in future books and isn't just dropped.

I also really liked seeing more Ax-in-public hijinks again, which I loved back in Book 5 and I love again here. They are also a laugh to read about and wouldn't mind seeing a bit more of them. Another thing that made this a pleasure to read were some of the nods and chat of things that have happened in previous books (Jake having been infested in Book 6, Seerow's Kindness from the Hork-Bajir Chronicles, ect). I know a lot of series (TV and books) that don't really reference the small details that came before, but this does. The small things are what can make something so much fun to read/watch as it reminds us of continuity and makes it all seem just that little bit more real. Along those same lines, it was also great to see the events from the previous books (Both Animprhs #7 as well as Megamorphs #1) being mentioned and having an impact on this book. Like I said above, continuity rocks and its great when a series acknowledges that.

On the topic of Seerow's Kindness; what made this book so interested to read, other then being the first from Ax's POV, is that we realize for the first time that he actually has kept a lot of secrets from the others for his own personal reasons, and we realize for the first time that despite being part of the group and being friends with the others, he really is quite alone and has to keep those secrets to himself, with no other Andalite to share them with. On top of that, we also get a good look at various Andalite customs and culture, which was really neat. Another thing that was constantly talked about in the previous books but never really hit home until now, is that they are indeed in a War. We see just how used to this war Ax is compared to the human characters and we get our real first bit of true understanding of what has to be done in wars sometimes, despite not exactly being fair or nice.

And the scene where Ax faces off against Visser 3 was about the most suspenseful scene in the series up to this point, that was a long-time coming since the big bad killed Ax's brother at the very beginning of the series. Sure, it wasn't some Michael Bay-inspired 40-minute explosion-fest but it was what Animorphs does best - hype up a confrontation only to have it unfold in unexpected, but very awesome, topping it off with the War Prince Alloran finally being set free from Visser 3 - if only temporary. It was quite possibly the single most rewarding scene in the series yet.

All of those things, plus the addition of Ax's journal entries at the beginning of every chapter, alongside his personal sacrifice he makes to keep his brother's name alive and respected among his race, make this my new favorite of the series so far.

Megamorphs #1: The Andalite's Gift

2010-02-23T07:12:00.000-08:00

PLOT: With the Kandrona machine destroyed in the previous book, the Animorphs take some time for a little R&R, but it doesn't last long as Visser 3 sends a strange alien creature made out of dust particles and gnashing teeth after the Animorphs, which it finds them and goes on wild destructive rampages whenever they morph.

RATING: 9/10

REVIEW: I keep saying that if the book series of Animorphs was a TV series itself, then the Megamorphs books would be the theatrical movies. It seems the adventures are bigger and more grander, the books themselves are far thicker, and each chapter is told from the POV of a different character instead of the full book, and so because of that we get to read about the same event a couple times over, but through the eyes of separate characters, which is pretty neat and not nearly as redundant as you'd think. However that's something that is dropped in the later Megamorphs books.

The entire idea of this monster being able to pretty much appear out of nowhere, and can sense when the Animorphs are morphing, is grounds for some really thrilling 'theatrical-quality' action scenes, such as the highway attack, and it also means the Animorphs are unable to morph without attracting it instantly to where ever they currently are, so they must use their brains more then brawn in this instance.

Also, while all that is going on, Rachel looses her memory due to being attacked by some birds while in Eagle-morph, and after having lost her memory, comes across a crazy lady in the forest that knows of the Yeerks. I wonder if this is the same person that they got out of the Yeerk Pool, way back in Animorphs Book 1? They never did say what happened to her, but it would make sense. And while we're on the topic of Rachel, I'm not exactly fond of her loosing her memory and coming across a crazy person in the woods that tries to lock her away. Seems way too much of a Kim Bauer-kind of side-plot. Those that watch 24, more-so Season 2 of 24, will know EXACTLY what I'm talking about, and you'll also know that its not a good thing. Actually, I have to say that that is where my docked point comes from for my score. It took away from the much faster-paced and more exciting action and main plot of the book, and as I said above, reminded me way too much of the negative aspects of 24 Season 2.

But back to some positives. This is the first book we get where Ax actually gets something from his POV, as his POV book isn't until after this, and both he and Marco have their humor levels raised even higher then normal, bringing in a much-needed counter-balance of comedy to the otherwise all-serious and sort of dark entry in the series. However during Ax's POV, he came across far more 'human' then an alien trapped on a distant world should, and far more 'human' then he does in his own POV book which comes after this, however that is easily overlooked.

It was also awesome seeing the return of the Wolf morph as that is a personal favorite of mine, and HOW they used the whale morph at the end was nothing short of absolute genius. They have to use their morphs sparingly due to the threat-at-hand but when they do use them, they're smart about it and make sure its damn worth it.

Even though the book is longer then the average Animorphs book, it really doesn't read longer because most of it is non-stop action and moves at a quick pace (Only counter to that are the pointless Rachel-with-no-memory scenes), and there are quite a lot of really nice action scenes, both on Earth and off of it on the Blade Ship.

The Animorphs Audiobook Project - Megamorphs #1, Chapter 1

2010-02-03T09:34:00.001-08:00

Myself and a group of fellow Animorphs fans from Richard's Animorphs Forum have begun production on a fan audiobook project where we plan on dramatizing every single Animorphs book. I'm the voice actor for the character of Tobias.

We've started with Megamorphs 1 first though, which takes place between Books 7 and 8, just so everyone gets a good feel of narrating their characters as each character narrates several chapters in it, and then we'll be going back and starting with Book 1.

Chapter 1 has been finished and someone was kind enough to do a youtube account for the project, which can be found here. If you wish to instead download the chapter in .mp3 format so you can listen to it On-The-Go on your Ipod or MP3 player, then you can download it here by Right-Clicking on the link and selecting 'Save-As'.

I'll be sure to post links up to future chapters as they get completed and are released online.

Book #7: The Stranger

2010-02-02T07:42:00.000-08:00

PLOT: The Animorphs finally find the new entrance into the Yeerk Pool after the original entrance was closed up at the end of Book 1. During their assault, things go wrong but right before they get eaten by a Taxxon, everything freezes and they get introduced to...The Ellimist! Making his first appearance in the actual series, and his third appearance overall. He gives them a choice, stay and fight a war that they will loose, or get whisked away to a safe-zone planet with their friends and family, leaving Earth to get invaded by the Yeerks with no defense.

RATING: 9/10

REVIEW: Sometimes when I was younger and this series was new, I looked at this almost as a TV series and I always held the believe that if it was one, then this book would be the Season 1 finale'. It has a very Season Finale-like feel to the entire thing. Multiple things that have been building up in all the previous books, such as searching for the Yeerk pool, come to a head in this book, with the stakes raised 10-fold for a battle harder then any they've fought to date with probably the closest they've come to dying, and they are given a very hard choice to make by an All-powerful God-like entity.

Much like the previous book, this book introduces tons of stuff that hasn't been done yet in the previous books, and a different format then normal. This book is also filled to the brim with all kinds of struggles, both internal and external. Apart from the obvious physical battles with the Yeerks (Which are some of the best yet), we also have Rachel's dad offering her to move away with him so Rachel has to struggle with if she wants to do that or not and thus quit being an Animorph, and if that wasn't enough she also has to decide if she wants to vote for moving her family to a protected-planet and running from the Yeerk fight and leaving Earth to defend for itself. She also has a huge blow-up on Marco and Jake has a huge blow-up on her for the first time, so those things causes some tensions between the characters. And best of all, the Animorphs are brought to the current future that Earth faces, which is a very dark and disturbing future where the Yeerks have won and enslaved all of Earth, which hits home very hard with them, all for their own personal reasons. Its a very emotionally-charged entry in the series. One thing I wonder though, is when the Future Rachel and Future Visser Three state that history has been changed, but nothing more is ever said on that – I wonder if that's from when the Ellimist changed history by making Elfangor not stay on Earth in The Andalite Chronicles, cause it seemed to be a throw-away line that nothing ever came from after.

There are also lots of little things to enjoy in this entry alongside the big things I already mentioned: Rachel gets her famous bear morph which is put to very good use and will continue to be very helpful throughout the remainder of the series. Tobias, my personal favorite character, is featured a lot more in this entry then he was in the last few and to make it even better, he has a temporary return to his human body. Marco's change in attitude from a couple books back is finally noted by the other characters in this one, which is some nice continuity.

There is a scene where Rachel uses her morphing to save some Elephants from a trainer that loves using a cattle prod to torture, which I enjoyed cause up to this point when using their morphs to save animals its mostly just been birds that they've saved.

Anything negative? It seems Applegate is back to being a tad bit redundant with the over-explaining of things that has been explained in almost every single book, and it seemed like this time she took longer to re-explain some of those then she did in the last couple books. Also, despite my joy at finally having the Ellimist introduced in the series, some of the Ellimist stuff kind of contradicts what we know about him from The Ellimist Chronicles, although don't get me wrong, his scenes were nothing short of fantastic.

With my younger-mind always having viewed this as kind of the Season 1 finale', I viewed the next book Megamorphs #1 as kind of the bigger-budget theatrical movie, so be sure to look for that review 'Coming Soon' ;)

Book #6: The Capture

2010-02-02T06:40:00.000-08:00

PLOT: The Animorphs launch an attack to put an end to a new Yeerk plan to take over a hospital and infest everyone that comes in, but something goes wrong and Jake falls in the portable-Yeerk Pool, and gets a Yeerk in his head, becoming a Controller. And he doesn't get just any Yeerk in his head – he gets his brother's Yeerk.

RATING: 10/10

REVIEW: This is the first book in the series to be a repeat Point-of-View since we've gone through all the other characters. I wasn't sure at first how that would be. I mean, now that we've read through all the other character's POVs, of course I now have some favorites and not-so-favorites and Jake, based off the only other book he's narrated, fell someplace in between those, however I'm happy to say that I absolutly loved this book. And what I liked most about it is that it was so different then any of the ones before it; it broke what was becoming a very predictable formula for the books and gave us something new, which kept the book interesting and never had a dull moment.

The main battle happened at the beginning this time instead of the end, and the remainder of the book was all about dealing with the aftermath of that battle, all the while we have Jake more or less fighting with himself, in his head, during the entire thing as he tries to wrestle control of his body back from the Yeerk that has taken it over, and the suspense of him trying to find ways to warn the others while not in control his body.

I also appreciated how they really raised the stakes in this one from the previous books with the whole sub-plot of the state Governor planning a visit to the infested hospital and the heroes trying to find a way to stop him and thus stop the Yeerks from getting in a great position of power in the Political world of the U.S. Add to that, some very interesting new morphs, classic comedy gold from Ax, Tobias saving the day in a way that only Tobias can, and we have a very good time reading this book.

Also, due to the events of the previous book, Marco is no longer whinny and bitching about everything - he's just as headstrong and ready to rush into danger as Rachel is, which I like a lot more as I was finding his constant bitching and moaning starting to get annoying.

Something I do find a bit interesting though is that at the beginning of the story, during their attack on the hospital, Jake killed hundreds of defenseless Yeerks in their natural state – while in The Andalite Chronicles, Elfangor just about fought War-Prince Alloran to the death to try and STOP him from doing the exact same thing. Would Elfangor be upset with Jake if he were still alive? Would he have tried to stop him with just as much force as well? Is the only reason that comes across as heroic in this book instead of evil like in The Andalite Chronicles is because we're supposed to relate to Jake and he's supposed to be the hero, where-as we were supposed to be hating Alloran? That's just some food for thought.

It was very fun to see that once Jake was down and out of commission, Rachel took immediate charge as the group leader and these scenes got me to thinking that maybe Rachel would be better-suited to be the full-time leader with Jake as her second instead of the other way around. She seemed to be able to make the hard decisions much quicker and easier then Jake does and it would have been very interesting to see the entire series with her as the leader instead.

Book 4: The Message is still my personal favorite in the series so far, despite a few minor complaints I had with that one, but this one is a very close second at the moment, both for its uniqueness that sets it apart from all the previous books and for the fact that I have absolutely no complaints about anything in this book.

Book #5: The Predator

2009-11-27T14:52:00.000-08:00

PLOT: The Animorphs agree to steal a Yeerk Bug Fighter so their new-found Andalite friend Ax can use it get back to his home planet, but Marco breaks the news that this will be his last mission before he steps out of the group. That is, until he finds out that his supposedly-dead mother is actually alive and is the host body for Visser 1, the Yeerk in charge of the entire Earth invasion, and Visser 3's boss.

RATING: 10/10

REVIEW: With all the other Animorphs out of the way, its finally time to get a book from the point of view of the group's token comedic member, Marco. Which makes it all the more surprising that this is actually the most serious book in the series so far. The events of this book gives Marco a very personal reason - a reason that's actually been haunting him since before he got involved in the War - to continue fighting. And if that wasn't enough to make this the most serious book yet, it also has a very deadly-serious morph that will haunt the teens, and the readers, for a long time to come, however it's also the most interesting morph yet - I was surprised, but the ant morph ended up being my favorite so far. It was just so different and more interesting compared to anything else they've morphed thus far, and the ant's hive-mind and the dangers they come across while in ant morphs (Such as an enemy ant faction) made it extremely intense. With everything they went through as ants (getting their limbs ripped off by enemy ants among that), I have a feeling this is the last time we'll be seeing the ant morph in action, but I hope I'm wrong. The psychological scars they get from that will make it very interesting if they ever have to return to that morph in the future.

I also found it interesting that when faced with seeing a man get robbed by a mugger, Marco made the EXACT same decision he gave Rachel so much hell for back in Book Two when she morphed into an animal to scare off a potential rapist. This go around, Marco did the exact same thing to scare off a mugger. Good to know he's really not that different, despite his whining and moaning and lecturing And speaking of that, now that he's emotionally invested in the War with the Yeerks, maybe he won't be doing as much whining and moaning from now on when it comes to them having to fight and go on missions to cripple the Yeerks, cause I have to say, its getting very annoying very fast.

One last scene I feel I have to mention because you can't talk about this book without talking about this scene - Ax in the mall, both in his human morph trying to blend in and then also in his regular Andalite form after he morphs back in public, and the hilarious hijinxs that followed. Good stuff there. He's definitely a great and unique addition to the series and I hope to see more of that stuff in the future as he hopelessly tries to fit into our society.

Overall, this was another really damn good entry that I don't really have any complaints about whatsoever.

Book #4: The Message

2009-11-25T09:57:00.000-08:00

PLOT: The Animorphs each start having strange dreams calling them to the middle of the ocean. When they all agree something is up, they go out into the ocean to investigate, knowing full-well it could turn out to be a trap by the Yeerks.

RATING: 9/10

REVIEW: It was nice to finally have a book from Cassie's P.O.V., as she seems to be the least-developed character in the series so far. She hardly has any lines in any of the previous books, and she's talked about the least by the other characters. But now it's her time to shine and we finally get a really good look into just who Cassie is and what her beliefs are and what her life is like and all that good inside stuff.

We're also introduced to a new character in this book that remains for the rest of the series, an Andalite cadet named Aximili–Esgarrouth–Isthill, or Ax for short, who happens to be Prince Elfangor's younger brother. I didn't think Ax came in this early. I could have sworn he didn't come in until book 7 or 8 or somewhere up around that area, so this entire book was a surprise for me cause I also had forgotten over the previous 12 years, what exactly was calling out to them from down in the ocean, and with me thinking Ax didn't come in until much later, it was like reading it for the first time all over again.

What I liked the most though was that most of the redundancy of re-describing previous morphs, multiple times, is gone in this book. Finally. Although they use their morphs to save some birds, once again, for the third book in a row. But whatever, that's only very minor, seeing as how my other long-running complaints have finally been fixed, and they do finally save other animals this time around (like a whale), which leads into another thing I loved about the book. In every previous book we've had mostly all the same setting - on land, whether it be in their city or in the forest just outside, it's always been the same general location. But this time around the majority of the book is under water far out into the Ocean and it was refreshing to get that change in scenery and an introduction to an entire new world, so to speak, of animals.

The writing is already improving in each book. You can tell that Applegate is starting to feel more familiar with the characters and the world they exist in. There was also a slight humorous nod to the TV show [i]Friends[/i], by naming each dolphin after the characters from that show.

Do I have any complaints? Not really, apart from there being a few times that Cassie didn't seem like the Cassie that's been described to us in the previous books, but instead felt more like Rachel or Jake, as if Applegate forgot which character she was writing for at times, and like I said above, this is the third book in a row where the Animorphs team has to save some birds. That's about it though, so nothing too major.

Even though Cassie is my least favorite character, and she's the least-developed character, her book is so far one of my favorites.

Book #3: The Encounter

2009-11-25T09:30:00.000-08:00

PLOT: The Animorphs discover a Yeerk ship cloaked in invisibility in the sky above their city and upon recon, they discover that it's a supply ship, bringing water and breathable air up to the mothership in space. So they launch an attack to knock out its invisibility while it's over a city, thus revealing the invasion to the world on a scale so large, not even the Yeerks can keep it quiet.

RATING: 9/10

REVIEW: Each book seems to be getting shorter then the previous book by a significant amount, which sucks by this point as this is so far my favorite of the actual episodic series. Anyway, this book was very interesting and unique, as it was told from the perspective of my favorite character Tobias, the character that is permanently stuck in hawk form, so right from the opening lines you know this book will be very different then anything in the series so far.

One thing that I don't understand is all the talk among Animorphs fans on the Internet of Tobias being emo. I just don't see it. Just because someone's depressed, doesn't automatically make them emo. Tobias has every reason in the world to be depressed. You would be too if you were stuck in the body of an animal for the rest of your life, having to live your life as said animal would. Personally, I find Marco much more annoying with his constant non-stop whining and bitching about everything, but cest la vie(sp?).

So, with that little rant out of the way, I'll start with my complaints of the book. In Book 2, the Animorphs saved a bunch of birds from poachers. In this book, they save yet more birds. It's starting to get a bit redundant. I know Tobias is a bird and all, but they can still save other animals from time to time too. But whatever, this is only a very small complaint. Although, while we're talking about redundant, I'm getting really sick of hearing the exact same morphs' morphing processes get described in every book over and over and over. It was a complaint I had with the last book, and it's a complaint that's even more on my nerves in this book. I don't mind describing new morphs, but for god's sake, this is the third and forth times about hearing these exact same morphs morphing, spending multiple pages to describe each one.

On the good side of things though, we get even more characterization in this book then in the previous two combined, and Tobias and Rachel's little unspoken relationship steps up a major notch, however it gets a bit weird seeing as how she's a human and he's now a hawk. The other characters get a bit more characterization as well as they finally start coming into their own personalities and settling down with them. These are finally the characters I remember from my childhood. And as I said above, it's really interesting to have a book from the POV of someone permanently stuck in a morph. It's different then the other two were and more interesting as its more or less a book from the POV of an animal and we get to see how Tobias, in hawk-form, lives his life out in the woods, but since this is still near the beginning of his life-change it's all still just as new to him as it is to us, the readers. Plus, what happens with the female hawk that kept popping in and out of the story from time to time was just downright heartbreaking and not something that could have been done nearly so good from any of the other character's POVs. It's amazing how this series can make you care so much about such a minor 'character' in such a short time.

Also, we finally get to see the wolf morphs. Wolves are my favorite animal (after dinosaurs anyway), and I remembered there were wolf morphs but I couldn't remember what book they first came about in, so that provided some very fun reading for me. This entry was also the most exciting to read so far as well. It had some great scenes, and not just of action but also of genuine suspense and drama as well. The scene where they were all morphing back to human from wolf right on the 2-hour time limit mark was disgusting to read and I imagine would look pretty disturbing in a film and its scenes like that that I have to remind myself that this was made as a kid's series, which is pretty amazing when you take into account how vivid and gruesome some of the descriptions get.

All in all, I have to say, this is my favorite in the main episodic series so far (not counting the Chronicles prequel series). Despite it's short page count and the minor problems I listed above, it managed to be my favorite and it was great to re-read it again after so long.

One last thing, I love how in this series, unlike most kids' series, the good guys don't always win. Actually, so far they've lost more then they've won, which is quite the realistic portrayal of how things are in real life sometimes. You know, minus the brain-controlling aliens invading the Earth and animal-morphing teens :D

Book #2: The Visitor

2009-07-29T07:56:00.000-07:00

PLOT: The Animorphs use Rachel to try to get close to the daughter of a Human-Controller – their Principal - so they can find the new entrance to the Yeerk pool after the old one had been sealed up following the events in the previous book.

RATING: 6/10

REVIEW: The Visitor is one of the many 'Filler' books in the series where nothing that happens in it has any real bearing on anything else in the series. Normally filler-related stuff (More-so TV episodes then anything) are obvious filler and not very interesting, but I'm happy to say that's not entirely the case with this book.

We start getting a better fix on the characters in this one. For instance, while we knew Marco was a joker and prankster in the first book due to Jake always saying it and commenting on it, we actually very rarely saw it as Marco was actually the most serious member of the team for most of that book. In this one, we finally get to see his joking sarcastic personalty that sticks with him for the rest of the series. On that same point, we also start seeing the beginnings of Jake and Cassie's 'relationship' in this one, as well as Rachel and Tobias' little messed up thing that some could call a relationship down the road. The first book was about introducing the characters, this one is about fleshing them out and giving them their own personalities.

It was also really good to see the Animorphs using their powers for something other then just fighting the Yeerks. They used them to stop some poachers from killing endangered birds, as well as Rachel morphing to take on a potential-rapist, which makes perfect sense to me. I mean, these kids are given this great power, wouldn't make much sense to save the world from alien invaders and then just ignore all the other problems that they're also capable of fixing. It was very nice to see that aspect explored. Another thing this book did that I really enjoyed, was it showed what kind of effect the actual morphing process is having on these kids, psychologically. Constant nightmares and mental scars and all that. It was great to be shown some psychological repercussions to what they're doing – something that most kids series' would never even touch on.

However, I do have a lot of problems with this book as well. It was predictable as all Hell, which is actually a huge-step down as I found most things in the series up till now really unpredictable for a kid's series and that's why I enjoyed them so much. Also, when morphing into an animal we've already seen them morph in a previous book, there's no reason to continue going into vivid multiple paragraph-long explanations as to how the morph looks. We've already read it, several times in some cases. It just gets old and takes up space when we have to read about it over and over and over. When it's a new animal, ok sure, or even in the later books one they haven't morphed in awhile. But one we've already seen them morph this specific morph recently and multiple times already, there's just no need to continue describing it over and over and over and over and I ended up skipping over those scenes more often then not.

And the biggest complaint I have about this book - when all was said and done...not a whole lot really happened. It was shorter then the first book and the space it did have seemed to be used more for over-explaining and over-describing things, so chapters were longer then they needed to be and situations took more pages and more time then they needed.

So to finish off this review with a brief summery, this is a step down from the first book story-wise, but a step up characterization-wise, however it can easily be skipped and you won't miss a single thing.

Book #1 - The Invasion

2009-05-05T18:47:00.000-07:00

PLOT: In the first actual Animorphs book, a group of friends get a power from a dying alien - Andalite Prince Elfangor - to temporarily morph into animals, in order to secretly fight against an invading alien species - the Yeerk Empire.

RATING: 8/10

REVIEW: Now that I've got all the prequel Chronicles novels out of the way, I finally got to start the actual episodic book series. My first impression was that its very noticeable that this book was written long before the Chronicles books. The writing style is much more amateurish, the book's length is far shorter, and there are some aspects of it that are contradicted in the later novels. One example of that is that in this book it's stated that the characters can thought-speak to each other even while not in an animal morph, while in even the very next book and for the rest of the series, it's stated that they can thought-speak only while in-morph. Also, there were some situations that didn't really seem all that realistic and made very little sense (I.E. the Cop-controller randomly showing up at Cassie's farm to ask questions without actually suspecting them as having been the people at the Construction site).

The storyline itself was pretty good though, detailing how the main characters get their powers and their first main battle against the alien species known as the Yeerks. It was nice to see the return of Elfangor from The Andalite Chronicles, although it was just a glorified cameo at the very beginning, but if it wasn't for him then the teens would have never gotten the power to Morph and the series just wouldn't be. There is also a nice introduction to each character, and I was actually surprised that Tobias got stuck in his Hawk morph so early. You see, they can only remain in a Morph for two hours or they get stuck in that body permanently (like what happened with Princess Andria in The Hork-Bajir Chronicles). I remembered Tobias got stuck as a hawk, but I thought it wasn't until book 3 or 4 that it happened and not in the very first book, so I was almost as shocked when it happened as I had been when I first read the series 12 years ago. That's what I like about reading this series again now all these years later - I remember almost nothing, so it's almost like reading it for the first time again.

It was also great to see right off the bat that even though this is a kid's series, it's not 'kidified'. By that I mean that this is about their first main battle against the aliens, and in the end of this book, they loose that battle. Normally in an introductory book to a series like this one, the main characters win their first battle and celebrate during the final chapter. Not this one. Their first battle was a failure that bit them on the ass and cost them a lot (I.E. Tobias stuck in hawk form for the rest of his life, Jake loosing his brother to the Yeerks, some humans they tried to rescue got killed) and what damage did they do to the Yeerks? Killed a couple Hork-Bajir Controllers and Taxxon Controllers. That's about it. And I loved that; it was unexpected and actually made the battle very suspenseful and had you invested in it. They let you know right off the bat that in this series, anything goes, nobody is truly safe, and the bad guys will win some of the time.

Overall, a really good start to the series, although not without some minor easy-to-overlook faults.

The Andalite Chronicles

2009-04-19T08:33:00.000-07:00

PLOT: This final Chronicles book follows the Andalite known as Prince Elfangor as he starts off at the bottom of the Andalite Military chain-of-command during the War against the Yeerks, and details his various adventures and missions across the Galaxy, which leads him into direct confrontation with the Yeerk known now as Visser 3, as well as into the middle of a civil war between the alien race called the Taxxons, and on a journey to find the mystical Time Matrix - an object that has the ability to let you travel through time and space.

RATING: 7/10

REVIEW: So this is the one book in the 'Chronicles' prequel series that I did read when I was younger. While it's really good and very entertaining, it's not as good as I remember. I remember back in the day, it being my favorite Animorphs book, ever. Now, while I still highly enjoyed it, I didn't enjoy it as much as I did with The Ellimist and Hork-Bajir Chronicles and I noticed many more faults then I did previously.

Starting with the good, it's a very well-written and a very engaging sci-fi story that is sure to not disappoint even casual fans of the series. We get to travel to multiple worlds and environments, and come across all sorts of alien creatures while involving many great sci-fi plots into one such as a race across the universe, getting caught up in a civil war, and of course time travel of sorts. Speaking of said civil war, it was very cool to have the whole Taxxon uprising in there. During the Animorphs series itself, the Taxxons have all become voluntary hosts for the Yeerks to be used in their army, so it was really fun to read about the beginnings of that and how some of their race actually tried to fight back against those that would voluntarily give themselves to the Yeerk, and we got to see a rare look into their culture and way of life.

I must also award some bonus points for continuity. Not only do we get more of Visser 3's story due to him being involved in all these other people's stories, but we also get to see the return of Alloran, the hard-headed sleazy War-Prince Andalite from The Hork-Bajir Chronicles, and it was a relief that he's still the exact same character we love to hate and that he hasn't changed any of his insane sleazy ways. He reminds me a lot of those crazy General characters in sci-fi movies that are willing to blow up a planet or hundreds of innocent civilians just to be able to throw a hurtful jab at the enemy in some way, and I really hope we get to see more of him in the future of the series.

I also really loved the ending and how it led directly into the beginning of the first Animorphs book perfectly, overlapping with it but from Elfangor's point of view instead of from the kids' perspective.

But as I said above, I noticed many faults through this second-reading. There's a point in the book where multiple characters reach the Time Matrix at the same time and thus it creates this screwed up alternate universe that's made up from equal parts of whatever locations where on the minds of each person touching it, so the laws of physics are all messed up in this alternate reality. While the idea of that section of the story was very cool and I liked it in theory, I think way too much time was spent in that weird screwed up nightmarish alt reality. She could have shaved 15-20 pages out of that and tightened up those chapters and I think it would have been much better. She should have made it 3 or 4 chapters max, instead of the 8 or 9 that it actually was.

And while Prince Elfangor is quite possibly one of, if not THE, most important side-character of the entire series, he seemed to be nothing more here then a male carbon-copy of Princess Andria from The Hork-Bajir Chronicles. I know in terms of being written, this book was written and released first, however it's obvious during this series that she had a very thought-out plan from near the beginning and since I'm reading these books in chronological order, that stood out to me quite heavily. It feels I just finished reading all about this character, as a female, in another book. Also,

Another thing that becomes very slap-in-your-face annoying, at least to me, starts with this book and carries on throughout the series - all the wild out-of-nowhere coincidences. Animorph Marco just so happens to be the son of the Visser 1 host body, Animorph Tobias just so happens to be the son of Prince Elfangor, and many more that I won't spoil here. It gets a bit much after awhile and way too unbelievable. And as much as I love the character of The Ellimist, I did not like his appearance in this book at all. It came out of nowhere in the final couple chapters, and the way he was presented makes for some major continuity errors later in the series.

Other then those things though, this was a pretty enjoyable read and it never once got dull or felt boring. One of the Must-Reads for those interested in the series.

Visser

2009-04-08T10:46:00.000-07:00

PLOT: Despite the false-advertising of the cover, which features the character of Visser Three, the only Yeerk in control of a morph-capable Andalite body, this is actualy about Visser One as she stands trial in front of her peers during the timeframe of the later books of the series, and during this trial she recounts her first missions to Earth and the events that happened to her during those trips and how she became Visser One, the Yeerk in charge of the Earth Invasion.

RATING: 4/10

REVIEW: Perhaps reading this book when I did in terms of chronology was a bad idea, as only half of it takes place in the past, while the other half takes place during the later books in the series, but oh well; what's done is done. In my opinion, this is the weakest book in the Chronicles prequel series, but before I get into all the negative things, I'd like to start on a positive note about the things I did enjoy.

The scenes of Visser One on trial in present-day were pretty interesting and actually turned out to be the best scenes in the book, which going-in I thought I would not like very much. I loved how Visser Three kept trying to trick her into admitting failure on her part and admitting all her well-kept secrets, yet she kept turning the tables around on him at the last minute and that also provided a great format for the flashbacks to the past that take up the other half of the book, and while not much that happens in the past is nearly as interesting as the present-day trial stuff, there are a few good things in there. When she first arrives on Earth, she arrives in the middle of the Gulf War in the Middle East, and I'm surprised with how much gruesome details the author put into her description for a kid's book. For example, she included very vivid descriptions of dead human bodies left from the outcome of a deadly battle in the desert, and after Visser One gets to Hollywood and takes over the mind of an unnamed famous actress, she develops a drug addiction to coke and author K.A. Applegate doesn't shy away from any of the dark details there either. Quite surprisingly when you take into account that this is a book aimed at 10-14 year olds, but that's what I love about this series - she doesn't talk down to her audience or gloss over situations and subject matter that other authors do, and there's just as much in these books for us adults to enjoy as there is for kids.

Unfortunately it couldn't keep such good things up. After the first few chapters in the past, the remainder of the flashback segments were just downright boring as nothing at all really happens. Visser One finds Earth and infiltrates it by hopping from host to host to host, and all of her struggles are simply with the host's mind she's trying to take over. You can only read about someone talking to themselves in their mind and struggling with their inner-selves for so long before it just gets old and you need a bit more to keep it interesting - something that never happens. I also wasn't a fan of her 'falling in love' with her Yeerk subordinate. It doesn't fit in with who we come to know Visser One as later in the series in the slightest bit, however it did work to provide a bit of tension during the present-day trial scenes, so I guess in that aspect it worked. And while I liked the trial stuff better, it wasn't perfect. I thought the book would have been far stronger if they didn't have the Animorphs crash the trial. I understand why the author had it happen in terms of the story - to help Visser One get that one final blow in on Visser Three and come out on top, but the entire overly-long scene ends up making this almost feel like an Animorphs book in the end and not one of the separate Chronicles books, which are supposed to be able to stand on their own without the help of the regular series.

So yes, there is some good stuff in here, but not enough for me to ever want read it again. Maybe it was the false advertising of the cover, or maybe it was just that overall I found the book very boring, I don't know. But once was enough and even then it took multiple tries to finally get through it all and I found myself more then once forcing myself to try to finish it.

Revenge of The Killer Tomatoes!

2009-04-07T18:38:00.000-07:00

Ok, so recently I was really bored at home after my roommate moved out, and I was in the mood to make an improv movie like the days of old, so I decided to go with a short fan-film for Attack of the Killer Tomatoes. However, unlike my 'Our Life' movies, this one, I am the ONLY actor, lol. Also, I never got to finish it, because a couple days later I forgot all about it and shaved my head, lol. But it wasn't going to be much longer then it is now anyway. Just a short battle scene between the tomato and the Tomatoinator, and that would be it pretty much.

Click here for the movie (2:11)

Our Fun Life - The Legendary Home Video!

2009-04-07T18:25:00.000-07:00

One day back when I was in high school, sometime in '01 or '02, me and my best friend at the time, Curtis Coates, were super-bored. My parents were out of town and he was staying over for the weekend. So what we did was take out my video camera and start making a movie titled 'Our Cool Life', with a production Company we created specifically for it, titled JC Productions. However this movie, we were making it up as we went along and had no script (Improving), and was filmed solely in one room of my basement, and had zip-all for budget. It took place in Alberta and started off with me (Wearing various articles of clothes bunched up under my shirt as breasts and a dishcloth over my head as long hair) playing as Allison, a girl pissed off with her parents. She packs her bags and runs away. The next day Jeff gets a call from his friend Curtis, who are both friends with Allison, saying that Allison is missing. Then we cut to Allison hitchhiking (Keep in mind ALL of this was filmed in one room of my house) where she gets kidnapped by a truck driver with a lesbian daughter (The daughter is never seen, only talked about). Jeff dons some clothes (It was all put together on spare-of-the-moment and I was making it up as I went along and gathered up various things to use on it) and becomes Nightboy: Boy of the Streets, and goes and saves her, running into some complications along the way.

Running time was 15 minutes. I ended up loosing the video after it was taped over by my mom for one of her soaps.

Then a half a year later the same situation, so we decide to make a sequel that we ended up calling 'Our Fun Life'. Again, completely improv, no script, and no budget, and in the same room of my house. This is that video. In this one, it takes place in Newfoundland instead of Alberta, about half a year after the first one.

Audio is a bit bad though, cause I had to use my digital camera to record it off of the TV, from a VHS tape.

Click here for the movie! (28:49)

The Hork-Bajir Chronicles

2009-04-04T09:57:00.000-07:00

PLOT: The backstory on how the Hork-Bajir alien race went from being a peaceful tribe-based race to being the enslaved mindless killing machine foot soldiers of the mind-controlling Yeerk Empire. It tells this story from switching from the point of view of an Andalite Princess, a Hork-Bajir seer that befriends the Andalite Princess, and the Yeerk that will come to be known as Visser 3 as he rises through the ranks of his militaristic species.

RATING: 9/10

REVIEW: This entry was really interesting to read because while The Ellimist Chronicles was a very self-contained story about that one character and didn't really have anything to do with the rest of the Animorphs story, this book marks the start of the history of the War that is the grounds for the entire Animorphs series. Reading these Chronicles books, is like the equivalent of the Star Wars prequels, only, you know, good. This begins before the Yeerks even start their Universe-wide invasion, and we find out how that all comes to be, why the Andalites blame themselves for everything, and of course, we get the story on the first entire species to fall under Yeerk control and the battles that the Andalites fought to try to save them.

Overall I think I still prefer The Ellimist Chronicles a tiny bit better, just because it stood better on it's own two feet and as a stand-alone general sci-fi book that anyone at all could pick up and read without any other knowledge of the rest of the series, while this one is the basis of the rest of the series and beginners may not want to pick it up as it assumes that you've read the Animorphs series and thus doesn't take the time to explain some info that a beginner to the series may be confused over. However for fans of the series, this one is pretty damn good and one of my personal favorites. It has everything I look for in a sci-fi war story - grand battle scenes, heartbreak and heavy loss, high stakes, good sci-fi technology, and a small love story that doesn't threaten to take over the story but is just slightly there.

I'm not so fond of the constant POV-changing though. I think I much preferred the Andalite Princess' point-of-view to the others. The Hork-Bajir POV was borderline annoying to read since the character doesn't speak very well or clearly, and while Visser 3's rising through the Yeerk ranks was interesting and informative, it was just not very fun to read and I felt it spent too much time away from the main story and I found myself rushing through those chapters so I could get back to the main story. Overall though, those are really the only somewhat negative things I can say about this, and even those are only minor.

And that ending...wow. I was actually surprised with how much of a downer the ending was; the Andalites loose the battle on the Hork-Bajir homeworld and the few that survived have to retreat off-planet, the Andalite Princess gets trapped in a Hork-Bajir body for the rest of her life due to staying in her Hork-Bajir morphed form for too long past the time limit, and just about the entire Hork-Bajir race get enslved by the Yeerk Empire and those that don't get wiped out by a bio-engineered virus that was made by the Andalites themselves and released on the Hork-Bajir homeworld to wipe out all Hork-Bajir in order to stop the Yeerks from gaining control over them and getting their army.

All in all, a pretty depressing end. I knew it would be somewhat, as it's common knowledge throughout the series that the Hork-Bajir were all enslaved, but I was thinking there would be somewhat of a happy ending in all of that. However, I can't doc any points for that, because for some reason I can't explain I love depressing endings like that, especially when I don't see them coming, because it leaves you with a sense of absolute hopelessness, dread, and doom, only in the end to have the good guys' victory be oh so much sweeter and rewarding.

The Ellimist Chronicles

2009-04-02T20:06:00.000-07:00

Another recurring section here will be reviews of the Animorphs books. I've taken it upon myself to read each one, in chronological order. I'm currently on Book 13, so I've got some catching up to do with my reviews. Now, for those of you unfamiliar with Animorphs, it was a young teen book series that started in the 90's, that was about a group of kids that got the power to morph into animals for a limited time, in order to fight evil brain-controlling aliens. Not only did it rock hard, but it actually addressed a fair number of realistic issues and dark situations that a kids' series normally wouldn't. I got up to the books mid-20's before I stopped reading, only now to pick it up again over 10 years later.

The proper reading order for this series is NOT the chronological order, but since I've already read part of the series before, I'm deciding to read it in chronological order this time. This is my first review:

PLOT: The backstory on the all-powerful Ellimist character of Animorphs, starting at a time when he was a teenager of an alien species, right up to the point where he becomes an all-knowing God-like entity.

RATING: 10/10

REVIEW: I'm amazed at how good this book turned out to be. It's one of the many books I never got around to reading before I quit the series 12 years ago, so it was nice to have that element of surprise while reading it. It follows the all-powerful God-like Ellimist, from before that point in his life, starting off at when he was just a teenage high-tech gamer for an advanced alien species that are somewhat similar to our interpretation of 'Angels', at least in looks. Some members of this species decided to broadcast game footage out into space and another alien race misinterprets that as actual footage and comes to wipe out this species for being so 'dangerous' and a threat. A handful survive though, including the Ellimist and they blast out into space Battlestar Galactica-style, to search for a new home. Along the way, the Ellmist character gets promoted through the ranks of his people as they come across many hardships and problems, and eventually extinction, which leads Ellimist into the first step of the rest of his life as an All-powerful entity.

It was interesting to see the transition of the Ellimist character from a lowly gamer looser to leader of his entire race, to the all-powerful Father Version 2.0 pretty much ('Father' is a very old, very large, very very creepy character in the book inspired by the writings of H. P. Lovecraft), to an even more powerful inter-dimensionable being. I also liked the confrontations between him and Crayek, who is pretty much the Evil version of Ellimist, even though they don't come in until close to the end of the book. I actually forgot I was reading an Animorphs book for a bit because it's so different in tone and style from everything else in the series, but in a good and refreshing way. This is a book that is great for people to pick up and read that aren't familiar with the series as a whole. You need absolutely no knowledge of the actual series to enjoy it. Apart from a cameo of the alien race The Andalites far in their past, and the opening and closing chapters which bookends the novel, this doesn't have any connection to the Animorphs overall plot at all, so it can be equally enjoyed by all.

It feels so good to be back in this universe again after so long away. I'd even go out on a limb here and say that growing up, Animorphs was probably my favorite sci-fi related thing back in the day. Forget Star Trek, forget Star Wars, give me my Animorphs.