Is this good? Not particularly, but the audiobook is fairly well done.
It is absolutely and stunningly strange that Han and Chewie are in this, it wouIs this good? Not particularly, but the audiobook is fairly well done.
It is absolutely and stunningly strange that Han and Chewie are in this, it would have worked a lot better if they weren't. But I suppose it was 2009, before the sequels killed our hopes and dreams, so perhaps the people hungered for Han content.
It also would have worked significantly better if it had been longer and had leaned way more into the premise. It's not particularly thrilling or tense, which is a shame, because the idea of a zombie-infested spaceship is inherently terrifying and very, very fun.
Schreiber ends up making it more an action story than a horror story. It's unfortunate, because it could have been creepy as hell. Still, it's interesting to see someone have fun and mess around genre-wise in a universe that is now so tightly controlled.
The characters, however, are not particularly interesting and you don't spend nearly enough time with anyone to really care if they live or die. Their story arcs have little pay-off and the circumstances they're in don't seem to change them at all. They stay the same throughout, which is... odd.
Jareth Satoris is the only character worth a damn, and honestly, they should have taken his character and made him Rey's secret dad in the movies. That's all I gotta say....more
I have shelved this under horror, although technically it might not be. I simply found the ending so monumentally creepy that I didn't even think twicI have shelved this under horror, although technically it might not be. I simply found the ending so monumentally creepy that I didn't even think twice about putting it in that particular genre.
Perhaps it's more science fiction. It's more subdued, but it definitely falls in the "mad scientist meddles in affairs that should be left to God (or the uncaring universe)". It's in many ways the classic tale of trying to solve metaphysical questions with science, while not truly considering the ramifications if you should manage to find an answer.
Du Maurier does atmosphere so fucking well, and while this is short it manages to convey that particular feeling of isolation when you're cut off from the world and only have a few select people to rely on. You become more sympathetic towards them. You start believing things you might not have otherwise. If left alone long enough with someone could they not eventually persuade us of anything?
I find parts of the story problematic and unpleasant, especially the way it talked about disabled people, and it's the reason I won't rate it any higher. However the ending really was, to me at least, supremely creepy and unsettling. (view spoiler)[ A soul trapped in a machine begging to be let go? Begging through a little girl? It sent a chill up my spine. The implications of the soul being real and then the soul being trapped after death is nightmarish to me, and somehow this little story captured that horror so well. (hide spoiler)]
I've been reading a lot of these little black classics lately, as I've had them for ages and am trying to get through them, and by some coincidence I read stories by Edgar Allan Poe and Elizabeth Gaskell right before this, both include horror stories, and this managed what neither of those did, what few things manage. It made me genuinely afraid for a moment....more