Mythica: Stormbound

I am a fanboy of fantasy movies, worship Lord of the Rings. I also really enjoyed the first 5 movies. I was willing to go easy on this movie and forgive a lot. But. The first five had what this movie is missing.

I would say this is more of a play than a movie. Something very talented high schoolers would produce. And if you have not seen the first five, forget this one. Will make no sense.

Has to be said that every actor gave it his all. It was a passion project, and it shows. The character named Stranger gave me Aragorn vibes for the first half of the flick. But that was not enough to make up for the shortcomings.

The majority of the movie takes place inside the inn, in one room. A la 12 angry men style. I am pretty sure the low kickstarter budget of $200,000 had a lot to do with that. After a while the repeated placement shot of the outside of the inn followed by more time in the inn started getting stale. I had forgotten the previous movies were kickstarters and kept wondering why the set never changed. This gave the movie a "play" feel. I never had that feeling in the first five movies.

The magical special effects were also pretty poor. And there was a lot less of them than in previous movies. They did little to sell the story or movie.

But the unforgivable sin is the story. It is derivative and forgettable. There is very little character development. The villain at the end is so underdeveloped me and the wife did not care if he lived or died. We were indifferent. The previous movies were much better written and were properly paced with rich story telling. We cared about the characters. We were invested. This movie would barely make it as a tv episode. The movie ended and we were shocked at the underwhelming ending and poor general script.

Maybe they had a lot less money for this one? I don't know. They setup a part 7. Story continues. But if they cannot recapture the magic of the first 5, it won't be worth making.

This was an absolutely wonderful follow up to the original 5 Mythica films. It takes place 19 years after the demise of Szorlock, and the Red Thorns have become the stuff of legends. Their stories are told around campfires, but the effects of war still run deep and have hardened most. Vytalion soldiers are hunted and killed. A gloom seems to hang over most as if they know they aren't quite out of the dark yet. I don't know if it was due to budget restraints, but they chose to set the film mostly in a single location. An inn, where they have all sought shelter from the storm. It felt as if Patrick Rothfuss wrote the Hateful Eight. Most characters here aren't who they pretend to be, and secrets are revealed slowly and done very well, and Will Kemp does a fantastic job as The Stranger. His secrets, and connections to the Red Thorns, brought a smile to my face. You do see a couple familiar faces, a "blink and you'll miss it" tribute to Daegan, the half elf thief, but over all this is a brand new cast of characters, all of which I would gladly watch in a new batch of sequels. The cgi effects are also fantastic for the beast which the stranger has captured, although lacking for the guardian owl. But I've always found poor cgi charming in a way, especially in the Mythica films, because you know it was all done with so much passion and love that it hardly feels like a criticism at all.

Plot

Years after Szorlok's devastation and the Red Thorns' victory, a new evil will threaten the world and new heroes will rise to fight it.

Cast

New unknown faces and little more than cameos from a trio of Mythica veterans.

Verdict

Dagen from previous Mythica movies steps behind the camera to direct his very first movie and had a lot of expectations on him from the fans. Were they met? Absolutely not, but to be fair he didn't stand much of a chance.

Doing a Mythica movie this many years later was an immediate disadvantage. Are the fans still interested? Is the magic still present? Only being able to get a few original cast members and having them on screen for a couple of minutes a time, foolish! And the apparent lack of budget! The film looks great until some form of special effects are required and then they look horrendous, truly appalling CGI.

Furthermore because such little happens it feels very oddly structured, like 90% of the film could have made up the first 15 minutes yet is drawn out and when the credits hit you feel slighted.

I'm a Mythica fan and it breaks my heart to say it, but I think they should have left it alone after the last film as this contributes nothing to the lore and is a mess of a film that tarnishes the legacy of what came before it.

Rants

If this is it, if we don't get another movie and everything is left here then what an embarrassment that is. Characters we love and have followed across all the previous movies have now been dragged into perilous unfinished plots? This should never have been made, and if they are to continue, if I'm wrong and several more films get made and everything is to be wrapped up. Please, please, put some more money into it as those special effects really ruined several scenes.

The Good

Well made in most places A couple of decent new cast members

The Bad

Awfully structured Original cast are wasted Terrible CGI Feels like a huge downgrade.

Just not the same story without Melanie/Marek. The storyline isn't bad, but the writing and new actors just don't feel like the same series. It's too bad they couldn't get all of the original cast to finish it all out. Nice try, but this is a swing and a miss. Do yourself a favor and just watch the series right up to this one and just stop. Like so many series in the past decade, the further they go, the worse they get. I'm just hoping that they do get the cast and writers of the original stories and put together at least one more before calling it quits. Regardless, this movie can be skipped and you won't miss anything.

If you've ever seen and liked any of the screensavers on YouTube featuring a spooky house on a stormy night with lighting and a cosy log fire burning then this movie is for you as it is a little like that but with a who done it story added on. I think the older Mythica's were much better, I definitely enjoyed them more but I had to watch Stormbound in two parts as I was falling asleep. So I can't really recommend it unless you are a Mythica fan. Nowadays mateur special effects CGI typed stuff can be really impressive unfortunately the special effects in this movie were some of the worst I've ever seen. As for the main actors I liked the slave girl and Stranger they did a good job and the dwarf was good too.