Welcome to the Vitka Zone

In "Independents Day" Nerd Caliber provides short reviews of noteworthy comics and books NOT produced by a major publisher.

Be afraid. Be very afraid... and amused, it turns out.

Space Whiskey Death Chronicles, indie author William Vitka's gripping short story collection finds the edges of classic science fiction and dark fantasy and dives headfirst into the horrible abyss beyond. There are no guarantees of happiness and fewer assurances of safety in Vitka's universe.

His work evokes the best of the "Twilight Zone" and "Tales from the Darkside." It's a completely fresh voice sharing a horror that feels as authentically eldritch as anything Poe and Lovecraft invented.

If you're looking for a nice story that makes you feel good about being a human, look elsewhere. If you want a story with a small epiphany at the end, where everyone is sadder, but wiser at the end, just put this book down.

There's no comfort here. Being a human in Vitka's fiction is like being an insect in a world much larger and more terrifying than we could realize. We cannot hope to influence our destiny. The best we can do is resist, futilely, the incredible forces that will certainly overwhelm us. Somehow in this real world full of science and math that is so far beyond our understanding, his work feels terrifyingly relevant.

Yet, it is to his credit that his writing moves the reader along quickly, as if some kind of joke that is teasing you toward the punch line. Jack the Ripper is a hero of the world. We are a family running out of oxygen in the deep reaches of space. Gremlins are helpers. All of your preconceived notions of good and evil mean nothing as each tale requires a total shift of perspective.

It's the mark of great stories that even when you can guess the ending that the journey was worth the time invested. This collection meets-and exceeds-this goal every time.

I rate it five Cthulhu tentacles out of five.

Buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/Space-Whiskey-Death-Chronicles/dp/162007155X/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1375211633&sr=1-4

Follow William Vitka here: https://twitter.com/vitka

When Heroes and Deadly Traps Collide You Get The New Trailer for ‘All Superheroes Must Die’

Fans of the Saw series know the scenario well: a group of regular individuals fighting to survive the deadly traps of a madman. It’s paid off quite well for Lions Gate Entertainment‘s last seven films, but what happens when the madman & his traps are being used against super powered heroes?

That’s the premise for All Superheroes Must Die, the latest film from Image Entertainment and Jason Trost, the co-writer/director and star of the independent hit The FP..

When four super heroes awake in an abandoned town, they find themselves at the mercy of their abductor and Arch Nemesis, Rickshaw, played by Dexter‘s James Remar. Stripped of their powers, the heroes — including Trost and X-Men: First Class‘ Lucas Till – must compete in a series of deadly challenges in a race against the clock to not only save the lives of the innocent civilians, but also their own.

Take a look at the trailer, from back when it was still called “VS”, after the jump.

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Being able to get Remar and Till on the cast for a film shot with a budget of less then a million dollars shows that at least some people think this film has what it take to be a hit, myself included. Hopefully audiences will see it that way too when All Superheroes Must Die is released in video on demand Jan. 1st, 2013, with a limited theatrical release a few days later on Jan. 4th.

Source: Bleeding Cool