4 out of 5

Boyll finally got the right blend of drama and sadness for the character; he finally got a believable mix of comic super-realism and scientific grounding; he found an involving subject to blend the horrific world of The Darkman with something that extended beyond the boundaries of the film; he found a general pitch for his writing that didn’t stray too far into any given trope…  In shortest phrasing – Randall Boyll truly found his pace and character with book 4 of this series.  So of course it ended up being the last one.

It was an odd pitch to begin with, so it’s sensible that it was hard to figure out in what direction to take things.  Raimi’s original character was totes comic book superhero, mashed into his R-rated sense of humor and cartoonish violence, which landed the movie with a grimmer feel than it may or may not deserve.  It’s nice that it’s R-rated and gets lumped in with horror, but it’s Army of Darkness in that sense, where it could totally pass on current TV almost unmolested censorship-wise, save maybe some language, and the under-riding feeling is one of humor.  Though Darkie definitely has more of a grounding in some exploratory pathos than Ash and crew could possibly bring to the table, lending it more ‘meat’ as a movie, and character room to explore in, say, a book series.  But from book 1 its obvious that it’s meant to be filed in horror, so Boyll keeps the bloodshed high, unfortunately feeling his way through what angle to take.  Super hero?  Antihero?  Thus did book one turn out as this weirdo noirish crime exploration, stumbling while wending through Peyton Westlake’s history.

And book two was ridiculous.  Boyll lashed about for a way to continue the tale, keeping the ‘hero’ aspect and trying to further divest itself of history by wrapping the story around Westlake’s wife Julie and her process of ‘moving on’ and how that connected to some new Darkman crime business in a very forced set of ‘coincidences’, with a completely pointless subplot that just seemed included to have some more violence.

I don’t have book three, but interestingly it doesn’t seem to be referenced in ‘Face of Death,’ unless the mention of it was casual to the extent that I wouldn’t know.  So perhaps that book was a stepping stone, who knows.  But either way, unlike book one and two, when Randall jumps between three major storylines – One: Darkman and Jennifer Dalton, the latter of whom has seen Peyton in full mummy gear, whose brother – Adam, American diplomat in Uruguay – has been kidnapped and held for ransom, which Peyton, thanks to film / book activities, has sitting around and agrees to pay;  Two: Rondo, crazy CIA man, who seeks to use Darkman’s fake skin to undertake some crazy take-over-the-world covert stuff;  Three: Adam Dalton, starving, held captive, suddenly offered an avenue of escape – you understand the reason for the ties, or are provided the reasons fairly up front, and each section appropriately moves the next one on by a few steps.  Books 1 and 2 were occasionally a slog when the POV would flip, Boyll ‘resetting’ the tone to try to introduce a new element, which is a writing style I don’t prefer.  But ‘Face of Death’ keeps the momentum going by having its plotting / POVs effectively linked and tightened.  Also gone is much of the ‘madness’ and whining.  Boyll chose to represent Darkman’s adrenaline surges with a second voice that chided our hero and annoyed our reader.  The voice is here, but he doesn’t rely on it as a device.  Darkman has his rages and things mostly go dark.  We’ll keep getting narration by Westlake while his rage brews, without the constant nagging reminder that he knows its wrong.  We’re just having his sudden bloodlust described, and it’s much more effective when it calms down and he surveys the wreckage, lending the violence an actual sense of horror and not just genre necessity.  Another significant shift is in the disposition of the character – resigned to his life, not really using the fake skin at any point in the story.  Which makes sense; which is more ‘realistic’.  Darkman as crimefighter is a little silly, but Darkman as lonely, withdrawn observer who gets inadvertently wrapped into things is totally workable.  This makes sinking into the setting of stepping past introducing Jennifer and Darkman’s initial meeting doable as well – not a lot of nonsense about which identity and face he used and how he convinced her to trust him blah blah blah… Peyton is treated as closer to a human being, just a damaged one, and thus you can include him in the human world without too many leaps of faith.

There’s still some loose footwork here in terms of the main hook with Rondo’s plans.  They don’t quite make sense and Boyll covers for that by having Rondo be insane.  Similar to this is an inclusion of a scene at a fairground.  It makes sense, but the action feels a little purposefully escalated just to match the book’s cover, which is Darkie poised on some rollercoaster tracks.  Like, here’s the cover, now write the book to match.  And there is an odd romance brewing between Jennifer and Darkman that, honestly, works, Boyll slowly nurturing it.  But it lapses into excess at select moments and threatens to ruin a nice downbeat feeling that the story maintains.  This is thankfully saved by the gorgeously depressing ending, but it’s still a bump in the road.

Those bumps, though, are not part of the core elements of the book that work so well.  Randall’s study of / understanding of the science of the skin comes across as legit this time, not just made-up writer mumbo-jumbo, and his detailing of Adam’s grueling struggle is felt and harsh.  He’d essentially found the elements needed to finally make the character his own, and it could’ve turned into a pretty great pulpy series of a true underdog.  Alas, it tweren’t to be, and here endeth the books of Darkman.