Lady Death (2004) Review:

Not all comic book adaptations have found success in live-action. From what has been produced in the past, it takes a lot of meticulous work and tedious time to produce a product everyone will like. Sometimes, the better route is to ditch the live-action bit and start off with an animation feature instead. It's less costly and could prove as a valid test to show whether a certain character has enough draw power to bring in enough viewers. Sadly, this motion picture attempt just didn't cut it for viewers, as did I.

Lady Death

The lead, Lady Death is taken from the same name character from a now debunked comic book company called Chaos Comics. Unfortunately, by the time this motion picture was released, Chaos Comics went bankrupt. So, that's not a good sign right there, if the main comic distributor is out of business before the movie is even released,...the turnout probably won't be that successful. This ended up coming true but not because of popularity, it was more because of everything else. The two components to this film that really bring the quality down are its animation and writing.

The majority of writing was done by Carl Macek, the same guy who wrote the screenplay to Heavy Metal 2000 (2000), the slightly bit more entertaining sequel to the animation cult classic, Heavy Metal (1981). But that's not to say that movie, or this one for that matter is really that entertaining. Heavy Metal 2000 (2000) was a little bit better because it actually focused on a character and not just a compilation feature. The same is here too but the reasoning behind various subplots are practically left untouched. After being accused of being the lovechild of Lucifer, Hope (the heroine) is burned at the stake and upon her death, decides to take vengeance on Lucifer for the cause of her death.

This particular plot may be simple enough but upon deeper analysis, there are a lot of holes within the story. For example, it's not even explained to why or how Hope turns into Lady Death or how she even decides to come up with the name. Another unexplained subplot is if Hope really was the lovechild of Lucifer. Was it all a lie or did she truly have dark powers that she had no idea of. And if that was the case, how did she learn how to use her power? It's questions like these that are not answered, which can lead to a very disconnected and possibly boring watch between viewer and the screen.

Lucifer's human form

Plus, the dialog isn't too deep either. One of the most repeated lines in this film is "Desire equals power" and its not that difficult to understand the first time it is said, yet it is stated several times as if everyone will forget. Adding to the frustration is the disjointed and choppy animation. There were even some frames where the character stopped moving completely and was zoomed out of the frame; almost like no one would notice. Even the continuity wasn't kept in line, which seems legit that no one was taking this animated picture very seriously. But it’s baffling though, the animators are not even credited here so....were they professionals? What's going on?

As for anything else, it's ok. The music provided by Bill Brown was appropriate for the setting but it didn't make the experience any more meaningful. The actors who lent their voices to their designated characters also did a fair job but again, the dialog didn't help them make their characters very memorable. The art headed by storyboard artist Dan Schaefer looked good but for these few things, that's about all I can give it for the attempt that was made. But to say it'll capture even the smallest bit of the viewers attention is a little bit of a stretch.

This poor adaptation of the Chaos Comic heroine has respectable performances from its voice cast but the overall product is horrendous. The writing is bare bones with minimal explanations to anything, the dialog is repetitive and animation is almost to the point of insulting.

Points Earned --> 2:10