Dark Angel: Before The Dawn by Max Allen Collins

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Dark Angel: Before The Dawn by Max Allen Collins
pub: Ebury Press/Random House. Price: £ 5.99 (UK). ISBN: 0-0918-9031-4

check out websites: www.darkangeltheseries.com and www.randomhouse.co.uk

For the most part, I've given up reading film or TV tie-ins myself. Apart from only being one up from fan-fiction in that some publishing house is paying for it, the stories used don't mean diddly-squat to the production studios.

In short, the material isn't canon and isn't going to affect whatever they do in the future. It also means that any tie-in book can't do some serious alterations to the reset button at the end of the story. This differentiates from the material in a novelisation which is adaptation of a film or TV series.

With the TV series 'Dark Angel' being cancelled, there are a couple books still coming out since they were commissioned before it happened. This particular book has to be of interest because it details Max's life after she escaped Manticore and leading up to her life in Seattle and looks like it should be regarded as canon.

In many ways this parallels the tie-in book 'American Gothic: Family', another cancelled series where its nice lead character, Sheriff Buck, has his origin related. It's also an extinct book. Try to get a first hand copy.

I suspect the same is likely to happen to 'Before The Dawn'. Unless you get it in first release, you're going to be struggling to get this particular book off of any ardent 'Dark Angel' fan.

That being said, is this book worth anything beyond its novelty value? Collins is a good recognised writer with a long pedigree. The number of references that link into the series and explains things were aided by both the TV company and his researcher, Matt Clemens, to avoid any cock-ups.

It should have a lot going for it...

Although this book is engaging, when someone like me starts analysing without consciously thinking about it, I end up looking for what doesn't feel right. Most of this comes down to Max. Not the writer but the lead character.

Practically all her life is one long, lucky break. She falls in with the right people at the right time. Granted she could have had a rough time with the abusing father of the family who first adopts her but nothing seems to sink in. Max feels anger when a street gang she belonged to was killed in a gun battle but it doesn't come out in her emotional make-up.

She just carries on as before. Nothing appears to shake her emotionally. Now, whether this is a reflection of Max's character in that she is mostly a cold fish - actually part-cat according to her genetic manipulation - is debatable. Is this evidence going to reveal itself further in the TV episodes I haven't seen yet? In the UK, we are after all, not quite near the end of Season One on terrestrial TV, so I shall have to wait and see the rest of the evidence.

For the most part, a lot of incidental information comes out of the story. We learn a lot of background info like why does Original Cin call Max 'Boo' and even the origin of the name 'Dark Angel' - but you need 'Eyes Only' to tell you that one. For trivia, you 'Dark Angel' fans are going to lap it up.

Story content-wise, I have reservations. It's still a trip book using Manticore to Seattle instead of A to B with too many set-pieces that you know will be destroyed because they don't turn up in the TV series two seasons. With the series now cancelled, it's probably the nearest you're going to get to canon material.

GF Willmetts

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