Book Review: Alita: Battle Angel - Iron City, by Pat Cadigan
A prequel that didn't need to be written.
Titan Books, 2018, 312 pages
As a Battle Angel Alita fan, I clearly have a high tolerance for ridiculous worldbuilding, plots that go upside-down and sideways, and dialog that alternates between cringeworthy and confuzzling.
But Pat Cadigan tried to take all that and put it in a novel, and it just doesn't work.
James Cameron's movie Alita: Battle Angel was supposed to be the first in a franchise, as he planned to film the entire Alita saga. Unfortunately, the movie tanked badly enough that we'll probably never see another one, but before then they apparently hired Pat Cadigan to write at least two tie-in novels.
I very rarely read movie novelizations, but like I said, I'm an Alita fan. Cadigan's first Alita book was just a straight novelization of the movie, and it was serviceable enough. Iron City is a "prequel" to the movie, containing material from the manga that probably would never have been filmed even if the franchise had continued because it all takes place before Alita shows up. Cadigan does what she can with the stories of Doc Ido, his ex-wife Chiren, Alita's future boyfriend Hugo, and Vector, the boss/fixer of Iron City, but these are all secondary characters who frankly aren't all that interesting by themselves. We care about Ido and Hugo because Alita cares about them. Chiren never appeared in the manga and was just an excuse to add Jennifer Connelly to the movie, and Vector is an antagonist before Alita moves on to bigger and badder villains.
So, if you've read the manga, this book doesn't fill in much of anything for you. If you really liked the movie and haven't read the manga, maybe you'll enjoy this book as it gives you more detail about the characters in the movie. But I just found it rather tedious.
Admittedly, it was not helped by Cadigan's writing. In the first Alita book, I could forgive the flat narrative voice and the exposition dumps because it was a movie novelization, after all. In this book, though, she's taking a story given to her by Yukito Kishiro (and Hollywood) but she had the freedom to put her own voice in it, and her own voice is, well, flat and full of exposition dumps. Page after page of telling us what Ido feels and why, describing Chiren as a walking manifestation of Resting Bitch Face, and of course, Vector, who's a cartoonish bad guy who didn't need to be quite so cartoonish in print, but Cadigan still writes him that way. Not only narrating his every thought in third person, but making him constantly such a petty, shitty employer that it's a wonder no one has shived him yet.
(In the manga, he eventually becomes slightly more sympathetic, though he's still a dick.)
Anyway, while this book wasn't terrible, I can't really recommend it. Read the manga instead. Given these two entries, I'm not really sad that Cadigan didn't get to write any more books in the franchise.
Also by Pat Cadigan: My review of Alita: Battle Angel.
My complete list of book reviews.
Titan Books, 2018, 312 pages
The official prequel novel to the highly anticipated film
A long time ago, there was the Great War. The reasons for the war have been lost to time. On the shattered surface of the earth, there is a metropolis that lives amid the garbage thrown down from the inhabitants of a sky city floating above it. Welcome to Iron City.
A lonely doctor specializing in cyborg repair, Ido, is doing his best to help the citizens of Iron City. But Ido has a double life, another persona born from the pieces of his broken heart.
Hugo, a young man surviving on a life of crime, spots the ultimate steal: an object that will unearth secrets from his own past.
And Vector, the most powerful businessman in the city, has his sights set on a new technology that will change the future of Iron City forever....
As a Battle Angel Alita fan, I clearly have a high tolerance for ridiculous worldbuilding, plots that go upside-down and sideways, and dialog that alternates between cringeworthy and confuzzling.
But Pat Cadigan tried to take all that and put it in a novel, and it just doesn't work.
James Cameron's movie Alita: Battle Angel was supposed to be the first in a franchise, as he planned to film the entire Alita saga. Unfortunately, the movie tanked badly enough that we'll probably never see another one, but before then they apparently hired Pat Cadigan to write at least two tie-in novels.
I very rarely read movie novelizations, but like I said, I'm an Alita fan. Cadigan's first Alita book was just a straight novelization of the movie, and it was serviceable enough. Iron City is a "prequel" to the movie, containing material from the manga that probably would never have been filmed even if the franchise had continued because it all takes place before Alita shows up. Cadigan does what she can with the stories of Doc Ido, his ex-wife Chiren, Alita's future boyfriend Hugo, and Vector, the boss/fixer of Iron City, but these are all secondary characters who frankly aren't all that interesting by themselves. We care about Ido and Hugo because Alita cares about them. Chiren never appeared in the manga and was just an excuse to add Jennifer Connelly to the movie, and Vector is an antagonist before Alita moves on to bigger and badder villains.
So, if you've read the manga, this book doesn't fill in much of anything for you. If you really liked the movie and haven't read the manga, maybe you'll enjoy this book as it gives you more detail about the characters in the movie. But I just found it rather tedious.
Admittedly, it was not helped by Cadigan's writing. In the first Alita book, I could forgive the flat narrative voice and the exposition dumps because it was a movie novelization, after all. In this book, though, she's taking a story given to her by Yukito Kishiro (and Hollywood) but she had the freedom to put her own voice in it, and her own voice is, well, flat and full of exposition dumps. Page after page of telling us what Ido feels and why, describing Chiren as a walking manifestation of Resting Bitch Face, and of course, Vector, who's a cartoonish bad guy who didn't need to be quite so cartoonish in print, but Cadigan still writes him that way. Not only narrating his every thought in third person, but making him constantly such a petty, shitty employer that it's a wonder no one has shived him yet.
(In the manga, he eventually becomes slightly more sympathetic, though he's still a dick.)
Anyway, while this book wasn't terrible, I can't really recommend it. Read the manga instead. Given these two entries, I'm not really sad that Cadigan didn't get to write any more books in the franchise.
Also by Pat Cadigan: My review of Alita: Battle Angel.
My complete list of book reviews.