REVIEW - VIENNA - DEAD DROP

Warning to all master assassins...spoilers follow

I was lucky enough to be relaxing by the pool when I got round to listening to episode one of the Vienna Box Set - Dead Drop. As a huge fan of the mechanics and twists used in The Memory Box, I had high hopes for this series.

Target Objective: Vienna is tasked with assassinating an extremely powerful psychokinetic individual nicknamed The Supreme Commander (whispers God Complex).

This assassination is scheduled to take place on the Custodian - space battleship - and Vienna manages to silence the target quite easily. Not much of a story eh? Well, unfortunately for Vienna,  just when she's about to jump ship and collect her earnings, the Custodian comes under attack by the Chtzin, an alien race whose unique psychic powers allow them to turn a person's instincts against them. Vicious combo eh?

The simple kill job turns into a space war between the Custodian and the Chtzin who are hellbent on destroying everyone on board. Poor Vienna just wants to leave, but everything gets in the way and she's forced to help out before the ship plummets into the sun. Don't know if this is a deliberate nod to 42.

I have to praise Mark Wright for Vienna's dialogue as she still sounds as sexy as she looks. Given that, I have to praise Masterson for sounding as sexy as she looks also. God this woman is as cold as ice, but at the same time she's as hot as fire.

Mark is also quite good at throwing plot twist after plot twist after plot twist in his story and this one is no different. There is nothing particularly wrong with this story - for the most part anyway. It feels like a big-old Star Wars/Star Trek space battle and the sound effects compliment the events beautifully. The only trouble is that I'm not a huge fan of that heavy SCI-FI storytelling. Closest space-battle I actually enjoyed was Gundam Seed. Nope. As you may have now realized, I'm not a Trooper or a Trekkie. Mum is though, but that doesn't really help the situation now does it? So for me personally, this story wasn't exactly what I was expecting from the first episode. 

This isn't a bad thing though. As mentioned, if you are addicted to space-battles, then this story will blast your socks off. It's tailored to that portion of the fans. I'm in the minority this time. It's okay. I can take it. I won't cry...(cries)

However, I am not one of those reviewers who just praises the good and leaves out the bad. This story does have some negative as part of the package. Mainly it's the pace. It tends to go up, then drop through the floor, then up through the ceiling, then down again etc. It's hard to get in a particular mood with this story, because as soon a you get in a certain groove, the story does a 180 and throws you off like a broncho bull. This element of the story gets annoying real quickly, so watch out.

Rating this story, I give it: 7.5/10

See you next time when I share my thoughts on Nev Fountain's Bad Faith in which Vienna tries her best to keep the faith.