Rogue Elements: A Ryan Drake Story

I was eagerly anticipating this production, being a fan of the Drinker and sharing most of his frustration of modern film making.

I've read a couple of Will Jordan's books and found them to be a bit paint by numbers, with the lead character "Drake" being a bit dull. I found this short film to be very similar. My main criticism is the casting of Ryan Drake, I'm sorry but I just don't see how anyone in their right mind would think casting of Moran as an experienced special forces operator was a good idea. Moran was a terrible casting choice and unfortunately, this completely ruined it for me.

Maybe I was expecting too much?! But I was left disappointed.

I'm a big fan of the Drinker as a critic. I could never really get into his writing as much, and this concept piece illustrates why for me.

Don't misunderstand to title, there's some fun to be had with some of the scenes, but the writing did not lend itself well to the direction it received, which resulted in a disconnect with any emotional investment the audience could have.

For all his talk, Will is not quite able to edit his dialogue down to something tight and concise. It's clear that he knows the story he wants to tell, simple and clear. Simple, indeed it is, but the word count that ended up on the paper did not reflect that.

This Proof of Concept should have been something that showed that Mr Drinker could walk the walk he talks about. Instead, several things he constantly criticized other films for, those some things appear here. Most importantly, it's just boring and not engaging. I at one time considered myself a fan of the drinker , but as of late I stopped watching because all his videos were the same and he spoke about the same thing over and over, and it seems he didn't have the desire to change and talk about some of the more positive stuff, but when he released this idea upon the world , I was excited. I am glad I didn't put money towards this. I know the people who backed this are pissed. It's just like sci fi tv series level of execution.

For all the hullabaloo and self congratulatory behaviour surrounded this 'tv concept' thing, it was surprisingly dull affair.

Just a bland, generic special forces mission type thing that helps congest the daytime rota of those strange TV channels that constantly play low budget, low quality tripe.

It makes the Equaliser TV show with that ex rapper look almost like Shakespeare and let's be honest it's not a patch of the original show. I will be surprised if this ever makes it into anything else, be it on TV or the big screen. I believe that there is a series of books with the Nick Drake character, but honestly, I think I could pretty much have a good idea of all the plots going by this.

Rarely has a crowdfunded project more comprehensively dunked on the mugs who gave it money. But Rouge Elephants goes all-out to subvert expectations by displaying all of the very same tropes that its creator mercilessly mocks when he observes them in others:

An anodyne, anonymous John Guyman lead with no character or presence. I've watched this twice and still couldn't name one trait of Nothing Dork.

Pacing that opens with a mild bang then immediately slips into flashbacks, tell-don't-show, and even as-you-know exposition to pad out the run-time.

Not one but two girlbosses who perform ridiculous feats of combat, when they would be laid flat by the first hand put on them.

Dialogue that's stilted, cheesy, clumsy, interchangeable, repetitive and rambling.

An utterly generic plot that's so genre-compliant that surely it must qualify as parody.

Bear in mint that all this comes from a writer / producer who can recognise all the traits of a great indie production, and yet chooses to use absolutely none of them himself.

It's telling that not one of the creator's circle of content creators has reviewed this short, because there is literally nothing in it to praise, either objectively, or in comparison to any contemporary production like Terminal List or Reacher.

A creator with courage would do a "The Drinker Fixes: Rogue Elements", but we still await that moment of humility and self awareness.