User reviews

The party continues on their quest, this time helped by a dark elf with mysterious markings, while a warlock is trying to beat them to their goal. Unfortunately, it seemed like the makers made a lot less effort for this film, especially in the areas of character interaction and storyline. That's unfortunate, especially since I loved A Quest for Heroes.

Some commentators focused on the quality of the special effects. I don't care about those, but this is an indicator that those people didn't feel the characters were important or the story inspiring, and that is on the script writer. If the story is great and the characterization well done, no one looks twice on the special effects. I think that, while I still enjoyed the film, more effort should be made to make the viewers feel with the characters in a story that one could believe in.

Bottom line: fun film, really inconsistent characters, jumping from love to hate on a whim, and a disappointing and rushed ending that made little sense. I hope the next part will be more engaging.

Mythica series is a niche for fantasy fans, it doesn't boast high budget production, but decent enough for a B-movie viewing. The Darkspore has a couple of nice designs and occasional humor, yet the narrative doesn't produce that great of an adventure. It does feel as though we're seeing some sub quest from a game or mediocre side episode of less-than-epic tale.

It revolves around a party of mage, necromancer to be specific, and warriors to ensure the enemy force doesn't possess the illusive Darkspore. Unfortunately, there's barely any draw to the premise, it spends almost one hour to set-up the plot yet the momentum doesn't take off and it just ends up floating in a flat line the entire time. A few gimmicky plot devices that are introduced won't appeal to many since they tend to be vague.

Actors do their best on the material they have, the costumes are nice as well. In some scenes, there is decent humor to be had, mainly in the expense of the joker character. Aside from that, the personalities feel bland. They don't engage the audience, merely rehearsing stereotypical fight the evil theme. It could've capitalized on the stereotypical premise to bring humor or present more twists, but the movie keeps it too safe.

Effects are passable at best, there are a few instances that really break the immersion. For example, the encounter with mythical entity that just looks dreadful. Considering the budget, it does fairly well for half the runtime, although when these flaws appear they are noticeably jarring.

I'm inclined to give it higher score since it has the feel of fantasy adventure when it shines for a brief moment, but the lackluster characterization and effects make the movie into an ordinary fetch quest, hardly a captivating tale.

Keep the costume designer and the photographer, fire all others, including the director.

Poor - no, I take it back - awful script and dialogues and terrible, terrible directing. There is no real coherence from one scene to the next, no one takes advantage of the actors' strong points, long scenes to fill the time in order to give an excuse for a movie.

This could have been so much more.

CG were not needed really; we could have used our imagination, with a bit of air acting, and use the money to hire a better director.

And the story - oh, the story - what a mess... It really peaks in the end where, disposing of the whole of the point, the heroes mess up their mission, utterly fail, leaving the world to its doom and walk away all smiles in search for another adventure and... warmer climates.

Really, now, whoever gave high marks to this film must either be a close friend of someone in the cast or crew or an utter nutter about anything sword-yielding, magic-casting or horse-riding.

And... "Hercules" must have been stoned up to his eyeballs.

It's not necessary to mention the terrible use of CG (most of which could have been done with cheaper, more realistic non computer effects), because that's not really where this movie can use improvement.

While the acting is mostly good, the script is very weak. Character interactions are awkward. Their relationship seem forced, like there doesn't really look like there's enough motivation for them to stay together. The fighting scenes are really badly coordinated. With that same group and just a bit of tactics, victory would come easy (at least to enemies shown) but instead everyone fights like if they were drunk or disabled somehow; so whenever the heroes are defeated, being in good condition, it is not believable. Also, all heroes are unremarkable: the warrior is not a great fighter, the wizard cast magic sparingly or waits the worst moments to do so, the "thief" is not really stealthy or that quick on the feet, and the priest has no real divine magic or combat power (despite "being trained in combat", see the first part).

Also the name/title of the enemy seemed like inspired from a video game, thus awkward and forced... the ending felt forced as well.

In the end, unless they improve script and character development and interaction, not even "Hercules" can save this movie series...

This film, the second in a three part series, was very well-done and enjoyable. I thought the character development in the first would have done well to continue in the second but there seems to be a disconnect in the relationships amongst the main characters that should not have existed based on the limited information that everybody had - especially at the beginning. Still, overall, a good product but just a tick less than the previous installment. Great acting, good storyline, sub-par CG/special effects (which is to be expected). ARROWSTORM knows how to make really good B movies. Now they have a good enough reputation that I am going to look up by production company to see what else they've put out. Enjoy this most recent installment of Mythica and we all await, Mythica: Necromancer (out this year, 2015, according to IMDb.com). This movie rates better than a 4.1 which shows as of the time I am writing this review. Get out of the visual dependency on high-end CG/special effects and enjoy these good stories for what they are... good stories. Be entertained, folks!

Low budget excellent entertainment! I am a great fan of fantasy and dungeons and dragons (the game). Quite a lot of movies were made with D&D in mind. Some better than others, usually on a low budget and sometimes a bit too much wanting it to be "just like the game". This might give you the feeling that acting and the stage feel a bit forced. However in the Mythica series it is not as prominent, although visible every once in a while. But really get sucked in the story and forget to pay to much detail to the low budget scenes and environments. In a way a sort of nice "I could be there" feeling, which I like about these kind of movies. If you are in to fantasy and play dungeons and dragons you will not be disappointed! Watch these movies and enjoy! Don't expect blockbusting setups or scenes but let these actors and plot suck you in and entertain you.

The first movie, Mythica: A Quest for Heroes, was not a bad movie but with some major debits and not an awful lot special about it. It was watchable if on the mediocre side if anything. Its first sequel Mythica: The Darkspore quality-wise is about the same (though with a couple of improvements), watchable with nothing to get angry or excited about.

Where it improves on its predecessor is in most of the production values. It's a very nicely photographed movie and more focused in terms of camera work and the scenery is more sweeping and boasts more colour and a little more atmosphere. Costumes and sets allow one to get suitably immersed in the fantasy world that is being portrayed. The acting is also much improved. Melanie Stone, one of the best things about the first movie, gives another very good performance, and the character is engaging and well-rounded. Nicola Posener's acting is more natural to her rather stiff acting in the previous movie, and while his screen time is still rather short Kevin Sorbo does have more to do and he does seem more involved.

Mythica: The Darkspore's music score is suitably stirring and grand, it also fits better than in the first movie (though it was still one of the better assets before as well) and is recorded better. The humour is much less awkward here thankfully, sure there were times where it wasn't really needed but it's better placed and its tongue-in-cheek nature is actually amusing, even with a character that could have been obnoxious if executed wrongly.

However, the special effects are a mixed bag. At best they just pass muster (never more than that), but in other places they do look ropey, the encounter with the mythical entity indeed looks distractingly bad. The action is even more clumsily executed than in the first, being unexciting and under-choreographed and it all looks too safe. Some sloppy editing and lack of interaction in the scenes featuring any action are further disadvantages, not being more apparent in the big fight towards the end which was rushed in storytelling which hurt the coherence of it, terribly clumsy in staging and pedestrian in choreography.

Regarding the script, the humour is nice and there are some interesting parts but it's still a bit trite and could have explained things much more. The direction has some imaginative moments, but is mostly of the getting-the-job-done-in-a-routine-fashion type, and while kudos is due making the story darker and more complex this time round instead of the non-stop thrill ride it should have been it was somewhat inconsistent. There are some nice moments that maintain interest and it does have more heart than its predecessor, but it does drag in spots and bumps along, with variable momentum, rather than flowing smoothly. The characters are never annoying, but only the main character is properly interesting, the rest are there with shades of a likable personality but little development and some like some of the mythical characters were not always needed.

All in all, not bad, nothing special. Passes the time without one getting irked or raving. 5/10 Bethany Cox

I was a bit disappointed with Mythica: The Darkspore at first. I thought the beginning didn't make much sense. Caeryn is murdered almost immediately and the party splits up leaving two of them behind at the inn. Marek then has some dialog with Gojun who talks about men and power several times. It was a perfect opportunity for Marek to point out that she wasn't a man but the writers didn't take it. At the very least, Gojun could have acknowledged that Marek was a woman!

The party eventually regroup and head off on their travels again but it is slow going. There are one or two redeeming parts later though, and I've given Mythica: The Darkspore a decent score because of that.

I hadn't seen the first one, before I watched this, so I might have missed a couple of jokes or references to the first movie, but overall it worked even without the knowledge of it. It's not an acting masterpiece or a masterpiece in general, but it does what a low budget fantasy movie is supposed to do.

Some of the effects are really bad, but you can deal with it, if you want to. The stunts are decent enough for the size and budget this movie probably had and if you like what you saw here (and maybe the previous one), you will be happy to hear, there is another one coming in 2016 to conclude the trilogy ...

REALLY? Really Anne Black? This is like watching a Chinese action movie where everyone stands around doing nothing until hero tries to kick them, then they fall in the most dramatic fashion possible.

Action, is just terrible in this movie. John Wick is a movie with low budget and that has some of the best action scenes ever done. Then again, John Wick didn't spend most of its budget doing laughably bad rendition of Hobbit, unlike Mythica.

Action is so bad that Mythica makes you doubt whether the guy wielding a huge sword can actually use it or not. In MOST shots featuring enemy Orks, you will actually see them standing around doing nothing. Really, they aren't even pretending to be in a fight. They are just standing watching the "fight".

Then there is the terrible CGI. Which is back and unlike the first movie, doesn't have a single convincing shot present. Why? WHY waste money on CGI that looks like it's from a console game from 90s? Spend that money hiring people who can teach your actors to fight and find someone to shoot action scenes like they should be shot (that is, don't show guys standing around idly thinking about meaning of life, in the background).

Everything else? Well I don't know. This movie somehow manages to make the heroes look even dumber, especially the thief who at the end doesn't seem to be bothered by the heroine stealing his life to use her necro powers to the point that he can't feel his fingers. I'd be pretty angry, honestly.

Now going to go watch the third movie, hoping they improved it. I wanted better than the first one, Anne made it worse with second. I am hoping third is going to be an improvement after all the feedback she got.. hoping.

RELEASED IN 2015 and directed by Anne K. Black, "Mythica: The Darkspore" is the second film in the five-film fantasy/adventure series about a limping servant girl with blossoming magical powers named Merek (Melanie Stone), who teams-up with a heroic warrior, Thane (Adam Johnson), a miscreant lothario, Dagen (Jake Stormoen), a priestess, Teela (Nicola Posener), and a hunky elf, Qole (Rocky Myers), for a journey to obtain all the shards of the Darkspore to keep it from the diabolical Szorlok (Matthew Mercer). Kevin Sorbo has a cameo.

The story takes place in an adventurous Medieval-like world where sorcery, elves, orcs, dragons and other fantasy creatures are real. If you like The Lord of the Rings, D&D, Warcraft, Conan or Sinbad you'll probably like the Mythica franchise. These movies were partly funded by a Kickstarter campaign with all the movies costing less than $100,000, except the fifth and final one. The first movie, "A Quest for Heroes," cost $94,294 while this sequel cost $81,099. The production quality is incredible for such meager budgets, particularly if you're familiar with micro-budget productions. The Mythica films are basically just as good production-wise as "Dungeons & Dragons: Wrath of the Dragon God" (2005), a TV movie that cost a whopping $15 million (for a TV flick, that is).

"The Darkspore" is disappointing in comparison to the dynamic first film, in particular the first half where the transition from "A Quest for Heroes" is clumsy and unexciting. Thankfully, things perk up in the second half and make up for the weak first act, especially a fight with a dragon in the desert. In any case, be sure to see "A Quest for Heroes" before viewing this one.

THE MOVIE RUNS 1 hour 47 minutes. WRITERS: Anne K. Black, Jason Faller and Kynan Griffin.

GRADE: B-

I'm a huge Scy-FI fan. I was super excited to see this one. The movie seemed promising the first few minutes watching , but after that it got all boring and expected to a point. I won't get into much detail not to ruin this for others still waiting to watch this one. I'm just gonna say that the movie didn't offer much whether with some of the comedy scenes or fighting scenes. Opinions differ, but I just didn't feel the movie at all, and I strongly felt like fast forwarding it at some points however I had to keep watching just in case something exciting or interesting might happen so I could at least come out of that boredom sense I was in but unfortunately , nothing captured my attention there. What a Disaster !

I didn't expect a lot of this film, the special effects are awful, some things are a bit rushed but that is the only bad thing i can say about it. For not being a famous film making crew i would say that they did a really awesome job!

The story is great, it hasn't thrown me out of it, i enjoyed watching without being bored.

The actors are good, i was expecting horror-movie-acting so they surprised me a lot. The one famous actor (the one from the Hercules series) Was even the worst actor in my opinion.

The dialogs are fun, i like the "feel" of this movie.

It felt like one of those good old movie, Indiana Jones but not quite, because i liked this better, i like old movies so if bad special effects don't throw you off then go watch it, it's actually good!

Because it's a continuation movie, it lacks the "newness" factor that always gives the first in any series a boost.

For those who enjoyed the first of the set, it's certainly worth seeing this second one too - it's an enjoyable watch with its own story, and it has a few surprises. The characters work well and have their own personalities that all get a chance to properly take their part in the story.

For those who have not seen the first, I would recommend watching them in order, beginning with the first.

Not sure why they bothered with this one. A 5 minute prologue could be substituted for this movie, without wasting all that screen time.