Wolf Creek - S01E01 Billabong (2016)

Reviewer:  mortecai.jpg

Review

The Thorogood family are taking a camper van around the Aussie Outback, mainly to allow teenage daughter Eve to recover from her addiction to pain killers. Eve was a promising athlete, drug setback, so I guess she was injured or something doing her event. Mom and Dad are Cops from Omaha, Nebraska and along for the ride is their son sub teen Ross. Mom wants to push on to the next town, which is only sixty minutes away, but Dad is adamant they are stopping at a nearby Billabong, Aussie word for watering hole - though J can tell me that has another meaning in Aussie slang. They stop at the Billabong for swimming, barbeque burgers, and Dad is planning to get a bit frisky when the kids retire for the evening. Naturally Ross hits the water and looks destined to join the food chain, crocodiles apparently live in Billabongs, till as luck would have it Mick Taylor steps in and saves the day.

Over dinner, Mick has been invited to chow down, we learn Eve doesn't like him, as he smells and won't friend her on Facebook, so she heads back into the Camper. This proves to be an astute move as Mick proceeds to knife Mom and Dad, now that's a knife, and shoot Ross dead as the kid tries to escape the scene. Eve is soon fleeing as Mick decides he should round out his Thorogood dance card, but she gets shot in the back and left for dead for her troubles. Ironically Mick uses her Father's prized 22 calibre for the final "kill". Long story short, Eve has survived and is discovered by a couple of Fisherman, and recovers in Hospital. She's pretty much dazed and confused, but local cop Sullivan Hill drives her to Darwin, in anticipation of her flying State side. We soon discover there's a large dossier on outback disappearances, which Inspector Darwin, (a detective?), attributes to one unknown perp. Eve decides the cops aren't going to catch the elusive Mick, misses her flight, steels the dossier, and vows to hunt down the Outback's most vicious killer. A pretty good first episode exploded onto my screen, I'm hooked!

Mortecai dialling in with a strange one, a former Brit residing in the U.S reviewing an Aussie television show for an Aussie horror site, they promised me it was going to get weird real quick here. So how many of you rocked out to the two Wolf Creek movies from Downunder? I did and nominated them in my top twenty movies on the year of their respective release, then I got some backlash for it, don't be different folks, the haters don't like it. So I was ready and willing to spend some time in the Aussie Never Never, which they tell me is Northern Territorian for Outback, with the six part television series. It has arrived folks, I've queued it up and will rapid fire reviews through each episode ending with a season one over view. It's going to get rough, we're dealing with the Downunder Michael Myers, no prisoners will be taken.

Eve vs Mick, not exactly the horror matchup of the year, but I'm a little bit excited

So I kicked back with a couple of cold ones and snacks for the first episode, Billabong - name had me wondering if it was some kind of Aussie whacky smoking device, and I'm saying 100% here I was knocked off my chair. The folks behind this blood drenched mayhem have taken Greg McLean's vision of an Outback serial killer and nailed it to the small screen. Couldn't be happier, the show lived up to my anticipation and then some. Wolf Creek is what Hannibal should have been rather than the artsy mess season three turned into.

I'm trying to get my thoughts together here before I go rambling on in increasingly incoherent paragraphs which will do none of us any favours. Big call out to Cinematographer Geoffrey Hall, absolutely stunning vision of the Outback, which reminded me of Greg McLean's very own Rogue, got a real notion of how harsh and sparsely populated the countryside is in the middle of Oz. Equally Director Tony Tilse nailed the urban landscape of Darwin, he goes for a very closed in look that dramatically compares to the isolated Outback locations. If you want to see how to shoot, no pun intended, television then Wolf Creek is your main learning source.

Director Tilse and his writing team have never heard of risk aversion, they sure are swimming in dangerous waters with episode one. More than one Reviewer has pointed out you are running a risk of rabid reaction if you kill off dogs or kids, except for evil kids, those bastards are fair game. What we get is a kid killed off early in the episode, paint me shocked, guess we'll get a dog next episode. I wasn't expecting this development, but two thumbs up; the death is a requirement in the developing revenge track Eve is going down rather than being inserted simply for shock value, Eli Roth take note. Still would be ducking for cover if I was Tilse, the first Wolf Creek was attacked even in its native Australia, Ross being slaughted in Billabong should have the anti-horror crusaders coming out of the woodwork. But the fun doesn't stop there folks, it happens off screen, but Mick brutally slaughters a yoga chick on some deserted road. We see the aftermath, and Tilse let's our mind do the maths, it's not pretty folks, Mick has this whole black humour thing happening for him. The writing and directing are top of the heap, no problems there either, this show is happening in cool town.

First rate performances from the entire cast, there's no weak link, even amongst the support characters. Running out of words here so let's focus on the two main leads, and discuss other recurring characters next episode review. Lucy Fry (Eve) was awesome, she hit the drug recovery patient with solid aloofness, brought across the traumatised victim like a tween chick unable to get One Direction tickets, and finally the grim determination has me thinking Mick might not have everything going his way in the weeks to come. Someone put Lucy Fry in a full length movie ASAP; the Lady has the chops to really knock our socks off on the big screen. I guess you can't get through a Wolf Creek review without saluting John Jarratt's turn as the manically Mick Taylor. If anything maybe Jarratt is a bit too much Mick for my liking, the insane evil is coming out of his every pore. Truly a horror villain for the ages, Australia has its very own Jason Voorhees.

The only slight critcism I would lock and load was Eve being as a suspect was dropped too quickly, then again Mick did dispose of the bodies while Eve was recovering, so I guess the cops would be starting to look elsewhere.

Excellent first episode of the first season of Wolf Creek, it already has me signed on as a fan. Plenty of horror themes, exotic location, and a team prepared to hang it out there in terms of risk taking. This series is going to work for me because its believable, Mick Taylor is happening, and now he may just have a worthy nemesis, settle in for some mayhem on your screen. Two thumbs up, this is a show any citizen that call's themselves a horror fan should be watching. Mortecai out, see you next review folks, do yourself a favour go and watch Billabong right now.