The Warlord #2: The Cutthroat

The Warlord #2: The Cutthroat, by Jason Frost
January, 1984  Zebra Books

I shouldn’t have doubted Raymond Obstfeld. I found the first volume of The Warlord so poor that I put off returning to the series for a good long while. I shouldn’t have waited so long, because from the first page of The Cutthroat I realized that this was the Obstfeld who’d written Invasion U.S.A.. That sounds like an insult but I mean it as a compliment, because I loved that book.

And luckily, The Cutthroat is in much the same style as Invasion U.S.A.; whereas the first volume of The Warlord was, I felt, a ponderous and bloated bore, the second one moves at a fast clip and has the snappy dialog I expect from Obstfeld. This is proven in the first few pages, in which Eric “The Warlord” Ravensmith and his girlfriend, former courtroom artist Tracy, are in a boat above sunken downtown Los Angeles and Tracy randomly starts wondering aloud if Goldie Hawn’s still alive.

It’s a few months after that previous book, and California has descended even further into brutality and despair. Rather than socialism, full-on unbridled capitalism is the order of the day, and in random asides we learn that women have become chattel. Obstfeld takes this concept and runs with it throughout, as well as the idea that people are free to become whoever they want to be in this post-catstrophe California. A former information technology entreprenneur can become a modern Blackbeard, a former nightclub singer can become ruler of Hearst Castle – which itself is transformed into a Mos Eisley sort of trader’s den. So the theme of transformation also extends to the setting, with California getting a new image post-Halo.

And yet despite the wish-fulfilment, Obstfeld is one of those men’s adventure authors who wants to buzzkill the escapism with “realistic” stuff. So we learn soap and razors are at a minimum – not only is everyone nasty and grungy, but women can no longer shave their armpits or legs. Tracy however loves this, and finds it one of the “best things” about living in post-Halo California. (Obstfeld uses this phrase throughout, and it’s catching, the Halo being the psychedelic smog that now hangs over California.) Tracy’s also hacked her hair off so she’ll look more like a boy and not rapist-bait.

Maybe because it’s because I’ve been on a classic rock kick lately, but I wonder if Obstfeld’s opening is an action ‘80s inversion of the CSN/Jefferson Airplane track “Wooden Ships.” ‘Cause both the book and the song open with people on different ships approaching one another in a post-holocaust world: in the song they exchange smiles and food, but in The Cutthroat they shoot arrows and bullets at one another while trading action movie one-liners. Of course, it’s possible I could be reaching, and it’s also possible my reading might’ve been colored by the fact I recently got Volunteers on vinyl, first pressing in mint shape with all the inserts and everything…

Anyway I’m digressing as usual. It’s a masterful opening sequence, and better than the entirety of the previous book. Eric and Tracy are on a canoe heading out onto the sea, tracking Eric’s archenemy Fallon, who as we’ll recall kidnapped Eric’s adopted son with the intent of raising him as his own. Instead they run into a bunch of pirates. The Cutthroat is basically Pirates Of The Caribbean meets post-nuke pulp; it has almost nothing in common with the previous volume, which played it straight for the most part.

And indeed, Obstfeld only makes occasional mentions of the first volume; only rarely are we reminded how much of a prick Eric became in the final quarter. Here he’s more willing to save others, though he’ll occasionally give almost blasé “it’s everyone for himself” comments on the situation. He’s also had a huge personality upgrade, doling out one-liners and sarcastic retorts; another recurring joke is that he’s a walking encyclopedia, and knows the particulars of any subject, no matter how obscure.

Obstfeld has just as much fun with the villains of the piece. Chief among them is Rhino, sort of a ripoff of Two-Face from Batman: one side of his face and body is melted gray flesh from a failed attempt at crossing through the Halo, which turns out to be hazardous to all forms of life. Now he’s reborn as the captain of a pirate ship, his crew dressed like Rocky Horror Picture Show rejects and Rhino intentionally going over the top as a bad guy.

There’s also Angel, an evil Vietnamese babe with boobs that are “large for an Oriental’s, but firm and perfectly round.” Further, “her long dark nipples budded straight out like thorns.” We get to see all this because Angel casually doffs her top upon Eric and Tracy’s capture aboard Rhino’s ship. Angel and Eric have a little history: after a night of sex 14 years ago in ‘Nam, Eric “killed” Angel with a sniper rifle. Orders from Fallon. Angel now proudly displays the puckered bullet wounds between her big ‘ol boobs; she didn’t die because double-crosser Fallon warned her and gave her a bulletproof vest.

How or why exactly Angel got to California before the quakes isn’t much elaborated on, but I love my pulpy and depraved female villains so I won’t complain. I’m just happy she’s here. However Obstfeld doesn’t do much to capitalize on this aspect – Angel’s evil, to be sure, in the Nietzschean sense at least, and was known for eviscerating and mutilating people with a balisong knife back in ‘Nam. But otherwise there’s no exploitation of her sexy evil charms, and she just plumb wants to kill Eric. She also disappears for a large portion of the novel, along with Rhino, which kind of sucks, because they’re set up as such a wacky pair, and Rhino’s motley crew of sadistic rejects is equally fun.

Instead, Eric and Tracy are able to escape when Rhino attacks another ship. Tracy is shot in the hip and, surprisingly for the genre, we learn that she won’t be able to just walk it off. She’ll have a permanent slight limp. So again as you can see, Obstfeld isn’t afraid to let realism get in the way of his escapist fantasy. However Eric and Tracy are promptly captured by another group of pirates, this one led by a muscle-bound black dude who calls himself Blackjack. They turn out to be sort of post-Halo hippies who live in a partially-submerged skyscraper; the top floor turns out to be a greenhouse in which they grow their own vegetables.

Both Blackjack and Rhino are searching for “Alabaster’s map,” and of course neither Eric nor Tracy have any idea what it is. Ultimately we’ll learn that Alabaster was a government employee who knew where all the guns and weapons confiscated from Californians in the first volume are now hidden. Both pirates want these weapons for their own purposes, though Blackjack claims he wants the guns for defense of his skyscraper island fortress. Presumably the “cutthroat” of the title, Blackjack is a memorable character, though not nearly as much as Rhino is. He turns out to have been a pediatrician before the quake, but now he’s the pot-smoking leader of a group of battle-hardened pirates, many of whom worked in Blackjack’s old hospital.

Even though there isn’t much in the way of the action, the novel moves at a snappy clip, making the previous volume seem even more like a sluggish bore. Also it’s worth noting that this volume’s much shorter, which I think works to its advantage. The focus is more on character and plot, as Eric is able to convince Blackjack that his best chance of getting that map is letting Eric get it, as Eric’s already figured out that Angel double-crossed Rhino and knows where the map is. This is how Eric’s able to negotiate his freedom and safe passage out of here with Tracy.

Things pick up in the final quarter, in which the action moves to the transformed Hearst Castle, now run by the above-mentioned nightclub entertainer, BeBop; his goons patrol the grounds in black Hearst Castle T-shirts. It’s an everything-goes sort of place, but BeBop has a strict no-killing policy, as it’s bad for business. Of course, Rhino and Angel are here, so it’s only a matter of time until the fireworks break out. Obstfeld works up the suspense and tension as Eric, Tracy, and Blackjack plot Angel’s abduction. Even here though it’s done more on a low-key vibe, without the big action setpieces you usually get in post-nuke pulp.

The climax is similarly unspectacular, but memorable: Eric versus Rhino in a garbage-filled pool in Hearst Castle. This features the novel’s sole gore, as Eric begins ripping off strips of Rhino’s mutated skin. There’s also mortal combat between Tracy and Angel; like the reporter in Invasion U.S.A., Tracy is a strong female character who doesn’t let cliched “tough girl” posturing get in the way of being a fun and vivacious personality – Hollywood’s screenwriters of today could learn much from Obstfeld in this regard.

Obstfeld’s writing is great but he undermines himself periodically with strange digressions that are shoehorned into the narrative and come off as incredibly arbitrary. This first occurs early on, with a needlessly-digressive backstory on Rhino, up to and including his first sexual encounter! This sort of thing goes on throughout; characters will flash back on happenings long ago, no matter what dire situation they’re facing – like Eric, in the climactic brawl with Rhino, pondering how people need entertainment no matter how horrible the world is. And did we really need all the arbitrary backstory on the employees who once worked in Blackjack’s skyscraper headquarters? This sort of stuff, now that I think of it, is what ultimately ruined The Warlord #1, but at least it isn’t as prevalent here. 

Even though this volume almost seems like filler in the grand scheme of things – Fallon doesn’t appear and Eric doesn’t get anywhere in his search for his son – it’s still very enjoyable, and makes me look forward to continuing with the series.