A Dark Tale

Two weeks ago, CSI (the original, Vegas-based incarnation) aired a rather messed up new episode entitled "Sqweegel." It was setting up the "recurring villian of the year," as CSI has had for most of its seasons, popping up occasionally between stand-alone episodes.

Aside from the lame name of the villain, which sounds like it wants to intentionally conjure thoughts of the Lord of the Rings' ring-craving nemesis, this dude is pretty cool, unsettling, and weird. He's an uber-patient contortionist that can hide in impossibly tight spaces. He stalks his victims for weeks, learning everything about them. And he makes his kills while wearing a freaky skin-tight rubber body suit that traps any physical evidence of himself he might leave behind a crime scene.

Also, as I noticed when I saw the "written by" credits flash on screen at the start of the episode, he was not originally created for CSI. He comes from a book titled "Level 26: Dark Origins," written by CSI series creator Anthony E. Zuiker and (I presume) a ghost writer, Duane Swierczynski. "Interesting," I noted aloud to my friend who was watching the episode with me. "I think I recognize the name of that book," she replied, accessing her encyclopedic knowledge of the book store where she works.

After we both enjoyed the episode, she off-handedly suggested that she might have to read the book. I told her to give me the word if she did. Instead, she showed up a few days later with the book in hand and loaned it to me. Well, what the hell? I wasn't reading anything else.

Even with the CSI story unfinished at this point, I feel safe in saying this concept works far better on the small screen than it did in the pages of a novel. It's telling that the television series shared almost no connection with the book other than to lift out its interesting nemesis. (Indeed, it didn't even really copy him exactly; the TV Sqweegel has a more refined motive, is far more sinister and less playful, and is -- as you would expect on CSI -- much less "forensic proof.")

The book itself is pretty much crap. The writing smacks of the worst of several popular writers all rolled into one. The short, almost staccato chapters -- some only two pages long -- try like Dan Brown to pull the reader through by simulating a brisk pace, but rarely end on compelling cliffhangers. This isn't even as readable as The Lost Symbol, never mind his best, Angels & Demons.

The overtly vulgar language and attempts to present graphic imagery are the efforts of a wannabe Stephen King. Mind you, I'm no King enthusiast (mostly due to his typically garbage endings), but not for nothing has the man earned his reputation. He knows how to turn a phrase to invoke horror, and even suspense, on a printed page. Level 26: Dark Origins, reads like someone familiar with the style, but who doesn't actually understand it.

Worst of all is the preposterous plotting that tries to put a top secret government agency between the hero and the killer. "We understand this super-agent is retired, but if you don't get him to work this case, we'll kill you. And then we'll kill him. Mwa-ha-ha-ha!!!" (And then to solve this case, you'll have... who, exactly?)

Then there's perhaps the weirdest element of all. Level 26: Dark Origins is not just a novel. It's a "digi-novel!" Spaced every 20 pages or so are "cut scenes," to use some video game terminology, which seems most applicable. The book instructs you to go to a web site, type in a code, and then watch a couple minutes of interstitial footage filmed specifically for this novel. I suppose one could applaud the effort to do something different, telling a story in mixed media. But instead, I see mainly the flaws.

First of all, the book has to cover the possibility that someone reading it isn't going to have access to the internet, or does and isn't going to take the time to go to the web site. Thus, most of these "cyber-bridges" (as they're called) reveal no actual information to progress the narrative. The few that do have the relevant information regurgitated in the novel a few pages later, so as not to leave other readers in the dark.

Secondly, the cut scenes undermine the reader's ability to imagine the novel on his own terms. I realize this is an odd complaint to make, since I was already coming to the book with the CSI episode's rendition of Sqweegel in my head. Nevertheless, it made the read a jarring experience. I'd get a few chapters in, imagine what a certain character might look like, and then find out "oh... well, I guess he looks like Michael Ironside." I'd develop an idea of who the cartoonishly evil bureaucrat character was, and then learn, "oh, it's Glenn Morshower." (Who, after playing the lovable, awesome, and heroic Agent Pierce for several seasons of 24, is woefully miscast here. He is a fine actor, but this wooden dialogue is not helping him escape typecasting.)

More than any of the characters (including Sqweegel himself), any of the writing techniques, or the book/web gimmick, the book seems mostly interested in selling this ridiculous idea that murderers are classified according to one of 25 "levels" of "evilness." (As if there would be that many. "So, you think he's an 18?" "Oh, no way, he's got to be a 19!") And rather than really show us how this Sqweegel is actually the worst of the worst, we're simply told repeatedly that he's so evil, they had to invent a new level 26 just for him. (On second thought, maybe this whole "we need a new number that's one higher" crap is how the scale got to be so stupidly large in the first place?)

In short, the only good thing to come from Level 26: Dark Origins is the very thing that made me ever read it in the first place -- it spawned a really cool episode of CSI. Perhaps that one plus is enough to give a D- to an otherwise F-grade piece of pulp, but either way, it isn't worth your time.