Hey everybody, welcome to another great week in Ye Olde School Café! This week we’ll continue our look at the Alan Moore and David Lloyd masterpiece V for Vendetta! So far, we’ve seen the “terrorist” V wreak havoc within the once impregnable Norsefire party. He’s murdered several prominent party members, and more are on the list! He’s befriended a young girl, named Evey Hammond, whom he saved from being raped by some of the “Fingermen” (cops on the payroll of the Norsefire party). The regular police are starting to get an idea of what V is up to, and they are about to get closer than ever before to finding him!
As Dominic and Finch are piecing together V’s plan, they figure out that the detention center, Lark Hill, is the one thing tying all of this together. They then realize that one of the names on the list of employees at the facility is Delia Surridge, the doctor doing the autopsies for the police. Finch immediately tries to call her, but the line is down. The reason the line is down, is because V is at her home with bad intentions. He actually sits down to talk with her about her actions, and he realizes then that she knows she did wrong by helping the terrible experiments that went on at Lark Hill. He then gives her a rose, just as he did before he killed the others, but this time, when she asks if he is going to kill her, he tells her that he already did ten minutes ago while she slept, and he reveals a syringe in his hand. She thanks him for his compassion and then she asks to see his face. He acquiesces and she replies that he’s beautiful. Finch phones Almond, and he makes his way to Delia’s home. He waits in the hallway for V with his gun locked and loaded…or so he thinks. You see, earlier that night Almond was torturing his wife by putting his gun to her head and pulling the trigger with the gun unloaded. He never loaded it before heading out to intercept V. It’s the last mistake he ever makes.
As Finch and Dominic show up just in time to see Delia and Almond both dead, Finch is visibly upset and says that he’ll see V dead for this. They both then discover a journal on Delia’s bureau table. Finch takes it, reads it, and then heads straight for the Leader’s office. He tells him that after reading this journal, he now understands what’s going on. That V is out for revenge and he’ll do anything to get it. Finch tells him about the goings on at Lark Hill and how Delia described the man from room 5 (V). Finch tells him that some of the pages were ripped out of the journal to keep them from learning something. What that is, they have no clue. After taking it all in, the Leader tells Finch that he thinks the idea that V has murdered these people for revenge and to also cover what he’s really doing behind the scenes is “utter madness.” He then tells Finch that that will be all, and dismisses him.
The next thing we see, is V playing the piano and singing, all the while we get a peek into the lives of certain people in England whose lives are violently thrust into new directions because of V’s actions. After that interlude, V puts on a magic show for Evey. He makes a rabbit disappear, then reappear moments later. She’s astonished by this, and then the two of them dance. She questions V about why he hasn’t tried to sleep with her, and he just stands there listening to her rationalizing why he hasn’t. After she’s given him several reasons, she is ready to give another, but he interrupts her by saying that maybe he’s her father. She acts stunned and says that’s exactly what she was thinking at that moment. He then tells her that he has a surprise for her, and blindfolds her. He takes her outside into the streets, all the while reciting the conversation they had earlier about her wanting to help him, but not liking the killing part. She removes the blindfold to reveal their location, and she sees V standing in the street motionless. He does state that he’s not her father, but then as she tries to nudge him, she realizes that it’s not V, but a dummy.
Well, that’s it for now, but come back next week as we dive into the complex mind of V, and watch Evey plummet into a dark place that she thought she’d never go. All this, plus more mystery, murder, and mayhem from the mind of Alan Moore! See you next week!
Billy Dunleavy
billy@comicattack.net
