An audio essay on Albert Pyun’s Mean Guns written and read by Brandon Streussnig, produced and edited by Blake Howard.

1997 was an odd year for Albert Pyun. As the world inched closer to the new Millenium, tastes in action were shifting along with it. Pyun, always persistent, was almost the perfect filmmaker to embody where the genre was heading. Beginning his career in 1982 with the stunning The Sword and the Sorcerer, he fit right into the brief high fantasy boom alongside huge luminaries like Conan the Barbarian, Krull, and Excalibur. As he moved through the 80s, he would mirror the times in his own unique way. Matching the bubblegum, jaunty aesthetics of the era, films like Radioactive Dreams and Viscious Lips felt like fever dreams of 80s excess filtered through one of Hollywood’s preeminent and undersung daydreamers. When Hong Kong began influencing Hollywood’s action, Pyun was right there with it, crafting a beautiful gun ballet in Nemesis that would undoubtedly make John Woo proud. Pyun can even lay claim to one of the early architects of JCVD’s ascension with Cyborg. He even dabbled in the initial superhero craze spurred by Batman with the 1990s endearingly silly Captain America. He did and saw it all by 1997, but, unfortunately, rarely was that ever met with any quantifiable success outside of his debut.

Voice Cast:

Brandon Streussnig- Staff Writer, Social Media Manager for Secret Handshake & freelance writer at Vulture, Fangoria, Polygon, The Playlist- Links: Twitter, Clippings

Art:

Tom Ralston - Links: Twitter, Website

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