''Emesis Blue'' is a 2023 Australian animated

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in Pennsylvania, United States * Independentes (English: Independents), a Portuguese artist ...

psychological horror Psychological horror is a genre, subgenre of horror fiction, horror and psychological fiction with a particular focus on mental, emotional, and Mental state, psychological states to frighten, disturb, or unsettle its audience. The subgenre freque ...

fan film A fan film is a film or video inspired by a film, television program, comic book, book, or video game created by fans rather than by the source's copyright holders or creators. It is a form of fan fiction. Fan filmmakers have traditionally been ...

based on the

multiplayer A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system (couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...

first-person shooter A first-person shooter (FPS) is a video game genre, video game centered on gun fighting and other weapon-based combat seen from a First person (video games), first-person perspective, with the player experiencing the action directly through t ...

game ''

Team Fortress 2 ''Team Fortress 2'' (''TF2'') is a Multiplayer video game, multiplayer first-person shooter game developed and published by Valve Corporation in 2007. It is the sequel to the 1996 ''Team Fortress'' Mod (video gaming), mod for ''Quake (video g ...

''. The film was produced entirely in

Source Filmmaker Source Filmmaker (often abbreviated as SFM) is a free 3D computer graphics software tool published by Valve for creating animated films, which uses the Source game engine. Source Filmmaker has been used to create many community-based animated ...

, by the fan group Fortress Films, and released for free on

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

on February 20, 2023. ''Emesis Blue'' bases many of its assets directly on those of the original game, following the nine playable mercenary characters on a fictionalized depiction of the

2Fort 2Fort, also known by its file name ctf_2fort, is a Multiplayer video game, multiplayer Level (video gaming), map playable in the first-person shooter games ''Quake Team Fortress'', ''Team Fortress Classic'', ''Team Fortress 2'', and in the mult ...

multiplayer map, but maintains a mature, surreal tone with a largely original narrative. At a total of one hour and 48 minutes, it received critical acclaim for its high production value and length, both of which were said to be closer to those of a

feature film A feature film or feature-length film (often abbreviated to feature), also called a theatrical film, is a film (Film, motion picture, "movie" or simply “picture”) with a running time long enough to be considered the principal or sole present ...

than a typical Source Filmmaker production.Bumpus, Kayvon
"Mercs and Mortality: ''Emesis Blue'', a Fan-Made ''Team Fortress 2'' Horror Flick"
''

Bright Lights Film Journal ''Bright Lights Film Journal'' is an online popular-academic film magazine, based in Oakland, California, United States. It is edited and published by Gary Morris. Originally a print publication established in 1974, it was discontinued in 1980 t ...

'', 16 April 2024. Retrieved 25 July 2024.Garner, Robin
"''Emesis Blue'' is a horror movie for ''TF2'' fans"
''The Standard'', 5 April 2023. Retrieved 26 July 2024. Drawing on the backstory originally presented in ''Team Fortress 2'', the film is set on

Halloween Halloween, or Hallowe'en (less commonly known as Allhalloween, All Hallows' Eve, or All Saints' Eve), is a celebration geography of Halloween, observed in many countries on 31 October, the eve of the Western Christianity, Western Christian f ...

of 1968 during the fictional Gravel Wars between mercenaries of Builders League United (BLU) and Reliable Excavation and Demolition (RED). The film follows a largely original plotline to its inspiration, rewriting elements of the story to present a more serious and grounded tone, but includes diegetic references to game mechanics like

rocket jump In shooter games, rocket jumping is the technique of using the knockback of an explosive weapon, most often a rocket launcher, to launch the shooter into the air. The aim of this technique is to reach heights, distances and speed that standard ch ...

ing, the capture the flag game mode, and

respawning Spawning in video games refers to the process by which entities, such as player characters, non-player characters, enemies or items, are generated and placed into the game world. Closely related concepts include respawning, which involves reint ...

, with a large part of the films story focusing on a non-canonical "respawn machine" supposedly used in-universe to revive the mercenaries during fighting.

Plot

The film begins with footage of several tests involving the "Respawn Machine", a device that can bring back soldiers from the dead. The footage shows the disturbing effects the machine has on its test subjects. On Halloween night of 1968, a former BLU scout named Jeremy visits his former medic colleague Dr. Fritz Ludwig due to the side-effects of an accident involving the respawn machine. Jeremy complains of paranoia and nightmares in addition to the physical defects that got him fired from the company, and Ludwig confirms the machine has had disturbing failures before. Jeremy returns home to his single mother, watching a VHS of the movie M he stole from Ludwig's office. He receives a telephone call playing back his previous conversation with Ludwig, before turning to see his mother has been beheaded by an unseen assailant as a masked figure stands in the corner. Ex-BLU Spy, Jacques Murnau working as a detective and his Soldier assistant, Jane Doe investigate the disappearance of BLU chairman and

Governor of New Mexico The governor of New Mexico () is the head of government of New Mexico. The governor is the head of the executive branch of New Mexico's state government and the commander-in-chief of the New Mexico National Guard. As noted in the govern ...

, Jules Archibald. The duo tails a former BLU Heavy as he waits to hand off a briefcase. Jane kills Heavy in an altercation, but a mysterious figure escapes with the briefcase in a hearse. Ludwig wakes from an out-of-body experience with blood on his hands, and receives an envelope of photographs of the scout being stalked as well as a phone call, playing Jeremy and Fritz's earlier conversation and Jeremy's muffled voice. Ludwig is directed by a bloody inscription to a RED base. At the base, he narrowly avoids a seemingly undead Heavy while escaping to the basement. He frees Jeremy, who apparently believes Ludwig to be one of his captors and runs off, only to be wounded, recaptured, and tortured to death by two Engineers, the Conagher brothers Zed & Maynard, guarding the briefcase in the flag room. Maynard manages to overpower and kill Ludwig after their fist fight, only for him to mysteriously resurrect and brutally kill him and Zed. Murnau and Jane find Ludwig's bonesaw at the murder scene while posing as Federal Agents, tracing him to the base. They outwit and fatally wound the RED Sniper in the sewers, but the detective is captured after the two are separated by the Pyro. Jane experiences a temporal anomaly in the base's lobby before freeing a wounded RED Demoman, Cyclops, who claims the base is no longer under RED's control. The two try to reach the weapons locker in the resupply room as they are attacked by a mutated Jeremy and a group of RED zombies. The Medic, now suffering a psychotic break, defeats a zombified RED Medic and takes the briefcase upstairs, where Ludwig, Jane, and Cyclops are forced into an elevator further down to escape the Heavy. Murnau escapes and shoots the Pyro, but is burned in the resulting gasoline fire. All four mercenaries begin to lose their grasp on reality as they move deeper into the base. Cyclops meets a third Engineer brother, Dell, who describes the Limbo-like eternity mercenaries experience between respawns. Jane and Ludwig find evidence of Archibald's initial experiments with respawning and the extreme toll it had on subjects. Jane then finds Cyclops frozen to death in a cloning lab before he and Medic defeat the resurrected Sniper and Pyro. The detective finds Archibald confessing to war profiteering with the respawn machines over the phone and shoots him, then forces Ludwig and the soldier to play

Russian roulette Russian roulette () is a potentially lethal game of chance in which a player places a single round in a revolver, spins the cylinder, places the muzzle against the head or body (their opponent's or their own), and pulls the trigger. If the ...

, killing the Medic. Jane narrowly avoids being killed himself while pursued by the Heavy. He finally escapes the base as it burns down, and the Heavy is killed by falling debris. At Archibald's funeral, attended by the rival CEOs Blutarch and Redmond Mann, the detective gives a cover story of Ludwig murdering Archibald and committing suicide, installing himself as Archibald's successor. A resurrected Ludwig suddenly rises from Archibald's supposed coffin and shoots Murnau, battling his way out. The soldier defects and hands Ludwig the briefcase, helping fight off the Mann brothers' bodyguards and killing Blutarch. Ludwig escapes the police in an ambulance, running over Redmond in the chaos, only to die in a car crash outside the city. He meets Archibald, Jeremy, and Maynard in purgatory. The film ends with a mysterious figure resembling Ludwig is seen emerging out of a flaming respawn machine.

Cast

* "JazzyJoeyJr" as the Soldier * David Love as Jules Archibald and Blutarch Mann * Cameron Nichols as the Scout * John Whinfield as background voices * Anton Pelizzari as Zed & Dell Conagher and background voices * Chad Payne as Dr. Fritz Ludwig, the Detective, Cyclops, Maynard Conagher, Redmond Mann, the Hunter, Agent Stemmons, and Stalingrad An honorable thanks was given to late voice actor

Rick May Richard James May (September 21, 1940 – April 5, 2020) was a Canadian-American actor, theatrical performer, director, and teacher. May provided the English-language voice for Peppy Hare and Andross in '' Star Fox 64'', the Soldier in '' Team F ...

, whose legacy voice acting in the original game was occasionally used for the Soldier's screams and laughs.

Production and style

''Emesis Blue'' was developed over the course of four years in Source Filmmaker, led by Australian writer and director Chad Payne. The film combines 3D Source animation with strong,

neo-noir Neo-noir is a film genre that adapts the visual style and themes of 1940s and 1950s American film noir for contemporary audiences, often with more graphic depictions of violence and sexuality. During the late 1970s and the early 1980s, the term ...

lighting, focusing on authenticity to the original game's assets and acknowledging the technical limitations of the software.Goodman, Aileene-Bjork
"Emesis Blue: 2023's Most Important Film"
''the Stallion''. Sharp red-and-blue lights are used over otherwise desaturated sets to emulate in-game team differentiation, while policemen and other background characters not readily available in the original assets are shaded out as

silhouettes A silhouette (, ) is the image of a person, animal, object or scene represented as a solid shape of a single colour, usually black, with its edges matching the outline of the subject. The interior of a silhouette is featureless, and the silhouett ...

to distinguish them from the canonical cast of ''Team Fortress 2'' models. A second ''Team Fortress'' film by the creators is "all but confirmed" under development as of 2024, currently titled ''Murder Inc.''

Reception

''Emesis Blue'' has been lauded as the first mainstream feature film to have been produced with Source Filmmaker, and the first Source project of its kind since ''Darkest Days'', an earlier hour-long

musical Musical is the adjective of music. Musical may also refer to: * Musical theatre, a performance art that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance * Musical film Musical film is a film genre in which songs by the Character (arts), charac ...

fan-film based on ''

Left 4 Dead 2 ''Left 4 Dead 2'' is a 2009 first-person shooter video game developed and published by Valve. The sequel to '' Left 4 Dead'' (2008) and the second game in the '' Left 4 Dead'' series, it was released for Microsoft Windows and Xbox 360 in November ...

''. Praise was directed towards the film's tone, visuals, voice cast, and technical ambition, while its narrative was described as reliant on mystery,

nonlinear storytelling Nonlinear narrative, disjointed narrative, or disrupted narrative is a narrative technique where events are portrayed, for example, out of chronological order or in other ways where the narrative does not follow the direct causality pattern of the ...

, and audience engagement through

fan theories The canon of a work of fiction is "the body of works taking place in a particular fictional world that are widely considered to be official or authoritative; speciallythose created by the original author or developer of the world". Canon is c ...

.Ventura, Rasec
"''Emesis Blue'': Viability of Abandoned Software, and Lovechild of Psychological Horror"
''Gothic Times'', 4 October 2023. Retrieved 26 July 2024. Some background details of the film's universe were noted as overly reliant on familiarity with the original game's story, but the experience was otherwise described as appealing to general horror fans as well. Film journalist Kayvon Bumpus noted some remaining budgetary constraints placed on the film, but nonetheless considered ''Emesis Blue'' a potential "crowning achievement" for both

machinima Machinima () is the use of Real-time computing, real-time computer graphics engines to create a cinematic production. The word "Machinima" is a portmanteau of the words ''machine'' and ''Film, cinema''. According to Guinness World Records, ma ...

and Source Filmmaker, writing that "countless projects with more budget, staff, and polish have failed to impress like this animated indie gem does". Gaming critic

Yahtzee Croshaw Benjamin Richard "Yahtzee" Croshaw (born 24 May 1983) is a British journalist, video game critic and developer, author, and humourist. He is best known for his video game review series '' Zero Punctuation'', which he produced for '' The Escap ...

praised the film as an engaging ''noir'' narrative and an example of what he coined as post-punk, arguing its production and tone subverted mainstream filmmaking standards by instead relying on the

punk art Punk visual art is artwork associated with the punk subculture and the no wave movement. It is prevalent in punk rock album covers, flyers for punk concerts and punk zines, but has also been prolific in other mediums, such as the visual arts, ...

practices of earlier satirical works like '' Heavy is Dead''.Croshaw, Yahtzee
"An Explanation of "Post-Punk" Games"
Semi-Ramblomatic, ''

Second Wind Second wind is a phenomenon in endurance sports, such as marathons or road running (as well as other sports), whereby an athlete who is out of breath and too tired to continue (known as " hitting the wall"), finds the strength to press on at top p ...

'', 8 February 2024. Retrieved 27 July 2024.

References

{{reflist

External links