A-Train: New Beginnings
2024 · 24m
Directed by Chris Carthern
Genres: comedy, musical, satire
Tones: absurdist, darkly comic, humorous
After the speedster A-Train accidentally kills a woman, the members of The Seven convene to decide his fate, and the disgraced supe takes matters into his own hands by launching a rap career, in a sarcastic, music-driven fan-film satire of superhero celebrity culture.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
A superhero fan-film that responds to celebrity accountability by having the guilty party launch a rap career is exactly the kind of premise that makes gatekeepers uncomfortable—it's absurdist enough to work, hostile enough to matter, and too fun for its own good. This is what happens when someone refuses to make the earnest choice.
While the satire lands, the film's relationship to its source material reads more as pastiche than rigorous engagement with the superhero genre's formal conventions or its own musical-comedy lineage; the tonal control wavers between parody and earnestness in ways that undercut rather than deepen the critique.
The decision to weaponize rap as a redemption arc for a murderous character—playing the absurdity completely straight in the delivery—is the singular choice that makes this work; everything else is platform, but that commitment to tonal deadpan in a fan-film context elevates it beyond its budget.
Reviews
Peppered with sarcasm and wit, the film is a cornucopia of gallows humour, fan fiction and rap music. An entertaining short that makes one hold their sides from laughing.