Review: Uptown Death Squad

Uptown Death Squad by Nick Cato
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

When Ronald Washington III returned to his old neighborhood after five years in Vietnam, he just wanted to relax for a while, get laid, and try to get back to normal life. But when his mother is murdered because of his brother's mistake, Big Ron is going to get answers the only way he knows how!

I'm a big fan of 70s funk music so I've watched a few blaxploitation movies in my day, mostly for the soundtracks. When this came up on my Amazon recommendations one day, I decided to take the plunge.

Uptown Death Squad is an homage to the blaxploitation films of the 1970's. Big Ron kicks ass on whitey with the power of a hundred Shafts and Dolomites. For the most part, it's a pretty linear revenge tale with Ron and company dealing out violence on the dirty Eye-Talians that are invading their neighborhood.

Nick Cato's love for the subject matter is abundantly clear on every page. It's a fun, violent story but that's pretty much all it is. It doesn't stray into spoof territory, like Black Dynamite, but doesn't break any new ground either. While I enjoyed it, it feels like a distillation of quite a few blaxploitation movies without a whole lot of originality to it. Three out of five stars.

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