Maximum Ride
Maximum Ride is a series of young adult fantasy novels by the author James Patterson, with an OEL adaptation published by Yen Press. The series is centered on the adventures of Maximum "Max" Ride and her family, called the Flock, who are human-avian hybrids born with wings after being experimented on at a lab called The School. The series is a reboot of James Patterson's earlier novels When the Wind Blows and The Lake House, aimed at a younger audience.
| Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment Maximum Ride: School's Out Forever Maximum Ride: Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports Maximum Ride: The Final Warning MAX: A Maximum Ride Novel Fang: A Maximum Ride Novel Angel: A Maximum Ride Novel Nevermore: The Final Maximum Ride Adventure Maximum Ride Forever Hawk | |
| Author | James Patterson |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Thriller, action, science fiction, fantasy |
| Publisher | Headline Doubleday Little, Brown and Company |
| Published | April 11, 2005 – July 6, 2020 |
| Media type | Print (hardback & paperback) |
Plot
The Angel Experiment
The first book in the fantasy series gives an overview of the Flock: Maximum "Max" Ride (the leader), Fang, Iggy, Nudge, Gasman, and Angel, all children respectively ranging from 14 to 6 years old. They are genetically altered beings born with wings, essentially a human-avian hybrid. This book primarily focuses on the abduction of the youngest member, Angel, and the rest of the Flock's noble quest to find and save the youngest member of their family, while fighting a number of obstacles including physical ailments, natural disaster, fighting Erasers (human-wolf hybrid creatures) and the evil scientists at the experimental lab called, "The School".
School's Out - Forever
The Flock is headed towards Washington, D.C., where they hope to find the answers to their origins. They end up being fostered by a former FBI agent and placed into a regular school system to live as "normal kids." Their time typical teenage drama. They are later attacked by the Erasers and a new unknown enemy, and must flee again to find safety. Max finds out there has been a clone created of herself and other members of the flock, intended for Max's destruction, Max II, with whom she must fight or flee from.
Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports
The Flock must save the world from the Itexicon Corporation who plan to destroy all genetically modified beings and destroy half of the world's population. The Flock is captured and they must find a way to escape and stop the Corporation's evil plan. There is debate among the group to decide if they want to escape from their newly found super-hero like duties and to just worry about their own needs, and the other side that feels they have a purpose in helping fight the evil in the world. Ultimately, this causes a rift and the boys of the Flock split from the girls in their disagreement, and leave without any contact.
The Final Warning
The Flock unites again after finding each other, and they are asked by government officials to contribute their abilities to help a team of scientist study pollution levels in the oceans around Antarctica. flies out of a government meeting set up to decide what the government officials think is best for them. Later, they go to Antarctica at Jeb Batchelder and Dr. Valencia Martinez's request, where a team of scientists needs their assistance in studying ocean pollution levels. While there, a few members of the flock are captured by the Uber Director and taken to Florida. The rest of the group makes their way to rescue them and defeat this new villain, in the midst of a hurricane. Max and Fang begin to solidify a romantic relationship with each other.
MAX: A Maximum Ride Novel
The Flock is attacked by a group of bionic robots (which Max nicknames M-Geeks) at environmental awareness shows in Los Angeles and Mexico City. Later, the government enlists their help in finding out what is destroying hundreds of ships and killing millions of fish off the coast of Hawaii. Max is also looking for her mother who mysteriously disappears from the safe house. A mysterious creature mutant appears near the sub so Angel unexpectedly dives out to have a chat with it. It ends up helping the gang. During this mission, Max, Fang, and the others discover many other abilities, like breathing under water.
Fang: A Maximum Ride Novel
The Flock travels to Africa where they meet Dr. Hans Gunther-Hagen, a former Itex worker, and Dylan, another human-avian hybrid designed to be Max's "perfect other half". Dylan joins the Flock, although they are all wary of his motive. Max and Fang are kicked out of the group by Angel who has decided that they are too focused on their personal relationship than the evils they should be fighting. Fang is taken by Dr. Hans and experimented on, he dies for a moment before Max revives him back to life. After getting back to their home, Fang decides to permanently leave the group and start his own Flock. They are all heart-broken.
Angel: A Maximum Ride Novel
Max finds out about an organization known as the Doomsday Group is brainwashing people and makes an interest in going to stop this group. Meanwhile, Fang starts his own gang which includes Max's clone, now called Maya. The two teams join forces in Paris, although they don't exactly get along, but they must stop the Doomsday group from killing themselves and hurting others. They devise a plan, but everything goes awry when Gazzy fails to disarm all the bombs under the gathering spot, and the bombs explode while Fang, Gazzy, and Angel are still in the blast radius. Fang and Gazzy make it out safely, but Angel is missing, leaving everyone heartbroken. Angel's epilogue reveals that she is still alive, though her whereabouts remain a mystery.
Nevermore: The Final Maximum Ride Adventure
The story begins when Max and the remaining members of the flock have to go to an ordinary school. Though Max is unhappy about it, she just cannot say no to Dylan. Meanwhile, Fang's gang is caught up when they're attacked by two convoy trucks and some of them are seriously injured and Maya is killed. Fang leaves the rest of his "gang" and tells them to move on with their lives, and he goes back to Max with his original Flock. Dylan at this time is under an influence to kill Fang in order to save Max, and the apocalypse is near. He is unable to kill Fang, and the Flock is led by Dr. Martinez to a paradise where they will be safe from the apocalypse and Angel is there to greet them. The apocalypse has taken the form as a virus and various natural disasters, and the Flock is trying to survive. This was supposed to be the last book in the series, but it was announced later that Maximum Ride Forever would be released in 2015.
Maximum Ride Forever
The ninth book in the Maximum Ride series was announced for release on January 19, 2015, but later had its release date changed to May 4, 2015, later revised to May 18, 2015. Like the previous book, it was advertised as the final book in the series. This plot begins with the Flock splitting up in this post-apocalyptic world to find survivors after the decimation of most populations of people on the planet. Many of their loved ones have died or gone missing. Throughout the book they locate their loved ones and fight a new enemy called Remedy, and his Horsemen who has been going around the remaining population of Earth and killing mutants. In a final battle of good and evil, Max defeats Remedy and the Horsemen, and all the survivors go into hiding. For four years, the entire army lives in the underground settlement as they let the nuclear winter pass. Once it's safe for them to leave, the mutants travel to Peru where they settle on Incan ruins. The series ends with Phoenix, Max and Fang's five-year-old child, starting her first flying lesson.
Characters
Maximum Ride
Maximum "Max" Ride is the title character and the primary protagonist of the series. She grew in a lab. She is a 14-year-old (15 in Fang, Angel, and Nevermore and 20 in Maximum Ride Forever) avian-human hybrid and the leader of the Flock. She plays the part of a mother or "mamma bird" in this case. Her hair color has differed throughout the books, is described as dark as sun-streaked brown (MAX) and as light as blond (School's Out Forever, Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports). She has peachy skin and eyes "the color of unbarfed chocolate", according to Angel. Max is 5'8" and weighs 97 pounds, as described in The Final Warning. She has a 13-foot wingspan and is half Hispanic as described in Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports. Her wings are light tan, with brown spots, and cream and brown streaks. They have been described as "tawny". Max's powers are to fly up to 350 mph, she is the strongest of the flock. She has great leadership abilities, is a master fighter, has a voice inside her head that tells her what to do most of the time, and she develops gills at the end of MAX. In MAX, Max talks with Fang in the desert after talking to him about Nudge wanting to cut her wings off. Later, the Flock meets Dylan, who, according to Dr. Hans Gunther-Hagen, is Max's "perfect other half". Max teaches Dylan how to fly and fight. She also notices a slight jealousy from Fang. Max begins to feel an attraction for Dylan when Fang leaves. In Angel, she and Dylan, an 8-month-old clone with 2% avian DNA, grow closer, confusing her feelings about Fang, who begins to grow closer to Maya, who is Max's clone. Max is one of the two members of the Flock who found her parents; Iggy is the other. However, she is the only one to like her parents, as Iggy leaving his after only a week or so (they wanted to put him in a freak sideshow). She is stunned when she learned that Jeb Batchelder (a "whitecoat" who helped them escape from the school and then raised them and then suddenly left) was her father. Dr. Valencia Martinez is her biological mother. Max trusts Dr. Martinez completely but remains wary of Jeb. She is also close to her half-sister, Dr. Martinez's daughter Ella, who Max first meets when trying to save her from some bullies in the first book. Max dislikes Ari (Her half-brother and Jeb's son) until she learns that they're related, with whom she is constantly fighting, but then he joins her "mini-flock" that was created in Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports for a short (he dies when his "expiration date" kicks in during a huge fight) time after rescuing them from the School where they were going to be killed.
Fang
Fang is 14 years old. (15 in the movie:Maximum ride,Fang, Angel, and Nevermore and 20 in Maximum Ride Forever) He is second-in-command of the Flock and Max's best friend (later her boyfriend). He is only four months younger than Max. Fang is able to virtually disappear by staying very still and quiet. He is somewhat stronger than the rest of the flock, often sustaining near-fatal wounds, as in books one and two. Fang almost always wears dark clothing and always seems to be sneaking up on Max. He has dark, blue/black hair and eyes with olive skin. He is believed to have DNA of a raven because of his black wings that have a purple/blue shimmer. He has a fourteen-foot wingspan. In The Angel Experiment, he found out that the School took him after he was born. When his mother had him the doctors told her that he had died. Fang decided that he didn't want to find his mother, she wasn't much older than his own age when she had him. He is somewhat reserved, but cares deeply about the Flock. He is usually very silent, and seems quite mysterious, always hiding his feelings. He runs a blog about the Flock's adventures that proves useful in several books, such as in School's Out—Forever. In The Angel Experiment, Max kisses Fang when he is injured. In School's Out—Forever, he is seen kissing the "Red-Haired Wonder," Lisa. He and Max fight about this, but afterwards they make up. In Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports, he kisses Max. In The Final Warning, Fang seems to like Dr. Brigid Dwyer, who worked with the Flock in their mission to Antarctica, and Max becomes jealous resulting in tension between the two. In Saving The World And Other Extreme Sports, when Ari joins the flock, Fang decides to lead half of the Flock and leaves Max with her half-brother. He later comes back, reuniting at the end of an epic battle made up of an army of his blog's followers, in which Ari "expires". Fang leaves the Flock again at the end of Fang because of Dylan, Max's "perfect other half", and because Angel has predicted that Fang would be the first to die; therefore, because he knows that by dying, he would put the others in danger, he leaves. Everyone is upset by this, especially Max, but she finds a letter later that he wrote to her saying that if in 20 years, the world hasn't come to an end, he'll meet her on the cliff where they learned to fly like the hawks.
In Angel, Fang becomes the leader of a new Flock (aka 'Fang's Gang') which includes Ratchet, Star, Kate, Holden, and Maya (Max's clone), who help him try to stop the Doomsday Group. When he realizes he cannot stop the Doomsday Group on his own, he enlists the help of Max's Flock. Max and Fang seem to grow apart and start to like different people. Also, Fang starts having feelings for Maya, trying to replace Max. However, he then realizes that Maya is different from Max, and begins to treat her differently, although in his heart, he still loves Max. After the planned D-day, Fang leaves with his flock, leaving Max and her flock in the rubble of Paris, searching for Angel (who is missing).
In "Nevermore", Fang hears the 'Voice' and comes back for Max, after breaking one of his wings. He and Max grow back together after he comes back and abandons his 'Gang'. It takes some time, but eventually they love each other again. Fang manages to kill several erasers and see Dylan kill Ari. It is after that, when Dylan attempts to kill Fang, Max really realizes that she wants to be with Fang for the rest of her life. When Doctor Martinez (Max's mother) takes them and the Flock to a paradise island, he and Max resume their previous relationship. When he and Max escape to a perfect perch, he tells her that he loves her for the first time, just before they are hit by a tsunami. When they are both rescued, Max tells Fang that she loves him as well.
Fang dies in "Maximum Ride Forever", but he is revived when Dylan sacrifices himself for him to live and Max to be happy. Fang and Max then have a baby girl named Phoenix.
Iggy
Iggy is 14 years old, six months younger than Max (15 in Fang, Angel, and Nevermore and 20 in Maximum Ride Forever), and third-in-command of the Flock. He is usually sarcastic, 6'0", has extremely pale skin, whitish-strawberry blond hair, very light icy blue eyes, and a wingspan of 14 feet. Iggy is described as very handsome, especially because of his "unseeing, yet captivating, eyes". He is one of the only two flock members to have met his parents, the other being Max. His real name is revealed to be James Griffiths. When he found his parents, he learned that he was kidnapped by the School when he was about 4 months old. At first, Iggy decides to leave the Flock to live with his parents, but later leaves when he learns that his parents didn't want to have him back and only wanted to use him to make money off his story. Due to the whitecoats' experiments to enhance his night vision, Iggy is effectively blind, though he can see if his surroundings are white and can identify people by feeling their fingerprints and the feel of their wings. He can also feel colors. Despite his blindness, the Flock often leave things up to him that require precision or detail, such as cooking and doctoring. His senses are also the best of the flock due to his blindness, although he occasionally suffers resentment of his blindness and the resulting dependency of the Flock it creates. He and The Gasman are best friends and have a habit of building bombs out of almost anything and blowing things up, including alarm clocks. Iggy and Ella, Max's half sister, also showed signs of growing affection towards one another in Angel, which ultimately culminated in a shared kiss in Nevermore.
Nudge
Nudge is 11 years old (12 in Fang, Angel, and Nevermore and 17 in Maximum Ride Forever), has brown skin, and has wild, curly, long, dark brown hair. Described as Max's best supporter and the peacemaker, she likes Max over Fang and can't live without her. Her wings are often said to be tawny-brown, almost cream. Her real name is revealed to be Monique, and she managed to track down who she believes to be her mother because of the resemblance in skin tone, but never meets her because she is attacked by Ari. She is a "motormouth" as said by Max several times in the books. The Flock calls her the Nudge Channel because when she's awake it's "all Nudge, all the time." She likes fashion, especially about hair, clothes, and make-up. Nudge can hack into computers with her ability to sense leftover emotions, also called psychometric, and she can draw metal towards her by will, like a magnet. Of the flock, Nudge is the one who most longs for the normality of the lives of other kids their age; in MAX, when Jeb offers the Flock to stay at a day and night school, Nudge wants to stay and get her wings cut off. Thankfully, Max convinces her not to.
The Gasman (Gazzy)
The Gasman (Gazzy) is 8 years old (9 in Fang, Angel, and Nevermore and 14 in Maximum Ride Forever) with blond hair, blue eyes, tan/light brown wings with a 10-foot wingspan. He is Angel's biological older brother, and they are the only blood-related siblings of the Flock. He has a mischievous nature and makes fun of Max sometimes. He and Iggy are experts at constructing and setting off bombs and explosives, as Max states, "You could lock the Gasman in a padded cell with some dental floss and a bowl of Jell-O, and he'd find a way to make something explode." He is also adept at other types of engineering and inventing, as he and Iggy did once create a mask for underwater use that extracts the oxygen from water so one could breathe. It is revealed that his parents sold both him and Angel, his younger sister, to the School when they were very young. The Gasman's most useful ability is to perfectly mimic any voice. Max and Fang find a picture of baby Gazzy when they go check out what they think was Gazzy and Angel's old residence; the Flock sees the picture many times accidentally and sometimes purposefully throughout the series. He is called The Gasman because he passes gas a great deal, owing to a problem with his digestive system. Additionally, he later develops a "skill": he can produce large "mushroom-shaped" clouds of gas which stink horrendously.
Angel
Angel is 6 years old (7 in The Final Warning, Max, Fang, Angel, and Nevermore), with blue eyes and curly blonde hair. Angel is also the biological sister of The Gasman (Gazzy). Her wings are pure white and are 8 ft (9 ft in Fang) across. She obtains seemingly random powers at random times, but her most eminent power, lasting throughout the series, is the ability to read and control minds.
In The Angel Experiment, she uses her powers to convince a woman to buy her an expensive teddy bear that she names Celeste. She acquires the ability to hold her breath underwater and swim in deep water at pressures that would crush a normal human as well as change her appearance into a 'bird of paradise' form and change her skin and eye color; however, after the initial introduction, this power is never mentioned again, except when she gets trapped under a snow pile in The Final Warning, but the attempt was unsuccessful. She is usually mistaken to be powerless and innocent, but she is truly extremely intelligent and dangerous. Her ability to control people's minds gives her extreme power.
In Fang, Angel believes that she is the strongest of the Flock, and holds a vote, temporarily kicking Max out of the group. She also has a 'Voice' in her head, like Max, but the Flock is unaware of this. Angel is portrayed as calculating, ruthless, and unstable in Fang, and has pointed a gun at Max to make enemies back off.
In Angel, she seems to have calmed some of the extreme changes of her personality that occurred in Fang, and helps Max to balance her feelings for Fang and Dylan. She appears to be content with her role and no longer bids for power, but advises Max, who is still suspicious of her. In the end, she volunteers to go undercover in a new evil organization (The Doomsday Group). She goes missing after she and Gazzy fail to defuse a bomb, and the others think she is dead. In fact, she is being held captive in an unknown location, and is continually told she is "most superior".
In Nevermore, Angel is captured by The School again. After many tests, they show Angel a video. Angel starts to cry as she realizes the video is of Iggy's operation that has left him permanently blind. She watches the scientists prod and cut open Iggy's eyes until a whitecoat tells her they will be performing the same operation on her. After the operation, Angel loses her sight temporarily and nearly dies in a fire until Max and the Flock come to save her. When they escape to a 'tropical paradise', the world is being destroyed and she admits to Max she is the Voice, and she has been for years.
In Maximum Ride Forever, Angel, at first distrusted by Max but eventually called her "little prophet", leads an army of survivors and mutants against the Remedy after being shown visions on the apocalypse the Remedy caused.
Dylan
Dylan is an avian-human hybrid who joins the Flock in Fang. He is said to be Max's "perfect other half", causing Max to refer to him as "Mr. Perfect", although Max and Fang are quite in love when they meet. He is six foot two inches tall with a 15-foot wingspan and chocolate colored wings, and is usually described as handsome, with dark-blond hair and turquoise eyes, and is said to have a beautiful singing voice. He is in love with Max, but he was programmed by the scientists to feel that way. Because of this, he and Fang do not see eye-to-eye until the end of Nevermore. He was also made in a lab, created from a clone of a boy who had died in a car accident in the country of Canada. He is 8 months old in Fang. He learns how to fly when Max teaches him by pushing him off a roof. His relationship with Max is complicated, but she does eventually start to like him. In Fang he is portrayed as somewhat meek, but appears to grow a backbone, even arguing with Max in Angel. The most notable argument in Angel starts at the beginning of the book with Dylan and Max arguing about how miserable Max has been since Fang left her. Dylan can heal himself almost instantly by placing his own saliva on his wounds and putting pressure on it. In addition, he has extremely good vision and clairvoyance.
In Angel, Max finds a new appreciation for Dylan, and a romance is sparked, though Max is usually confused and therefore harsh. The first time Max allows Dylan to comfort her is in the desert where they embrace. Although she is confused, she allows him to get closer and closer to her.
Later, in the book Nevermore, Dylan is told by a 'Voice' that he must capture Max's heart with all his might, so he takes her to a treehouse he made himself and kisses her then. Later, Fang re-appears after his own clan had been destroyed and Max realizes her mistake, choosing to be with Fang instead of a clone with programmed feelings. Dylan goes on a rampage, destroying part of a town and even attempting to kill Fang. Dylan is nowhere to be seen, so Dr. Martinez seizes her chance and whisks the original flock to a tropical paradise. Dylan appears and states that he will be there for Max when the world ends so they would die together. Max is irked but doesn't respond to him. Since a meteor is coming to demolish the planet, Dylan goes to herd mutant hybrid kids into elaborate caves. In the end, Dylan helps pull Max from the water after the apocalypse.
In Maximum Ride Forever, Dylan is seemingly killed but in reality is kidnapped by the Remedy and turned into a Horseman. However, he becomes aware that the transformation was not successful as he still has free will; when tasked to kill the flock, instead of doing so, he fakes their deaths so that no other Horseman will be sent to truly kill them. Eventually, Dylan despairingly but solemnly accepts that Max will always love Fang and he cannot be with her. He decides to sacrifice himself to bring Fang back to life in order to make Max happy.
Phoenix
Phoenix is the daughter of Fang and Max, conceived and born in the ninth book, Maximum Ride Forever. Phoenix has Fang's black hair and wings and Max's brown eyes, though her wings are more blue-ish and her eyes are light. The series ends with Phoenix receiving her first flying lesson.
Total
Total is a black Scottie whom Angel saves from the Institute at the end of The Angel Experiment. He is described to have the characteristics of a Scottish terrier. When Total is rescued from the Institute, he is described as looking similar to Toto from The Wizard of Oz, which would make him a Cairn terrier. Total's character is not fully developed until School's Out Forever, when it is discovered that he has the ability to talk. He is often humorous and dramatic, exemplified when he gets shot in the tail and isn't hurt largely, but still exaggerates the injury. Despite his dramatic nature, he can be mature when he wants to be and will not tolerate getting treated like a normal dog- even going as far as eating at the table with the rest of the flock. In the end of Fang, Total marries Akila, an Alaskan Malamute whom he met in Antarctica in Maximum Ride: The Final Warning. It is discovered Total thinks Tricia Helfer is hot in Angel when they are going to go to the ComicCon in San Diego. He is known to be a fan of culture, including theater and cuisine. He has the ability to jump to great heights, and eventually grows his own tiny wings. Total is very loyal to Angel because she is the one that found him in an underground lab in N.Y.C.
Akila
Akila is an 80-pound Alaskan Malamute with no special powers who meets Total in Antarctica in The Final Warning and becomes Total's wife in the end of Fang. She belongs to Dr. Papa, one of the scientists on the boat that the flock took to Antarctica. Akila is killed by Cryenas in the final book in the series, "Maximum Ride Forever".
Dr. Jeb Batchelder
Jebediah Batchelder is a scientist, and part of the group (the 'School') that experimented on Max and the rest of the flock. He is 73 in the series, but that isn't confirmed by any character. He used to work at the School where the Flock was experimented on, but felt compassion for them and later broke them out and let them live with him. He lived with the Flock deep in the mountains for four years, where he taught them basic survival skills and how to fight so they can defend themselves. Max refers to Jeb as the closest thing she had ever had to a father, although later her feelings for him are mixed. Jeb then disappeared, leaving the Flock alone to fend for themselves. The Flock thought Jeb was dead, but he reappeared later in the first book. In The Angel Experiment, the flock discovers Jeb back at the School when they are recaptured. This initially leads the Flock to believe that he is a traitor, but he later comes back to the Flock and helps them on numerous occasions. Jeb is Ari's and Max's biological father. Max does not trust him after discovering his identity. Jeb is shot in the sixth book, but he is shown to be making a steady recovery. Though Jeb and Dr. Martinez are Max's biological parents, there is only a professional relationship between them. Max trusts Dr. Martinez, but is usually wary of Jeb. Jeb donated his chromosomes, which were matched with those of Dr. Martinez to create Max. In Angel, Jeb tells Max she needs to breed with Dylan after the world ends, and later goes missing with Max's mother. Once Max thought Jeb was the Voice in her head, but in The Final Warning, he reveals he "can do the voice, but isn't the voice", confusing Max. Jeb keeps telling her things are tests. Throughout the entire series, Max's feelings towards Jeb are conflicted, ranging from a familial love to ultimate hatred. These feelings are ultimately challenged in Maximum Ride Forever when Max encounters Jeb helping the Remedy in Himmel. Upon realizing his part in destroying the world, Max begins strangling him but cannot bring herself to kill him; after letting him down, Jeb tazes her and threatens to inject her with the "upgrading" serum, but he is killed by Fang's gang who came to rescue her.
The Erasers
The Erasers, created by the School in Death Valley, are half-human, half-wolf hybrids that were bred by the School to be guards, but their larger mission later involves hunting down and even killing the members of the Flock. Their powers are superhuman strength, but they also eventually gain wings that are crudely grafted onto their shoulder blades. They have a life span of about 4 years to reach maturity and approximately a year or two to hunt the Flock. Jeb's son, Ari, who was turned into an Eraser at a very young age, is one of the last to die when Itex 'retires' all of the Erasers and replaces them with the Flyboys, robotic Erasers with synthetic skin attached to their robotic structure. The Erasers are originally killed off because they 'expire' very quickly, but they make a surprise appearance in Fang when they attack all of the flock but Max and Fang, who are not at the house with the others. It is believed that when Itex was disbanded, some scientists took Eraser DNA with them, creating these new Erasers, though they are never mentioned after the events of the surprise battle. They are always armed, but rarely use their weapons after The Angel Experiment and later novels in the series.
Ari Batchelder
Ari is Jeb's son who was turned into an Eraser when Jeb was helping the Flock escape from the school. In The Angel Experiment, he was once killed by Max in the sewers of New York but gets revived in the second book. He thought his father Jeb Batchelder didn't care about him, which is part of the reason that he hated Max out of jealousy and chased and terrorized the Flock. However, it is later confirmed that Jeb does care about Ari, because in The Angel Experiment, after Max has fought with and killed Ari, Jeb cries for Ari and calls after Max, telling her that she has killed her own brother. He is Max's younger half-brother since they have the same father, Jeb. When Ari was only seven, the whitecoats used him as an experiment to see if Erasers would be stronger if they were mutated after birth. The wolf DNA turned Ari into a "super-eraser," although he is always partially morphed. Ari came back to life and was grafted with wings according to Saving The World And Other Extreme Sports. According to Angel, Ari loved and hated Max at the same time. In Saving The World And Other Extreme Sports , Max and Fang get into a fight because after Ari broke them out of the School, Max was convinced that he was no longer evil. The Flock splits up: Max, Nudge, Angel, Total, and Ari go to Europe, while Fang, Iggy, and Gazzy go to Hollywood. Max and the gang go to the Itex headquarters in Germany, where there is a super-mutant named Omega. Ari tries to help Max fight him, but then his expiration date kicks in and he suddenly dies in Max's arms, only living until the age of seven. As his father creates yet another clone of him, Ari returns in Nevermore, showing up with other Erasers with the intent to take out Fang's Gang. Several times he tries to kill Fang, but in the end he is killed for good.
Dr. Hans Gunther-Hagen
Gunther-Hagen is a scientist the Flock meets in Fang, where he introduces Dylan to the rest of the Flock. He is the main antagonist in both Fang, Angel, and later Maximum Ride Forever, constantly telling Max that she needs to join forces with him to save the world . He creates a lot of tension in the Flock. Max constantly makes fun of his name, calling him things like Dr. G-H, Dr. Haagen-Dazs, Dr. God, Dr. Disaster, etc. He created Dylan, wrote a book, and makes the shocking suggestion that Max and Dylan should come to live with him to Germany in order to "breed" (have children) or create the start of Max's "dynasty". He also has some special abilities such as instantly healing from illnesses and regenerating small extremities, such as fingers.
He was Dylan's caretaker until Dylan joined the Flock.
In Maximum Ride Forever, he becomes known as the Remedy and builds a large underground shelter in Russia known as Himmel. He develops a serum known as "upgrading" which turns his subjects into "Horsemen", genetically improving them, making them stronger and increasing their senses but removing their free will. He allowed the meteor to strike the earth in Nevermore and kill millions of people in an attempt to eradicate the genetically "imperfect" in order to populate the earth with his genetically "perfect" creations. He uses his Horsemen to kill the imperfect mutants still living on earth, including the flock. He desperately tries to kill Max and her developing baby to keep her imperfect genes from spreading, but is then killed by Max when she drops him over the ocean.
Dr. Valencia Martinez
Dr. Valencia Martinez is a Hispanic veterinarian that lives in Arizona and helps Max when she (Max) is hurt in The Angel Experiment after helping Dr. Valencia's daughter, Ella, escape from bullies. When Dr. Martinez gives Max an x-ray, Max finds that there is a microchip embedded in her arm, which leads her to believe that the School is tracing the Flock with her microchip. In Saving The World And Other Extreme Sports, Max goes to Dr. Martinez to have the microchip removed, where she is put under the influence of Valium for the first time and admits her feelings for Fang. Max then loses use of her arm. Dr. Martinez is a strong-willed woman who goes to great lengths to help Max. It is later revealed that it was she who donated the egg that created Max, making her Max's mother. She also has a pet dog named Magnolia. In The Final Warning, the Flock is given the opportunity to go to Antarctica to help a group of scientists that are trying to save the world as well. In the following book, Max, Dr. Martinez is held hostage on a submarine, leading to a rescue mission by the Flock and some of the good scientists they met in Antarctica. Max trusts Dr. Martinez and trusts her judgment, which allows her to understand some things she is blind to. We later find out that Dr. Valencia Martinez was working with the white coats, and doctor Gunther-Hagen in the book Nevermore. When Fang comes back after departing from Colorado, forming Fang's gang, being betrayed by Kate and Star, arriving again, and being attacked by failure eraser copies of Ari, led by successful Ari copy, and Jeb, hurting Jeb, it is revealed that she was persuaded by Jeb, in a sort of spell, but still isn't to be full trusted by Angels' mind reading skills before they go to the tropical paradise islands with tree houses, used as a sanctuary made by Dr. Valencia Martinez, and Nino Pierpont, the richest man in the world, among others. Dr. Valencia Martinez died when the large tsunami hit.
Ella Martinez
Ella Martinez is Dr. Martinez's other child, making her Max's half-sister. Max met her in The Angel Experiment when she saved her from bullies. Ella got away but Max was shot and had to go to Ella's house to get help. Ella is proven trustworthy. By the end of Nevermore: The Final Maximum Ride Adventure, she had become a lover to Iggy. They had started flirting in ANGEL, right before DoomsDay brainwashed Ella, and briefly Iggy. Like her mother, Ella drowned below ground when the tsunami hit in Nevermore.
The Director
"The Director" or Marian Janssen was the leader of the ITEX industries. In her appearance in the third book, she posed as Max's mom, in order to get under her skin and learn her greatest secrets, to eventually eliminate all not "advanced" humans. Max originally dropped her from a great height, but she had sympathy for her and saved her.
Reception
Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment received generally positive reviews. The School Library Journal called the book an "exciting SF thriller that's not wholly original but still a compelling read".[1] Booklist described it as "an action-packed cross between Gertrude Chandler Warner's Boxcar Children and Marvel Comics' X-Men.[1] John Ritchie of the ALAN Review wrote a negative review, saying that Patterson "slips in his attempt to write an action-adventure series for kids". He called the book "filled with every possible comic book/Saturday morning cartoon cliche" and described Patterson's writing style as "uneasy" and Max's dialogue as "horribly fake".[2] In January 2010, the webcomic Penny Arcade poked fun at James Patterson based on the description found on the back of the first book.[3][4]
The second book, Maximum Ride: School's Out Forever,[5] was criticized for being "disappointingly anticlimactic and violent," although Total's character was praised for being "sure to entertain."[5] Booklist delivered a positive review, praising Patterson's "ability to write page-turning action scenes" and noting that he "leaven[ed] the suspense with some surprising humor."[5] It also mentioned that fans of the first book would be "delighted"[5] with the sequel. Erin Collazo Miller from About.com praised the "fast-paced" novel, "fun characters," and "interesting premise," but criticized the characters and plot lines for "lack of depth and development."[6] The review said that "[a]fter 400+ pages, readers may wish they were a little farther into the plot and that more of their questions had been answered."[6]
Other works
OEL manga
Illustrated by Narae Lee and released by Yen Press, the first chapter of the original English-language manga adaptation came out in July 2008 in the magazine Yen Plus. A free 22-page preview was released on Free Comic Book Day (May 3, 2008).[7] The first volume of the series was released on January 27, 2009, the second volume was released on October 27, 2009, the third volume was released on August 17, 2010, the fourth volume was released on April 26, 2011, the fifth volume was released on December 13, 2011, the sixth volume was released on December 11, 2012, the seventh volume was released on October 29, 2013, the eighth volume was released on July 29, 2014 and the ninth volume to be released on November 17, 2015, with one more volume afterwards expected to be published.[8] It was on the "Top 25 Manga Properties" list in 2012.[9]
Film adaptation
In September 2007, it was announced that a film would be created based on the Maximum Ride series. James Patterson would be the executive producer.[10] Avi Arad, who had already worked on films such as Spider-Man and X-Men, would also produce alongside Steven Paul.[10][11] In an interview with James Patterson, it was revealed that Arad has already planned out the first two movies.[12] On August 7, 2008, it was announced that Columbia Pictures had bought the screen rights to the franchise. The film was slated for a 2010 release.[13] Catherine Hardwicke was said to direct and Don Payne would be handling the script.[10] In January 2010 it was announced that the film would go into pre-production. Hardwicke asked for a script rewrite to include more action in the film and hired Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby for the job, which subsequently delayed its estimated release to 2013. In February 2011, the Maximum Ride Facebook page posted, "The Maximum Ride Movie is Coming – In 3D!" and asked its Facebook fans who they would like to play Max in the movie.[14]
In an interview with USA Today, Patterson revealed that he was hopeful for a film adaptation. Patterson took note of fan-made audition videos from User Based Casting, a fan-driven casting initiative for the upcoming Maximum Ride film adaptation, commenting, "there's something like 9,000 Maximum Ride videos on YouTube, and some of them are stunning. I also think we're closer to the movie than we've been. I never know for sure in Hollywood, but it's definitely warm now."
The film ran into trouble in early 2012, when Catherine Hardwicke quit as the film director.[15] When asked about the odds of a movie still being made, Patterson claimed he was "...very hopeful as opposed to mildly depressed".[15] Trouble continued with the death of screenplay writer Don Payne on March 26, 2013.[16]
With the film stalled by mid-2014, the series was submitted for adaptation into a web series by Collective Digital Studio.[17] Sites attached to Patterson and Hachette claimed that the series would begin in the second half of 2015.[18]
The completed film, starring Allie Marie Evans as Maximum Ride, was released on Digital HD on August 30, 2016. It adapted the first half of The Angel Experiment, and was rated very poorly by fans and critics alike.
Marvel Comic series
The Marvel Comics adaption Max Ride: First Flight debuted April 8, 2015. It featured the talents of Marguerite Bennett and Alex Sanchez.[19] It was followed by Max Ride: Ultimate Flight beginning in November 2015, and Max Ride: Final Flight beginning in September 2016. Together, the comic series adapted the first three books of the series. There are significant differences from the books. Rather than avian wings, the characters have wings made of a metal alloy.
See also
Global warming portal
Children's literature portal
References
- Amazon.com: Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment: James Patterson: Books: Editorial Reviews
- Barnes and Noble.com: Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment: James Patterson: Books
- "A Comprehensive Education". Penny Arcade. January 13, 2010.
- "A Comprehensive Education (comic)". Penny Arcade. January 13, 2010.
- https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/product-description/0316155594/ref=dp_proddesc_0?ie=UTF8&n=283155&s=books
- Miller, Erin Collazo. "Maximum Ride: School's Out - Forever - Book Review". About.com.
- A 7-page preview was also released in the first paperback edition of The Final Warning. Aoki, Deb (April 10, 2008). "First Look: James Patterson's Maximum Ride Manga". About.com.
- "MAXIMUM RIDE story by James Patterson, art by Na Rae Lee". Yen Press.
- http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/25219.html
- "Catherine Hardwicke Takes Maximum Ride". ComingSoon.net. March 17, 2009.
- Maximum Ride - The Film Archived 2012-08-04 at Archive.today
- "Books: Maximum Ride". Archived from the original on October 11, 2007.
- Fleming, Michael (August 7, 2008). "Columbia takes 'Maximum Ride'". Variety.
- "The Maximum Ride Movie is Coming!". facebook.com.
- "James Patterson's 'Nevermore': Cover reveal, plus Q and A". USA Today.
- https://www.empireonline.com/news/story.asp?NID=36957
- https://www.thewrap.com/collective-digital-studio-will-turn-james-pattersons-maximum-ride-into-a-web-series/
- http://maximumrideforever.com/#web-series
- https://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2014/10/11/james-pattersons-maximum-ride-will-become-a-marvel-comics-series/
External links
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