Review: Pariah Nexus “A Mark Presented”

From the start, this show goes hard. The opening for Pariah Nexus is some of the slickest, most out of this world designed art I’ve seen in a very long time. With every show, Games Workshop just ups their game. You can tell GW wanted to go hard and deep to supplement the release of 10th Edition. All I can say, really, is thank you.

I’m not deep into the game, at all. The way I get the lore is through the supplementals like WarhammerTV and the games. Here’s a special shoutout to Auroch Digital and Focus Entertainment for giving us Boltgun. If you have an itch for Doom, and you’re a major fan of Warhammer 40K, go and play this game. It was easily one of the best gaming purchases of the year. And the story was very easy to follow.

That said, we finally got a full season of a story that features the Adepta Sororitas, or the Sisters of Battle. These zealots ride into battle on mobile cathedrals, and are more zealous than about 90% of the factions that make up the Imperium. But who are the enemies? Well that would be the Egyptian themed zombie bots that would make King Tut dance in his grave…the Necrons.

A lot of this first episode was spent putting pieces onto the board, which is perfectly okay. We don’t need a rushed story, and that’s what Games Workshop excels at. The Necrons are destroying, repurposing, and rebuilding. As we’re listening into the two Necron units talking, you can see the lighting and reflections in the Necron lair just absolutely set the mood for what’s about to happen.

The way this first episode plays out is a lot like how Pulp Fiction playes out. There are a lot of shorter stories that are being told at the same time, but it feels very simple to piece them together and suspect where things go. As the episode progresses, they start to come together, like when one of the Necron are sniping Cadian army members, and the Sister telling her family story to a Cadian army person. This Necron is an absolute boss.

I love how Games Workshop manages to use their universe as a microcosm for how shity politics and religion are to the general populace and global policy. And you see the delineation between common sense and zealousness with this Sister of Battle and the Cadian trooper. Remember, kids. If you’re not blindly following some zombie emperor who’s hooked up to life support, The Imperium doesn’t care. Near the end of the episode, we get another faction sorely missing from these phenomenal shows, the Salamanders.

As I said at the beginning of this review, “A Mark Presented” is a giant step up from the CG we were getting during the 9th Edition run of shows. Don’t get me wrong, because those shows were beautiful. However, when you put the quality of the CG and script next to Pariah Nexus, they just don’t hold up. Everything from the ash falling from the sky, to the intricate lighting from the Necron rifles shooting, to the even more complex lighting on the Necron were done to perfection.

The way the script was presented was phenomenal as well. It takes a real genius writer to be able to put together a story presentation akin to Pulp Fiction, let alone make it successful. “A Mark Presented” is the next benchmark for storytelling from Games Workshop and Warhammer Storyforge. If the rest of the series can keep up. Pariah Nexus is going to be a linchpin for lore going forward.