"Rise of the Lycans", on the surface, makes a perfectly well working prequel. The loss of Kate Beckinsale and Scott Speedman is compensated by a great Rhona Mitra and especially Michael Sheen's titanic effort. The look and the action are amazing, considering the somewhat lower budget, and the story makes sense to prepare us all for the things to come in the other two movies. All in all, the trilogy is round now and does not disappoint in any department, unless you are taking everything a bit too literally and wonder how werewolves can make babies.

It is interesting, however, to peek below the surface. The makers mentioned in interviews they see similarities to "Romeo & Juliet" insofar as Lucien and Sonja are lovers not allowed to get together. One crucial difference, however, is that Romeo and Juliet came from two noble families, whereas in "Rise of the Lyans", Sonja is a member of the aristocratic pale vampire rulers, who are sipping glasses of blood on the castle, while Lucien is with the ugly, hairy slaves, the werewolves exploited as cheap labor force. We don't really get to see what this work consists of except carrying stones around. Also the love story isn't explained enough in the running time of not much more than 80 minutes PAL until the credits start to roll. But the point is that "Rise of the Lycans" is a hardly disguised class struggle story. Similar to the Italian socialist cinema of the 1960s which would show the rebellion of poor farmers against the rich property owners, the working class has to realise their value (in Lucien's words: "we are more than animals") and claim their human rights. When Lucien says "this is just the beginning", it may seem to the audience that he jokingly refers to other other two movies which have shown us already how the story continues after this prequel. In the subtext, though, he is making a very serious statement that freedom is the foundation of a life worth living, and everything else will be built up now upon this basic condition. It's a pity that the movie doesn't elaborate more on that and doesn't spend some additional time on the character development, either, because it could have been the best of the trilogy. Alas, I voted almost equally 8-7-7 for the three movies.

This epic vampires versus werewolves prequel to "Underworld" and "Underworld: Evolution" qualifies as first-rate entertainment that resembles a combination of an old western and a variation on "Spartacus." The vampires are forted up in a medieval castle, and the werewolves lurk beyond the walls in the dark woods like hostile Apache Indians. The action is fast and furious and it sticks to the exposition from "Underworld" and concludes with Kate Beckinsale perched on a window ledge. Director Patrick Tatopoulos' "Underworld: Rise of the Lycans" occurs before Death Dealer Selene came onto the scene. "Lycans" chronicles the franchise when Viktor (Bill Nighy) commanded the coven and clashed with his rebellious daughter Sonja (Rhona Mitra of "Beowulf") who has an affair with a Lycan. The scene when the Lycan attack the vampire castle and Sonja's lover, Lucian (Michael Sheen of "New Moon") fires gigantic cross-bow arrows at the rampaging werewolves is unbelievably cool! Prepare yourself for an unhappy ending.

A prequel that takes you to the origins of how the Lycans came into being a force. Lucian (Michael Sheen) is the first werewolf born who could return to human form instead of turning into a wolf and never turn back.

Vampire king Viktor (Bill Nighy) decides not to kill the infant Lucian, a mistake he acknowledges at the time but uses him to create an army of slave Lycans to protect the vampires from other werewolves.

What Viktor did not count on was his daughter Sonja (Rhona Mitra) would fall for Lucian and rebel against the vampires. In short this film is a variation of the forbidden love story set in medieval times and also without Kate Beckinsale.

The film is more of an action horror, the producers of the Underworld franchise have got the actions scenes and CGI template laid down to a fine art. The trouble is not always great action, just derivative and some dodgy CGI.

The film was shot in New Zealand but they still managed to make it look like some unnamed Gothic East European city. It might had been cheaper if they just shot it in Eastern Europe.