Let’s figure out how the film entered the list of the worst films of the year according to Metacritic rating.
After the first screenings of Zack Snyder’s new film, the first reviews began to appear on the Internet and, as it turned out, critics and viewers did not like this film, to put it mildly. It scored just 32 out of 100 on metacritic.com and 24% on rottentomatoes.com. The film is criticized for its weak script, banal plot, illogicalities, pathos and much more. And in this material, we will try to figure out what’s wrong with “Rebel Moon” and whether it’s worth watching at all.
Plot
In a peaceful colony of farmers on the moon lives the main character named Cora. And she loves to plow! So much so that she herself stands behind the plow and feels a mixture of adoration and lust for the earth.
At the same time, you can’t call her a peasant! Judging by her appearance, after working in the field she manages to run to a cosmetologist, a stylist and a fitness club.
But the idyll is disrupted by the sudden arrival of the Ancestral Homeland’s troops led by Admiral Atticus, who organizes a strict surplus appropriation.
He kills the local leader and leaves his squad on the moon, and also forces the peasants to give him 10 bushels of wheat from the next harvest (although the colony harvests 12 in total). Why condemn to death those who bring resources is absolutely incomprehensible. Apparently the villains can’t stop being evil.
But our heroine turns out to be much more than just plowing. She is a former warrior, a killing machine. Cora single-handedly takes on a crowd of soldiers without even breaking a sweat.
At the same time, the fight was staged as poorly as possible. In those moments when the heroine becomes vulnerable, no one shoots at her. Apparently, because the soldiers do not beat the girls, but only give them back.
Then, together with his beloved Gunnar, he escapes from the settlement, gathers a squad of rebels on different planets and, excuse the spoiler, begins the fight against evil. But although evil finds itself on its back, it does not give up!
Problem #1: “Star Wars” or “Just Don’t Copy It Exactly”
The space opera was originally conceived by Zack Snyder as his own Star Wars. And Zach can be understood! Because the Star Wars franchise has been bringing Disney a lot of money for many years, but it doesn’t share it with anyone!
But Snyder did not have a breakthrough. Zack stole almost everything from the Star Wars universe: lightsabers, bad Empire, droids, bounty hunters, blasters and oppressed rebels. But he managed to ruin everything! That’s why in Star Wars, in addition to drama and pathos, there was humor.
Problem #2: Stale Plot
Bad guys attack the village of simpletons, but brave people with military experience defend it. We have already seen all this at least in Akira Kurosawa’s “Seven Samurai”. And also in the fourth episode of the first season of The Mandalorian.
But if Akira Kurosawa’s conflict is logical and organic, then here it looks like an owl stretched over a globe. The main villain, who for some reason wants to starve the settlement to death. Soldiers who are causing nightmares to the civilian population in vain. And no one explains why they are so bad! Maybe they are angry because they have never owned a bicycle?
Problem #3: Flat characters
Not only has no one explained in the entire film why the villains are bad, but no one reveals the backstory of the rebels whom the main character recruits for her team. The audience is only shown “how good they are, how powerful their paws are!” and that they are oppressed by evildoers. And what happened to them, why they found themselves in an unenviable position, one can only speculate from lengthy hints in the dialogues.
Because we are not shown the characters’ backstory, their motivation suffers. It is not clear why they go to war with the troops of the Ancestral Home and fight to the death. But the director came up with, as it seemed to him, the ideal solution to this problem – pathetic speeches, on which everything rests. Literally: “We are kind, oppressed, and they are evil and sleek! Enough tolerating this!”
Problem No. 4: “Horses and people are mixed together”
The whole movie is one big mess, a patchwork quilt made from many other famous films: Star Wars, Seven Samurai, The Fifth Element, Harry Potter, Tarzan, Ghost in the Shell, Gladiator. etc. There are very few original ideas and solutions in the film. One idea is a parasite that uses a person’s body to speak through their vocal cords. But what’s most offensive is that this moment is not explained to us at all.
What I would like to say at the end…
Rebel Moon is perhaps the worst Snyder Mark movie and not worth your time. Because the film, apart from graphics and camera work, has nothing to boast of. Everything else is very bad. Instead, check out 2018’s Perspective from our list of 10 good sci-fi movies you probably missed.
We can’t even imagine what the director will need to do to try to attract people with the help of the second film (it is already being filmed). If only we film it together with Sarik Andreasyan, where these space samurai will fight with the Defenders and the East