"The Fifth Wave" | MOVIE REVIEW

They almost had it. Almost.

I don't know exactly what the balls went on during the conceptualization process of this film, but whatever happened, I'm sure there was some form of dysfunction behind the scenes. And I say this, because The Fifth Wave had a lot of potential to be a gripping alien invasion thriller. What we got instead was, um...

Yeah.

The marketing for this movie (or, at least, the trailers I was exposed to), set this up as something along the lines of Red Dawn meets Independence Day with a bit of 2012 in it. If you thoght that way, too, then you're not entirely wrong.

 

It's more like Red Dawn meets The Host with a touch of Stockholm syndrome.

So, The Fifth Wave is the film adaptation of Rick Yancey's novel of the same name (which I haven't read), and it's also the latest addition to the dystopian-young-adult-trend that's been going on ever since The Hunger Games came out. As such, it faces the risk of being generic and just another fish in the sea. However, like a lot of other films in its category, The Fifth Wave did have a lot of moments that could've worked and were actually pretty cool. The problem was that the movie failed to capitalize on the potential it had.

One of the things this movie bad that had the potential to be pretty good was its plot. I'm saying that sincerely - the premise was genuinely interesting! So, here's the lowdown: a bunch of aliens - called The Others - have entered Earth in this mothership that looks like it came straight out of District 9, and have attacked the planet in four separate waves. The first was an EMP that took out all the power, the second wave was, like, natural disasters and s***, the third was a virus, and the fourth was a full-scale(ish) invasion. It's a systematic process and it was refreshing to see this kind of approach to an alien invasion.

The main plot revolves around Cassy (played by Chloë Moretz) and her quest to get her brother back from the military, who've been brainwashing kids to kill people and stuff.

 

This sounds familiar.

I can't say anything about the cast, but the characters in this movie were balls. I didn't care about anyone except two people: Sam (the brother) and this girl named Teacup - and I only did so because I didn't wanna see decent little kids die. Everyone else was just... ugh.

Every character in this movie has one emotion. Each. For example, Chloë Moretz's character is afraid, like, 95% of the time. The dude from Jurassic World was in here and he only makes one face the entire time. Liev Schreiber's character is like this army dude and he hardly ever changes expression. You know, for a movie about people dealing with different things in an alien invasion setting, you'd figure they would try and say something remotely humorous to lighten the mood, but, no.

And the way these characters were written out was bollocks. I didn't care about any of them. The only characters in this movie with motivations were Cassy and that one dude who kinda looks like Guy Sebastian.

 

You know I'm not wrong.

And don't get me started on the two of them. Do not.

I have seen s**tty romances before. I know what I'm talking about when I say that the romance in this movie was completely unnecessary and did not need to happen at all. And it's really creepy how the movie starts it off, too.

 

I don't suppose you care about these, but, yeah...

So, Cassy wakes up one morning and wanders off to look for Guy Sebastian (or Evan Walker, as he's known in the movie), and she happens upon him bathing in full shirtless glory. At that one moment, the entire movie fell to s*** and began its descent into genericness.

Whenever Guy Sebastian opened his mouth to say something, someone in the rows behind me would laugh. I kid you not. I even pulled a Picard at one point at how bloody corny the dude's lines were. If he had died at one point, the movie would've been so much better.

 

That one scene (my friends know what I'm talking about) wherein Chloë Moretz was getting bandaged up was the only time I was ever excited to have the two of them in the same scene.

I did some research about the book and the amount of differences I found in the plot synopses of both the movie and the film was massive. I haven't read the actual book and none of my friends have, either, but I read some reviews from people who did and they hated it.

And I feel their pain, I know where they're coming from. I lived through the Percy Jackson sacks of dick. After much thought and deliberation, I had finally come to a consensus with myself and decided that The Fifth Wave is deserving of a Picard.

 

The really cool things about this movie just couldn't outweigh everything that sucked about it in the end. That being said, there is some amount of enjoyment to be had in this movie. Now, I can't say for sure where this film series (which is unlikely) will go from here, but I can't see it gaining any further traction.

So, The Fifth Wave - have you seen it? What did you think about it? Leave a comment, let me know. And, as always, stay tuned for the next post.

Image Credits:

 

http://www.screamhorrormag.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/The-5th-Wave-Poster-2.jpg

 

http://www.justjaredjr.com/

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