It's hard to defend films which don't get much love even from their director. Granted, I have only seen snippets from an interview with Zack Snyder, the director of Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire and Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver (which I'll call Rebel Moon 1 and Rebel Moon 2 for convenience). However, he seemed to be talking up his forthcoming R-rated versions of these films at the expense of the PG-13-rated ones now available on Netflix. I must say, these auteur directors can be enigmatic, even downright annoying. Surely, if you want the public to watch versions of your films with crushed skulls and the like, you try to make a decent fist of the versions without crushed skulls instead of half-arsing it and saying "don't worry, the R-rated ones will be better"? If you nail it the first time, people end up wanting more instead of giving up on Rebel Moon before it's even become a franchise.
Having read an article in a film magazine about the Rebel Moon films before their release, I was pretty excited about them. However, like proper Snyder fans (I'm ashamed to say these are the first films directed by him that I've seen), I was disappointed by what we got. So far, we have nothing that could rival the epicness of the Star Wars franchise even on a bad day. But though I feel no great wish to rewatch Rebel Moon 1 and 2, I will give the next film in the series a go (if there is a next one). There are things here I quite enjoy. And I'll say this for Rebel Moon: although it started as a idea for a Star Wars movie turned down by Lucasfilm, this universe doesn't feel like a Star Wars knock-off.
So, all right, there's an evil space empire, and the odd glowing sword pops up, though they aren't essential to the plot. But when is there not an evil empire? When's the last time we saw a good empire on the silver screen? (Napoleon? Sorry, I had to. Still haven't seen it, by the way.) One thing I really liked about these films was the aesthetics of the Rebel Moon universe. The planets and people visited by the protagonists in Rebel Moon 1 borrow traits from different places and historical eras on Earth: the Wild West, the Roman Empire, Ye Olde Japan etc. It's a bit odd, I suppose, considering this is outer space, but it's an idea that sets the Rebel Moon galaxy apart from the Star Wars one, where the look was more classic sci-fi and the planets often felt like they had one trait each (here's a desert – but it's a planet, here's a forest – but it's a planet, here's a big city – but it's a planet etc.).
The star ships look nothing like the Star Wars ones, but are more like clunky locomotives in space. Modes of teleportation are also different, and the advanced medical treatments one of the main villains undergoes are inventively squishy, a far cry from the a-scan-and-you're-fine treatments we mostly get in sci-fi. The music is properly grand and epic. So, plenty to like in the settings and soundtrack, then. That only leaves the problems with details such as story, script and characters.
Stop me if you've heard this one before: a peaceful agricultural village, where people live in harmony from the good of the land, is threatened by a superior force (in this case troops from the evil empire, called simply the Imperium). The superior force demands more from the village than it can give, or it will be destroyed. A deadline is given. The villagers are distraught. What to do? They're farmers, not soldiers. One hero (heroine in this case) manages to assemble a motley band of warriors to defend the village. However, that is not enough: the peaceful farmers, and their womenfolk, have to learn to fight for what is theirs and stand up against the oppressors...
Yeah, I know. I haven't even seen The Seven Samurai or The Magnificent Seven, and I have still seen this story so often I've become sick to death of it. A Bugs Life, episodes in Doctor Who and The Mandalorian... this plot seems to be everywhere. It's a mystery to me why Snyder couldn't find a better story to tell in this visually stunning universe he's imagined. What's more, the characters just aren't interesting, with the possible exception of the kick-ass heroine's mild-mannered boyfriend. Some of the acting is fine – Anthony Hopkins voice-acts an enigmatic robot with aplomb – but at other times it's decidedly wonky, and the actors aren't given much to work with. The tormented heroine Kora fights well but is otherwise not compelling, and not a strong enough character to build a franchise on. Her band of fighters are hardly more fleshed out than Asha's side-kicks in Wish, and though we get to hear their back stories they are more or less variations on the same theme (the Imperium attacking out of nowhere and doing their evil empire stuff).
As for the villains... Ed Skrein clearly has fun as the evil dictator's man on the ground, with heavy irony named Atticus Noble. But he's too much of a parody to ever feel menacing. I kept wishing for the second in command, Cassius (!), who seems much more competent, to live up to his name, knife Atticus and take control. No such luck. I guess Atticus must be seen as the comic relief rather than a serious threat, but it diminishes the tension when the heroes are up against a buffoon. And that haircut.
This world's Palpatine is called Balisarius, on the other side of the Asterix spectrum to Galbatorix in Eragon. What his motivations are I honestly couldn't tell you: "unlimited power", I guess. The only character he's known to have a personal relationship with is Kora (she's his adopted daughter), and he screws her over. It doesn't make any sense why he's so keen to capture her after that, when surely, for propapaganda purposes, it would be much better to have her remain the empire's most wanted elsewhere, and he has no personal axe to grind. But, well... he's bad, and that's all there is to it. A pity he couldn't be entertainingly bad like Palps.
So no, I'll not be watching the R-rated versions of Rebel Moon 1 and Rebel Moon 2, even though Snyder promises to "deconstruct" the tropes he leans so heavily into in the PG-13 versions. But if there's a film about Kora's search for the lost princess (very Super Mario), I'll watch it: this universe is interesting enough to warrant a better story than what we've seen so far.
