⭐️⭐️
Director and Writer (Platform): Zack Snyder (Netflix)
Publisher (Release): Netflix (2024)
Length: 2 hours and 2 minutes
Genres: Adult; Space Opera; Sci-Fi; Fantasy; Action
❗️Disclaimers❗️:
major warning for flashing lights
moderate violence
this review contains low-level spoilers
recommendation: vibe check before watching
👍 Pros 👍
Some snippets of an interesting world
Stellar soundtrack
Epic scale
👎 Cons 👎
Overly long
Overly reliant on slow-motion
Overly indulgent
👀 Synopsis & Trailer 👀
Kora, her recruits, and the farmers of Veldt prepare for the Motherworld’s impending attack.
🛎️ Introduction 🛎️
It hit me as the credits rolled that Rebel Moon – Part 2: The Scargiver could’ve just been bundled into A Child of Fire. I mean, it is just the one story split in two, right?
So, why wasn’t it?
The Scargiver isn’t devoid of style or positive aspects, but its sickeningly gratuitous reliance on that style can’t quite hide the vacuous space where substance should be.
🧩 Plots 🧩
The Scargiver picks up right where A Child of Fire left off and proceeds to abuse slow-motion by applying it to nearly every single scene as the farmers of Veldt prepare for war. Prepare as in monotonous montages that, while capable of layering characters, bog down the story’s flow and lack the balance needed to be utilised effectively. So, when every other scene is inflicted with a slow-mo filter, an overlong experience gets ridiculously frustrating.
Like the first film, so much could’ve been edited down or out, and Scargiver makes this painfully apparent when the watcher can only ask ’why wasn’t this just the ending of the first film?’.
Scream if you wanna go faster
What’s equally frustrating is that creator Zack Snyder’s world has some magic, some intrigue that compels the viewer to see if there really are inspired foundations or if the series is going to be made of fragmented derivatives. It’s too on the nose, slow but easily bored of itself that it still feels chaotic and choppy. Some great moments suffer from poor connective tissue, painting the picture that those involved knew what they wanted from the big, bombastic scenes but didn’t care much for how they got to them.
Juicy tidbits begging for attention
The finale, which, undeniably, should’ve just been the first film’s finale, does inspire some adrenaline. A soaring soundtrack and gorgeous visuals elevate the frenetic if plain action. Surprisingly, despite all the fighting, The Scargiver is relatively tame when it comes to blood and gore, leaving itself, at moments, looking strangely goofy.
‘…why wasn’t this just the ending of the first film?’
🎭 Characters 🎭
The diverse cast fairs slightly better this time round with more dedication made to layering them as individuals. Their pasts, fears, hopes and dreams are blatantly smashed into the viewer’s face, but they’re welcome regardless. This more emotionally complex approach allows the actors to shine a little brighter and better showcase the talent that Rebel Moon is stacked with.
Revenge is a dish best served…naked?
That exploration, however, is marred by some truly frustrating lapses in judgement. Slight Spoiler: our protagonist Kora goes for the cliched sacrifice to save innocents by giving herself up after the first film and most of this film’s beginning showed the viewer she knows that never works!
It’s not even a sleight of hand or a nifty little ploy, it’s nonsensically absolutely serious.
Not devoid of potential but actively working against it
‘…more emotionally complex approach…’
🧠 Final Thoughts 🧠
The Scargiver isn’t Part 2 so much as it’s the ending to Part 1 stretched and twisted to reach an overlong runtime primarily using slow-motion as a crutch to hide a lack of substance in style. I feel transported back to the 2010s when it felt like every YA film needed two parts to tell one story.
I hated it then and I hate it now, and it leaves the bitter taste in my mouth that someone needs to step in and moderate Snyder’s overly ambitious but sadly underdeveloped ambitions. There are nuggets of gold here and there that glimmer with potentially juicy mythology that only needs to be tapped into.
The scale is interesting despite the derivative ideas and, with some better choreographed action, Rebel Moon could take its solid soundtrack and create a space opera less reliant on forcing the viewer to watch faux flair and get their hearts pounding with some epic science fiction.
The Phoenix Project 
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