The first movie of Maze Runner, out of all the young adult movies, was perhaps the one that's more interesting and has the potential for me to want to follow the series. Not anymore.
This sequel, The Scorch Trials, frustrated me quite a bit even though I did enjoy the action sequences once again.
Many of the story progression and character development, especially with Dylan O'Brien and Kaya Scodelario's characters, did not make enough logical sense. O'Brien came off as someone who unnecessary and without enough reasons to care too much for people he just met. And in one very important conversation where Scodelario blamed O'Brien for something, it was strange that he did not pursue it further.
We get glimpses of the brotherhood between O'Brien and his mates but it never played out enough to convince the audience that the rest would naturally follow O'Brien's leadership. So when Thomas Brodie-Sangster (Newt) questioned O'Brien, I was wondering why he still stayed. O'Brien only seemed to have bonded with Ki Hong Lee but we never saw that happened too.
But there were some characters which I enjoyed. The franchise seems to be eyeing TV's "Game Of Thrones" cast; other than Brodie-Sanagster from the first movie, and Nathalie Emmanuel in a smaller role, it was Aidan Gillen who shone the most in this sequel as he was a screen-worthy antagonist.
The addition of Alan Tudyk and Barry Pepper, however, were not as great. Especially Tudyk's scenes where, out of the blue in the middle of the desert, there's this place where people are partying. This turn of events was so ridiculous that I wished the whole sequence wasn't included. And we wouldn't have missed much had it been removed too.
But overall, it was Wes Ball's direction that was a let down. He cared more for creating scenes after scenes that must have been from the book, rather than focusing on telling a better story for the characters to look more human and three-dimensional.
I'm not looking forward to the next sequel.
No comments:
Post a Comment