Ivan Radford | On 21, Apr 2024

Director: Zack Snyder
Cast: Sofia Boutella, Michiel Huisman, Ed Skrein, Djimon Hounsou, Staz Nair, Bae Doona
Certificate: 12

Seven Samurai in space. Star Wars meets Harvest Moon. Zack Snyder meets lightsabers. Rebel Moon, Netflix’s two-part sci-fi saga, is all of these and more – and, simultaneously, somehow less. The first part of the action-packed epic debuted in 2023, many years after the 300 director first conceived of a George Lucas-esque blockbuster that, ultimately, never made it into the official Star Wars universe. Rebel Moon: Part One – A Child of Fire was a handsome but hollow space opera, which pitted a bunch of rogue rebels against a fierce ruling Imperium. Rebel Moon: Part Two – The Scargiver is the visually gorgeous concluding chapter that sees the skirmish actually take place, but struggles to bring much heart to the blaster-wielding heft.

We begin with a brief recap of the first film from Jimmy (the crown-of-trees-sporting robot voiced by Anthony Hopkins), before we park ourselves on Veldt, the farming planet where the rebels are making their last stand. What follows, though, is a tediously drawn-out series of flashbacks and monologues in which each of our ragtag rogues spell out their backstory – simultaneously making Jimmy’s recap redundant and making the film far less exciting than a movie featuring a crown-of-trees-sporting robot voiced by Anthony Hopkins should be.

The crew is led by Sofia Boutella’s Kora, the adopted daughter of space tyrant Belisarius (Fra Fee), who gets a bit more history filled in, and Michiel Huisman’s brooding farmer-turned-warrior Gunnar. Also joining them are Titus (Djimon Hounsou), a general who carries shame of past defeats with him in a hip flask, Nemesis (Doona Bae), a revenge-fuelled woman who reveals the source of both her vengeance and her cyborg swords, and the muscly, formidable Tarak (Staz Nair) and Darrian Bloodaxe (Ray Fisher).

The on-the-nose script from Snyder, Kurt Johnstad and Shay Hatten leaves us even less emotionally invested in their quest, having undermined each actor’s charisma with its tell-don’t-show philosophy. By the time we’re up to speed with their varying motivations, we then wade through a training montage and some heavy-handed voiceover before we actually get to the final battle. All the while, we see Ed Skrein’s villain, Atticus Noble, brought back from the brink of death, leaving him feeling frustratingly familiar and curiously less threatening – his larger-than-life villainous presence was the best and most disturbing part of Part One, but Part Two struggles to recapture the brutal horror of his angry energy.

The result is a strangely muted affair, despite the fact that the final half of the film is a set piece stuffed with some impressive moments. Old-school military tactics and futuristic weapons collide with a slew of slow-mo explosions and collisions to make for a feast of spectacle that’s exactly what you want from a Zack Snyder space opera. And yet, as the action escalates, you realise that you’re overly moved by any of it – there’s no fist-punching celebration to echo the destruction of the Death Star here, or edge-of-your-seat stakes to rival Andor or Rogue One.

Even the enjoyably unexpected opening sequence in which a ruler is betrayed, Julius Caesar-style, while a live string quartet plays, gets forgotten in the ash-strewn emptiness of a surprisingly and disappointingly forgettable sequel. What could have been Snyder delivering a bombastic pay-off to a film of middling set-ups becomes a missed opportunity that misses the world-building of the first chapter, but doesn’t fill that gap with enough fun, thrills or feels. The tease of a possible Part Three makes you wonder whether a story that takes us somewhere less derivative within this universe is actually the droid we were looking for along.

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