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CLOVERFIELD PARADOX (2018)

2/4/18 - Cloverfield Paradox - 3+/10

This movie had the flash marketing and buzz of the franchise explainer/glue, but it quickly spent all that good will  in a lackadaisical trickle down its leg. It tried way too hard while not really trying at all. Sci-fi and horror tropes again and again, but without the substance or verve necessary for caring or competency. It doles out character like a hot dog vendor applies condiments, rarely in the right proportions if even at all. This is a weak junk food meal that doesn't satisfy or sustain.

It is a weak “mind bender for beginners” that wants to be Star Trek, Sphere, Coherence, and Event Horizon, but it can’t manage the bare minimum for any of the above. Weak facsimiles of plots and actions, like the clone of the clone of the clone in Multiplicity. Weak and unproductive thinking.

I didn’t care for the melodramatic main character’s angst, the faux Cold War II geopolitics, the boring disaster nothingness on Earth or a single relationship on the station. We know from minute 5 that this is what leads to that (other 2 Cloverfield properties),so surprises are light if they even exist. Everything is telegraphed (the other engineer never smiles. Is that Chekhov’s grimace?) unless it doesn’t matter at all (this kid the husband finds...who cares?). Often just feels like things thrown at the page/screen.

The substance of reality matters only for the necessity of the plot, as does “space science” (ex. This station is broken and we must fix it to survive/do anything! Oh wait! Weirdness is happening. Eh, that survival thing will take care of itself. We have plot to dive into!). When nothing makes sense, what sense am I to make of it?

In the end, it felt like a waste for most of the decent actors, a stumble from the script, and faltering in making this some explanational linchpin of a shared cinematic universe. It isn’t unwatchable and is relatively sharp looking, but it can only do so much with that . Cloverfield Paradox was a jumbled mess without the sting of conviction or the armor of logic. It fails at frightening, fumbles at funny and falters at fulfilling sci-fi. I guess it gives some answers, but does anyone really care in the end? There were no twists and it leaves us scratching our head during (how does anyone here relate to what we already know...Is this even the same world?) and after (Do I care about any of what I just saw or have been talking t about? {NO})