Tom's Guide Verdict
The 'Borderlands' is both a bad adaptation of its source material and a painfully unfunny, unoriginal mish-mash of other, better movies. Skip it.
Pros
- +
Cast do their best with what they've got
Cons
- -
Hackneyed, cliche writing
- -
Laughs don't land
- -
It's just plain boring
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In a world where we've been treated to genuinely excellent projects like"The Last Of Us" on Max, Netflix's "Arcane" and Prime Video's "Fallout" TV series, the "Borderlands" movie feels like one hell of a throwback to a very different kind of video game adaptation. And no, that is not a compliment.
Minus the Pre-Sequel, I've played every one of the Borderlands games for hours on end, and I was desperately trying to remain optimistic that the final project might at least be okay. Alas, my pleas got waylaid, because Eli Roth's new "Borderlands" movie is easily one of the worst things I've watched all year.
Instead of being the "Guardians of the Galaxy"-adjacent ensemble action-comedy it so clearly wants to be, the "Borderlands" movie ends up playing out as a dull throwback to the previous era of utterly dire video game movies, one which I can't in good conscience recommend you seek out whatsoever.
No laughs to be had
Plot-wise, the movie's cohesive enough. It revolves around an outlaw with a mysterious past, Lilith (Cate Blanchett), who heads back to her home planet of Pandora at the behest of the (mostly absent from the movie) villainous Atlas Corp. CEO. She's off to find and retrieve Atlas' daughter, Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt) from Tina's Psycho protector, Krieg (Florian Munteanu) and Roland (Kevin Hart), the rogue Crimson Lance soldier that kidnapped her. Once they cross paths, they later link up with neurotic scientist Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis) and robot Claptrap (voiced by Jack Black)
Arguably my biggest issue, above all, was the script itself. Roth and his co-writer, Joe Crombie, have delivered a painfully unfunny movie, which is a problem as an action-comedy; I saw it in a packed auditorium, and you could count the number of laughs loud enough to be heard over the movie on one hand.
Aside from genuinely one good joke at Roland's expense and his fate in the games, I can't recall anything else I liked. Our ensemble attempts to be a little bit "quippy" mid-scrap, but the delivery's off. Elsewhere, the gags they do shoot for are the lowest of low-brow; one of the final lines of the movie is genuinely just a premature ejaculation gag. Now I'm not above puerile humor, but when every other cheap shot at a laugh had fallen quite so flat, it left the worst lasting impression.
At least the cast is OK?
When it's not being unfunny, the script is treating viewers like an idiot. Characters come out with the most uninspired lines; Lilith genuinely drops an "I'm too old for this shit" line early on. Likewise, you'll see every potential reveal a mile off, either because a). you know the games' lore better than the people who wrote the movie or b). because "Borderlands" bashes you over the head with anything it deems important or emotive.
Other low points include egregious needle drops — a chaotic scrap with Psychos simply must be set to Motörhead's "Ace of Spades", obviously —or just the idea of trying to turn an ultraviolent, sweary, and crass game series into a PG-13 movie that boasts bang-average action. It just doesn't work. "Borderlands" at the very least is merciful enough to move along at a clip, but when everything else is so uninspired and, frankly, boring, it's still a slog.
Casting has been a hot-button issue for the "Borderlands" movie from the get-go, and, to be honest, it ended up probably being the least of my woes. Yes, we've got a mostly absent villain, and yes, the costumes have a distinctly average cosplay feel, but the actors themselves are trying. Black's Claptrap is serviceably irritating, Hart valiantly tries to prove he can play against type as a stone-cold hero, Greenblatt's a decent Tiny Tina approximation, and Florian Munteanu injects a hint of much-needed physicality into the otherwise inert fights.
Blanchett, predictably, is the best of the bunch, but she's cast in such a one-note, dour role that even she can't do much beyond grumble and point pistols. And when you can't hype up two-time Oscar-winning actress Cate Blanchett, you know something's gone wrong.
'Borderlands' review: Verdict
In someone else's hands, "Borderlands" could have been a fun, if disposable, sci-fi action-comedy. The Borderlands universe has a lot of charm, but this adaptation has instead decided to shoot for a dire mix of aging pop culture riffs, bad jokes, and bland action that isn't even so-bad-it's-good fodder.
All in all, it plays out like a bad Borderlands parody. It was always going to be a bold choice to turn a series of games that primarily function as looter-shooters first, and stories second, and what we've been shown proves this was a bad idea from the get-go.
There's some cool set and prop work on display, and at least some of the visual effects are well done, but otherwise, this is a deeply inferior rendering of what is otherwise quite a fun, off-kilter corner of the universe. If you're planning a trip to the movies anytime soon, I'd implore you to seek out literally anything else.
"Borderlands" is in U.S. theaters starting Friday, August 9.
