First things first. I think I have to point out that it was incredible how in just one day, the first official publicity for this movie is made public via a teaser trailer during Super Bowl 52, then it's officially released to be watched on Netflix mere hours later, and here I am writing my review of it no more than six hours after seeing that advertisement for the first time. Amazing. Is the movie itself amazing though? How does it compare to the previous two Cloverfield movies?
One thing it really has going for it is the cast. Fantastic line-up of actors here. From the stellar Gugu Mbatha-Raw, entertaining as always Chris O'Dowd, the commanding presence of David Oyelowo, to the rest of the cast from Daniel Bruhl, and even Elizabeth Debicki (hey, that's Zemo and Ayesha from the Marvel movies!). Another thing going for it is the premise, that involves particle accelerators and the overall tie-in to the Cloverfield universe. Plus there are some genuinely spectacular sci-fi horror sequences that are creepy and shocking in all the right ways. There's a whole thing with an arm that is easily one of the highlights of this movie.
So far so good right? Well, the script could have used more work. Like many sci-fi movies around, there needs to be a level of believability in the supposedly smart scientist astronaut types that fill the characters in the movie. Then how come they still do some stupid things here?! Forget the sci-fi aspect for a second, but as a horror-thriller movie, the audience watching it shouldn't be smarter than the characters who should know better. There were also some plot issues that just felt so nonsensical and were just there to serve the story's dramatic moments.
If I looked at "The Cloverfield Paradox" as a simple straight-to-video type "B-Movie," then I can probably excuse it for it's flaws. I still liked the characters, the general premise of the story, and those cool memorable scenes. All that saves this movie from just being out right disappointing. I can probably still watch it for those good aspects. With that said, this is unfortunately the weakest in the franchise so far.
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