The prestigious director of the Oscar winning movie Parasite, Bong Joon Ho, has released his newest movie titled Mickey 17. The movie features big names such as Robert Pattinson, Steven Yeun and Mark Ruffalo. The movie opened to a wide mix of reviews from the audience and critics, an adaptation of Edward Ashton’s novel, Mickey 7.
The plot to Mickey 17 may sound simple and basic, but in reality it is very complex. Essentially Mickey is an “expendable” which means they put him in dangerous situations knowing he is going to die, and when he does they print a new version of him out. So before the Mickey we see there were 16 Mickeys hence why they call him Mickey 17. This version of Mickey gets sent off somewhere where everyone assumes he is going to die but somehow he actually survives. No one knew he survived and so they accidentally printed out a new Mickey, Mickey 18.
The world they live in is dystopian in nature and is run by a dictator, so having doubles of someone is massively against their rules. So Mickey 17 and 18 who are both very different people now have to struggle with not getting caught. Mickey 18, being the immature and irrational one, almost gets caught immediately and this is where the chaos begins.
This part of the film reintroduces the characters that saved Mickey 17 and they now are known as “creepers.” Even though Mickey tries to tell everyone on the ship that the creepers are good and do not mean any danger they still continue to not listen. This is where the villain of the story takes more of a leading role.
Mark Ruffalo plays the character, Kenneth Marshall, who is a villainous politician. Mark Ruffalo plays this character wonderfully and makes the viewer want to hate his character. His role in this film is very similar to his role in another award winning film, Poor Things. While it is very early to say as the Oscars from last year only happened a few months ago, it is not crazy to say Mark Ruffalo might receive a nomination for this film as well.
The whole last sequence of the movie is pure chaos and it really works. It adds a lot to the tension of the film and keeps the viewer entertained. Kenneth continued to steal the show and really was the comedic relief, while also being despicable. The ending also was really done well and made the viewer feel good, but also was a bit ambiguous.
Overall Mickey 17 is an absolute blast for viewers. It is not going to blow anyone’s mind with how amazing it is, but it is just two hours of a fun and exciting ride. It probably will not be talked about much during Oscar season just due to it not really being an Oscar quality movie and it coming out so early in the year. So even though that sounds negative, it never seemed like that is what this movie was about and that is ok. This movie is just pure fun and consists of great acting performances. Even though it is a blast it is actually a great film and should be watched by all audiences.
