Review: Eternals

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7,000 years ago, a group of immortal beings known as Eternals were sent to Earth to protect the planet from creatures called Deviants. There's Sersi, (Gemma Chan) Ikaris, (Richard Madden) Thena, (Angelina Jolie) Ajak, (Salma Hayek) Sprite, (Lia McHugh) Kingo, (Kumail Nanjiani) Phastos, (Brian Tyree Henry) Makkari, (Lauren Ridloff) Druig, (Barry Keoghan) and Gilgamesh. (Ma Dong-seok) Now that the Avengers have restored Earth after Thanos' destruction, it opens another threat that only they can stop.

I find myself at an interesting place going into Eternals. I read the plot leak that ended up on reddit months ago, and I didn't like it, but written spoilers can translate wildly different on screen. I've been reading them long enough to know that, so despite all the fuss over this being the first rotten MCU movie on Rotten Tomatoes, I went in with an open mind.

If there's a project that could've benefited from a Disney Plus series prior to their film, it's this one. Eternal's biggest hurdle is that it's so vast, and there are so many characters, it spends the majority of the film explaining everything about them. I kept thinking of Guardians of the Galaxy while watching it. They didn't have that problem, because that movie spends about 20 minutes on introductions, then they get right into the action. Eternals doesn't have that structure. They can't move forward with the plot because they constantly have to jump back in time to show us something else. 

I like Chloe Zhao, I do, but she has no idea what to do with Angelina Jolie. I can only hope she's meant to do something bigger in another film down the line, and maybe Zhao will get to direct that and spend some time on her, but she's very underutilized here. So is Makkari, but even in her small amount of time she ended up being my favorite. Strangely, Kingo is the one I liked the least, and I expected Kumail's humor to charm me, but barely any of it landed for me.

It's not a complete disaster. Chan and Madden have amazing chemistry and we even get a PG-13 sex scene, which...love that for us. I look forward to seeing Thena, Makkari, and Phastos again specifically, and they also open a few doors for upcoming properties. I don't think this is the worst MCU movie, but it's going to be towards the bottom for me. It had too much story to tell for a two and a half hour movie and ended up being underwhelming and bloated.

Recommended: Yes (if you like the MCU) No (if you don't)

Grade: C+

Memorable Quote: "He's 10, not stupid." - Makkari (Lauren Ridloff)

Comments

  1. Often Off TopicNovember 9, 2021 at 10:13 AM

    I agree wholeheartedly with your last paragraph. I could watch Richard Madden for hours but I did struggle with his performance a bit. What did you make of the humour? A lot of the jokes fell completely flat for the audience I was part of!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamNovember 10, 2021 at 6:05 PM

      The humor barely landed for me. I think I may have only chuckled a few times, which surprised me.

      Delete
  2. thevoid99November 9, 2021 at 7:04 PM

    It's not the worst MCU film as that belongs to 2 other films but this was so underwhelming. I wanted more of Makkari as she was a joy to watch. I think its problem is that it wanted to be both a Marvel film and an art film and never found its balance.

    I am with you about how it brought the characters together as GOTG took 20 minutes to get everyone on board and then BAM. They could've at least used the first hour to do that and then use the second hour to fight and also deal with some personal shit. The film could've trimmed about 15-20 minutes to get things going. I don't think this was a bad film as I did enjoy it but it was so underwhelming.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamNovember 10, 2021 at 6:06 PM

      Exactly. I don't even think the run time was egregious, it's just the way they chose to utilize it. I don't think it was terrible, I just saw so much wasted potential.

      Delete
  3. BirgitNovember 11, 2021 at 9:40 AM

    I think people are beginning to burn out with all the Marvel movies. Even in the trailers, this looks like a Bit of a mess to me because there are too many super heroes to look at plus it looks like they went very CGI everywhere.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamNovember 12, 2021 at 6:20 AM

      I never feel Marvel burn out lol. Too many characters is the films biggest problem because it takes its time to give them back story, which is normally a good thing, but when you have 10 of them in one movie it doesn't work.

      Delete
  4. keith71_98November 12, 2021 at 10:42 AM

    I agree it's not a disaster. But super disappointing for me. I never really connected with any of the characters. And I'm still amazed at how dull I found it. Even the big ending action scene left me cold.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brittani BurnhamNovember 13, 2021 at 10:59 AM

      I really connected to Makkari and Druig lol. I'd love to see more of them.

      Delete

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