The Eternals is the latest entry to the Marvel’s Cinematic Universe franchise. It was not well received by fans for many reasons. Here I will try and review it as impartially as I can.

So the movie tells a story of a group of immortal beings here on Earth, guiding civilization and protecting us humans from the Deviants. The concept and the subplot for the most part does suit well with the rest of the MCU world. It does a good job stretching the world a little bit further than we know of it. Giving us new characters and aspects of the franchise’s universe that we don’t know of. However, the concept relied heavily on exposition to be revealed to the audience. The subplots where compressed and dished out in just a few dialogues between characters. It kinda gives us an unsatisfying experience in this cinematic journey. We don’t not get to discover the nature of this world as things unravel, rather we are hit with heavy dosage of exposition. Be that as it may, the subplot, albeit affected by bad lazy writing, was standard and interesting enough to make me care about the movie, like I said before, it suits well with the rest of the MCU world and that is important.

Unlike most MCU movies, this installment attempts to reach deep into the characters and drive the movie with their essence. It wanted to dive into their experiences and struggles and triumphs to form personalities that will serves as the backbone of this movie, which will make it stand tall amongst other MCU movies. Well that backbone is not strong enough to be anything but just an attempt. The characters were not created with enough development or personality to be cared about. The movie tried to overload the audience with so much emotions, sometimes where it is not necessary, risking to be simply boring. The intention is pure, to create grounded characters but the execution was faulted.

Speaking of execution, the actual writing is just wrong. The plot is incoherent, though the flashbacks were applied well to give context to the present settings. Still the flashbacks are not exempted from the emotional overload. The dialogue is just bad, outright bad, unintelligent and shallow. There is absolutely nothing redemptive about the dialogue. Also the writing has the same problem that other marvel movies has, but this time it took it up a notch. It looks at things that are to be taken seriously, like world ending events too lightly. That just makes for a distasteful movie. If the characters don’t take them seriously, then why should the audience take the movie seriously.

The performance of the cast was mediocre at best. It would have been better if they had better materials to work with. They really had potential but was limited by the situation at hand. However the performance of Angelina Jolie was outstanding as always. Even the fact that she was not only given bad materials to work with, she was not given enough bad materials to work with, but still, she was awesome. Richard Madden was good despite all odds. Maybe it is because of the nature of his character. Don Lee’s performance really stood out for me notwithstanding having less screentime and inferior materials. It was just good. Watch out for things made in Korea I guess. The acting of Barry Keoghan and Lia McHugh in my opinion are not well received by me. I feel like they did not do justice to their characters at all. Even worse, as their characters, by virtue of the story were the most interesting. This is where the emotional overload would have been better applied. All of it was dampened by lack of personality and charisma.

The cinematography however was great, it was top notch, I loved it. For what it is worth, it gave the audience a feel of the world the plot failed to give. The visuals was also good. I also love how it was not priority in the story telling. The break from the shallow visual spectacle was refreshing. The CGI was also good. The movie from the technical aspect was perfect. It created the exoskeleton needed to cover the many flaws in this movie and still retain its entertainment value. The humor in this movie was applied well. It felt more natural to me than most Marvel movies. However, it kinda dampened the weight of the events in the movie.

To be honest, I loved the direction the filmmakers were intending to be heading, away from the MCU formula that has become stale. At least I love the intention, because they failed to do just that. It would have been nice to take risks once in a while and break the cycle of the same thing we have seen over and over again. The Eternals had so much potential, albeit wasted. Partly because of the tone of the movie. In my opinion, it does not suit the genre which the movie falls under. The movie is too slow, and that is not the description of a Sci-Fi Action movie. I think the filmmakers treated this project more like an indie movie than a big budget mainstream flick it is. As I said before, the whole trend where nothing is taken seriously in the movie and MCU world at large kills any form of energy the audience need to vibe with. I hate to compare, but the Captain America: Winter Soldier, the stakes were high and the movie always reminded us about it. The same feelings were never created with The Eternals. I was actually rooting for this movie, being an MCU fan.

My Ratings: 35%