(SPOILER WARNING!!! This article does contain spoilers, if you haven’t seen the movie, just see the first paragraph to be informed without spoilers!!!)

Jupiter Ascending had some great visual effects, but that is expected from The Wachowskis, everything else is a big mess.

Rating: 2.5 Stars

The Wachowskis are definitely innovative directors. It really all started with one of my favorite movies, The Matrix. The way they used slow motion action (which is greatly overused now) and making a very unique storyline that got us all mind blown if this is really true or not. They moved on with the sequels, and created more movies where they really create new and astonishing worlds that really makes us feel we are living in a fantasy world. The great stories are just icing on the cake. The Wavhowskis are known for innovating special effects and design something new that will look great for our eyes, even with mediocre movies like Speed Racer (I personally like that movie) and Cloud Atlas, the graphics can still live you in awe. Now The Wachowskis decide to make their own little Star Warsesqe world. I knew it would be different and graphically great, but will it be good?

What I Like: The graphics, special effects, and action scenes were some of the greatest that I have ever seen. That one scene where the main characters, Jupiter and Caine played by the beautiful Mila Kunis and Channing Tatum, were fighting aliens and spaceships all around the city of Chicago. Seeing Caine in those rocket boots was pretty awesome to watch. The different worlds in space which The Wachowskis created were interesting to see, and it seems like they wanted to try make a Star Wars movie of their own. (Emphasis in try.)

The So So: Mila Kunis has to be one of the beautiful women on this planet, however, her voice can be a turn off. Maybe it’s because I watched to much Family Guy where she voices Meg Griffin, or when she acted as the annoying Jackie in That 70’s Show, but her eyes alone make me want to melt. (If she had the voice of Sofia Vergara, I would explode with infatuation.) She is perfect for comedy roles, but for action, her voice keeps her back. In this movie she was ok at best. She is pretty naive in this movie which didn’t help, and always seemed that Caine had to save her butt plenty of times. In any case, if you put the movie on mute, you may enjoy the movie that much more.

What I Didn’t Like: First off the story was confusing. It took me a while to put everything together, and when I did, I just didn’t care. Pretty much Jupiter is the guardian of Earth and she didn’t know it, and Caine came to Earth to help her from royalty siblings from space who want to use Earth to create space fighters (at least that is what I got from the movie.) The royalty siblings were just a bunch of spoiled brats that rather kill her to have Earth instead of acting like regular humans and settle it peacefully. One sibling, Titus Abrasax played by Douglas Booth, tried to marry her to have the rights to Earth, which he plans to kill her later. The other sibling, Balem Abrasax played by Eddie Redmayne, wanted Earth so bad that he sent aliens to kill her, and when they weren’t successful he went and kidnapped her family and hold them at random. If this is called a space opera (which is confusing cuz there is no singing whatsoever) the story is pretty lame. The acting was horrendous as well. Channing Tatum just reverted back to his horrible acting after I applauded him for his role in Foxcatcher. What was really disappointing was Eddie Redmayne’s performance. After his Oscar winning performance in The Theory of Everything, he laid an egg in this role. His soft spoken voice was was really annoying, and his arrogance in his role only made it worse. He was the main villain for this movie, but it was one of those villains that you want for him to get defeated and lose. I mean how can you be a good villain and get your butt beat by Jupiter. I believe The Wachowskis concentrated more on special effects then an actual story, and that is a shame.

Overall, if you love special effects and nothing more, than this is your movie. However, if you are looking for more than that, it can be an atrocity. There is always a red flag when a movie gets their release date pushed back for whatever reason. Most of the time the movie will not be good!!!

Rating: 2.5 Stars

(Sidenote: Cake- Here you see Jennifer Anistan in a dramatic role playing Claire Bennett. She has gone through a traumatic accident where her 5 year old son was killed, and left her with scars and chronic back pains. Because of this, she goes through a lot of pain killers and a depressing attitude where she doesn’t care. Her maid Silvana, played by Adriana Barraza, is her only voice of reason and really tried to take care of her even though she treats her like crap. She is also haunted by a ghost of Nina Collins, played by Anna Kendrick, a women who committed suicide in her support group, and haunts Claire to kill herself as well which she always comes close to doing. The movie really deals about coping after a horrific experience and moving on. Anistan really acted well in her dramatic role and made it believable. The movie kind of drags on, but does have its moments.
Rating: 3 Stars)