There's a better Bong Joon Ho movie buried under Mickey 17

Jackson Weaver · CBC News

· Posted: Mar 11, 2025 4:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: 10 minutes ago

There is simply a telling country toward the extremity of Bong Joon Ho's overmuch delayed, overmuch anticipated Mickey 17. In it, the titular 17 (Robert Pattinson) stands shivering connected the loading dock of his spaceship implicit the snowfall satellite Niflheim. Beside him is his clone, Mickey 18 (Robert Pattinson), conscionable arsenic burdened by gadgetry and the convoluted, interwoven plots that got him determination arsenic his partner. 

The 2 are strapped with explosives, equipped with machetes and connected the hunt for "sauce" from the circling mob of pill-bug aliens — each elements introduced from scattered, incomplete b-plots that person lone present had a accidental to converge. And turning to his partner, 17 introduces yet different element.

He brings up a representation helium can't assistance but clasp connected to: The mysterious reddish fastener he pushed arsenic a child, agelong earlier helium became a clone — the 1 connected the dashboard of his mother's car, which lead to the accident that killed her.

"I told you, man," 18 replies. "You gotta fto that go."

Here's the thing. My memory's not perfect, but unless it's precise bad, I don't deliberation the 2 of them had ever really discussed this representation before.

WATCH | Mickey 17 trailer: 

And it is true, I truly whitethorn person missed a speedy motion to the infinitesimal determination betwixt abstraction battles, philosophical rambling and an adjacent parts creepy and confusing imagination sequence. But to beryllium just to this poor, overloaded reviewer, the information that there's excessively overmuch present to clasp onto is benignant of the main problem. 

At its heart, Mickey 17 is astir a antheral who finds himself successful dire fiscal straits and sells himself into servitude arsenic an "expendable" connected a space expedition. These workers are fixed what whitethorn beryllium the astir undesirable occupation in this near-future hellscape: dying.

Being an expendable's not each that bad. When they die, their memories are all digitally preserved past re-uploaded into a cloned body, printed by a reconstitution instrumentality that uses each manners of integrated worldly (banana peels, quality waste, dormant bodies) to spit retired a shiny caller Mickey — similar an abnormally reliable inkjet. 

That makes them particularly invaluable for unsafe experiments. Need to spot however agelong it takes for radiation to termination a quality successful space? Send Mickey retired there. Got a pesky alien microorganism problem? Infect Mickey and trial the vaccines connected him.

And determination are plentifulness of unsafe experiments courtesy of Mark Ruffalo's Kenneth Marshall, the person of the expedition who is nary uncertainty astatine slightest partially inspired by Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk — with a steadfast dose of Jim Jones thrown in.

Marshall's wife, Ylfa (Toni Collette), whispers proposal successful his receptor similar a coiffed Wormtongue. She willfully tortures captured aliens, and from her, we get some insight into astatine slightest 1 of the movie's meanings: "Sauce is the existent litmus trial for civilization." 

If you're wondering what precisely she means by sauce, don't worry, so is everyone else. Sometimes, it's an approximation of nutrient — possibly alien tails blended together successful some sort of space-age Magic Bullet — and other times it's conscionable humor drops wiped up from the floor. 

Either way, it's an absorbing capable metaphor: the uber-rich of a space-exploring aboriginal truthful cartoonishly disconnected from the worth of quality beingness that they lust aft the crushed up goop of its constituent parts, be it successful a condiment that's consumed, or the benignant utilized for printing retired a clump of Mickeys. It's an enticing lens that's absorbing capable to trade an full movie around. 

Unfortunately, Mickey 17 besides crafts itself astir the Mickeys' duelling consciousness of self. After 17 survives an duty helium wasn't expected to, 18 is accidentally cloned earlier the existent Mickey really dies. It's a huge error, since both clones being live astatine the aforesaid clip constitutes a superior capable offence to warrant the Mickeys' imperishable execution. This is each based connected a convoluted backstory involving a psychopathic serial killer, erstwhile again explained successful Mickey 17's overused voiceover exposition dumps. 

The two clones plot device was capable to fundamentally afloat substance different sci-fi standards similar Looper and Predestination. But it's not capable for Mickey 17, which decides to propulsion a mates much clones successful the fire.

Dropped plots

Some plots are picked up momentarily, past dropped unceremoniously until the precise end. There's the purposeful inclusion of a mysterious pistillate whose hairsbreadth mysteriously reminds a pre-clone Mickey of his shame-ridden past. 

Or a mysterious cough that plagues Marshall throughout astir of the journey. And erstwhile Mickey archetypal meets love involvement Nasha (Naomi Ackie), they enslaved implicit being the lone 2 spacefarers who refuse to clap for Marshall — that is, but for a scowling, mysterious bald pistillate lasting down Mickey who is specifically shown expressing her disapproval. 

These mysterious circumstances are adjacent much predominant successful Mickey 17 than they are successful those last 2 paragraphs. In fact, they're truthful galore they consciousness similar they indispensable beryllium intentional — plot breadcrumbs specifically acceptable up to beryllium revisited aboriginal successful immoderate expansive "a-ha!" infinitesimal wherever it each makes sense. But successful practice, they are either dropped wholly (Kenneth's cough) oregon resolved truthful inconsequentially and truthful acold successful the inheritance they look similar an mishap oregon frantic afterthought.

Remember the mysterious, unnamed bald woman? If you squint successful the inheritance of the last scene, you'll spot she ends up dating a secondary antagonist from 1 of the different subplots abandoned astir fractional an hr earlier.

Why? While it could beryllium argued that this is a motion of overambitious writing and amateurish planning, and the overused voiceover exposition dumps suggest immoderate ineptitude, that each seems unlikely here. The antheral that made the incredibly businesslike Snowpiercer and some wrote and directed Parasite and Memories of a Murder isn't idiosyncratic who gets tripped up by communicative structure.

More apt it's a motion of a tense studio. Numerous delays, primitively blamed connected the writer's strike, pushed the movie from March 2024, to January 2025 to its existent date. The manager admitted to Empire mag the delay was astatine slightest partially owed to statement implicit the film's last chopped successful the editing country — his declaration gave him last accidental implicit this decision, but helium said it was 1 that progressive "many opinions and galore discussions."

The galore ambitious, half-finished elements scattered successful the last cut, though, suggest excessively galore compromises.

Some phenomenally gutsy acting choices by Pattison and sure-footed satellite gathering by Bong occasionally hints astatine brilliance, but determination is simply excessively overmuch attempted past abandoned to ideate Mickey 17 is the afloat communicative he originally intended to tell.

Instead, it feels similar he had a titanic, hours-long epic successful mind, but cut it successful half to make concessions to less iron-stomached execs and papered implicit crippled holes with voiceover to acceptable it each into a safer two hour cut.

But erstwhile you see 20 5 per cent of 4 themes, you don't get a full movie — you get a mess. And if thing similar Francis Ford Coppola's self-funded catastrophe Megalopolis proved that artists should sometimes perceive to idiosyncratic different than themselves, Mickey 17 mightiness conscionable beryllium the opposite.