Movie Review: "The Scorch Trials"

The Scorch Trials (2015)

PG-13

2 Stars out of 5

Director                                                Wes Ball
Writer                                                   T.S. Nowlin (screenplay); James Dashner (novel)

Dylan O’Brien                                      Thomas
Kaya Scodelario                                   Teresa
Thomas Brodie-Sangster                   Newt                                    
Jacob Lofland                                       Aris
Patrica Clarkson                                   Dr. Ava Paige
Aiden Gillen                                          Janson
Giancarlo Esposito                              Jorge
Rosa Salazar                                         Brenda

 

“The Scorch Trials” is the second cinematic version of the three part book series “Maze Runner” by James Dashner. In part 1, we met Thomas (Dylan O’Brien) a young man apparently suffering from some serious memory issues. The opening of “Maze Runner” (2014) is visually clever. Thomas is shown rising in some sort of freight elevator. He is confused and disoriented. When he reaches the upper floor of the elevator’s run, he finds he is in the middle of a large expanse of grass. Unfortunately once at the surface the cleverness stops. Thomas meets a group of young males living their version of “The Lord of Flies”. They are led by Newt in an area they refer to as the Glade. This is a “safe” area within a valley that is surrounded by high rock walls. The walls are un-climbable, but there is a way out. Thomas is shown this way and is warned he cannot risk it as he is too new to the Glade and too inexperienced to life in this strange world. Thomas ignores the prohibition (are you surprised?) and goes through the passage-way in the rock walls, he finds a maze; a maze filled with lethal dangers. Thomas will eventually lead a team of fellow courageous teens (now including one young woman, Teresa played by Kaya Scodelario, who seems to share some history with Thomas) out of the Glade via the maze into a new world. The other world exists behind the walls of the maze and appears to be a manufacturing space with no clear purpose. In this manufacturing realm, they meet via a video connection, the Maze’s maker, the evil corporation WCKD, led by the very wicked Dr. Ava Paige (Patricia Clarkson). She thinks she has the boys cornered and about to be captured, but no!! They escape. Thus ends part 1.

Where they escape to is part 2 of this poorly told, extremely derivative tale: ”The Scorch Trials”. In part 2, returning director Wes Ball will with writer T.S. Nowlin take our intrepid heroes from one “maze” equivalent to another. Little ground and even less in terms of theme or thought was covered in Part 1. In Part 2, Ball and Nowlin will make up for that deficiency in terms of geography, if not in theme. First up is a frantic helicopter flight from the manufacturing grounds last seen in part 1 to a refuge of sorts. Why the flight was so frantic and who the pilots fear as they ferry the gang is far from clear. In any event, the gang of former Gladers runs into a building housing a large group of similarly aged teens – all apparently fellow escapees from other mazes. Oddly, this refuge is managed by the creepy character Petyr from Game of Thrones (Aiden Gillen). In this movie he is known as Janssen, but it seems to be pretty much the same underhanded character that Gillen plays so well in GoT. Thomas smells a rat despite all of his comrades telling him to chill out and enjoy the hot showers and food they now get each day. Thomas’ fears are heightened through his interaction with one of the boys he meets at Janssen’s refuge, Aris (Jacob Lofland). Aris really seems to have issues; nevertheless, Thomas follows him into (where else) the a/c ducts. This allows them to leave their locked dorm room at night while the rest of the Gladers sleep peacefully away. From the ductwork, Aris and Thomas are able to find a room where other escapees are in a trance-like state and are hooked up to various evil-looking tubes. It turns out the Gladers and all the other maze-escapees are immune to the Flare, the disease that has ravaged the Earth. And the evil WCKD Corporation is bleeding the escapees in the room Thomas has found in order to create a serum for those with the disease. Problem is for the escapees, life in a trance hooked up to tubes draining your blood is kind of a bummer.

Now Thomas has had his fears realized. He leads the gang in a new escape; they are on the run, again. This is a pattern repeated several times in “Scorch Trials”: reach a new safe haven; find out it isn’t safe, escape, run to a new “safe” haven, repeat. This time the boys (and Teresa) run through the desert to an abandoned mall. They meet some zombies (called Cranks in this story), actually advanced state victims of the Flare. The Gladers run away from the Cranks only to be captured by a bunch of tough guys. The tough guys hang the Gladers upside down over a pit for no obvious reason that I could discern. The tough guys are led by Jorge (Giancarlo Esposito) and his young ward, Brenda (Rosa Salazar). Kudos are due to the writing team for creating the laconic Jorge and to Esposito for playing him as a weirdly subdued, wild card character. This character is not beholden to WCKD, the zombies, or the official resistance team (the Right Arm) that Thomas is now searching for. Sadly for Jorge, Rosa and the Gladers, (wait for it), the really bad guys, WCKD shows up and the Gladers have to escape again – joining forces with the now contrite Jorge and Rosa. Hmmm… what could happen next? They run away, find The Right Arm, feel safe, and you will never guess it; they have to run away again when WCKD shows up again. Thus ends Part 2.

The endless running and escaping are pointless enough, but they really never seem to get anywhere. Is this some kind of philosophical point or merely bad writing designed to get us solely to Part 3? Perhaps there is deep down a point worth considering in Part 2: there is the implied warning created by the Flare virus; we don’t know where or why the disease came into being, but it safe to assume it is a Frankenstein metaphor to society not to mess with things they really don’t understand. And perhaps there is another theme within the concept of using the young people, the escapees immune to the disease being harvested as if they were cows producing milk for a dairy farmer. There is a kind of warning there to society to take better care of our animals and to certainly not treat other humans as poorly treated livestock. But I fear I may be reading far too much in this simple, poorly written film; maybe the books better illustrate ideas more complicated that running and escaping as the true themes in the Maze stories.

The chief problem with “Scorch Trials” is that it is so derivative of much better Young Adult post-apocalyptic worlds: chief among them parts 1 and 2 of The Hunger Games. There is little reason to watch Scorch Trials other than maybe, just maybe you really like the books and would like to see them illustrated via a film. I fear that even for such fans, they will be disappointed.

Book Review: The Hunger Games Trilogy

The Hunger Games Trilogy: The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, Mockingjay (2008, 2009, 2010)

Four Stars out of Five

Suzanne Collins

The Young Adult (YA) fiction genre has a long history, stretching from the 19^th Century (e.g. Swiss Family Robinson, Oliver Twist, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer) through the mid-20^th century (e.g. The Outsiders) to the influential and occasionally profound 70’s (The Bell Jar, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings), and up to the present day (e.g. The Harry Potter Series). YA fiction has through the years been primarily written by adults aimed for readers somewhere between the ages of thirteen and twenty-five. Their themes range over a wide variety of topics, but are generally thought to be topics of concern to this age group: romance, identity, family, and depression to name but a few. One of the key elements is that these stories are generally told from the first person point of view of the protagonist about whom the story is concerned. They are told in (usually) a spare textual style that helps propel the plot without much character definition or evolution. The Hunger Games trilogy written by Suzanne Collins and published in 2008 through 2010 captures many of these elements, but explores some of Man’s darkest traits in a largely believable and highly relatable manner.

The first novel, The Hunger Games introduces Katniss Everdeen. She lives in a post-apocalyptic North American country, Panem. Panem is comprised of twelve districts living and working in thrall to the Rocky Mountain-based “Capitol”. The districts had rebelled against the Capitol roughly seventy-four years in the past and had lost. As part of the armistice, the districts paid a heavy price: The Hunger Games. These games are held annually and require each district to send two adolescent tributes, one male and one female to the Capitol to compete in a contest that will result in one victor and twenty-three dead losers. The games clearly hearken to the Roman Empire and their gladiatorial contests, but they also allude in a sense to Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery. The theme of sacrificed children for the safety of society is one I had not expected to see in YA fiction.

Katniss’ story follows a predictable path but includes some features that might catch some readers by surprise and might also reveal some room for growth for author, Collins. Katniss hunts with her bow and arrow and a quasi-boyfriend, Gale in the nearby woods. As expected, her hunting trips help prepare Katniss for her inevitable entry into the games; she is, of course a superb archer capable of living on her own in the forest. By telling of her experiences in the forest, Collins informs the reader of Katniss’ family and of their influences (especially the father) on her character’s strengths and weaknesses. Here though is where I found fault with the textual style of these books. Katniss and the other characters are revealed solely through their actions. As noted, the writing is a very spare style, plot is everything. It is to my mind a style well suited to the young reader but frustrating in gaining a more intuitive understanding of the various characters. I found myself in the end disappointed that my understanding of the characters was as superficial as their “definition” in the book. Additionally, Collins utilizes another textual style that drives me to distraction: fragmentary sentences (e.g. Katniss is very good with bow and arrow. Very good.). Collins employs these techniques to keep the text simple and the plot moving; perhaps perfect for the adolescent YA reader, but maybe too simple for mature readers.

Move, the plot does. These three books capture the reader’s attention as the plot moves briskly along. Katniss does go into the arena several times and due to her successes finds herself the symbol for a nascent insurrection against the capitol. By the time of the third book, Collins has very cleverly introduced the reader to the cruelties of the Capitol, the entrenched cynicism of both the Capitol and the rebels via their use of propaganda, and most critically the willingness of both sides to use any means to attain their ends, no matter how depraved those means are.  In 1971, “The Who” released a song, Won’t Get Fooled Again, whose lyrics included the following lines: Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. As I read the book or watched the movie, I kept hearing these words in my head. At first blush, this is not a new topic, but Collins uses it well. The tragedy of the massacre near the end of third book had me in tears, but also amazed.

Collins uses her trilogy to indeed discuss and examine many of the YA themes mentioned above, such as family and love. She uses science fiction as the sub-genre to convey her message. What I find amazing is her use of an over-arching theme I did not expect in a YA novel:  the corrupting influence of power. The desire to gain it and hold it, and the amorality of too many of those that seek such power are powerful story lines. They are easily understood and felt by those that have studied history, or even watch the evening news. That adolescents can read and learn from those lessons as depicted in this book is a good thing. I just hope they do learn from it, and somehow despite the centuries of failure before them, someday a new generation will come along that makes the changes needed for mankind to finally leave the violent and self-centered moral caves we still live in.