Movie Review
There are bits of 2003's Daredevil, The Incredible Hulk, X-Men 2, and even Joker, but none of these influences are coherently combined into anything other than a patchworked mess held together by loose cello pieces. Which is a shame, because there's a really solid cast and some great ideas, but none of that matters when the script, technical aspects, and plot are so bad.
For those who don't know, Morbius is the latest in Sony's ever-growing arsenal of supervillain spin-offs. Or more specifically, Spider-Man's famous list of bad guys. A more notable addition here is Venom, which manages to balance a campy, quirky tone with ludicrous action. It wasn't everyone's cup of tea, but at least it was suitable. Venom also looks like Citizen Kane.
Storyline
The story follows Michael Morbius, a biochemist who suffers from a rare blood disorder. His life's mission is to heal himself and his best friend Milo from this dire condition, eventually merging his blood with the Costa Rican bats to become Batman. Or, anyway, the Batman version of Spider-Man; Michael Morbius, who went from villain to anti-hero.
Script
The script was hastily put together and some of it was edited very poorly. We start off with a quick scene in Costa Rica before going back 25 years...and then we go to an awards ceremony that took place in the original timeline. It's just that we weren't told that. After a while, he's left to piece together bits of loose dialogue in the lab, thinking about his "trip to Costa Rica" and the "fish tank" of bats he acquired.
Given that Morbius' team is attacked by a swarm of bats in the first 5 minutes of the picture, Morbius has absolutely no powers and when they attack their home... how did Morbius come back? These vexing issues crop up throughout the film, and with even a modicum of logic, can be reduced to a falling pile of cards.
Plot Holes
There are so many plot contrivances, holes, and leaps of logic that make this movie hard to take seriously. Here the focus shifts between Morbius and two fugitive police detectives who investigate a series of crimes during their time on the job, but hey, it doesn't really bring anything to the fore. In fact, their arc at the end of the film doesn't matter at all, spending a good portion of the film on dead-end police work.
A lot has also been said about the ending of this movie, and I don't think I've ever gone to a movie theater knowing more about the post-credits sequence. In fact, in one of the more outlandish pieces of marketing in recent years, Sony actively spoiled the film's big "twist" ahead of its release. Basically, it raises big question marks around what happens in No Way Home and swings the forced narrative device to justify more movies like it.
Evil tricks and tricks are the least of Morbius' problems. In addition to the rules surrounding Michael Morbius being incredibly vague and ripe for questioning, the actual technical aspects of this movie are bad. I mean, really bad.
The camera shakes wildly during extreme close-ups, and the fight sequences are a strange mix of slow-motion bullet-time action and dizzying, disorienting, dimly lit gunfights. This movie tries hard to tie together the Quicksilver and Nightcrawler sequence in the X-Men series and fails spectacularly every time.
On top of all that comes the dialogue, which contains every one-liner and eye-popping cliché you can think of. “I gave birth to it; I can take it back.”; "You won't love me when I'm thirsty." and the hilariously inappropriate "Interesting." (stick around for the post-credits sequence, which will explain this in more detail!)
Jared Leto
There's going to be a lot of bashing against Jared Leto in the end, but honestly, he's pretty good in the role and does the best with the material he's given. Matt Smith is very badass and relishes his role as the villain in this ensemble, while the others are simply spot on.
Morbius is not a good movie. It's a tragically bad, poorly written mess. I wouldn't even recommend watching this for the "so bad it's good" vibe. It's just bad, and as other more witty critics and publications have pointed out – it's in shambles.
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