The actors don’t look like they’re having fun. I commented in another thread that they seem to be attempting to make a Guardians of the Galaxy style movie, but chemistry between the actors and director were critical for those movies.
This is what happens when you have some combination of bad casting, a bad script, and bad direction. Even good actors have a hard time producing good work in a bad environment.
(“bad casting” in this case meaning “casting an actor who isn’t well suited to the role”)
Interesting. In the trailer, I don’t mind Jack Black (not sure if he is a good pick though), but I sure miss the complete insanity from Tina. That’s what made her character so crazy and fun for me (yes, that sounds weird, even for myself).
Who the hell is the random psycho just chilling with the main characters? Did they just add the dude from the game covers to the main cast like he’s actually a character?
Borderlands 2, Krieg was an intriguing character but as a class generally sucked. His ult was a melee only mode which... doesn't mesh with a game about COLLECTING GUNS. They also introduced Gaige. Her class worked better in the game, although very gimicky, lore wise she was basically a more sane Tiny Tina.
Like... genuinely a series or a movie about him sounds cool... but... I don't think they're gonna show him off like that link. How is an internal monologue supposed to work if only one of the 4 hear it? It can't work while sharing a spotlight.
Also I can't remember if it's official or cannon but
::: spoiler spoiler
Krieg is Tiny Tina's dad so...
:::
I mean, I understand leaving out Brick. Both Roland and Brick are not... bastions of dialogue. Both combined could be a bit much in a film. Even though he's a fascinating character. Mordecai confuses me more. He seems like a much better straight man (comedy term, not the orientation) than Roland or Brick, and if he operates like a sniper then he makes a great diagetic narrator to move dialogue and scenes because he operates as the scout from range. Granted the CG for the bird will probably cost.
I'm sure a good chunk was they wanted more Tiny Tina, and then they added Kreig just for the reveal moment which is... a lot of dedicated screen time just to create a moment. Seeing as he barely had any time in the trailer... clearly he doesn't shine in this film.
I said this elsewhere, but essentially it looks like a "Turn your brain off" movie which kind of hits the notes that Borderlands is known for while also having a bit of a fun house mirror / "We've got [game] at home" feeling to it.
Overall though, it feels... forced. From the limited bits you can hear, I don't think Jack Black really works for Claptrap (no reason to not just keep the original VA outside of "Jack Black is so in right now" or some shit); the dialog feels overly filtered, if that makes any sense.... Like too many people edited it so that it achieved maximum 'for the lolz' (not that the first two games (the ones I actually have experience with) were the peak of writing, mind you); and I don't have any feelings one way or the other for Kevin Hart, but for this role I think he was also a bad casting choice (but what do I know, I've only seen a quick trailer... maybe he nails it).
Action looks decent enough, and I do appreciate that (at least from the looks of things) they're pushing Cate's character as the lead.
Well said, agree about Kevin Hart, I pictured Roland differently. I had this short flash where I pictured Roland as Arnold Schwarzenegger how he looked in Predator and that made me laugh. Predator was no comical film of course, but I could easily see Arnold do the Roland thing and I would find that amusing.
Why, in the love of God, would you look at Roland, hulking, dour, tough as nails veteran soldier whose main character trait is being completely unflappable, and think “Kevin Hart”?
What were these people smoking?
Also the bits of writing we get in the trailer are just bad. Tina doesn’t even manage to feel like a poor imitation of herself. Even with better casting (seriously, you could literally just have Ashley Burch play Tina, you’re up-aging the character anyway, what’s the harm?), there would still be none of the vibrancy of the scripts from 2 and Pre-sequel. I’m not saying those games had flawless writing, but it was fun, funny, and generally managed to land on the right side of transgressive.
Honestly, the whole thing has this really awkward “We really wanted James Gunn but couldn’t afford him” feel to it.
Why, in the love of God, would you look at Roland, hulking, dour, tough as nails veteran soldier whose main character trait is being completely unflappable, and think “Kevin Hart”?
My theory is that the original casting was supposed to be The Rock, and then after that didn’t work out, some casting person was like “The Rock and Kevin Hart often work together on stuff right? Maybe we can just use him instead”. Dwayne Johnson would have basically been straight out of Central Casting for Roland.
Oh it's easy, they just googled "Roland voice lines" and he sounds like a perfect role for Kevin heart.
Could he pull off the borderlands 2 Roland intro? I don't think so, but I've been surprised before.
What really has me saddened is the whole pisswater gully bit. Tiny Tina is a native of pandora, Roland and Lilith are not (to my knowledge). So if anything, the roles should have been entirely reversed because:
It makes more sense.
It's way funnier.
Which means they're messing with backstory of the characters to match... nothing. Because it doesn't seem to make the writing better, and it differs from the original. It would also match Tiny Tina's character so much better and mitigate the annoying whiny child part of the character that is just SHINING through this trailer.
Oh, yeah, they completely failed to get what makes Tina an interesting character. She’s constantly putting up this mask of being the toughest, meanest badass who’s seen it all and done it all (all of which is an attempt to hide the fact that she’s a scared, traumatized child).
I feel like they just completely missed on this. They tried to capture the cel-shaded style of the games but everything looks low-budget as a result. Pandora is a backwater, if you’re going to do it live action everything needs to look like it’s been sandblasted and sun-bleached for a decade and repurposed at least twice. Everything just seems too clean.
The dialogue is bad. Can’t really blame the actors for that, but I also struggle with all of them in their roles except Jack Black (I actually don’t mind that casting).
Also, unless this is set between 1 and 2, I’m not sure how Krieg and Tiny Tina ended up on an adventure with Roland and Lilith.
The writing doesn’t seem great (forced and unfunny), but it’s just a trailer, so I don’t put a ton of stock in that. Besides, some of Borderlands’ best jokes are slow burns over the course of the game or even the franchise, so that might be why it feels a little off.
But the cast…they’re going to have to win me over.
Lilith as the lead, I’m fine with. But Cate Blanchett as Lilith I’m a little more concerned about. She’s definitely older than Lilith, yes, but that’s not the big problem; for me, I just don’t think that she has the vibe to pull off Lilith (and I don’t think she did even when she was 25). She’s got too much gravitas.
Including Tiny Tina in the main cast, I’m over the moon for. But casting Ariana Greenblatt, I just don’t see. In fairness, I don’t think I can see anybody in particular as that character; she’s so singular and wide-eyed, I don’t know if there’s a young teenager-passing actress who could pull it off. You need the 16-year-old equivalent of Helena Bonham Carter, and she’s a pretty singular person. Tina needs to be absoluely unhinged, but in a gleeful way; maybe this could be a Millie Bobby Brown role, or maybe it could be Jenna Ortega (though she might be a bit too sardonic; Emma Myers perhaps?), but I don’t know that we have any evidence of any actress in the right age range to pull off Tina.
Not including Brick or Mordecai is sad; I think Dwayne Johnson could pull off Brick decently well, and Michael Pena would’ve been a funny Mordecai, though it would be even better to bring people into those roles who we’ve never seen before.
Krieg was kind of a blank slate to begin with, so he’s no problem. Marcus, Hammerlock, Scooter, great. Jamie Lee Curtis as Tannis, fine. No major issues with any of that casting. Same with Jack Black as Claptrap; yeah, it would’ve been nicer to have the original voice actor, but I get that you want somebody with a name in that role and Black is as good as any. I would believe he’s played the game, so I trust that he understands the role.
But Kevin Hart…I mean, come on. Idris Elba was right there, and you went with Hart?
After watching the trailer, my opinions shifted slightly. Hart was actually the least of my concerns after watching the trailer; I liked his role in Jumanji, and it seems like he’s channeling that same vibe, so I think he’ll probably do fine here. And Blanchett’s performance as a more grizzled, almost Jane Lynch-ian Lilith kinda works for me.
But Tina still isn’t quite right.
All in all, if this had been the same cast in different roles (Blanchett as Captain Scarlett, retconned as a hero? Greenblatt as Gaige?) or the same roles with a different cast (Saoirse Ronan as Lilith? Kiernan Shipka as Tina?) I’d be totally down. The world feels right and the story sounds interesting, I’m mostly just worried about the dialogue and the cast.
I think Ashly Burch would’ve been just fine as Tiny Tina, even though she’s a full grown adult. Because, you know, she’s the actual voice actor who can channel that energy. Just age the film character up.
My issue with Ashly Burch isn’t her age so much as…has she ever done any acting before, beyond voice acting? I don’t know if that’s even a skill she has.
I’ve never seen it before so I can’t personally say how competent she is in the role, but Ashly Burch is a cast member on Mythic Quest, a live action sitcom on Apple
I’m avoiding everything about it. video game movies are generally a misrepresentation of the source material entirely. so I never have hope for any video game movie. and borderlands is a franchise I actually really love.
and after seeing the cast, I think it’s going to be a disaster. 😭
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