Having seen this movie twice in a twenty-four hour period. I can easily say that it doesn’t get old. Scoring tickets for the sneak preview because I’ve got the hook up was even better. While visually striking, the opening sequence relies on it. Actions speak louder than words, and you’ll need to know that going in if you’re someone who needs dialogue to know what’s going on. If you do, get to the theater a little late, it won’t hurt that much and it would be wasted on you anyway.

Zack Snyder tells a wonderful story, full of multiple layers like the myriad of onions featured in the kitchen scenes. (By the way, if you’re reading this Zack Snyder, stick to your own worlds. This far outstrips anything you’ve done that’s been adapted from other properties.) However, it has a video game feel to it, which I hopelessly adore, and it’s awesome to see this play out. Which is something movies rarely do. Gutsy. It makes me feel dreamy and caged at the same time

With the opening that leads the character Baby Doll into the Lennox Home for the Mentally Insane, you’re thrust behind the bars and are taken into the scene as yet another character watching the induction of the new girl.

The scenes that are spawned from the fantastic imagination of Baby Doll and the drive to escape the asylum are riveting and action packed. The use of CGI, the new scapegoat of American cinema, is put to work well here to impress just how the imagination fills in the gaps of an otherwise mundane goings on. While the girls are on their quest for the four items that they need to escape, they are shown fighting steampunk zombies, fire drakes (note: drakes, NOT dragons, I will outnerd you if you go against me on this), and robot gun-men to the backdrop of beautifully aggressive songs that drive the action.

Showing the nature of the struggle to survive and will to fight in these epic fight scenes illustrates the underlying hope of a hopeless situation. That these girls are not defeated, but merely oppressed. That they find the fire to strike back against their oppressors, despite the obvious disadvantages screams to the core of the individualistic struggle of everyday life, in which we often forget that we do have all the weapons and tools we need to succeed in whatever it is we desire.

As the last layer is pulled back, the heart of the story is shown as the skin of the story. We’re taken back to the first level and inserted seamlessly into what is. The events that had transpired could be written off as mere fantasy, but are credited and put into perspective. The main character has a drastic epiphany that shakes the core of the mythos that snaps the audience into the heart of the events that took place. At the end, it isn’t the journey of Baby Doll, Sweet Pea, Rocket, Amber, Blondie, Blue, or even the Wiseman that we’ve been watching but the story of ourselves. We are the main character of our story. Take what you will, leave what you will, but if you missed that, go back and watch it again. You’re missing out.

Find out?

Tune in soon for the next episode!