Cut Short: Eternals (2021)

This is such a weird movie. It’s 2 hours and 40 minutes long and for once I find myself saying that if this movie wanted to work, it definitely needed to be longer. There is just so much stuffed into it that I occasionally forgot members of the cast existed. Routinely someone would show up and I’d be like “oh yeah, that guy is in this movie,” and I don’t think I was supposed to be thinking that.

And it is a bit of a shame because it plays with some cool concepts and ideas that, if done well, I genuinely believe could have made it one of the better MCU movies post-Avengers Endgame. The trouble is so much is happening that no single concept is allowed to evolve beyond its most shallow, surface-level version of itself and so it just feels like a generic science fiction movie.

So yeah Marvel made an incredibly existential movie where the plot revolves around discovering all the million-year-old characters’ lives have been complete lies, before they all decide to go against God. Well, this movie’s stand-in for God, I guess. And somehow it was boring. The highlight, as usual with these mid-tier superhero movies, being the part where they all go and punch each other at the end.

Would I recommend Eternals? Not really. It’s a prime example of great potential not being capitalised on. But it’s still not even interesting enough to watch for that reason. I will say it’s not as disastrously bad as I’ve seen people saying it was on social media and YouTube, but it’s still not up to the standards of other MCU movies.