Diverging

Last year I read the first book of The Divergent Series in which Beatrice Prior who after living her whole life in one of the five factions (Abnegation, Dauntless, Candor, Amity and Erudite) that make up this post-apocalyptic world in the vein of a thousand other YA novels these days, finds she is Divergent, meaning she can belong to many factions. This is looked down upon because keeping the factions going is all this world knows. It is a great parable for growing up in which you find that you may not be the same as your parents or that you are not solely what people want you to be. No one wants to be an outcast (The Factionless in the novels) but  you never want to just follow in your parents... To quote Varsity Blues and The Beek "I don't want your life..." and then he proceeds to turn down Ali Larter in that whip cream bikini...just like his daddy would've. Weak sauce Van Der Beek. So I saw the movie and then I read the book. I know what people are saying. How can you do that? Well I didn't know I'd like the movie. I just assumed it might make a fun film and I secretly harbor a crush on Shailene Woodley. She is just one of those girls. A Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johannson type girl who you think you want to know. I hear she's very cool and maybe she wants a chunky guy in his later 30's who thinks she is the bees knees. Who knows? I enjoyed the story so much that I went home and bought all three books for the sole reason of adding more understanding to the characters I now already liked. Now a year later, Insurgent, the movie for the second book in the series came out and I thought it might be fun to jump back into this series. So on new movie Thursday...

The Divergent Series: Insurgent

Insurgent is one of those sequels that serves the purpose of moving the story along but really doesn't break new ground. It opens a few days after the first movie and Beatrice "Tris" Prior and her love "Four" as they escape from the happenings in the first movie.  Soon they are on the run from Erudite and blah blah stuff and soon Tris is sacrificing herself to save us all. I liked the movie, I did but I was reminded of why I stopped reading the second book. It just goes where it is supposed to go. There is no point to the movie other than to take down the evil Erudite leader Janine in the most passive way possible and show that Tris and Four are the most bad ass of the bad ass. I get they are the heroes but countless times they are outmatched and outgunned and a simple damn shot to the face would stop them but no...they let them live because...reasons.

Shailene Woodley is still very capable but she seems almost bored here. The movie doesn't move because the characters do it, the characters do something because the movie needs something to happen. Oh they are in Amity and not in danger...oh Tris, punch someone in the face to upset the Amity (you see what I did there?) Tris is broken up because she killed someone she cared about...let's give her a truth serum so she is forced to tell us who she killed so we can have some made up bullshit drama. The movie goes on like this over and over again. 

I realize that this is the middle chapter in the series but unlike Empire or Godfather Part 2...this movie stagnates as it comes up with a plot device to make people do stuff. I just wanted them to go somewhere and have to react. Not to mention that the action is just as boring. Every fight ends in 3 seconds and the hero simply wins because they are the hero. In Divergent, Tris was vulnerable... in Insurgent, she is unstoppable. She and Four dispatch their enemies with relative ease so any threat they posed in the first movie is overwhelmingly nullified by this movie. 

I want to like this movie and it is not without it's moments. The simulation scenes are awesome and there are some cool moments where you want to believe the story they are telling you. I wanted to see more moments of Tris and Four being in love and enjoying each other. I wanted there to be a reason to root for them as there was in the first movie. I liked that Peter was redeemable except that it is all done a little conveniently for me. Tris is a character that is owed more to do than fret over her loved one's and be forced to act all the time. She deserves better. Especially when it seems no one really seems to care about her but Four. Her own brother... I mean seriously what the hell is wrong with her brother? I'm not one to not recommend a movie and I will still recommend this one because it moves the story closer to where I wanted it to be for this one. Out of the society and the factions and into what is their world. 

Hopefully the third book and the impending movie will answer my questions and bring us closer to resolutions to the questions I have. I'm going to read the second book now but unlike the first book, where I was enraptured by the world, I am going into this book seeking answers as to where this movie went wrong.  I intended to be more positive when I started this review but as I thought about it, I realized that the movie wasn't great. Shailene was great, Kate Winslet was great but where this movie goes wrong is when they make decisions for the character based solely on someone saying "Whelp, we haven't had this guy do anything for awhile...let's insert him or her or creepy brooding factionless guy." It just never raises the stakes. It stagnates and seems like a filler for the next book/movie where the action will get a going. 

Overall....

Mr. Unhappy Sez: I wanted this to be good but in the end it was bland. I wanted to see more of Shailene Woodley and all I got was dry humped by her naked back... oh well. It was still interesting. That's more than I can say for a lot of movies out there. I'll wait and see what happens in Part 3... and I'm glad I saw it.