Essays

Ready Player One-Review(C1)

In the film magazine Take One, there is a section where readers are invited to send a review of very popular films. You wish to contribute by writing about a film you have seen, explaining why the film is successful and whether you would recommend it to other readers.

Write your review.

Ready Player One is a sci-fi movie entirely dedicated to Ernest Cline's novel of the same title. Unapologetically made to put spectacle first as the main priority, the movie astounds the audience with a virtual reality utopia filled to the brim with top-notch immersive CGI, never-ending action, and last but not least, an astounding plethora of visual references from numerous games, movies, and franchises in the past decade.

Set in a dystopian future, the adventure follows the protagonist Wade Watts, an orphaned teenager living in a world where everyone finds escape from reality in the OASIS, an expansive online simulation devised by James Halliday. This virtual reality contains any and all forms of entertainment known to humanity, from fully immersive horror movies to massive first-person shooter tournaments to even an entirely functioning school system.  

On James Halliday's passing, the OASIS released a three-part quest in its universe, the keys to each of them hidden by Halliday himself. Whoever finds the three keys and the ultimate Easter egg first gets full control of Halliday's creation and his vast fortune. As the story progresses, Wade transforms into an unlikely hero of the people in a reality-bending treasure hunt through OASIS.

The main attraction in Ready Player One has to be the widest collection of Easter eggs in any form of media to date. It's an affectionate nod to pop culture in the U.S. and a nostalgia ride for those who grew up in the 90s watching Back to the Future. Furthermore, it doesn't come off as overwhelming since to the majority of the audience, they're just a part of the magnificent world in the background of the OASIS.

As Wade and others follow their quest through races, battles, and puzzles, each and every one of them features a breathtaking setting of not only a dizzying blur of visual references but also additional easter eggs that weren't featured in the book. Notably, the film also goes further than the book by conveying a message through Halliday's retreat into his own fantasy realm.

However, without the spectacle of Ready Player One's easter eggs CGI and worldbuilding, the film would be immensely bland, to say the least. As if the film carried over some of the book's most notable flaws, there is a notable lack of depth, character, and logic throughout the storytelling, additionally with suspicious amounts of narrative convenience and plot armor injected in major storylines.

The story barely holds together as it jumps from one major point to another as a result of necessary connective information and scenes either limited to a bare minimum or simply overlooked. The romance between the protagonist and his love interest suffers from a serious lack of emotion and development, and lastly, the final message isn't sufficiently delivered by what might be the worst solution made for the specific dilemma present in the movie's ending.

The film did an undoubtedly brilliant job of expressing its endless visual dynamism, which is why I would strongly recommend Ready Player One. However, the heavy emphasis on sci-fi fantasy mixed with over-the-top action throughout the whole movie leaves little room for a solid, meaningful plot, which the book has never been decent in to begin with. The film is solely designed for the dazzling effects and pure spectacle, and for that, it has succeeded tremendously in - but I can't guarantee about other aspects overall. 

*...well, there goes my word limit.