Independence Day: Resurgence (Review)

It's been so long since I've written a review, in fact my last one was way back on with, so trust me when I say I am super excited to get back into posting them this summer!

If you haven't watched the first movie I would defintely recommend watching that one first as while it's not 100% necessarily needed to understand the sequel, I honestly think it helped. Until the day before I went to the cinema, I myself hadn't seen the first. While the movie genre isn't necessarily what I would personally pick, my sister really wanted to see it and after watching the trailer and seeing Liam Hemsworth, I was defintely up to give it a go! I actually ended up really enjoying the first film so I was super excited for the second. I was shocked when I realised how old it actually was because it comes across as only a few years outdated not decades.

Click here for the trailer.

As is obvious, the Earth is once again invaded by aliens and thanks to the previous movie, we can almost predict what is going to happen the whole way through. The plot is pretty much the same with the collective will and strength of humanity coming together to triumph.
David is now the first guy they call, not the desperately trying to persuade everyone, in an emergency. His father wrote a book about saving the world and all the children left over from the first attack have devoted themselves to their government, including the president’s daughter and stepson of Will Smith, now a national hero. Unlike everyone else, President Whitmore is suffering from PTSD and Dr Brakish Okun, the key scientist, has been in a coma all these years only to be awakened by the alien return.

Unfortunately, the ultimate fault of this movie seems to be the fact it focus' on overused CGI explosions rather than emotional acting. To top it off are the ridiculous plot holes, particularly the medical ones; a man getting up and walking after a supposed 20 years of being comatose...unrealistic to say the least.

I loved the new additions to the cast but also admire that they kept some from the original. I'm not a fan of Will Smith in general but even if you are, I don't particularly think he was missed from the film at all.

Unlike the original this one is set in the future, where deciphering the secrets of crashed alien ships has given Earth an incredible push forward in technological advances. From gravity-defying helicopters, space fighter jets and a base on the moon with weaponry set to protect the planet, everything seems to be working perfectly and amazingly, after the devastation of the last attack, the population seems to have worked together to build cities back up and achieve world peace.

It's almost unrecognisable as 2016 because the high-tech sci-fi world is so far fetch, at least from the world in which we live. But I did them and I was a little disappointed that the advancements weren't explored more.
Once again, this is another film that seemingly lacks of focus; with numerous subplots left unexplored, they seem to only be a distraction from the main plot. Why were they exploring the leftover ships? What has happened to them? What happened to the tribe left behind? What about the man?


It appears that there was very little new imaginative ideas and instead there are just a lot of comparisons to the previous attack. Admittedly, they get a little tedious towards the end, considering I'd only just watched it but in retrospect it may have been a different story if I needed the recap.

Having said all this, Liam Hemsworth was one of the main actors and I love anything in which he does so I did enjoy it. It just didn't reach my high expectations after the first and it seemed like they were almost at a loss of stories. I am still excited for the final film in the trilogy which is planned but it just won't be a film that I go back to watch time and time again.

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