by Emma Smith, Reporter

Watching The Darkest Minds felt rather like watching a talented but lazy artist fill up a sketchbook. There are hints of brilliance here and there – a well-captured expression, the dizzying fall of an autumn leaf, a quick dash of a cat across a window ledge. But every sketch feels rushed and surface level; none have been deepened into fully formed art. 

If you’ve seen the trailer, you know the basics of the plot. Some unidentified disease takes out most of the world’s children, the survivors develop abilities and the terrified adults ship them off to government camps. The intrepid heroes escape and go on the quest to find the Camelot of Children. 

There are hints of talent in The Darkest Minds. The “children with crazy powers” storyline requires the CGI to carry some difficult effects. The wizards at BUF, Crafty Apes, and Exceptional Minds managed to do that and also create some quite lovely scenes. Amandla Stenberg is luminous as Ruby, a girl on the run from government forces. The plot includes some interesting themes about trust, family, and impossible choices. 

Unfortunately those hints of talent are overshadowed. The film rushes through building the dystopian world it wants us to believe in, leaving it so superficial as to be unbelievable. In a world currently struggling with an outcry over the the separation of a children and parents, The Darkest Minds is shockingly cavalier about how parents would react to their children being dragged away to military camps “for their own good.” It writes rules for this new world, only to immediately break them. It feels rather as if the filmmakers are in such a hurry to jump start the next big young adult franchise that they’ve forgotten to spend the time creating characters we care about. 

When the film does get to the “good stuff.” it doesn’t fare much better. No one seems to have taken the time to work the dialogue into something that sounds like real humans. The plot continually uses a hammer where it need a scalpel. Ruby isn’t just in a government camp; she’s in her own version of Prison Break (complete with her very own Captain Bellick). After she escapes, she can’t just mourn the loss of her freedom and childhood; she has to mourn the loss of her prom (to be fair I am mildly impressed they managed to shoehorn a prom dress into a dystopian escape film but I won’t pretend they did it well). And they can’t just have a Rue dupe; they must have a Rue dupe who can’t talk (yes, I’m aware of who they case as Ruby and no I don’t think it was an accident). The most disappointing flaw is the decision to introduce ideas about freedom, self-determination, and compassion only to jettison them as soon as they became thematically inconvenient. The ends justify the means apparently, but only if you’re the hero. 

Ultimately, The Darkest Minds is too flawed and too frustrating to be worth the price of a movie ticket. But don’t worry, if you’ve seen the trailer, you’ve already seen the best parts.

ComicsOnline gives The Darkest Minds 1.5 out of 5 conveniently placed radios.