Donnell Watched: Mickey 17
Donnell's Watchin It Score: 3/5 Must Watch It: 2/5
Overview
Release in Februay of 2025, Mickey 17 follows Mickey, a man working as an Expandable on a space ship destine to colonize a new planet for humanity. Starring Robert Pattinson (Twilight, Batman), Steven Yeun (The Walking Dead, Invincible), and Mark Ruffalo (The Avengers, Foxcatcher). Based on the book Mickey7
Review: You only die once, many times
SPOILERS INBOUND
Mickey Barnes (Robert Pattinson) is in a bit of trouble. His macaron business hasn't worked out and his friend has left him on the hook for the all the money. And the man holding that hook just happens to be a gangster who enjoys watching people die painfully. What's Mickey to? Flee the planet on the last colony ship available of course.
Mickey 17 starts with Mickey 17, the 17th and current version of Mickey Barnes. When Mickey signs up to get onboard the colony ship the only way was to become an Expandable, a person that is as their name suggests, sent to do task that are deadly, experimental, or disqusting (or all 3). But don't worry, humans have created a human 3D printer and can print up a new you if anything happens to you. And Mickey appears to be in the need of that as he lies in the ice about to get devoured by creatures.
We take a flashback to see how Mickey got, starting with the failed cookie business and gangster flee mentioned above and get to see that things for Mickey 1 through 16 didn't go that great. While we don't meet any other expendables in the course of the movie, the story clear shows that Expendables are seen as lesser people. They don't have have respect, have very little rights, and most of the time, people aren't even concerned their feelings. Since their bodies are printed from recycled waste, some people don't even see them as human anymore. But things are all bad for Mickey, he's managed to make a couple of friends and even find love. Of course that will all have to wait, since Mickey 17 is about to check out. Or not as it turns out that the creatures don't want to eat him, just get him out of their home. But when Mickey arrives home, it turns out that he is already there. Enter Mickey 18.
This is the core of the movie and where it takes an interesting twist. Coming into this movie, I thought it would just be a silly little movie about a guy who is cloned over and over again and then accidently get's cloned while he is still alive and the high jinks that follows. And don't get me wrong, that is here. But we get a much deeper and thought provoking story. The first interesting point is there is the issue of the 2 Mickeys. With the creation of human printing, new laws had to be made. Since the print jobs have the same DNA and are functionally the same person, it's ruled that you can't be printed while still alive. This law is comes about after the creator of the printer does a string of murders. But we also see with the introduction of Mickey 18, that maybe you really aren't come back. Mickey 17 is a kind and timd man. We don't get to see much of all the other Mickeys, but the original is also appears to be this way. But Mickey 18 is brash and angry. Where 17 accepts his place on the ship, 18 revolts against it. He is also much more free spirited and imposive. So it really begs the question if these Mickeys are the guy or just people with the same memories but different personalities. This really shows when Mickey 17 explains to 18 that he was ok with dying before cause he always knew that he would come back, but now it won't be him coming back but 18.
The other second interesting point is why this ship is even going to colonize another planet and who leads it. See, earth isn't doing that great, so people (rich people) have decided that it's just easier to find a new home then fix the old one. One of these people is Kenneth Marshall (Ruffalo). After he failed his political run, he and his wife Ylfa decided that they aren't getting the respect they deserve on Earth, so they will load a ship filled with mostly their loyalist followers and head out to make a new Earth where everyone loves them. They see themselves as in the right in everything they do, from how they treat Expendables to how they react to the "aliens" they find on the planet. All these bubbles up to the point that Mickey 18 can't take it and decides to try and assasinate. This leads to the Mickeys getting caught and spiraling to our conclusion.
Mickey 17 turned out to be different movie then I originally thought it would be, but that's not a bad thing. The questions of what makes you yourself and whether you truly continue on if memories are in another being are interesting. I wish the movie would have focused a little more on this as we never find out why 18 was so different from the rest of the Mickeys. And the movies take on the current state of things in the world was not expected. The fact that the movie is all about rich people fleeing earth, about someone fostering a cult a personality to the point of being seen as rightous in everything they do, about how easy it is to dehumanize people seen as less then or alien. The creators say that Kenneth Marshall is based on Trump, but Mark Ruffalo's preformance seems to be try to be him. That and the fact that his followers love him in a cult like manner and they wear red baseball caps makes it hard to believe this isn't on purpose.
Should you watch it:
Overall, Mickey 17 is a pretty decent sci-fi movie. But if you look at it for more of the parallels to real life, it's actually quite thought provoking. It is in no way a most watch movie, but if you are interested it you won't be disappoint at the end of the run time.
Mickey 17 Trailer -
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