Bong Joon-ho is an acclaimed director behind Snowpiercer starring Chris Evans and Parasite, an award-winning film that won Best Picture at the Oscars. His latest, Mickey 17, is a sci-fi film starring Robert Pattinson as Mickey who signs up as an expendable to help out a human colony in space. As an expendable, he has to perform dangerous tasks, and if he dies, the government gets to bring him back to life as a clone and have him perform these tasks again.

The concept for Mickey 17 is intriguing with Mickey dying repeatedly, which reminds me of Tom Cruise’s Edge of Tomorrow. However, in that movie, he gets to live again thanks to the time loop. In Mickey 17, Mickey dies and his thoughts are transferred into a new cloned body. The process was broken when scientists believed Mickey 17 was dead, creating Mickey 18 and resulting in two Mickeys living in the space colony. Now they must learn to live together or suffer permanent deletion.

The colorful cast is a delight to watch. Pattinson delivers an engaging performance playing two different personalities. Mark Ruffalo is a standout as the eccentric and crude leader of the colony, Kenneth Marshall. Naomi Ackie is the tough-as-nails Nasha Adjaya, Steven Yeun is the despicable friend, and Toni Collette is the anchor to Kenneth.

Joon-ho’s films have common themes of social class inequality, which can be seen in Snowpiercer and Parasite. In Mickey 17, there is a hierarchy and special treatment for some of the colonists, but it isn’t at the forefront like the other films.

Having two Mickeys alive and interacting with each other was very entertaining, and the film sets itself up for many possibilities regarding shenanigans, drama, and the meaning of life. However, the third act pivoted into a conventional sci-fi action film. Another threat takes the spotlight instead of fleshing out the story presented to us with the Mickeys and the cloning process.

Robert Pattinson is a blast to watch as he plays different characters in Mickey 17, and there is fun to be had watching a human colony trying to survive a hostile world. However, it was a lost opportunity with the film switching up the third act instead of seeing the drama of the Mickeys play out. I think it would have worked better as a series.

Score: 3/5 Atoms