THE SCORCH TRIALS is an exciting action packed
sequel better
than THE MAZE RUNNER. It picks and
chooses what elements from the book it wants to have this movie that very
loosely follows the second novel in the THE MAZE RUNNER series. Even though
the narrative in the book makes
more sense, I like the movie better than book (where I still think the novel of
THE MAZE RUNNER is still better than the movie). It is always challenging
to adapt a novel
into a two hour movie and by giving more of a face to the bad guys of Wicked
(WCKD), it helps the narrative of the movie as Thomas (Dylan O'Brien) and his friends from the
maze must brave the scorch to get to the mountains while running from the
disease transformed Cranks and the soldiers of WCKD led by Mr. Janson (Aidan
Gillen) that hunt the ones immune
to the Flare. THE SCORCH TRIALS is a successful adaptation even though it
doesn’t follow many parts of the novel while having some scenes and characters
that fans of the book will recognize, but the screenwriter must condense any
novel when turning it into a screenplay as is the case with THE MAZE RUNNER and
the scorch trials. If you want movies that
follow the books closer, THE HUNGER GAMES series and the DIVERGENT trilogy
follow the material more successful than THE MAZE RUNNER movies do. Many of
the changes in the movies improve on
the source material even though a little longer movie could have fleshed out
the new characters that have very little character development (Brenda, Jorge,
the Right Arm group).
THE SCORCH TRIALS has some nice visuals
and special effects
along with great casting and a sweeping sci-fi music score. The landscape of
New
Mexico lends itself as a character to this sequel as
much as Georgia
did to THE MAZE RUNNER. I can’t wait for
the final movie (which 20th Century Fox wisely decided not to split
up the final book into two movies) even though the ending deviates from the
book ending, but I think THE MAZE RUNNER movies have to be treated as their own
separate thing from the novels.
This
review is ©9-19-2015
David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission. Send all comments
to feedback@enterline-media.com
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