A Minecraft Movie (2025)

Rated PG.  Probably the only red flag from this movie is the kind of scary bad guys.  There's something unsettling about the CG world of Minecraft when given film aesthetics.  What might be a simple thing when watching these characters in a video game comes across very differently when it comes to a film.  I can't think of much else that really would be upsetting about the movie.  

DIRECTOR:  Jared Hess

I know that I start all of these by saying that I don't want to write.  I'm kind of in a funk, so if I'm overly harsh on this movie, I apologize.  But I've been putting off writing about A Minecraft Movie long enough, so I suppose I should still write about it while it is still somewhat fresh.  (Note:  I have things that I absolutely need to write about and this is not helping.) 

By this point, you'll all have heard about the walking meme that is A Minecraft Movie.  Younger Gen Z and older Gen Alphas have been tearing apart movie theaters to ironically lambaste A Minecraft Movie.  Me?  I have younger Gen Alphas.  My kids loved the movie unironically and thought that the applause and the hooting that was going on during the movie was genuine enthusiasm for the movie.  I want to look at theater culture both to comment on the degradation of society when it comes to the movie while keeping myself also in check as I'm about to turn 42.  

I knew what I was getting into when I took my kids to the movies.  My son has been way too excited about this movie without any sense of irony.  Sure, his classmates are making "Chicken Jockey" references left and right.  But my kid, like many other kids, absolutely adore the whole Minecraft culture.  I kind of get it.  It's a game that isn't for me.  But out of all the games that he could be playing, Minecraft is oddly wholesome.  It's digital Lego.  I applaud that. Given time and effort, players can create anything that they want. While it's a bummer that it is digital, there's something wonderful about the notion that kids are creating worlds, many of whom are doing it without the thought that there could be something artistic or self-serving in the behavior.  For a culture that is so viral-video obsessed, many kids take those videos as inspiration as opposed to seeking instant fame and that's pretty great.  The fact that there is a narrative mechanic is also kind of fun.  I get Minecraft. 

So, for my kids, it was a movie that spoke to them.  Now, my son said it was his third favorite movie after Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and The Super Mario Brothers Movie. You can see what he likes more than movies, right?  I do think it is weird that we have A Minecraft Movie as a concept.  The lore is not exactly one of those stories that is easily adaptable.  But I also grew up in an age when no one had really cracked the video game movie code.  Now, decent video game movies are a dime a dozen.  To A Minecraft Movie's fault, some of them are pretty darned good.  A Minecraft Movie isn't great.  I'm putting that first and foremost.  The reason that all these pre-teen turds are ironically watching the movie is that there is quite a bit to pull apart.  But is it watchable, especially for kids?  Yeah.  Maybe.  Me, a 41-year-old man who never got into Minecraft?  I kept on watching it as a Jared Hess movie.

I know that I'm writing just to write here, but Jared Hess is the Napoleon Dynamite / Nacho Libre guy.  His directing style is so rife with irony to begin with that he almost lacks heart.  I know that Napoleon Dynamite is actually kind of a touching movie at times.  But that seemed like a balancing act and a passion project that allowed Hess to really figure stuff out.  A Minecraft Movie is not that.  If anything, there's a lot of cooks in the kitchen here.  The sheer amount of people who have a screenwriting credit on this movie is borderline offensive.  I know that many movies have screenwriting credits that we never get to see.  But A Minecraft Movie had too many people writing this movie and you can feel it.  The entire opening had to be a draft of the film.  The movie opens with Steve explaining his entire life and a whole movie's worth of adventure.  The problem with that movie, probably, was that it didn't have enough characters in it.  Jack Black as Steve probably had to carry the movie himself, saying things to no one because Minecraft itself is a pretty solitary game.  (I know!  You can have people working on the same project in the same server.  But that seems to be the exception to the rule nowadays.)

But the rest of the story feels like a bit of a formula, leading to the big problem of saying absolutely nothing by the end of the movie.  Here's the problem:  Steve is not the protagonist.  Steve is almost more setting than he is a character.  If we're going to compare Steve to another character in my son's canon of great movies, Steve is Toad from The Super Mario Brother Movie.  He's there to show how insane this world is.  While he might be on the adventure, Steve does very little growth, going as far as abandoning the internal conflict that set him on this mission.  (Steve promises to betray the team for the sake of his dog.  From moment one, he's pretty open that he lied to Malgosha.)   Henry is the protagonist of the movie, which is shocking considering that most of the film is almost devoted exclusively to either Jack Black's Steve or Jason Momoa's Garbage Man Garrett.  

That's where the real problem lies: Garbage Man Garrett and Steve serve the exact same role in the film.  This is some studio nonsense.  It seems like every video game movie thrives with Jack Black in the movie somehow (Sorry, Borderlands...) and Jason Momoa physically looks different from Jason Momoa.  But both can do physical comedy.  The inclusion of both of these characters is, as Dan Harmon would most likely testify to, "a hat on a hat."  (I know he didn't come up with this phrase.  I feel like I'm defending myself from you guys more than normal today.)  Both of these characters play the goofy blowhard.  Neither one of them is particularly good at their jobs.  If anything, it's the parody of the blowhard American.  But having two of these characters was a bit much.  If anything, we have our main characters take a backseat because they act like everymen in this story. 

And, honestly, I love Danielle Brooks.  I love her.  She's fantastic in everything.  She's even fantastic in this.  She has nothing to do in this story.  If anything, the movie kind of regresses gender narratives by splitting the movie into "boys' stuff" and "girls' stuff."  While the men are having an adventure, the girls literally make a home.  That's the girls' story.  That's no good.  Danielle Brooks is there to be a sounding board to the white girl saying that she might be a bad sister.  The worst part?  I bet that "I'm a bad sister" plot was the crux of one of the drafts of the script, but doesn't even really matter in this movie.  It comes back to it every so often.  But from this perspective, Natalie and Dawn have borderline nothing to do in this movie.  It's bad storytelling.

But that brings me to the thing that frustrated me most about the movie:  Gen Z and Gen Alpha.  Here's where I want to not be an old man.  Part of me loves that Gen Z and Gen Alpha are turning out for A Minecraft Movie.  In some ways, it's The Rocky Horror Picture Show for a new generation.  I love audience participation.  From a guy who was raised with Mystery Science Theater 3000, I can't claim I'm above watching a movie ironically.  Mind you, I would never talk during a Mystery Science Theater.  Here's my point.  Where I lose Gen Z / Gen Alpha on this movie is the fact that Rocky Horror is a sign of loving the film unironically.  It's a complete embrace of the purpose of the film.  And when we watch Mystery Science Theater 3000 and laugh about how bad these movies are, they tend to be dramatic.  We're adding comedy to something that wasn't meant to be a comedy.  

When these kids are tearing apart theaters (too far, by the way.  Don't be jerks to people who are trying to show you a good time.), it's being ironic about something that is already ironic.  When Jack Black delivers a line completely over-the-top, he's aware that he's doing it.  We're supposed to laugh at the absurdity of what is going on.  Making fun of something that is making fun of itself misses the point.  Like, it's just broadcasting a lot of stupidity to the rest of the world.  And I'm being the old man again here, but it isn't a good look.  Also, how dare you make fun of the songs in A Minecraft Movie.  Mr. Jack Black is one-half of Tenacious D, a comedy-band duo that rocks so hard that it forgot more about comedy than you'll ever know.  Also, keep in mind, there's probably a studio head who wanted "Peaches", but for Minecraft.  Get off Jack Black's butt about it.

However, there is a certain joy that comes out from knowing that A Minecraft Movie is benefitting from all the attention it receives.  It's going to be a bummer, though, when Another Minecraft Movie (or whatever it's going to be called) comes out and tries capitalizing on the irony that was Gen Alpha culture.  They're going to be saying "Chicken Jockey" every so often (much like how this movie included "tots") and no one is going to laugh.  But whatever.  

​It is what it is.