John Carter Review

John Carter Review
By Simon Jago

The front cover of the Blu-Ray reads “Star Wars for a new generation” and I shudder, because I just know they are referring not to the timeless original Star Wars trilogy but the awful Lucas vomit that is the prequel trilogy. CGI spacemen, aliens that look like arses and sword fighting laser wielding Romans in space pretty much sums up what’s going to be shoved down your throat for over two hours.

John Carter (Taylor Kitsch), a former American Civil War Confederate Army captain suddenly dies. His nephew Edgar Rice Burroughs (The author of the original novel) is asked to attend the funeral and finds that everything has been left to him in the will, including a diary with specific instructions for only him to read. The diary explains that before John Carter died, he was transported to Mars by a freak accident.

While on Mars John Carter discovered his Earth origins granted him special powers due to Mars’s weaker gravity. John Carter had become embroiled in a world war that was taking place on the Red Planet, but was his the story fiction? Or did Edgar’s uncle really become John Carter of Mars?

Where to begin with this one? I’d heard so many bad things about this movie before I watched it, and I tried really hard to ignore the negativity and go in with a open mind, but it really wasn’t long before even my love for sci-fi began to wane. Firstly I really don’t rate Taylor Kitsch as an actor, I thought his much anticipated potrayal of Gambit in ‘X-Men Origins: Wolverine’ was disappointing, and other than that I couldn’t name another film he is in. How he landed this lead role is beyond me as I find his charisma reserves as dry as Mars’ river beds.

Other than John Carter, the rest of the cast are just as completely unlovable. In fact about two thirds of the way through it is refreshing to suddenly be delivered some proper acting by Mark Strong who plays the villian Matai Shang, leader of the evil Therns. Willem Dafoe’s performance as Tars Tarkas is more recognisable but still gets lost in the wash of nonsense that is John Carter.

Overall I would just say the film is boring. It’s tedious script and poor delivery of space nonsense in a stupid Martian language very quickly starts to grate on you. After the princess Dejah Thoris (Lynn Collins) comes into it you just want to scream at the screen. Her fairy tale storyline of having to marry the evil Sab Than (Dominic West) to save her people from destruction is mind numbing and ultimately you just don’t give a Martian crap about any of the characters.

I really wanted to like this film, it had everything I usually like; Action, Aliens and Adventure. However, this cesspit mix of Tarzan, Star Wars, the wild west and Romans in space is nothing more than Disney sewage. The biggest ever flop for Disney and it’s not hard to see why, the film is just awful. Instead of John Carter being beamed to Mars, I think they should round up every DVD and Blu-Ray copy of this movie and do the same, so they can rot on Mars’ surface and where no more human beings have to be subjected to this utter rubbish.