Chris Kavan's Movie Review of Legion (2010)

Legion - Apocalypse Dull
Chris Kavan - wrote on 01/23/10

Apparently Robert Frost was wrong. The world shall not end in fire or in ice, but rather a plague of banal characters, bad dialogue and a host of angelic-possessed mankind who turn into shark/Spiderman hybrids when angry.

Legion tries so hard to make the Apocalypse interesting. In fact, for the first half hour or so, it almost pulls it off. You have Michael, the former angel-turned lead farmer. Paul Bettany does his best playing the fallen angel and he's the best thing about the film. He's not on a mission from God anymore; he's on a mission to snap God out of his funk. You see, he's doing was God needs, not what God wants.

Then you have the restaurant at the end of the universe, sorry, I mean desert. You have an assortment of people, but all are cookie-cutter stereotypes: bickering couple with rebellious teen, the fed up owner/father, devout cook (bonus - ex military w. war wound!), untested hero, mysterious urban stranger and the key to whole film, the pregnant girl, who smokes like a chimney. It doesn't matter if they bring in Dennis Quaid, Charles Dutton, Tyrese or the guy from that on Fast and Furious movie - none of these people are ever really fleshed out and you don't feel much when they're offed one-by-one.

The best scene comes early on, and if you've seen any trailers, it's already spoiled. Let's just say if a kind, old lady walks into your place and order a rare steak - watch out! I don't know who Jeanette Miller is, but she owns that scenes.

And it's pretty much all downhill after that. There's a lot of guns firing, cars exploding, acidic boils, a creepy, killer kid and an angelic smackdown - but it all seems entirely by-the-numbers. There's no revelations, no grand message - I usually don't like my movies to be preachy, but for a movie about God's wrath, I was expecting a little more fire and brimstone.

In the end you get a generic action / horror hybrid that just so happens to thrown in some angels. I've seen much worse, but this should be a rental at best.