The latest would-be YA dystopian franchise starts with a fascinating premise and ends with a whimper. But everything in between is pretty great!
Kaya Scodelario, Dylan O'Brien, and some maize in The Maze Runner.
Ben Rothstein/Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
Right up until the end, when the movie takes a crazy turn and then stops for a giant information dump in preparation for its "to be continued" conclusion, The Maze Runner doesn't feel like another YA adaptation at all.
And, with all due respect to the thriving genre that has brought the world Katniss Everdeen, that's kind of wonderful. Dystopian young adult stories about stalwart, beautiful teens who learn to stand tall against oppressive governments are currently all the rage, from The Hunger Games and Divergent to also-ran The Giver, but they also follow the same pattern of training, a recognition of specialness, and eventual revolution. These high-cheekboned young folks in their artfully drab clothing (which could either be from a bleak future or a Rick Owens runway show) may live in a future gone mad, but their stories are in danger of feeling very sanely calculated.
The Maze Runner, which opens in theaters Sept. 19 and is adapted from James Dashner's novel of the same name, still has plenty of underlying similarities to its grim YA dystopian siblings, but it drops you into the action in a way that evokes more grown-up sci-fi like Lost or the 1997 cult film Cube. There's some dizzying world-building, unspooled in bits and pieces by the maze's residents (who call themselves Gladers and their home the Glade), but it's as much for the benefit of our hero, Thomas (Dylan O'Brien, who's perfectly fine), who's been wiped of all his memories, as it is for us. We're in the same boat — or, rather, box.
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
We arrive in the Glade the same way Thomas does in the film's opening scene, rocketing up on the caged-in platform that, once a month, emerges from below ground, carrying supplies and a new arrival to the square of greenery in which a group of teenage boys have been living for three years. A panicked Thomas blinks in the sunlight at his jeering new neighbors, scrambles out, then takes off running — only there's nowhere to go. The Glade's surrounded on all sides by giant concrete walls, with one ominous sliver leading out to dark parts unknown.
It's an arresting image, and the maze continues to be an enthrallingly creepy creation, even as we learn more about it and about the life that the Gladers have carved out in the three years since the first members of the community were brought in. There's the leader, Alby (Aml Ameen), who's helped figure out a system of hard-won peace, Alby's second-in-command Newt (Thomas Brodie-Sangster), and the sweet-natured Chuck (Blake Cooper), who befriend Thomas; Gally (Will Poulter) who instantly mistrusts him; and the Runners' leader Minho (Ki-hong Lee).
The Runners are Gladers who've been assigned to explore the maze that lies outside the walls of the enclosure, exploring and mapping, but always returning before the end of the day. That's when the door closes and creatures they've named the Grievers, which look like giant biomechanical spiders with a deadly stinger, come out to roam.
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