Review: Legion
I saw Legion on Friday.
Wow.
This movie sucked out loud, on ice.
For real, this was one of the worst movies I have seen in a long time. And, yes, that was a huge disappointment to me because I was really looking forward to a movie about the end times and angels and the powerful, smiting retribution of God. Well, there were angels in it, anyway.
So, right, here’s the the basic plot; it’s the end times, but not really like we’re used to seeing or hearing about, and only one baby can save us, but his mother isn’t all that into having him and God has sent an army of angels to kill the baby and pretty much anyone along the way who tries to stop them. Sounds like a winner, right? Yeah, you’d think. But, somehow they managed to take that premise, a fairly decent cast and screw it up at every turn.
First of all, Michael, chief of God’s angels, essentially rebels to come to Earth, make himself human, and try to save the mother of the implied second coming of Christ. Not a bad start, really, except that no one ever cops to the fact that the baby is the reborn Prince of Peace. Oh, and also? That whole rebel angel thing. That’s been done and, uh, Lucifer, the angel of the morning star, already did that and was cast out of heaven. So, really, that was kind of a hard-sell to me, Michael rebelling. And, uh, pretty well that’s the entire plot. Angels coming to kill unborn kid, rebel angel out to stop them and the rag-tag group of human misfits who sort of tag along for the ride and cliched object lessons. And, since I cannot in all good conscience recommend that anyone waste one, thin dime on this movie, I am totally going to ruin it for you now. The rebel angel succeeds and the kid is born, humankind is saved, his parents are redeemed and become what seem to be red-neck, Christian Identity, gun-toting survivalists who apparently discover Utah. And, now, thankfully, you don’t need to see this film.
So, if you’re still with me, here’s a theological issue I had with the movie.
Michael, the newest rebel angel, repeats several times that he’s giving God what He needs, not what He’s asking for.
Uh, hello? What? Are you implying that God doesn’t know what He wants? That some angel with an English lisp and Enochian tattoos actually know better than God what God’s mind is and His needs are? Seriously? Because, then, God pretty well couldn’t be God, since that’s sort of defined by being all-powerful and all-seeing and all-knowing and if one of His creations knows better than He does then He can’t be those things. Right? And, really, that was just the most obvious and egregious theological failing, but it wasn’t the only one. It’s just that one distracted me so, so much from the rest of the film that the rest of them aren’t worth mentioning.
And, really, the potential good parts of the film were bad, too. Like the action and the manifestation of angels and all the ways that subtle morality lessons that never actually manifested. Oh, and the crappy dialog. And, the the bad acting by pretty much everyone except the baby, who I’m fairly certain was special effects.
And, did I mention that the movie was filled with badly failed cliches? Because it was. I mean it was clogged with them like an overflowing cinematic toilet. It was bad, bad, bad.
Honestly, this movie was so bad I cannot believe it actually got made.
If you were thinking about going to see this film, slap yourself, have a stiff drink and go see The Book of Eli instead. You’ll be happy you avoided this one. And, I would say, don’t even bother to rent this stinker. Truly. It was bad in more ways than even I can list.
Do NOT waste two hours of your life going to see this movie.
