Rebel Moon — Part Two: The Scargiver Review: A Sequel Made of Empty Cinematic Flair

Rebel Moon — Part Two: The Scargiver, the follow-up to Rebel Moon — Part One: A Child of Fire, leans further into director Zack Snyder’s skill as a cinematographer but falls victim to the very same problems the first movie suffered from.

The film picks up where the first left off, with Kora and her group of surviving warriors preparing the modest farming planet of Vledt for an attack from the Imperium, led by the resurrected Atticus Noble.

While the first film’s story was formulaic, unoriginal, and unrealistic, there is hardly any story to speak of at all in the sequel.

Viewers will recall the first film built up to the major battle between Veldt and the Imperium. Hence, Rebel Moon: Part Two — The Scargiver is that major battle — and little else.

To be fair, there are some positives to the simplicity of the story. For one, it allows Snyder to do what he does best: epic fight scenes.

Once viewers get to the second half of the film, the hour practically flies by, given the nonstop action and breathtaking visuals. It essentially turns into a top-notch war movie.

The battle meets the definition of “epic,” stirring emotion in viewers from the sheer intensity. It’s difficult not to feel emotional watching some characters take their last stand and witnessing a battle that seems almost impossible to emerge victorious from.

Snyder captures some beautiful shots, especially the phenomenally choreographed final battle between Kora and Noble.

Still, some unoriginality is noticeable even in the fight scenes. The Star Wars influence is especially heavy, given the prominence of blasters, Nemesis and other characters’ usage of what are, essentially, lightsabers, and the presence of ships that appear earily similar in design and function to Walkers.

Although Synder succeeds in embuing emotion, drama, and suspense through the fight scenes, it doesn’t quite make up for the lack of story. At the end of the massive battle, which claims several lives, viewers are left asking why it matters.

The movie fails, again, to give viewers a reason to care about the characters, planet, or entire world of Rebel Moon.

When the movie attempts to build the characters’ story, it always looks for shortcuts, making everything feel a little forced and surface-level.

At one point, all the warriors sit around a table and, one by one, decide to tell their tragic backstories to one another. Many of them, especially Titus, have powerful and emotional stories.

However, using a Last Supper-style setting and making it a ritual for them to each tell their stories takes away some of the realism and emotion.

It’s so obvious that, instead of taking more time in the first film to show these characters’ backstories, Snyder took a shortcut by having them all randomly decide to tell their stories. It’s challenging to get into the scene and emotion when it feels like it is only written to mark off an item on a checklist.

One can almost imagine the writers going, “Backstories. Check. Moving on.”

Similarly, the telling rather than showing also stunts Kora’s backstory, which should be a shocking reveal, but instead falls flat as the film fails to explore her guilt and sees the other characters uncharacteristically brushing off her past actions.

The failure to delve deeper into Kora’s story is especially disappointing because Sofia Boutella is such a capable actress. She easily packs the most emotion, ferocity, and power into her performance, and there’s no doubt she could’ve captured Kora’s despair and guilt over the past.

Unfortunately, the film rarely gives her an opportunity to show viewers the full scope of her acting talent. Similarly, Djimon Hounsou is believable as Titus but is often regulated to acting through his facial expressions or war cries due to the lack of screen time devoted to him.

Doona Bae does an excellent job of showing a more human side of Nemesis, but viewers are once again distracted from emotion by the glaring clichés and checklists as the movie seeks several formulaic heroes’ deaths.

Ed Skrein is quite terrifying and volatile as Atticus Noble, but the villain lacks depth. Like the entire Imperium, he’s seemingly evil just for the sake of being bad.

The final major letdown of Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver is the ending. Given that Snyder is in his element in the final battle, one would’ve thought he had a satisfying ending down pat.

Instead, he decides to use the last moments to set up a third movie by revealing that a character long believed to be deceased is somehow still alive.

Of course, viewers are given no explanation for how this character is alive and how their living status is suddenly so well known that Titus just nonchalantly drops that detail. Not to mention, it also wipes out the little bit of depth in Kora’s story by revealing she doesn’t have anything to be guilty about at all.

Given the lack of depth and creativity, it’s no secret that both Rebel Moon movies are tedious to get through. Hence, many hoped that the second part would at least largely tie up this story and perhaps signal a chance for a better story next time if the franchise continues.

Instead, viewers are still stuck with the same story and practically no answers.

Rebel Moon — Part Two: The Scargiver is quite satisfying to look at, with its well-crafted, epic war sequence and meticulously choreographed fight scenes.

However, although it has arguably better visuals and pacing than the first film, the story, character development, and depth deteriorate even further, preventing the sequel from even eclipsing its predecessor, which was already a notoriously low bar.

What did you think of Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver is streaming now on Netflix.

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