2020, Michael Matthews (Five Fingers for Marseilles) -- Netflix
So, an asteroid is hurtling towards the Earth and we shoot rockets to destroy it, and the remaining particles of said space rock rain down and turn everything into monsters? Nope, funnily enough the radiation and byproducts of the rockets themselves spill down onto the Earth mutating all cold blooded, insectile, etc. life into MONSTERS ! Quickly; some might say, I say instantly. This is comic book maybe even cartoon level science, but sure, whatever -- premise! Handy wavey!
The night it happens, teens Joel (Dylan O'Brien, Maze Runner) and Aimee (Jessica Henwick, Iron Fist) are making out during the rain of goo and have to each run off to their separate families, promising to reconnect when possible. Seven years later, Joel is sharing a missile silo bunker with paired off couples, no family, no Aimee. He's a bit of a third wheel in all aspects of bunker life. So, after making contact with Aimee on the ham radio, he decides to go upstairs into the monster infested wilderness to find Aimee at her colony.
Road story!
I know it's probably me, but I always see my own love of PoAp and the varying bits of pop culture associated to it, attached in some way to modern tales. In Kipo and the Age of the Wonderbeasts I saw Gamma World. Here I saw some Gamma World (quick re-evolution of wildlife) and even some Fallout -- I swear I saw the exact junk you would collect in Fallout 4 sitting on a table in one of the abandoned houses Joel hides in. I sincerely think a set dresser was giggling to themselves as they made the choices.
After some initial "run & hide" Joel connects, first with Boy, a good dog looking for a companion, and perhaps the owner of a red dress, and then later with knowledgeable travellers, Cap (Michael Rooker, Guardians of the Galaxy) & Minnow. They provide him the survival skills to make it the rest of the way to the coast, where he finds an older, wiser Aimee protecting a group of seniors, and not quite ready to pick up where the couple left off.
Despite the title, I didn't really care much for the romcom aspects of the movie, and it was a little light on really roping us in. It really did just want to have fun with the different monsters, the gooey practical effects and the thrill rides, and in that aspect it succeeds. Its not a great movie, but fun, and decently produced. And totally Halloweeny, yep uh huh, it is!
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