| John2290 said: Spoilers ahoy. I have to say it's biggest fault is the books Author and his judgment in having the team be four women with only one in anyway capable of combat and one being mentally unstable with self harm, one (Even though she is the leader) has cancer which was on record and the last minute tack on of the Mary Sue with the severely and obviously conflicting personal issues of having her missing husband involved. Having that expedition approved in anyway even with the leader being in charge to some extent on oversight of the larger management of Area X and expeditions in an out of the shimmer is so unbelievable it almost ruined it entirely, thankfully this is downplayed in the film and not drawn out in detail and as a film the suspension of disbelief factor is there to save the day, Some how it gets a pass even though this will likely be the reason most tune this one out. A brilliant concept almost destroyed by these creative choices, the film works and while I've not read the book I don't intend to after knowing this, he would have to be a master of none author and the book would have to come with an opiate attached every few chapters for the to be in anyway something that one could swallow.All in all a pretty good film with amazing visuals that could have been amazing had the core basic aspects been a bit more grounded in reality, hell this could easily have trumped Interstellar, sunshine, children of men or Inception for Sci-fi film of this century or at least be in the same league. A damn shame. |
My understanding is that they sent in teams of military men and never heard back from them. The psychologist suggests women in part to see it herself and also because what they've been doing is not working. It was seen as a suicide mission by those involved so while we don't see the approval process it may have been thought no big loss should the team all fail.
The shimmer is mysterious and the characters don't know what it entails and what is valued inside it. no information from previous groups is relayed out. If you keep doing X and get no results, trying Y despite conventional wisdom has merit. Maybe combat skills aren't valued, have no way of knowing. They sit there helpless as Oblivion relentlessly trudges toward them, they've become desperate.
Lena is not a Mary Sue to me. She has deep character flaws and guilt over her affair and need to redeem herself making her reckless at times. She cannot save any member of her team and is helpless in the hostage scene. She never has any super human moments given her military background. Her method of dealing with the entity cannot even be said to have succeeded given the ambiguity of the ending. She could have failed and be responsible for the extinction of life on Earth for all we know.
