How About We Don't Have Any More Movies Or Series About the AI Apocalypse.
Plus how I found one good idea in "Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning: Part One." And no, it wasn't the title.
After all of these years, it still surprises me how poorly written most of the “Mission: Impossible” movies are. Is there a franchise that so utterly flouts the “show, don’t tell” rule of storytelling by leaning in, to a preposterous degree, on exposition?
Because “Mission: Impossible” seems to think that its plots are so complex, as opposed to absurd and incoherent, that it absolutely must have expositional plot thoughts not just spouted by everyone, but everyone in very short sentences, with cut-aways.
Character A: “So we need to find these two halves of this key and see if they fit?”
Character B: “And if they fit, we need to figure out what they unlock.”
Character C: “Because if we don’t…”
Character D: “The world will end.”
Character E: “And no one will be able to stop it.”
Character F: “That’s right.”
(Wide shot of everyone looking like they just came upon a great notion.)
I was recently in the mood for something entertaining and dumb enough to pay half attention (found it!), and since I hadn’t seen the latest version of Tom Cruise doing his own stunts, I got in a mostly supine position and let the day fall away.
“Dead Reckoning Part One” is yet another movie about rogue AI. It came out in 2023 but based on concept and shooting schedules (and picking premiere windows) it’s clear that the movie was wrapped before ChatGPT launched at the end of November of 2022.
Long before that, of course, we’ve had movies and television series about robots and AI and the concept of an apocalypse created when non-humans go sentient.
Many of them have been very good. Some arguably great. I’ll let you offer up your choices in the comments. But the issue now is complete saturation of the concept. Not soaking in it, not drowning in it, but dead from it. AI overkill.
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