Recently, I saw Allegiant in the theaters. The trailers tantalized me. It looked as if it were more straightforward sci-fi with more effects. Factoring in where the last movie ended, I expect at good time. . .
The movie was good, but not great. There was nothing wrong with the effects, nor was the plot line a problem. Also, the acting was fine. Yet, it wasn’t entirely satisfying.
After some thought, I finally realized what was missing. The movie rushed many of the emotional moments. The biggest example is Four distrusting David while Tris trusts him immediately. I didn’t feel any tension between Four and David. The tension between Four and Tris was muted until the pivotal scene when Tris needs to break free of David’s influence.
The Four/David issue isn’t the real problem. Not showing the tension could be a valid character choice. However, the viewer needed to see/hear Four and Tris’ viewpoints of the situation, and for them to conflict. We were cheated out of seeing this.
Another issue was how some people outside of Chicago wanted to help Tris and Four instead of sticking with what they had grown up knowing all of their life. It’s not that that had never happened (or would never happen); it’s just that nothing prepared the viewer for it to happen. It looks like it happened because the plot needed it to happen.
The movie almost hit a home run, but it came up with a triple because of several small things. Here’s hoping the final movie works better.
I’m an author living in northern Virginia with a wife and a cat. In the late ’80s, I worked on the International Space Station project. I recently retired from managing a group of software engineers to focus on writing science fiction and speculative fiction. Learn more.