When you’ve seen the trailer for “Borderlands,” you’ve seen all six of the primary characters at their wisecracking greatest. Other than Claptrap (Jack Black), the two-and-half-minutes of a trailer is about on a regular basis the film has for any of that. As a substitute, we’re handled to a string of explosions and shoot-outs — and little or no else. And whereas these might be enjoyable, with out something to floor them, they quantity to little or no. Because of this, “Borderlands” isn’t an epic catastrophe, however with out something to hold it’s story on, it’s boring.

The plot, corresponding to it’s, goes one thing like this: Lilith (Cate Blanchett) is a bounty hunter on a job when Atlas (Edgar Ramirez), the pinnacle of a multi-planet company, recruits her to seek out his daughter. She does this pretty effectively, however shortly learns that Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt) doesn’t wish to return to Atlas. In truth, she doesn’t appear to love him a lot. And shortly, a complete mess of individuals in official Atlas gear are coming after Lilith and Tina. So Lilith does what anybody in her state of affairs would do: she goes with Tina and her pals, Roland (Kevin Hart) and Krieg (Florian Munteanu), whereas Claptrap, the robotic who made himself recognized to Lilith earlier, chases after them as they flee from the military that was despatched to seek out them.

They find yourself on a mission to get all three keys to a vault with the assistance of an extra crew member, Dr. Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis). Nobody’s precisely positive what’s in there, however everybody desires to get in so it should be one thing good, proper? That retains the plot transferring alongside, however not precisely buzzing. Most motion films like this one have a plot that revolves round getting one thing that’s actually only a MacGuffin, however right here, the entire thing feels particularly pointless. There are a number of causes for that.

One main downside is straight out of filmmaking 101. Outdoors of the combat sequences, as a substitute of displaying the viewers what occurs, the film retains telling us. In restricted portions, that’s not against the law, regardless of what movie professors might say — however the truth that nothing is dramatized is a disgrace. We’re instructed that the Eridians had been aliens who died out and left actually cool stuff. We’re instructed that Tiny Tina is a clone. We’re instructed that Lilith’s mom left her with Dr. Tannis. This stuff don’t have the identical visceral enchantment in the event that they aren’t proven to us, and consequently, the film misses out on some main alternatives.

It’s clear that as a substitute of fleshing out these scenes, the director Eli Roth, who additionally co-wrote the script with Joe Crombie, needed to spend the movie finances on the combat sequences. However he may have shaved these scenes down just a little to make room. Scenes explaining the characters’ backstories would have made a distinction. In truth, absolutely anything would have made a distinction on this lengthy chain of taking pictures and blowing issues up. Because it stands, although, the film appears like a string of sequences in a online game, however because you’re not taking part in, it feels tedious as a substitute of impressed, boring as a substitute of gripping.

One other downside is that the characters aren’t greater than ciphers. Whereas many followers of the “Borderlands” video video games have (loudly) criticized the film’s casting, that is really addressed. There are scenes at the start of the movie that word that Cate Blanchett is considerably older than her character within the video games, which makes Dr. Tannis considerably older too as a result of the pair knew one another since Lilith was younger. Roland being brief is remarked on too. What’s not clear is why any of those modifications had been made.

That’s a puzzle in itself, however the actual downside is that the characters aren’t given any time to shine. Why solid Blanchett or Kevin Hart if you happen to aren’t going to allow them to do something? Hart, specifically, is given brief shrift; we all know virtually nothing about his Roland besides that he was once a soldier. However nobody is given a lot of an opportunity. Lionsgate has offered colourful explanations for the entire characters, however I didn’t see a lot proof for them. As a substitute they only look like cogs in a machine.

Principally, although, the film appears to endure from its score. Eli Roth is usually often called a director of horror films, and most of these have R rankings. Not solely does this enable the flicks to pump up the gore issue, however it additionally permits them to curse, and the latter is what “Borderlands” wanted. In any case, if they might have had some “Deadpool”-style cursing, the film not less than may have been amusing. As a substitute, with a PG-13 score, many of the characters barely develop a persona. That mentioned, I do surprise if Roth would have been able to giving this film the grounding it wanted. In any case, horror films are typically gentle on character too. And in a horror film, maybe, you don’t essentially want robust characters so long as your villain is killer, each figuratively and actually. However on this film, you want barely extra. Nonetheless, “Borderlands”‘ characters aren’t even archetypes. There are some nice actors on this solid and so they all appear sport, however Roth by no means takes benefit of it.

Whereas Roth and his manufacturing designer, Andrew Menzies, do most of the units justice, significantly when the ragtag group goes to town heart, the story simply can’t reside as much as this. “Borderlands” is a poor man’s model of “Guardians of the Galaxy”; whereas it could look sort of fairly, it has not one of the persona of that earlier film. Don’t waste your time on this one.

“Borderlands” opens in theaters on August 9.