“We are not animals! Is this want you want? We can be slaves, or we can be… LYCANS!”

Justin’s rating: All the ticks and fleas that you’d expect with such a hairball

Justin’s review: Prepare yourself, for I’m about to make one of those massive blanket statements that some nerd on the internet will object to with a raised hand and a “Well, actually…” and then refute me with a cherry-picked example. I don’t care. I’m going to do it anyway.

So here goes: Nobody ever asks for or desires prequels. Ever. But that’s not what Hollywood thinks. Hollywood figures that we’re all sitting in flyover states making our little noises and wishing that we could be entertained with the origin story of the Rugrats or Spaceballs‘ Pizza the Hutt. And so we get prequels by the dozen, they almost always disappoint, and Hollywood figures that it just needs to try harder next time.

I can’t imagine that even the most well-studied Underworld expert was clamoring for a prequel instead of a continuation, especially since Evolution ended on a bit of a cliffhanger. But here we go, heading back in time for a history lesson on the centuries-old conflict between werewolf and vampire.

Yawn.

Honestly, I think this was an excuse to bring Bill Nighy and Michael Sheen back after biting the big one in the previous films. But it does this at the expense of shoving Kate Beckinsale almost entirely aside. That is so bizarre, considering that Beckinsale’s Selene is the most recognizable element of the franchise.

Want to know what happens next in the series? Shut up, it’s Prequel Time, baby!

Instead, we go back to the medieval politics of angry vampires and angry werewolves. Lucian (Sheen), sees his fellow werewolves as an enslaved and hunted caste, and so organizes a bit of an uprising. But that’s not before he falls in love with Viktor’s (Nighy) daughter Sonja (Rhona Mitra) and they dabble in some Forbidden Love that’s destined for tragedy.

Was anyone really asking why these two sides don’t like each other? Did there need to be a treatise on this situation? Did we really need another “slaves rise up and overthrow their oppressors” story with a fantasy overlay? It’s unnecessary world building the way that prequels often do.

Anyway, it’s not as if I could actually see this movie. If the previous movies were obsessed with a moody blue tint, then Rise of the Lycans has invested in barely visible shadows. My pet theory is that this movie takes place on a world without a sun — or a moon and stars. It’s dark, is what I’m saying. That’s probably a godsend to the CGI team, since shadows cover up a lot of imperfections in that department.

The only thing that brought a smile to my face was seeing that the runtime was just a smidge over an hour-and-a-half. I don’t think I could’ve taken Underworld’s full two hours.

At least the simplistic story is told straight and true and has a few decent fight scenes. It could be a boring, sloppy mess, and I recognize that. But competence still doesn’t give purpose.

Intermission!

• Baby penis in the first minute. Fortunately, he finds pants.
• One crossbow can hit several targets at once
• That is not safe sex in any definition of the term
• Werewolves make for good blacksmiths. Rippling muscles and all that.
• That’s one nasty whip
• A sword through the mouth doesn’t kill vampires?