Zack Snyder said that the R-rated Director’s cut of Rebel Moon was essentially a version that takes place in “two entirely different timelines” compared to the PG-13 original. It is not that. It is longer, bloodier and fixes practically none of the things wrong with the first draft. It is very much the same, not worth watching again, not worth watching for a first time if you waited.
I just finished watching the 3.5 hour(!) Part 1 (!!) of the nearly seven hour Rebel Moon “unleashed,” and the few differences I’ve seen have convinced me not to possibly bother with the second half, if these are the types of changes that are being made. Yes, obviously this just should have been the version that was released originally, and this entire plot by Netflix to try to recreate Justice League Snyder Cut mania was a horrible idea. But so was giving Snyder carte blanche to do whatever he wanted in this original universe that is simply very bad. Snyder is at his best when he’s adapting, Watchmen and 300 for one. And at his worst…here. He’s at his worst here. And this is coming from someone who does in fact like most of his movies.
What’s different? Well, the film adds a 25 minute opening that is essentially the Negan/Glenn bat scene from The Walking Dead but even more uncomfortable, and you come to learn it’s an origin story for what is perhaps the ninth most important character in the film. There’s an extended ending that scribbles down a final few lore notes. It feels like Snyder has 100 pages of backstory for every being briefly glimpsed in this film, but there’s not any time to expand on it at all. He truly thought this was going to turn into some sort of sprawling six-movie saga with spin-offs and the whole thing. It is not that.
Elsewhere, here’s a little more about Cora’s backstory. A little more back at the farm as Jimmy the war robot mediates his way into peace. There are bits and pieces here and there but nothing that fleshes out the story to make a reasonable difference from the original version to this one, even if an extra hour was jammed in there. That also makes it feel, you guessed it, pretty overlong and bloated. To say nothing of the three hour Part 2 you’re supposed to watch after this.
The R-rating adds f-bombs and blood and a passing amount of nudity courtesy of a truly uncomfortable sex scene near the start from star Sofia Boutella. There’s a separate one later where the film’s villain Noble (who I’ve argued is the only good character in this movie) has sex with some sort of tentacle monster which is gross in an actually kind of funny way.
The added gore very much makes the action scenes better. Not become I have some insatiable bloodlust as a viewer, but because without the blood and limb-chopping the fights in the PG-13 version were ridiculously edited and lacked any weight to them at all. The R-rating makes all the fights better and once again reinforces how ludicrous it was to do a PG-13 version of this in the first place.
I actually think Snyder’s weird wide world here is kind of interesting, and I enjoy its Warhammer aesthetic and weird tooth-collecting priests and aliens psychically communicating through nude corpses. There’s some neat, insane stuff in there.
But the script…the script is just not there. And a bad script produces bad performances from even a talented cast of actors. This is “The Phantom Menace” syndrome where poor writing and editing made Liam Neeson, Ewan McGregor and Natalie Portman look like high school drama dropouts. And nothing about a director’s cut change that. More blood and backstory doesn’t change that.
If you loved the first Rebel Moon, well, this is definitely built for you, and I have no doubt you will like it. If you hated the first one and hoped this cut would transform it dramatically, it does not do that in the slightest. If Part 2 goes any better, someone let me know, because I’m not bothering to attempt it after this.
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