The Flickering Myth writing team share their thoughts on the first trailer for Independence Day: Resurgence…
With Christmas just a little over a week away, Hollywood continues to roll out the trailers for some of 2016’s biggest releases. We’ve seen our first look at Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows and X-Men: Apocalypse over the past few days, and yesterday 20th Century Fox released a trailer for the upcoming sci-fi action sequel Independence Day: Resurgence. What did our writing team make of it? Well read on to find out…
Gary Collinson: Was pleasantly surprised by the trailer. I liked the first movie, but haven’t been desperate for a sequel, and all but forgot this was even coming out next year. So, it’s done its job, and made me interested. Not majorly interested, but still…
Stuie Greenfield: It looked dramatic. I just hope they don’t make it a complete ‘look we are a sequel’ and make it an film in its own right. Recurring cast look good. All in all a good trailer. Though having grow up in the generation that adored it maybe I am biased.
Jackson Ball: Looks very generic. The original wasn’t exactly groundbreaking, but this looks like a your standard, run-of-the-mill cinema fodder. Dull.
Jessie Robertson: Looked very similar to the first. Made me interested in seeing how it turns out and Jeff Goldblum is never a bad thing. Guess I’m wondering why they made a sequel now?
Tai Freligh: I’m starting to sound like a broken record, but this trailer did nothing for me. I guess I was so out of the loop that I didn’t even realize they were making a sequel. I wanted to be jazzed about it, but had no idea what the plot could possibly be. This looked like a rehash of the first movie, but without Will Smith. With so many other movies in recent years that this looks like a copy of (see Battleship, Battlefield Earth, etc.), why even bother? Maybe I’m spoiled by Marvel and DC trailers (I LOVED the new Batman v Superman trailer AND the Captain America: Civil War trailer), but these last few have been stinkers. Once again – home video for me… and maybe not even for this one.
Villordsutch: I’m really rather interested in where this is all going. Considering the first film was true bubblegum for the brain, here is its sequel and I’m truly intrigued thanks to this trailer.
Luke Owen: I adore the first movie, and was so in for this utterly pointless sequel. Thought the trailer was good fun, and the final product should play up to the first film’s bonkers and tongue-in-cheek personna. All the returning cast looked good, and it’s great to see Maikia Monroe in a big movie and roll. Laughed my arse off when they reused Bill Pullman’s speech but added in “once again”. Having said that, the stuff with Goldblum and Hemsworth on the moon looked a bit shit, and could be a step too far from being a clever pastiche to Iron Sky territory.
Ricky Church: It’s a pointless sequel, but looks like it will be a lot of popcorn fun. It looks like they’re trying to recreate the magic that went into the first one and hopefully they’ll succeed. As everyone knows, the first one is kind of illogical and dumb, but you don’t really care about that because it never took itself too seriously and just had fun with the premise. Even still, it does look, as Tal said, a bit like a rehash of the first one, but I think we all expected that result more or less. I’ll probably wait until after its left theaters to see it, but it at least succeeded in raising my interest in this film.
I will say, however, the War of 96 website is pretty cool. I’ve now spent the last few minutes looking through that site and its a pretty cool bit of viral marketing and altered history. If nothing else, its interesting to see how they’ve filled in the 20 year gap between invasions.
Tai Freligh: Like how they explained why Will Smith’s character isn’t in the sequel on that website?
Ricky Church: That is one thing that is kind of dumb about all that. Can’t just say he’s retired or died of something totally unrelated (or simply recast the character), but he died testing alien technology. Its okay though, because his son is going to pretty much be a carbon copy of Will Smith’s character. That’s always worked out so well before, right?
Helen Murdoch: The first is one of my favourite popcorn movies. This trailer didn’t do much for me but it wasn’t as horrifically awful as I thought it would look.
Chris Cooper: I was actually quite impressed. The Goldblum factor is large of course, but I liked seeing Earth making use of the tech and moving on. Makes sense that whilst it would advance us significantly the aliens would hardly be standing still. What can I say, I’m up for it.
Tom Jolliffe: It looks daft but fun. I do like Goldblum even though it’s very hard now not to picture his vinegar strokes. I’d watch this.
Anghus Houvouras: You know what it was lacking? Fun. The original ID4 trailer was this great balance of Jeff Goldblum’s daunting technoballe, Will Smith’s catch phrase spewing charisma, and Bill Pullman’s inspirational speech. There were these great levels of seriousness and fun. There was zero fun in this trailer. I realize they couldn’t get Will Smith, but is Liam Hemsworth the best replacement you could come up with? I liked some bits: the stuff with Goldblum talking about merging the alien tech with ours to create an awesome Earth Defense Force, but it’s sooooooo grim. I still love the original ID4 because it’s big, corny, and ridiculously entertaining. This first trailer makes the whole thing seem a little more Empire Strikes Back and a little less A New Hope. I know he died in the first film, but there is a way to work Randy Quaid back into this franchise?
James Garcia: I was actually pretty surprised by this trailer. I’ve long been adamant that the world really doesn’t need an ID4 sequel, and while I still think that’s the case, I’m intrigued by what the trailer presented. It doesn’t just go bigger, but seems to at least be TRYING to follow up the original film in interesting ways. Bill Pullman’s character is obviously still haunted by the events of the last film, and the world has dramatically changed because of the events that transpired and the technology that was left behind. I’m still skeptical that the movie will actually be good, or will capture the same fun, imaginative spark that made ID4 so stupidly lovable, but color me intrigued.
What did you make of the trailer? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below…
Independence Day Resurgence is set for release on June 24th 2016, with Roland Emmerich directing returning stars Jeff Goldblum, Vivica A. Fox, Judd Hirsch, Brent Spiner and Bill Pullman alongside new additions Liam Hemsworth (The Hunger Games), Charlotte Gainsbourg (Nymphomaniac), Maika Monroe (It Follows), Sela Ward (The Day After Tomorrow), Joey King (Wish I Was Here), Jessie Usher (When The Game Stands Tall), Angelababy (Young Detective Dee: Rise of the Sea Dragon) and William Fichtner (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles).
