Disturbing visuals, concerning accusations, and a string of controversial statements: it all adds up to about a million reasons we're worried about A Minecraft Movie.
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00:00Disturbing visuals, concerning accusations, and a string of controversial statements — it
00:05all adds up to about a million reasons we're worried about a Minecraft movie.
00:10There's been talk about making a Minecraft movie for almost as long as the game has existed.
00:15Technically, the first discussions of adapting the game involved a TV project that was first
00:19mentioned in 2012, though that never came to pass.
00:22By 2014, things had shifted towards the big screen, with plans for a crowdfunded fan film
00:26that was ultimately shut down by the game's creator, Marcus Pearson.
00:30Then, for the next 80 years or so, multiple attempts to make a legitimate Minecraft movie
00:34were announced, only to eventually fizzle out for one reason or another.
00:38It was beginning to look like it just wasn't meant to be.
00:40But finally, in 2022, there was an announcement about the movie that's now set to come out
00:45in April 2025.
00:47Considering this backstory, it's hard not to wonder if Warner Bros. was tired of having
00:51this property on its hands and just wanted to put anything out to be rid of it once and
00:55for all.
00:56The Lego movies prove that you don't need to reinvent the wheel when bringing a brick-based
01:00property to life, and when the Netflix series Minecraft Story Mode reworked the video game
01:04series into an interactive TV show.
01:06Sure, it was technically a game at first, but it still worked just fine as a show that
01:10was made up entirely of Minecraft graphics.
01:13All of this is to say that the decision to have a Minecraft movie be a hybrid of animation
01:17and live-action actors is somewhat baffling.
01:19For one thing, it's just plain weird to see human actors interacting with the blocky environments
01:24and creatures from the game.
01:25Also, it just smacks of a project that didn't have enough faith in its source material to
01:29directly translate it visually to the big screen.
01:33Minecraft first launched in 2011 and eventually found an audience with both children and adults.
01:37It's always been an all-ages affair, which is likely a huge part of why it's gone on
01:41to become the second best-selling video game of all time, behind Tetris.
01:45And now, the young kids who played Minecraft when it first came out have grown up into
01:48teenagers and adults.
01:50So even though the Minecraft fanbase includes plenty of adults, the first trailer for a
01:54Minecraft movie feels like it's aimed almost entirely at youngsters, and that could very
01:58well be a major miscalculation.
02:00Bad idea.
02:02Recent successful films based on legacy video game properties like Sonic the Hedgehog and
02:06the Super Mario Bros. movie manage to be both kid-friendly while also appealing to an older
02:11demographic.
02:12Hopefully, a Minecraft movie is wise enough to do that as well, despite what its marketing
02:15has shown thus far.
02:17The premise of the first Sonic the Hedgehog movie is that its main character is sucked
02:21into another dimension and needs to figure out how to get back home.
02:24The premise of the Super Mario Bros. movie is that Mario and Luigi are sucked into another
02:28dimension and they need to figure out how to get back home.
02:30And then there's also Jumanji!
02:32Welcome to the Jungle, which, while not based on a video game, is also about being sucked
02:36into another dimension and needing to get back home.
02:38A Minecraft movie seems to be following this overused trope as well.
02:42The game actually has a legitimate story and deep lore, more than enough to potentially
02:46build multiple movies around without having to resort to a tired gimmick.
02:49Even when your inspirations are some of the highest-grossing video game movies of all
02:53time, an overdone trope is still an overdone trope.
02:56Oh boy, here we go again.
02:59It might have been a little more forgivable that a Minecraft movie is a hybrid of live-action
03:03actors and computer-animated environments if the blend looked seamless.
03:07But that doesn't appear to be the case, at least not based on the trailer.
03:10Instead, the actors stick out like sore thumbs, even when all they're doing is walking through
03:14a field or just standing still.
03:16The fact that the trailer shows very little interaction between the actors and the animated
03:19creatures is more than a little worrisome.
03:21Ultimately, the real test would be how convincing it looks to see them talk to animated characters,
03:26touch animated animals, and battle animated creatures.
03:29But so far, all we've seen are cuts between animated creatures and completely separate
03:32shots of human actors reacting to them, or animated characters only in the background
03:37of shots with human actors.
03:39It's still a relatively rare occurrence that music by The Beatles is officially licensed
03:43for a movie.
03:44Whether it's too expensive or too hard to get approval, or both, the Fab Four songs
03:47just aren't as prevalent as you might expect them to be on screen.
03:50So the fact that the trailer for a Minecraft movie uses a Beatles song might at first seem
03:54like a big deal, and maybe even a positive sign.
03:57But there's just one problem.
03:58The song in question is Magical Mystery Tour, which happens to be the theme for the worst
04:02movie that Paul, John, George, and Ringo ever made.
04:06Released in 1967, the movie was just a random collection of scenes and moments that were
04:10thought up on the fly.
04:11So it wasn't long after the Minecraft trailer dropped that people started making the obvious
04:15joke that using the song from the worst Beatles film was a bad omen.
04:20The initial trailer for the first Sonic the Hedgehog movie infamously featured an absolutely
04:24dreadful design for its main character that was supposed to be realistic, but instead
04:28came across as creepy.
04:30Fortunately, Ugly Sonic was ultimately nixed in favor of a more cartoonish look, which
04:34worked just fine when interacting with the movie's human actors and real-world sets.
04:38Somehow, though, the character designs for a Minecraft movie seem to be going the exact
04:42same route as Ugly Sonic.
04:44The sheep and the llama in the trailer both have wool textures that look fine, but they
04:47also both have terrifying, human-like teeth.
04:50Don't look at it.
04:51Shut your eyes, Murray, and don't look at it, no matter what happens.
04:54Even worse are the piglins, who have a grotesque skin texture that feels unsettling and out-of-place
04:59— not just compared to the source material, but also within the virtual landscape that
05:03the movie seems to be trying to create.
05:06It's worth admitting that Jack Black has more than proven his gamer bona fides.
05:09For one thing, he starred in the cult classic game Brutal Legend by voicing the main character
05:13and filming a live-action intro for the game.
05:15And he even appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live! or dressed as his character.
05:18He also has a YouTube channel, on which he's shared various types of game-related content,
05:22seemingly just for the heck of it.
05:24That's right.
05:25It's me, Jablinski.
05:26Cam Black also delivered quite the scene-stealing performance as Bowser in the Super Mario Bros.
05:31movie.
05:32He not only nailed the role of Mario's longtime antagonist, but also wrote and performed the
05:35song Peaches for the film.
05:37So, for a while, Jack Black's connection to video game-related media felt like a clear
05:41sign of quality.
05:42But then, the Borderlands movie came out in August 2024 and was one of the biggest critical
05:47and commercial flops of the year.
05:49So now, plenty of fans are seeing Jack Black in a different light than he was even just
05:52a few months ago.
05:53Therefore, it's not exactly the best timing to reveal that he's one of the stars of yet
05:57another video game movie.
06:00Nowadays, when a highly-anticipated movie is announced, one of the first things that
06:03fans do is make a video of themselves reacting to that announcement.
06:06So, with a property as beloved as Minecraft, there was bound to be plenty of people with
06:11plenty to say about the Minecraft movie trailer.
06:13And unsurprisingly, most of what they had to say wasn't very good.
06:17Then something odd happened.
06:18Several YouTubers claimed that their reaction videos for the Minecraft movie trailer had
06:22received copyright strikes and were forced to be taken down.
06:25Conspiracy theory gears started turning, with some people wondering if Warner Bros. was
06:29trying to quiet down some of the massive backlash to the trailer.
06:32Now there remain plenty of videos on YouTube bashing the Minecraft movie that haven't been
06:36taken down, and those instances where some disappeared may have been caused by a mistake
06:40or a technical glitch.
06:41But once a conspiracy theory takes off on the internet, it's hard to stop it from spreading
06:45like a wildfire.
06:46There's a conspiracy here.
06:47A dark, vast conspiracy that may just go all the way to the top.
06:53Barely two weeks after the teaser trailer for a Minecraft movie dropped, another controversy
06:57about the film arose.
06:58A YouTuber named Valkyrae, who has a cameo in the movie, revealed in an interview with
07:02fellow YouTuber Jason LeWine that her worst-ever celebrity interaction was with Jason Momoa
07:08while filming her cameo.
07:09Valkyrae claimed that during her short time on set, she witnessed Momoa yelling at members
07:13of the crew.
07:14From her vantage point, it didn't seem like a good environment to be working in.
07:17"...it was a very emotional scene, so maybe he was still in character, I don't know, but
07:20I just was kind of surprised by how he treated, like, some of the crew."
07:24As of October 2024, neither Momoa nor his representatives have addressed Valkyrae's
07:28accusations.
07:29It's also worth noting that there have been varying stories over the years about what
07:33it's like to work with him.
07:34Amber Heard, for example, claims to have had a bad experience with him while shooting Aquaman
07:38and the Lost Kingdom.
07:39Meanwhile, Emilia Clarke had nothing but kind words about their time together on Game of
07:43Thrones, saying that he advocated for her and was protective of her on set.
07:47Even if Valkyrae's claims aren't true, or if they are and this was just one isolated
07:51incident, such accusations are hard to shake, and could very well only add to the struggle
07:55that a Minecraft movie is already facing.
07:58Typically credited as the creator of Minecraft, game developer Marcus Persson eventually sold
08:03the rights to the game to Microsoft, which made him a billionaire.
08:06He left Minecraft developer Mojang, and he hasn't been directly involved with the game
08:09or the developer since 2015.
08:11Nevertheless, fans were unsurprisingly curious to know what Persson thought of the Minecraft
08:16movie trailer.
08:17As it turns out, he ended up offering one of the few positive, leaning reactions to
08:20it when he tweeted,
08:21"'Okay, I'm in.'"
08:22But Persson's stamp of approval isn't quite so simple.
08:25In the years since selling Minecraft, he's proven to be the controversial figure, having
08:28made negative statements about feminism and proposing a heterosexual pride holiday.
08:33Persson's got so contentious that he wasn't invited to Minecraft's 10th anniversary festivities,
08:38with Microsoft issuing a statement that said,
08:40"'His comments and opinions do not reflect those of Minecraft or Mojang and are not representative
08:44of Minecraft.'"
08:45Considering that Persson's relationship to his creation is so contentious, and that he's
08:49been generally unapologetic about the things that he's said, it's hard not to wonder if
08:53he's actually glad that a Minecraft movie looks bad, and is just reveling over its perceived
08:57eventual failure.