Final Rating: 0.5/5
Art at its best offers a new perspective, even when the subject of that art is nothing new. How many versions of Romeo and Juliet are there, which nevertheless feel wholly distinct from one another? Retreading old ground isn’t a bad thing when an artist has something interesting to say. It’s always worth it to examine a film, or any existing narrative for that matter, from a new point of view.
Art at its worst, however, offers nothing new. No new story, no new perspective, no new insight. At its worst, art is simply content, pushed out not for the purpose of engaging, but of being consumed. After all, “actor,” “director,” and “composer” are all job titles, and while those titles can certainly mean something, they also represent people who need to be paid.
A lot of people got paid for making The Electric State, the latest film from Joe and Anthony Russo, which premieres on Netflix this weekend. With a reported budget of $320 million, it’s the most expensive film ever produced by the streamer and it certainly looks and feels expensive.
Stars adorn the promotional material: Chris Pratt, Anthony Mackie, Jenny Slate, Woody Harrelson, Stanley Tucci. Oscar-nominated composer Alan Silvestri wrote the score, while recent Oscar winner Ke Huy Quan stars in a major role. The film is built on visual effects that, to their credit, look natural without any obvious signs of generative AI. Technically, the film is somewhat competent, but it’s completely unimaginative.
Electric State imagines an alternate version of the 1990s where promotional robots and animatronics have gained sentience and unified against the United States. Led by Planter’s mascot Mr. Peanut (Woody Harrelson), robots marched for freedom, were violently put down, and finally plunged the US into a new civil war between man and machine. These events are recounted in a montage over the opening credits, showing the decline of civilization between 1990 and 1994, finally culminating in Mr. Peanut signing a ceasefire treaty with Bill Clinton, America having been reduced to a cyberpunk dystopia.
It’s in this dystopia that the audience is introduced to Michelle (Millie Bobby Brown), a girl in foster care who lost her brother and parents at the start of the war and along with them, any and all motivation to carry on. Michelle is headstrong and independent; a regular Sam Witwickie, for anyone who’s seen Michael Bay’s Transformers. And when the mascot of her favourite TV show accosts her in her home and implies that her brother might still be alive, Michelle sets out to travel across the electric state and reunite with her remaining family.
To summarize The Electric State: Michelle breaks away from her foster parent after being called to adventure by a robot, meets a pair of comic-relief good-for-nothings with hearts of gold (Pratt and Mackie), learns that the peacekeeping force behind the human/robot ceasefire may be more evil than they let on, and finally unites with the underdogs to take down the mastermind behind everything bad in the world. At the end, Michelle gets a nice moment wherein she proclaims to the world that only by way of human connection can we hope to experience life.
The point is that you’ve seen this story before. The Electric State cribs liberally from Terminator 2 and Ready Player One, but even those films weren’t the first to tackle the Hero’s Journey in a cyberpunk setting. What those films did do was offer an interesting perspective. Terminator 2 explores pre-determination by way of a character attempting to avert the apocalypse with help from a sidekick who literally knows the future and should have a good idea of how to prevent it.
Ready Player One explores the impact of the past on a prospective future, presenting characters who, despite living in a futuristic dystopia, must be fully in-tune with the 1980s in order to progress in life. By contrast, Electric State takes place in the 90s – thus avoiding having to speculate on a possible future – and makes all the major robot characters mascots of existing corporate entities – thus avoiding having to create any kind of vessel for interesting commentary.
Where Electric State could say something, it avoids doing so. The characters venture through the desert states, bypassing any kind of civilization so they don’t come into contact with anyone. Animosity between robots and humans is confined to a single conflict between a group of robots hiding in an amusement park and corporate hitmen, bypassing any kind of commentary on bystanders or non-combatants caught up in violent conflict. The relationships between characters never move past a surface level “these characters like each other” and “these characters dislike each other, because one is evil.” And of course, anytime there is even the threat of an emotional moment, whoever is involved in that scene will lighten the mood with a groan-worthy quip.
There’s simply no heart to The Electric State, and it grows old fast. Characters are broad archetypes: Michelle is the protagonist, Pratt’s character is a rogue with a heart of gold, Mr. Peanut is a diplomat, but he’ll also run you through with a sword for the good of his people. If the intent is to show that robots are as complex as people, this film certainly makes an argument, but only by bringing everyone down together.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Justine Bateman recounted that she’d heard from showrunners who had been given notes from streamers that “this isn’t second screen enough.” “Second screen” here means that viewers of a film or TV show are watching in the background – on a second screen – only occasionally looking up between regular distractions. If the viewer gets confused, they’ll turn the film or show off, which is bad for numbers, so media should be accommodating to this type of “tuned-out” viewer.
The Electric State could not realize this principle more. The film fully embodies a “tell don’t show” ideal, characters opting to talk about their talents rather than demonstrate them. The opening scene shows Michelle’s brother – whose defining characteristic is that he is smart – passing a test that, we’re told, “Einstein didn’t even pass his first time.” The action is uninspired, and usually relegated to short but deliberate bursts: if a robot is about to throw a car, you can bet they’ll do it a few times, and wind up for a while beforehand, so you can finish your move in Candy Crush in time to tune in. Silvestri’s soundtrack is as generic as it gets, but also incredibly manipulative, to the point that the individual tracks may as well be called “Death of Character’s Best Friend,” “Decisive Battle,” “Theme of Villain.”
On paper, the story of mascots destroying a world superpower in a violent insurrection is an interesting idea with plenty of potential. In practice, Electric State is meticulously crafted such that, should you fall asleep, you won’t miss anything.
The Russo Brothers are responsible for two of the highest-grossing films of all time by way of Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame. The goodwill they gained from those films has given them a blank-check to do whatever they want in the years since. So why this? Electric State is artistically bankrupt and dramatically inert. The names attached to the film are impressive, but no one seems invested in it as anything more than a stopgap between more interesting work. What’s more, the film is straight to Netflix without any kind of theatrical release, so there’s not even a box office incentive to justify the film’s ridiculous price tag.
The Electric State just exists, but even that statement feels like a stretch. The film doesn’t communicate anything, doesn’t offer any perspective. It is a film designed from start to finish to be put on in the background while doing something else. There’s nothing to engage with, because there doesn’t have to be. It just has to justify keeping the app open for 2 hours.
Thank you to Netflix and Touchwood PR for the press screening.
