Bong Joon-ho’s Mickey 17 is a bold and unpredictable mix of sci-fi spectacle, existential horror, and wry satire. It’s a film that defies easy categorisation, lurching from dark philosophical musings to moments of absurd comedy, with Robert Pattinson at the centre of it all, playing two versions of the same doomed man. At its best, it’s an audacious and thought-provoking thriller. At its worst, it’s a messy but fascinating experiment that never quite settles into a rhythm.
The premise is bleakly compelling: in a dystopian 2054, Mickey Barnes signs up as an “Expendable” on a space mission to the frozen hellscape of Niflheim. His job is to die over and over again, each time waking up in a new clone body with his memories intact. It’s a grim, Black Mirror-esque conceit, given an ironic twist as Mickey gradually realises that the true horror isn’t his repeated deaths—it’s the politics, betrayals, and corporate rot that infest the colony itself.
Pattinson brings a slippery, sardonic charm to the role(s), playing Mickey 17 as a scrappy survivor and Mickey 18 as his more aggressive, possibly sociopathic counterpart. Their clash is the film’s most intriguing element, a clone-versus-clone battle where identity and ethics blur beyond recognition. Naomi Ackie provides a grounded counterbalance as Nasha, Mickey’s love interest, while Mark Ruffalo and Toni Collette revel in villainous theatrics as the colony’s scheming power couple. Steven Yeun’s Timo, meanwhile, injects moments of levity as Mickey’s pragmatic but self-serving friend.
Visually, Mickey 17 is stunning. Bong’s trademark ability to blend the industrially grotesque with dreamlike beauty is on full display, whether in the sterile nightmare of the spaceship or the eerie, frozen landscapes of Niflheim. The creepers—strange, tardigrade-like aliens—are one of the film’s best creations, initially threatening but later revealed to be more nuanced than the humans who fear them. Their eventual alliance with Mickey provides a fascinating subversion of the expected human-versus-alien conflict.
However, the film’s pacing is uneven. The opening act is a gripping mix of dark comedy and existential dread, but the middle section drags as it gets bogged down in political scheming and colony bureaucracy. The climax, though, is pure Bong—chaotic, tragic, and darkly comic. The final act, in which Mickey 18 sacrifices himself in an explosion that also takes out Marshall, is both cathartic and bleak, ensuring that the film ends on a note of uneasy resolution.
Mickey 17 is likely to divide audiences. Some will find its mix of tones exhilarating; others will see it as frustratingly inconsistent. But even at its most uneven, it remains a fascinating, ambitious film that challenges the conventions of the sci-fi genre. Whether you love it or struggle with its chaotic energy, one thing is certain: Bong Joon-ho has once again crafted something utterly unique.
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