An excerpt from my script review for Gemini Man which will be available 10/14/19:
3.) Quality of Characters
Imagine if the A-Team had to fight younger versions of themselves.
Now imagine if everyone except Hannibal and Murdock just make cameos and die early on.
That’s the characters you have in this script.
(Unfortunately B. A. Baracus dies before we meet him onscreen. Call me a cynic, but I don’t think Will Smith was who Benioff envisioned for Henry Brogan. Maybe I’m the racist, but it felt like the only diversity was when we’re treated to “foreign” clichés like Latin drug lords or Asian policemen.)
The issue with this version of the script is we’re not given anything new and unique.
The action scenes are all things we’ve seen before, and now you’re delivering us stereotype characters?
Shit, even if you don’t agree with my above A-Team comparison, then substitute in Jason Bourne fighting a younger Jason Bourne.
John Wick versus Young John Wick…etc.
It all felt phoned in, even when we tried to show Junior longing for a real childhood. It was never fully developed and instead we have cheap “woe is me” scenes as he waits for his next instructions.
(And the main villain? We don’t even really see him do anything, it’s just implied that he’s a heartless badass, until he pulls a pistol on Henry and gets shots by everyone else.)
Please be original with your characters.
What could have worked better here? Showing Junior in these settings and then having him be cold blooded, like we expect him to be sad, but he shoots the kids soccer ball or something just as sinister.
That way when Henry eventually tries to bring him around, it’s a real challenge to get through that sort of mental conditioning.
Lead your audience one way, and then “flip the script” on their expectations.
They just might applaud you for it.
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