A Minecraft Movie breakdown and review

Let's Minecraft

This is more of a full spoiler breakdown of the movie than a review. This is your only spoiler warning. Beyond this point, they will fly fast and free.

As someone who has been a fan of Minecraft for well over a decade and change, I’ve always had mixed feelings about any attempts to create a narrative within the Minecraft world. The idea of a structured story seems to fly directly in the face of the free flowing creativity that makes Minecraft one of the most iconic games of all time. The concept of a live action Minecraft movie is absurd enough as it is, but then you throw in a cast including Jack Black and Jason Momoa and I’ll be damned if my interest isn’t piqued enough to want to at least want to check it out. My excitement for All Elite Wrestling’s All In Texas (taking place about 10 hours after the posting of this) led me to order that through Amazon Prime Video, and I received a $10 credit for doing so. I then used $6 of this to rent the Minecraft movie and the other $4 to get a significant discount on renting Sinners. These are called pro strats. I'll watch Sinners after Y'all In, but for now here is a full breakdown of A Minecraft Movie followed by a short review. Enjoy.

The Set-up

A Minecraft Movie starts with main character Steve (played by Jack Black, of Brutal Legend fame) stuck in a rut at his office job as a doorknob salesman in Chuglass, Idaho. He is yearning for the mines, so he decides to follow his heart. While mining, Steve finds two artifacts, that when combined, create a portal that leads him to the cubic overworld that we all know and love. He soon discovers the joys of bringing a creative vision to life and eventually becomes what all Minecraft players become at the end of the game. A master of the overworld. After building to his heart's content, he discovers a ruined portal, and enters the nether where he is captured by the movie's antagonist, Malgosha. Steve sends his loyal wolf, Dennis to back to the real world to hide the artifact orb under his waterbed and then we get a title card. We are then introduced to Garrett "Garbage Man" Garrison (played by Jason Momoa), a man stuck trying to recapture his glory days of being a champion gamer. He ends up buying a storage unit in a storage wars sort of scenario on the hope of a super rare and potentially expensive Atari Cosmos console. It turns out the unit was full of Steve's stuff and now Garbage Man has the cubic artifacts. As he is driving while absolutely belting out Skid Row's "I Remember You", his car breaks down and we are soon introduced to two of our other main characters. Brother and Sister duo Natalie (played by Emma Myers) and Henry (played by Sebastian Hansen) are moving to Chuglass after their mother's death because it's cheap and Natalie has a steady job opportunity. Finally we are introduced to the fifth member of our group, real estate agent/mobile petting zoo operator named Dawn (played by Danielle Brooks). The next day, Henry meets Garrett in the latter's vintage video game store where they start a friendship after Garrett says he can show Henry to be a winner. By this point, it's more that obvious that this movie is not taking itself seriously at all, but that point is hammered home when in the next scene, Henry designs and builds a working jetpack, but due to somebody sabotaging the jetpack, ends up destroying Chuggy, the mascot of the town's prized potato chip factory. After a talking to from the principal Marlene (played by Stiffler's Mom, Jennifer Coolidge), Henry calls the guy he met literally that morning instead of his sister for some reason. Back at the video game store, Henry and Garrett put the artifact orbs together and this causes Steve's portal to open. As they are being dragged to the portal, Natalie and Dawn catch up to them and all four are transported to the Minecraft overworld and our story truly begins now.

What The Actual Fuck is happening?

After our four friends are dropped into the overworld, Garrett talks to a sheep because he thinks it's a quest giver and a Nitwit Villager enters the portal to the real world. Back in the nether, Malgosha is tasking her piglin army with finding gold and we are treated to a bizarre critique of capitalistic greed as she notices a piglin child drawing something, she calls it over, it shows her it's crayon drawing of a house, she asks how this helps her find more gold, then she straight up fucking shanks the piglin child. Shortly after this, she finds Steve chiseling a piglin statue and telling him "no one wants to waste time on art or leisure". After Malgosha sends Steve to retrieve the orb, we are taken back to the other four where they are caught outside at night and they are attacked by an amount of mobs that would make hardcore difficulty look like peaceful. While running away, Henry runs into a tree and discovers how the Minecraft world works. He is able to build a tower to escape the mobs, at least for a short time. Fortunately for the four, Steve shows up to drop some elbows on some zombitches and shortly after, the sun rises to finish off the rest of the mobs. Unfortunately, one part of the orb was broken and now they're all stuck in the Minecraft world until they can go to a woodland mansion for a new Earth Crystal (which is not actually a thing in Minecraft). Back in the real world, the Nitwit Villager from earlier is walking around before being hit by Marlene's Jeep Grand Cherokee. She asks if the villager is going to sue her, because everyone sues her when they get hit with her Jeep Grand Cherokee. Marlene then inexplicably invites the villager to dinner because why the fuck not...

The Second Act, I guess?

Back in the overworld, Steve has taken the other four to a nearby village so they can grab some things from his secret stash, which is conveniently marked with signs denoting the location of his secret stash. Along the way we are treated to the Lava Chicken song, which is unironically a banger. Back in the nether Malgosha is made aware of Steve's betrayal and is bringing out the big guns. She summons a general by the name of, and I swear to gawd bro, I am not freakin makin this up bro, General Chungus (voiced by Jared Hess), to go and get the orb from the five humans and kill them. Back in the overworld we have a conversation about letting your creativity out and being yourself where Natalie is trying to get Henry back to the real world, while Steve and Garrett say that Henry's natural creativity are able to fully shine in the Minecraft world. Garrett drops the line "I'm more of a sister to Hank than you'll ever be". Just when I think I'm going to join my kitty in paying attention to something else, this movie pulls me back in with a silly line like that. The guys go and bro out in Steve's dope, secret stash room while the ladies take the more practical route of trying to trade for a map to the woodland mansion. We get a good crafting joke where Garrett accidently crafts buckets before trying to pass them off as nun-chuck like weapons. Henry then just straight up builds a fucking blunderbuss that shoots tater tots. While Henry is toying with his creation, Garrett shows Steve that he has the orb and tells Steve to take him to a massive stash of diamonds or else. "No diamonds, no orb". As the ladies approach the cartographer, General Chungus (again, I am not making that up) launches a full scale attack using ghasts and an army of piglins. Chungus apologizes for having to unalive Steve using that exact word choice, before a full scale battle breaks out. Garrett accidently knocks Steve out with his bucket nun-chucks before getting wrecked, Henry starts blastin fools, and the two ladies kick all sorts of piglin ass. The guys end up on a cliffside where Steve shows just how much he has accomplished in the Minecraft world by whipping out TWO elytra and implying that he also has a third somewhere (for context you have to beat the Ender Dragon which is considered to be the final boss, then you have to clear an end city just for one elytra. Steve in the movie is well beyond end game level). Garrett gives Henry a shove off the cliff before jumping off himself. Steve forgot his third elytra so he dives off the cliff to catch up to Garrett. This of course leads to the hilarious visual of Jack Black Riding Jason Momoa like a Pegasus. After a fantastic aerial fight set to the B-52's "Private Idaho", Garrett and Steve have to fit through a small tunnel to escape and we get an even funnier visual of Jack Black and Jason Momoa in a full 69 or as they call it in the movie a "full man sandwich". After escaping, all three guys collide and go careening towards the ground, but are saved by the pro gamer, water bucket trick. Back at the village, the ladies seem to be doing alright except for not knowing how to craft a boat. They then take off headed for the woodland mansion.

What The Actual Fuck is happening, part 2:

Back in the real world, Marlene is on her date with the nitwit villager, and I hate to say that this villager is having a better first date than 95% of the ones I've ever been on. You also get a cameo by Minecraft developer Jeb as the waiter in this scene. These scenes with Marlene and the villager payoff in a small bit at the end and have nothing to do with the main plot at all. I don't know why they're here, but if I have to watch them, you have to read about them. Back to our three guys, Steve tells Malgosha's backstory of how she was embarrassed during the semi-finals of the Nether's Got Talent show and that is somehow what caused her to denounce all forms of creativity instead choosing to pursue gold. Faced with the choice of going over or through Redstone Mountain, Steve opts to go through it after being reminded that Garrett has the orb that is Steve's only hope of saving Dennis. In the Nether, Malgosha calls upon The Great Hog, a massive piglin. This gigantic piglin knocks a bunch of others off a bridge before vaporizing General Chungus. RIP in peace General Chungus. The two ladies are casually strolling through a forest at night while talking and slaying zombies. They are confronted by a wolf that Dawn is able to tame. It turns out that this wolf is Dennis. Dennis leads the ladies in the direction of the woodland mansion. Inside Redstone Mountain, Garrett triggers every last one of Steve's booby traps before accidently opening the door to the stash of diamonds. Henry is upset that they went this far out of the way just for diamonds, but before anything can happen, The Great Hog starts blasting. The trio make a break for the minecarts and head towards a safe room before being diverted in a different direction. Steve's torch goes out, but once it's relit, they find that they are dead in the middle of Steve's poorly designed creeper farm. The Great Hog is onto them again and Garrett gets out and pushes the minecarts to the next powered rail. In the movie, the creepers don't seem to activate until hit so as Garrett is pushing, Steve and Henry start smacking creepers around to get them to explode. The minecarts just barely touch the powered rail and go shooting off as all of the creepers explode in a chain reaction. Once they've reached the end of the line, Henry let's his feeling about Garrett's diamond detour be known and Garrett finally drops the macho, ultra confident persona that he has been barely hanging onto the whole movie. After they all have that moment, it's back to the date between Marlene and the villager. Yay... Instead of another screenshot of my Minecraft base, how about a video tour where you can also see my dope Fallout koala skin. It's a million times more interesting than this dumbass plotline. Back with the three guys, they've finally arrived at the woodland mansion. Steve attempts to demonstrate the layout of the mansion, but doesn't have the time to build a multilevel diorama. There's a little bit of back and forth about this before Henry says that he could build stairs to the second floor and then sneak in. Steve says that they'll need a diversion. Somehow Steve and Garrett procure saxophones and mushroom hats to stage a performance for the illagers. Steve straight up points at Henry upstairs, but somehow the illagers didn't seem to notice.

On his way up to the third floor, Henry is spotted and chased by some illagers, but is able to make it to a room filled with chests. Steve and Garrett aren't quite as lucky. As Henry is searching for the Earth Chrystal, Steve and Garrett awake in a wrestling ring. This movie has gone fully off the rails. Steve is tied to the ropes and Garrett is across from a chicken. This is the infamous chicken jockey scene. As someone who used to clean movie theaters, the people throwing popcorn weren't that big of a deal, because that all just got swept under the seats anyway. The people who were throwing sodas and especially the person who brought a live chicken to a showing of the movie...force them to clean every theater for the rest of the night under threat of scaphism if they fail to do so. I'm glad I didn't see this movie in theaters.

Anyway, Garrett gets shitmixed by the chicken jockey for a bit while Henry finds the Earth Crystal. Henry makes the rookie mistake of not building up three blocks before looking an enderman in the eyes. Back in the ring, Garrett finally gets a hope spot in before falling for the old crying baby trick and gets cut off. Life Pro Tip: Never trust a crying baby. Back in the chest room, I don't know what kind of acid trip version of Minecraft the people who made this movie played as this enderman forces Henry to hallucinate all of his friends giving him disparaging remarks, but he is able to snap himself out of it before fucking the enderman up. Garrett is still taking the heat, but Steve is able to free himself and headbutts the baby out of midair. Back upstairs, Henry is swinging wildly at the enderman instead of just putting a boat down and luring the enderman into it. Eventually, Henry kills it and picks up the ender pearl before digging straight down to join with the other two. Henry, Garrett, and Steve make a quick exit before being surrounded on a bridge by Malgosha and her piglin/ghast army (air force?). As piglins carrying TNT surround them, Garrett throws Henry onto an open platform carried by a ghast. Steve then uses a slime block as a trampoline to make the jump to the platform. Instead of joining them Garrett decides to make a last stand so they can escape. He fights a bunch of piglins, but a massive explosion takes out the bridge and causes the ghast carrying the platform to crash not too far away. Henry and Steve are knocked out, but reawaken in a mushroom house with Dawn and Natalie. We also get the reunion between Steve and Dennis. Malgosha now has the orb and tells a piglin named Travis to place it at the top of a tower so it can block out the sun and cause a permanent night. Things don't look great for our heroes.

The Final Battle

Travis drops the orb into the cube at the top of the tower and as Malgosha said, a laser shoots up and blocks the sun. A massive amount of piglins come through the portal at the base of the tower. After getting everybody on mostly the same page, the heroes head to Steve's secret stash where Henry comes up with a grand plan to fight off the piglin army. A montage plays of various parts of the plan coming together before everyone is ready for the final battle. Malgosha gives a speech to her army telling them to destroy the villages. To burn the homes and the symmetrical farms. The piglins are now fully mobilized toward the village, where Natalie is putting the jack-o-lanterns on what can only be described as a fucking shit ton of iron golems. Henry puts boots of swiftness on one of the golems to create a leader golem of sorts. The piglin army stops in their tracks at the sight of several dozen iron golems heading their way. Malgosha correctly proclaims that the golems won't attack unless provoked. Travis from earlier shoots an arrow that boops a golem and now shit's popping off. Predictably, the golems just fucking wreck the piglins. Deadeye Henry and Sword Saint Natalie show up and make their way through the battlefield towards the tower. The Great Hog joins the battle and things begin turning in favor of the piglins. We get a fun little sequence between The Great Hog and the leader golem before Steve confronts Malgosha while decked out in full diamond armor. Steve fails a dramatic attack and gets his diamond chest piece broken, but is able to get back to his feet. While Steve is throwing eggs at Malgosha, Natalie and Henry are at the base of the tower. The Great Hog smokes the leader golem before running to try to stop them. Henry puts the ender pearl from earlier into his gun and shoots it to the top of the tower. The Great Hog attempts to fight through Natalie to get to the tower, but Dawn returns with an army of tamed wolves that start going to town on The Great Hog. This gives Henry enough time to attempt to build up high enough to grab the orb. Unfortunately, he gets straight noscoped by The Great Hog and falls all the way off the tower. As he's falling, The Great Hog takes another shot at him, but Henry is saved by a flying ghast controlled by Garrett who survived the explosion on the bridge earlier thanks to the water bucket trick. Henry grabs a spear and jabs the ghast in the tentacles causing it to shoot several fireballs at the tower. This destroys the tower and shuts off the laser, allowing the sun to come out again. All of the enemies begin either dying or zombifying. In the explosion, the orb was knocked off the tower and lands at the feet of The Great Hog who picks it up and is immediately on the receiving end of a primary lotus/windmill headbonk. The orb gently falls to Natalie and all but Steve reunite at the base of the tower. Steve now has Malgosha at the end of a diamond sword where they have one last ethos battle. Steve says that it is harder to create than destroy. That's why cowards tend to choose the latter. Malgosha attempts the "lure them in to stab them" trick multiple times, but Steve is too smart and Malgosha too weak for it to work at all. Malgosha eventually face plants and the good guys have officially won.

The End:

The group is standing at the portal and Steve is giving Henry the option to stay if he wants. Henry declines. Everything is set up for Garrett, Henry, Dawn, Natalie, and even Dennis to go back to the real world. Steve sings Dennis a song about how the wolf should help Dawn the same way it helped Steve. Everyone says their goodbyes to Steve before walking into the portal, but in a twist, Steve joins them. We then get a sequence where everyone teams up to make a hit game and now Garrett's once floundering shop is the hottest spot in Chuglass, Idaho. Garrett and Steve team up to perform a song while we get a montage of what happens to the crew after returning to the real world. Dawn's zoo on wheels becomes a success, Natalie opens a self defense studio, and Henry gets his jetpack to work properly and becomes the coolest kid in school. The movie ends with everyone singing and dancing followed by a cut to credits.

Post credits:

During the credits, we finally get the payoff to the Marlene/Villager nonsense. Marlene's ex husband is the teacher who was in the movie for all of about 90 seconds, the villager now speaks with a posh British accent, and for some reason Marlene can speak villager. They literally met the night before... Every minute of this plotline has been a horror show waste of time. These motherfuckers had better have gotten PAID by Jeep for this dumb shit.

The post credits scene shows Steve returning to his old house. He is greeted by Alex (the female main character of Minecraft, apparently played by Kate McKinnon). And that's the end of A Minecraft Movie. Here are my final thoughts.

My thoughts:

I thought I was going to hate it, but to be honest it's actually a pretty fun, turn your brain off movie. All of the performances are great, but Jason Momoa's performance is a ton of fun, and Jack Black being Jack Black just elevates the movie even more. If literally anybody else is in the role of Steve, this movie fails completely. As far as the main story goes, I enjoyed the themes it was playing around with. It doesn't really go all that deep into those themes, but also IT'S A FUCKING MINECRAFT MOVIE so I can't really expect it to. I also thought a lot of the effects looked pretty good. I was watching it on a tv that was about 15 feet away so maybe that had something to do with it, but I thought they were good.

Obviously, the movie does kind of play it fast and loose with some of the core concepts of Minecraft the game, but that hardly detracts from Minecraft the movie. What does detract from the movie, is the villager/Jennifer Coolidge plot line because it had no impact on the main story, and the payoff was just plain fucking stupid. If you take that out, this movie honestly almost gets bumped up a full star. But as it stands now, A Minecraft Movie is a fun, dumb, movie that any fan of the game can at least watch for a laugh or two. I can't say that I regret watching it, I will however say that I am glad that I didn't pay my own money for it, because then I might feel a little bit different about it.

★★★★★★☆☆☆☆ 6/10

If you enjoyed feel free to leave a comment, have a great day/night/whatever, and always remember, Don't Let the Bastards Grind You Down. Thanks for reading.