On 4th Feb, that expert trickster JJ Abrams dropped Cloverfield 3 aka The Cloverfield Paradox straight onto Netflix at the same time as the trailer landed, with no warning whatsoever. It's getting, um, mixed reviews (okay, it's getting largely negative reviews).
We liked it. But that's not to say we can't acknowledge that it is also extremely silly.
So, without judgement and in the spirit of affection, here are The Cloverfield Paradox's nine most ridiculous moments. Needless to say this is full of spoilers.
1. Jensen and the photo
Elizabeth Debicki as Jensen randomly turns up in the wall with electrical cables running through her skin (why? That's the least of our worries right now). We were more confused by the presence of a photo on the wall from Jensen's Earth 2 version of Cloverfield Space Station (we're calling the parallel world where Jensen is from 'Earth 2' for convenience).
Jensen wasn't on this version of the space station. Okay, inter-dimensional timey-whimey business is going on but it's a bit bloody convenient that that particular team photo comes with her and appears perfectly intact on the wall while Jensen appears no way intact and actually in the wall.
2. Volkov's eye. And face. And stomach. And imaginary friend.
Rattling through horror tropes like future of the world depended on it, in The Cloverfield Paradox the mistrustful Russian Astronaut Volkov (Aksel Hennie) gets the sharp end of the stick. Straight after the particle accelerator sets off the inter-dimensional shift, Volkov (but no one else) is feeling right peaky.
First he gets a funny eye which is wobbling all over the place. Then it turns out he's full of worms. And later it turns out a key piece of navigational equipment, their gyroscope, is also in his tummy. And he definitely didn't put it there. And who's he talking to in the mirror? The worms?
Why? What logic is this based on other than 'parallel universes! Particles and stuff'? And what did Volkov do to make him full of transported worms and a gyro?
3. Mundy's arm
Come to that, how did Mundy's disembodied arm know where the gyro was? And how did it operate without… person attached?
Volkov isn't the only crew member to suffer a cruel and unusual fate. Chris O'Dowd's is cruel, unusual and hilarious, as he, for no discernible reason, gets sucked into the wall of the spaceship, which cuts off his arm and perfectly heals the stump immediately. The arm, elsewhere, then grows sentient and can operate independently, tipping off the gang to the whereabouts of the missing gyro.
But how did the arm know? Did the arm put it there...? And why are the crew not the least bit curious about what other secrets that arm is in possession of? It might have been able to give them a hand.
4. Armies everywhere
And on that, if this is a parallel universe in which sentient disembodied limbs are possible, wouldn't that be a thing that's potentially going on on Earth as well? And if that's a thing, isn't it probable that there are a number of other anomalies and differences that are pretty pertinent? If only there was someone from the other dimension they could ask. Oh.
5. How do you make a working firearm with a 3D bagel printer?
We are aware that it's already possible to 3D print a working firearm. It's not currently possible, or indeed desirable, to print a bagel. But hey, this is the future, we can live with it.
However, we still have questions.Why, for example, are there a template for a gun and some ready-made space bullets aboard the station? Highly irresponsible when this is an international mission to create a sustainable energy source, not Star Trek, and where there are already tensions amongst the crew members even before Volkov gets worms.
So irresponsible, in fact, that Jensen nearly kills everyone with it and Hamilton (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) blows her out the window with it. Also, wouldn't there be a high chance of getting bagel mixture in your gun?
6. Who let Schmidt out of the airlock?
Let's never mention this again. The characters certainly don't.
7. Where in the Universe?
If they just changed dimension, why are they on the other side of the sun from the Earth in the second dimension? Also, why didn't they notice that, even without the gyro? Any half-decent astronaut should be able to spot that just by looking at the stars.
8. Michael's final plea
Hamilton's husband Michael (Roger Davies) is stuck back on Earth and worried sick about his wife who's suddenly vanished into thin space. He meets and rescues young Molly, who is separated from her family and when we last see him (we're not exactly clear on the timeline of how long Hamilton has been gone and exactly what went down when on Earth 1) he's living in a bunker with Molly.
When he gets the news that his wife has reappeared and is heading back to Earth, though, he's not actually pleased at all. Instead he begs her not to come back.
What would you have her do Michael, die alone in space?
9. Hamilton's dilemma
The emotional crux of The Cloverfield Paradox is Hamilton's choice of whether to stay in the parallel universe where her kids are alive, or to return to Earth 1 where they are dead. What will she do? Take the selfish route and reunite with other-world offspring or return to the infinitely harder world where her real bereaved husband lives?
Only that's not the dilemma at all. It's 'do you want to go to a world where disembodied arms scurry around sentiently, where if you're out of luck you might end up full of worms and where another version of you exists already, a world which we know has very little chance of survival since Earth 2's Cloverfield Station has already crashed into the ocean, and with the chance of re-building Earth 2's particle accelerator negligible, according to Jensen, so you'll probably have to watch your kids die horribly again?'
Nah, you're alright. I'll go back to my own one, ta.
