Mere days after the launch date, we have a trailer for War Machine, coming to Netflix next month. Here’s what Alasdair Stuart spotted…

0.01 – Not having fun

I was thinking a lot about Chris Pratt and Alan Ritchson, their shared tendency to be cast as soldiers and why I find Pratt increasingly objectionable and Ritchson not at all. Moving aside from personal life choices, a lot of it is embodied in this shot. Pratt tends to play soldiers who wear their work lightly. Ritchson, even as Jack Reacher, is 100% down for showing physical and emotional cost. Literally the first second of this trailer being him waking up, traumatised and wounded, speaks very loudly to that.

0.06 – Look at the news story

Ritchson’s noggin is front and centre (and I like the stylistic choice of that shot being repeated a lot), but look at the screen. That’s an orbital track, going past Earth, with what seems to be an asteroid. We can see the words NASA and BREAKUP so now we know where the bad guy comes from. Have you seen A Quiet Place? Because this is how you get A Quiet Place.

0.07 – ‘But why are you here?’

The loaded nature of that line, playing out over Ritchson’s character in an unarmed combat drill (a polite way of saying fight club in this instance) is wild.

0.10 – Warzone

Moving aside from how tired I am of ‘yellow filter means middle east’, this shot feels revealing. That’s a convoy that’s got ripped up, and our boy is carrying a wounded comrade out. This should feel gratuitous! This should feel jingoistic! But it doesn’t, because it’s clearly a horrifying situation. Like I say, Ritchson knows how to set the tone for this kind of thing.

0.14 – ‘I just want to get across that finish line, Sergeant Major.’

The delivery on that and the PTSD he’s clearly suffering makes me wonder whether this is going to deal with the incredible psychological damage of being a soldier, especially an active duty one. I hope so, and if anyone can cover this stuff in a mainstream movie about an evil alien robot, it’s Ritchson.

0.23 – Esai Morales!

So nice to see him in something other than being wasted in both Mission: Impossible Reckoning movies. Such a great actor.

0.29 – RASP

Ranger Assessment and Selection Program or RASP is an eight week course with a 50% failure rate. The 50% that don’t fail are eligible to join the 75h Ranger Regiment. It’s widely regarded as one of the hardest selection process in the US Armed Forces, hence the RASP shirt here and the exercises the soldiers are undergoing.

0.32 – Smoke on the horizon

This shot of a lot of soldiers deploying via helicopter goes by very quickly but there are at least two smoke columns on the horizon. Given the location, I’m guessing the RASP candidates are nearest the asteroid fragments when it comes down and sent to investigate. There’s also either a fighter or a drone moving through the top of the image which again, suggests an unusual training exercise or actual deployment.

0.52 – Rout

The soldiers flat out running for their lives while the Mech, and we WILL GET TO THAT, attacks is an interesting beat. Even pre Ranger qualification these are professional soldiers, who know how to pull back while covering their colleagues’ escapes. The fact they’re running like hell drives home just how unprecedented this is. Also, look closely and I think two of them might be carrying a wounded colleague.

1.04 – Female Soldier

Just to get out ahead of it, RASP regularly has female candidates and Captain Sidney Jacques became the first female soldier to graduate the program last year.  This looks a lot like a female RASP candidate.

1.07 – ‘No comms, no flares, no firearms.’

So let’s talk about the angriest AT-ST in the world. The villain being a machine is such an obvious, and FUN, idea and this seems to suggest it’s able to work with their technology and subvert it. Alternately, a later beat suggests the candidates realise they can’t win, and their job becomes very different…

1.15 – War Machine

And there it is. Look at that angular, spiky, cubist anvil of a mech! Every line of that design screams ‘HURT’ and it’s got a tangible threat level I really enjoy. It also seems to have a very variable geometry. Plus we’re seeing it in daylight, stationary, a lot, which speaks to confidence in both the design and the effects.

1.22 – Look under the chopper

It goes by in a flash, but there’s a helicopter in this scene hauling something that’s a very odd shape. It doesn’t seem to be a military vehicle, it’s too angular. Honestly, it looks like the War Machine itself. I could well be reading it wrong but  wonder, are the Army in on it? Are they feeding these soldiers to the machine to see what it does?

1.22 – ‘It’s not about us anymore, it’s about warning everybody it’s coming.’

After a shot of a badly damaged airfield, we get this line from Ritchson and a look at what looks like his team. 15 is played by Blake Richardson, best known for Mystery Road: Origin. 60 looks a lot like Keiynan Lonsdale, beloved in these parts for his work on The Flash. There are two other guys to the right whose numbers we can’t quite see and that female presenting soldier again, 44, and with a little google fu…Alex King! Previously starred in Mask of the Evil Apparition and The Longest Weekend! Mystery solved!

1.29 – ‘Rangers lead the way!’

Given how badly he’s beaten up here, I’m guessing either a mid-movie rallying cry or a take on ‘COME ON YOU APES, YOU WANNA LIVE FOREVER!’ from Starship Troopers.

1.35 – APC Vs War Machine

Oh hell yes! This looks like a big fun moment. Also either the War Machine adapts a lot or it brought a friend…

 

 

War Machine looks enormously good fun and maybe a little smarter than we’re expecting. It’s on Netflix March 6th.

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