Genetic Infantry soldier 19 (Aneurin Barnard) is on the front lines of the battle for Nu-Earth. After his comrades (Jack Lowden, Daryl McCormack, Reese Shearsmith) fall in battle, their consciousnesses are uploaded into 19's helmet, bag, and gun. Together, they track down the general who betrayed their unit.
Those outside of the U.K. may not be as familiar with the Rogue Trooper as a character or the 2000 AD comics, even if you are familiar with Judge Dredd. However, you are most certainly familiar with the Trooper's footprint across film, video games, and sci-fi, with parallels from Avatar to Star Wars, and multiple spin-off games and comics. Director Duncan Jones, a fan of the character since childhood and who has built his career on sci-fi, has given himself a challenge with the first feature adaptation of the iconic character.
This is an animated film, and one that certainly takes some getting used to. It is made with Unreal Engine 5, the program used most often in video game creation. Ultimately, the film ends up feeling like an extended cutscene. Is the animation perfect? No, of course not. Then again, I can't think of any other way to bring such a world to the big screen without an enormous timeline and budget.
Perhaps the most glaring issue is the fact that the voice performances are terribly hard to understand. There are often loud noises of war in the background, and some of the actors themselves are filtered to sound more robotic. Pair this with particularly heavy U.K. accents, and many moments of dialogue were rendered inaudible; I had a particularly hard time understanding Shearsmith, unfortunate as his character, Bagman, serves as a major source of comic relief.
The film is childlike in its sense of scale and wonder. One can readily imagine a young Jones running around with action figures, creating these sprawling sci-fi battles. There are natural lulls or moments of comedic relief, as parents downstairs yell to 'keep it quiet up there!' There is an undeniable charm in Rogue Trooper, if not for the clear passion for the character. I do believe wholeheartedly that this is destined to become a cult hit. This is one for the fans.
