Genuine, honest-to-God, (and a bit late) review of A Minecraft Movie. (2025)
[Image ID: A picture of Jack Black as Steve, a bearded man with long hair and a turquoise tunic, holding a glowing cyan cube in front of a blocky portal made of black obsidian cubes, in a blocky, grassy atmosphere with cubic trees. He wears a surprised, delighted expression. End ID.]
It's been too long. (Spoilers ahead!)
It's been far too long since I grabbed my iron shovel of nostalgia and dug straight down into a mineshaft of childhood adaptations. The last time I ever talked about a movie on this Tumblr was my pre-release discussion of The Garfield Movie. To cut that long story short, I saw it with my mom, and it was frankly the most disappointing thing I'd ever seen. That's all you need to know about my opinions concerning The Garfield Movie.
However, I can not say the same for 2025's A Minecraft Movie. Yes, not the Minecraft movie, but a Minecraft movie. That title still bugs me to this day.
I know for a fact that this film had practically everything working against it, from the uncanny trailer featuring the now-infamous pink sheep, to the fact that it's been called more or less a Jumanji rehash (not that I've seen Jumanji though), to the fact that Jack Black was cast as main character Steve in what I would call a grave oversight, all these factors were setting up for what some would call one of the worst adaptations of all time.
And it was. To some people.
But not to me. Shocker, I know!
Don't get me wrong, I do have some problems with this film. I do agree that the whole "warped into Minecraft" plot is a bit clichΓ©, given the overall history and negative image of these "other dimension"-type plots. To be brutally honest, if it was just a story about Jack Black messing around in the Overworld, I might have liked it more, because for me, a lot of the best parts were when Jack Black was on screen, especially when he was with Jason Momoa's character Garrett.
There's also the whole subplot of Jennifer Coolidge's character being infatuated with a villager. For me, that was a bit unnecessary. Though it did build up to a pretty good punchline during the credits sequence, whenever they cut to that subplot it felt like the movie screeching to a halt.
I got the chance to see it the day after its initial release, on April the 5th. I got to see it with my father in the days leading up to my birthday. If you allow me to go off on a tangent, when one of my parents comes up to Kenosha to visit, it's often something very special. More often than not, whatever we're doing during that visit is often accompanied by a visit to the record store, Half Price Books, or more often than not, both as they're both in the same south Milwaukee shopping center. And me and my dad did the same with A Minecraft Movie.
Picture yourself in my situation.
So we got into the theater. We sat down. The movie began. It opened with Steve telling us about how he "yearned for the mines", but it never really worked out due to the authoritative nature of an old man blocking the entrance. Steve grows up, he gets a job, and while eating lunch, he rediscovers his dream. This was apparently directed by the same guy who did Napoleon Dynamite, Jared Hess, who also plays General Chungus in the film. Again, not that I've seen that film, but from what I have seen of it in passing, it does look similar.
Steve discovers the Orb of Dominance and the Earth Crystal. Upon combining the two objects, it opens a portal to the Overworld. As Steve stares in awe at the blocky landscape, it transitions into a montage of him building, surviving, taming a wolf named Dennis, typical Minecraft fare, and... Take a wild guess on what song plays in the background. I bet you wouldn't guess in a million years.
An instrumental cover of "Just Can't Get Enough" by Depeche Mode.
This was what effectively sold me on the film. One of the things you absolutely can not fault the film for is its soundtrack. There's some original stuff in there, such as the "Steve's Lava Chicken" song, which is always fun, as well as the Tenacious D-adjacent "I Feel Alive" which plays at the end of the film, but I feel the film shines when it reuses old music.
One of the earliest scenes in the film shows Garrett "The Garbage Man" Garrison, played by Jason Mamoa, wins a bid on a storage locker of items previously owned by Steve, under the belief that a rare 1978 Atari Cosmos was in there. (For your information, the Atari Cosmos was a real console at one point, but it was cancelled and never released publicly.) He is reasonably furious to find out that it's only the box, and is full of mostly worthless junk; The Orb of Dominance and the Earth Crystal among them. It's actually quite a funny sequence, especially as he screams "Where's the Atari?!"
Garrett drives home, and the song that plays in the background is "I Remember You" by Skid Row. Now, this may seem like a cash grab pop culture reference, but as someone who absolutely loves 1980's music, I got a serious kick out of it.
A future scene with Steve, Garrett and Henry escaping the Piglins is set to "Private Idaho" by the B-52's. Again, I understand that this may not please a lot of people, especially people who love C418's soundtrack to Minecraft, but I love new wave so I applauded regardless.
"But Max!" I hear you ask. "There's so much more to the movie than just the soundtrack! There's other characters and moments you haven't even discussed! You're just biased!"
You're right. I am biased.
I'm getting to that, hold your damn horses.
Much of this film centers around two characters: Henry, played by Sebastian Hansen, and Natalie, played by Emma Myers. There's also Dawn, played by Danielle Brooks, and Marlene, played by Jennifer Coolidge, the principal of Henry's school who falls in love with a Villager.
Since this post is already much longer than I ever anticipated, I'll try to keep things brief.
Henry and Natalie have just moved to Chuglass, Idaho, home of the Chuglass Chip Factory. The reason they moved? Because their mom passed away, or left, or something. ClichΓ© as all of the Nether? Yes. Executed well? Debatable. Much of the opening of the film is building up to when Henry discovers the Overworld, but Henry wants to appear normal. I understand if they wanted to add this subtext to make it more relatable to a younger audience, but it's so overdone that it's almost comical at this point.
Unfortunately for Henry, his attempts to appear normal backfire horrendously when a couple of bullies sabotage his attempts at building a fully functioning jetpack, which drifts completely off track and blows up Chuggy the Chip, the mascot for Chuglass Chip Factory, and probably nearly costing Natalie her job at the factory. What does this have to do with Minecraft? Nothing. But it's entertaining to watch nonetheless.
This is easily the most entertaining moment I can name off the top of my head concerning the characters that aren't Steve or Garrett. The younger siblings just seemed a bit too dull and generic for me. Not that they're bad characters, mind you, I still like them, but they just didn't do much for me other than remind me that they're there to appeal to a younger crowd.
I feel if the film focused solely on Steve and Garrett, it would've been a lot more fun to watch. Even Dawn, whose entire character is built on her love for animals, would have made a good third character to fill it out.
And speaking of things that don't really work, it's time I address the elephant in the room: The Villager x Marlene subplot.
This subplot, my God. Again, I'll keep it brief.
It's not that I don't like it. I'm a furry, so weird relationships such as this are second nature for me. There's also a few funny bits in this which I won't get into. But... it really was not necessary at all! It adds absolutely nothing to the film except I guess satisfy the B-plot quota. I also find it funny, and kind of disappointing, that they got Matt Berry to voice him at the end. Personally, I would've preferred if they got one of the Element Animation villager voice actors for him, but what do I know. But as I said earlier, every time they cut to this B-plot, it feels like the film as a whole is screeching to a halt. It's like the film is changing channels; The two plots seem so disconnected to each other.
The villain: Rotten pork from the Nether.
[Image ID: In a fiery, blocky landscape, we see Malgosha on a voxel throne, a piglike creature with a hunchback, black cloak, and glowing purple eyes, looking towards a piglin, an anthropomorphic pig like creature on the right, holding up a piece of paper. On the left, Malgosha holds a staff with a hook on the end. End ID.]
The main villain of this film is Malgosha, played by Rachel House, the leader of the Piglins who rules over the Nether with an iron hoof. I must say that I really do like her as a villain. I honestly found it interesting that they chose to create an original villain instead of just reusing the Ender Dragon or the Wither. When I created my own Minecraft AU (coming soon!) I actually chose to create a new villain that's an anthropomorphic Mooshroom, who is actually driven by a similar desire.
What does Malgosha want? The Orb. Who has the Orb? Steve. Why does she want it? So she could rule the Overworld!
[Image ID: An animated GIF of M. Bison from the Street Fighter movie, a militaristic figure with a military hat, red collar and dark grey jacket, turning to the camera and yelling "Of course!" in front of several TVs, showing a man wearing a helmet. In the lower left, it says "Of course!" in all-caps, white Impact font with a black border. End ID.]
In the beginning of the film, Steve finds a ruined Nether portal, reconstructs it, and lights it up with some... say it with me now!
He enters the Nether, and Malgosha takes notice very quickly. They capture Steve, and hold him captive for Jeb knows how long, and Steve sends his tamed wolf Dennis out to protect the orb after they snatch it away from one of the Piglin Brutes. Dennis then takes the Orb and hides it under Steve's bed in the real world. I must say they opened the film reasonably well; They really did a good job of making it seem theatrical and epic.
The bulk of the film is taken up by motley crew of four heroes trying to learn the ways of Minecraft from Steve. Along the way, they encounter Piglins who fly around on fireball-shooting Ghasts, and other Piglin creatures, such as a giant Piglin beast who Malgosha unleashes upon our heroes after smiting down upon Chungus.
And it's now I get to talk about audience participation.
[Image ID: We see a chicken jockey, a green skinned zombie with a square head, rectangular eyes and nose, turquoise shirt and boots riding and caressing a blocky chicken while smiling. He is surrounded by ropes, and behind the ropes are Illagers, grey-skinned square figures with large noses and eyebrows, wearing buttoned jackets. A torch burns on the left. End ID.]
One of the major headlines this movie has generated is the damage caused by people during the "Chicken Jockey" scene. The scene lasts less than a six minutes but left a massive impact. I've heard the rumor that the reason people acted this way is so the movie would get banned from theaters and potentially bomb, but that seems like a stretch. I'd say, people just want to act like assholes. Simple as that.
Thankfully, the theater I went to didn't result in such chaos, though from what I remember we saw it a day or so before it became a meme. People simply clapped and repeated lines back. No food was thrown, no chickens being snuck in, no firecrackers lit off. Just simple, wholesome movie audience participation. I can't wait for the day when midnight showings of this become a thing, though I also kind of dread that day.
I close out my review by talking about the ending, which I'm sorry, was well executed but a bit anticlimactic. You see, after training on the ways of Minecraft with the help of Steve, Henry, Natalie, and the others are ready to take on Malgosha. Natalie responds by making an army of Iron Golems, and Dawn goes out and tames a metric ton of wolves.
Malgosha and her Piglins have already built a gigantic Nether portal, I guess as a means of unleashing the forces of the Nether upon the Overworld, all powered by the Orb of Dominance, which they stole from Henry, Steve, and Garrett earlier in the film.
This results in a fight sequence between the Iron Golems and the Piglin army, one of the Iron Golems has a winged Mercury helmet and Boots of Swiftness, which I felt was a pretty cool design. Malgosha even points out that Iron Golems don't attack unless provoked... which one Piglin makes the mistake of firing an arrow at them. Well done, man. It's a good spectacle, though I didn't get that much out of it.
To cut a very long story short, the Piglin Beast gets defeated by the Swiftness Golem, the Orb is rescued, the rest of the Piglins, including Malgosha zombify. Steve makes the decision to return to the Overworld after some careful thinking, sings "I Feel Alive" with Garrett at his video game store, and in the post-credits sequence meets Alex at his old house. Yes, Alex. I told you there would be spoilers!
In conclusion, I feel people are way, way too harsh on this film. I understand completely if it isn't what people were expecting; I wouldn't be surprised if people genuinely wanted a more serious Minecraft experience, but I like when something goes out of its way to be more entertaining, because in an age of overly serious and gritty reboots and superhero movies, it's refreshing to see a film that isn't afraid to think outside the box-er, block.
A Minecraft Movie. Perfect movie? Absolutely not. Terrible movie? Refer to previous answer. Definitely a flawed movie, but I enjoyed it a lot more than most people I've seen on YouTube. I even bought the 4K Blu-ray steel book. I did pay forty dollars for it. And no, I do not regret it.
