10 Movie Idiots Who Made Simple Solutions Look IMPOSSIBLE

The Wachowskis have been royalty in the sci-fi film industry ever since they created one of the most infamous franchises, The Matrix. But in 2015, they released a film that nearly became their downfall. That film was Jupiter Ascending.

Jupiter Ascending concerns one illegal Russian immigrant, Jupiter Jones, who has spent her life cleaning toilets for a living only to discover she is the reincarnation of a space monarch. She befriends wolf-human hybrid Cane, who is basically Channing Tatum with a dodgy goatee and pointy ears, and embarks on a quest to claim her inheritance from this dead space queen. Opposition comes from the dead space queen’s children, all of whom want Jupiter’s sizeable inheritance for themselves. What exactly she is inheriting, you might wonder. Well, it’s Earth. Yeah, the whole planet. Because what you don’t realise is that these space dynasties “seed” planets with human populations, then “harvest” the population once the planet has reached capacity to blend humans down into… life juice? It’s like a really good moisturiser that keeps everyone basically immortal (except if you’re murdered – hint hint.)

So Jupiter goes off-planet to meet all her previous self’s children and admin the hell out of all of them to claim Earth as her own. (Seriously, there is a whole admin sequence at what is essentially the space DMV. Incredible.) Eddie Redmayne gives the performance of his life, reveals he murdered his mother, and then gets blown up in a life-juice factory on the planet Jupiter. Jupiter inherits the Earth, and returns to life as an illegal immigrant cleaning toilets.0.

Also Sean Bean is there and is part bee.

It was a critical disaster, even though it managed somewhat of a cult following. While I’d consider myself part of that following, I’m not blind to the questionable scriptwriting. One thing that cannot be faulted 99% of the time is the Wachowskis’ world-building abilities and interesting characterisation. Once you get your head around the system of space capitalism, it’s a surprisingly nice two hour jaunt around the solar system. Plus, it’s a very aesthetically pleasing film – one guy straight up built a gothic cathedral on his spaceship, which is taste in design I cannot fault.

Yet there is one character in this entire film for whose actions I cannot forgive. At the beginning of the movie, Jupiter Jones’ father lives in Russia with his pregnant wife, and likes to look at the stars with a very fancy telescope. One night, burglars break into their home to steal valuables. They try to take his telescope, he tries to stop them, and gets shot dead right in front of his pregnant wife. For some reason, this evidently very smart man decides that a telescope is worth risking his life over – nay, his entire family! This smidge of plot is unlikely to really change the wider events of the film, since Jupiter is already going to be the reincarnation of a Space Queen. But really, was your telescope worth it in the end? Doubt it.

There’s an important lesson here: if you’re being mugged, your belongings are not worth risking your life over.