The Divergent Series: Allegiant Review - 11 Reasons It Might Be 2016's Worst Film

4. Nonsensical PG-13 Violence

One of the biggest problems facing YA movies is that, though the books are able to broach some tough themes and even include graphic violence, the films aren't quite so amenable, especially as movie studios naturally want to keep the rating at the PG-13 level to ensure that all the tweens can actually go see it. This creates a weird situation, however, where the filmmakers are forced to find creative ways to shoot around and obscure all the bloodshed, such as the painful shaky cam in the original Hunger Games. The first Divergent featured gunfights with neurotoxin darts which simulated the pain of an actual gunshot without the physical damage, which was actually a pretty clever way to make the action feel visceral without needing to shed blood in a logical way. Allegiant, however, isn't quite so lucky, and director Robert Schwentke hasn't really made much of an effort to massage the violence into the movie. One notable character is killed off early on with a gunshot to the head, but there's not a lick of blood despite the camera zooming in close on her corpse. If this happens to a character in a PG-13 movie, maybe keep the camera a little further away so the lack of blood isn't quite so distracting? This isn't the only example either, and though the movie often defers to enemies getting knocked out rather than violently killed, there are several characters who get shot up-close and just fall down as though they're merely pretending. It's jarring as hell.