5 Great Video Game Movies That Aren't Based On Video Games
2. Dredd (Halo)
It’s so frustrating when video game movies take characters we know and love and try to humanise them or make them relatable. We don’t want that, because video games allow us to escape from the ordinary and enjoy ridiculous characters that forego natural instincts. Think of it like this: does Soap McTavish at the end of COD4 finally confess his affection for his girlfriend and settle down? No? Why? Because there isn’t a girlfriend, because there doesn’t need to be! Call of Duty is a game series where you take your metal murder sticks to various parts of the world and kill people without asking too many questions. It’s big, loud, shouty fun, and whilst it may not be for everyone, it still knows what it wants to be for its audience and does it well.
So when it comes to movies that stick to their strengths, look no further than Dredd, with a protagonist who you could easily say is part of that Space Marine genre of leading male, in as much as he wears giant armour, has a massive gun, we never see his face, and he kicks so much ass that donkey farmers in Guernsey sleep with one eye open.
Dredd exists on video game logic from a time before the third dimension had been explored. Much like the original Donkey Kong, we start at the bottom of something and work our way towards the boss at the top. It’s textbook progression. Not only that, but Dredd is basically one long escort mission, and whilst you might think that sounds bad, remember, you don’t need to worry about keeping some suicidal AI safe.
Dredd is brilliant because, like John Wick, it’s self aware: it knows it’s about cold, hard justice, and the sentence is death, delivered by a man whose parents could be actual tanks. Dredd is the archetypal video game protagonist. He’s so bare-bones that we’re allowed to project ourselves onto him. Much like Master Chief in the Halo series, he’s portrayed as a super-grunt, and though there’s many like him, with the same appearance and tools, but he’s just so much better.