Posted by Computer character becomes self-aware – taking its first steps toward world domination, using humans as battery cells and travelling back in time to kill John Connor
Ok. After my initial disappointment with the Secret Screening movie reveal, I had to remind myself that Free Guy is actually a movie I’ve looked forward to seeing. The movie screening was busier than other showings I’ve been to during the pandemic. Even then, I was surprised some people actually walked out when the movie was revealed. Maybe they just can’t stand Ryan Reynolds – which I cannot understand. Each to their own… Who am I to judge?
Free Guy follows a guy, named Guy (Ryan Reynolds) who learns he is a non-playable character (NPC) in a video game called Free City. He is on a mission to help game developers Millie (Jodie Comers) and Keys (Joe Keery) prove that Free City publisher Antwan (Taika Waititi) has ripped off code of a game they created years prior.
Free City is basically a spoof of Grand Theft Auto, where multiple online players wreak havoc on a city while NPC characters just happily go about their daily lacklustre lives. The contrast between Guy’s happy-go-lucky smiling persona and the chaos and destruction around him is one of many funny gags in what is a very funny movie. Self-aware humour is something that always makes me laugh. I also loved seeing the Dude character (also seen in promotions, so don’t tell me that’s a spoiler!) with his incomplete vocabulary, despite some dodgy CGI – Catchphrase! You’ll probably not get that reference if you haven’t seen the movie or promotions, so that is a complete failure on my part.
The promotions had vibes of Deadpool – actually, not just vibes – Deadpool featured in the promotions himself. That was encouraging seeing as Deadpool is basically Ryan Reynolds being Ryan Reynolds – that’s what he does best. Reynolds’s track record is a bit of a strange one. I really like him, but outside the Deadpool movies he hasn’t really led a movie worth seeing before this.
To be fair, the movie is at it’s best when Reynolds is onscreen. Free Guy get’s the plot moving quickly, but when the movie delves into the “real” world the pace does sometimes slow down just a little. I found myself waiting for Reynolds to come back and see more of the bizarre happenings of Free City. I suppose there was Waititi’s eccentric performance, but I can’t decide if I think he was funny, or if he was just plain annoying. Maybe that’s what he was going for.
The premise of Free Guy reminded me of several other movies. Thankfully movies I liked. On more than one occasion there were feelings of The Truman Show, as well as The Lego movie and The Matrix. That’s not a bad thing, I think it worked very well, and I guess all these movies deal with similar themes of a hero realising their reality is not real.
Being as this movie was to be released by Fox, now owned by Disney, there were a few tie-in elements from movies under the Disney umbrella. This seemed a little forced, though when you compare it to the forced integration of Warner Bros assets in Space Jam 2, it’s certainly less in your face, so I can forgive it. Plus, I did find it funny when a cameo showed the reaction of one of the actors linked to a Disney asset being used. I won’t give much more than that away so I can keep this spoiler-free.
Verdict
Free guy is as good as I hoped it would be. Ryan Reynolds is on top form, playing a funny guy who’s not quite as cynical as his Deadpool persona. Yes, he’s done other movies, but they aren’t worth mentioning. Finally, he’s done something else worthwhile and befitting of his style!