The Maze Runner: Scorch Trials - Movie Review

The Maze Runner: Scorch Trials' is as enjoyable as the first movie when it comes to intense action sequences but poorly lacks on narrative. It focuses heavily on foreshadowing the next installment of its franchise than actually delving in on its own plot. Sure progressions are mandatory, but can the filmmakers slow down for a while and let their audiences have a taste of what's now and not of what's later?

You can make the case that accuracy for a book-to-film translation is very important given that this is a popular set of books, and a lot of people were familiar with those stories. But a movie is different, and it's a filmmaker's job to make the risk of rearranging key events so it will have a tighter finish when presented onscreen. 'The Maze Runner: Scorch Trials' took liberties of course on adapting its source material, but it wasn't good or exciting enough.

Dylan O'Brien proved once again that he has a long way to go in his career with another determined performance. The actor excels during the running sequences, which are the only praise I can point out except him. Same as the first one, the first half was equally intense and exciting. But the movie goes south when the characters are forced to join another group, which was given poor roles in the narrative, resulting in a dour punch in case something bad happens to them.

'The Maze Runner: Scorch Trials' is half-enjoyable and half-ridiculously bad. The movie could've become a much tighter whole if the filmmakers didn't even rely on assembling the sequel, but the action sequences and especially Dylan O'Brien left really good impression out of it.

The geek rates it 6.5/10!

'The Maze Runner: Scorch Trials' is locally distributed by 20th Century Fox Philippines!