Doomsday is one of those movies that you can never accuse of lacking truth in its advertising.
This is indeed the end of the world as we know it, and no one is left feeling fine after this one. The problem here is that you won’t be left feeling fine after the movie ends, either.
The plot is fairly simple enough—there’s some kind of supervirus roaming Scotland, and apparently only Scotland. For a movie that deals with something as big as a supervirus they’re not going to be hugely clear and leave a whole bunch of gaping plotholes—more on those in a minute. Anyway, the supervirus, called the Reaper Virus (and shame on you if you thought it was the Rage Virus), does horribly nasty things to people’s complexions and also leaves them coughing up enormous wads of what may be mucus or what may be blood, I’m not all that sure. The British government, in response, rebuilds Hadrian’s Wall and seals off Scotland from England.
The rest of the world doesn’t take this well, and thus Great Britain is left to descend into a morass of poverty, chaos and white slavery. Until it’s discovered that there are survivors living in Scotland, despite the Reaper Virus’ worst, and a team is sent to find the cure keeping all these people alive.
Inevitable comparisons between this and Escape from New York / Escape From L.A. are as founded as they are certain to happen. Seriously—Rhona Mitra is the new Snake Plissken, and I can’t help but find that pretty solidly awesome. Yes, Doomsday is a spectacular ripoff of pretty much everything that came before it—even the bad guys in this one favor the Mohawk haircut just like the baddies in Mad Max, and I meant it about Rhona Mitra being the new Snake Plissken. This doesn’t necessarily make it a bad movie, however, and one thing is abundantly clear. This is a fun movie to watch, even if it’s shoddily built and shoddily done.
Now, for the plotholes: somehow, this movie involves a supervirus that ONLY affects one continent. It’s apparently not airborne, nor was there any air travel in and out of the continent during that time span that would cause the virus to spread. The British government is apparently also capable of building an eighteen mile long wall made of foot-thick steel in a matter of days because no one actually saw this coming in advance. This and many other horrifying plot holes literally infest the screenplay for Doomsday, but this really doesn’t matter as we’re too busy watching things go boom and things get set on fire.
It’s a fun movie, Doomsday is. Just don’t expect anything in the way of coherent narratives and you and it will both get along fine. The cast is gleefully over the top, the effects are as flamey and splattery as you could like—there’s one great sequence in which a disembodied head flies, screaming, at the camera. And for those of you who really liked this sucker, take heart—based on the ending, sequel possibility is easy like Sunday morning. If Rhona’s not back blasting bikers within the next three years I’m gonna be patently amazed.
So really, there’s plenty of reason to not enjoy Doomsday—especially if you’re a plot snob like I tend to be. But if you’re looking for a gun-crazed romp that feels all too likely, especially THESE days, then Doomsday is going to make your calendar.
An in-depth, spoiler-filled