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The Cloverfield Paradox (2018)

    Two days ago, Netflix surprised all of us with the announcement that it would be releasing the third Cloverfield movie, The Cloverfield Paradox, later that night after the Super Bowl. That's right, the movie was released the same day it officially got a title. The release was definitely strange, but that's not what I'm here to talk about. I got around to watching it last night, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Despite being a big fan of the other Cloverfield movies, I went into this movie knowing virtually nothing about it, aside from the very basic plot summary provided by Netflix and what I could take away from the teaser. I found the story compelling, the characters likeable, thanks to some great performances, and that did a great job connecting and explaining some of the events from Cloverfield. Basically, I liked it a lot, and I was very, very surprised when I found that I was in quite the minority with that opinion.
    The film is being blasted online for generally sucking. Brace yourselves if you haven't seen it yet, because I'm gonna be delving into spoiler territory pretty soon. The biggest complaint I have heard is that a lot of the spooky things that happen on Cloverfield Station just don't seem to make any sense. For example, a dude dies by vomiting out a bunch of worms, part of the station’s wall eats off Chris O’Dowd’s arm, and then he's, like, eaten alive by magnetic putty or something. So, I mean, yeah, the argument that a lot of shit in this movie just doesn't make sense is entirely valid, but here's my take on it: When Cloverfield Station accidentally transported themselves into a parallel universe, they also apparently sent Clover (and probably the aliens from 10 Cloverfield Lane) to their home version of Earth, but the question of where they came from is yet unanswered. They almost certainly didn't come from the alternate Earth the station found, so where did they come from? My thought is wherever Clover and the others came from is the same place that all the weird stuff happening on the station originated. Maybe all those things that happened have a completely logical explanation that we just don't know of yet. Wouldn't be the first time a Cloverfield movie introduced some bat-shit crazy ideas and then just didn't explain them (Lookin’ at you, last 15 minutes of 10 Cloverfield Lane). In short, I think the criticism for The Cloverfield Paradox is way too harsh, it's by no means a perfect movie, but I do recommend you check it out yourself. Cloverfield 4 (currently titled “Overlord”) is apparently going to be a prequel set during WWII, so I guess we'll see how that factors into things.
Articles like this are pretty out of character for us, since The Cloverfield Paradox is neither a B movie nor a monster movie, but I just wanted to talk about it. Don't get used to it.

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