Time: 86 Minutes
Age Rating: R16 – contains graphic violence
Cast:
Kate Beckinsale as Selene
India Eisley as Eve
Theo James as David
Michael Ealy as Detective Sebastian
Stephen Rea as Dr. Jacob Lane
Charles Dance as Thomas
Director: Måns Mårlind, Björn Stein

I rewatched the first three Underworld movies partly because I wanted to get to the next two movies (Awakening and Blood Wars), which I hadn’t watched yet. I heard some negative things about both, but considering that I enjoyed the first three films (which didn’t get the best response), I hoped that I would be into them.  Unfortunately, in the case of Awakening at least, the criticisms are all pretty valid.

Following the Underworld prequel titled Rise of the Lycans, the filmmakers opt to return the focus to previous main protagonist Selene, except it also serves as something of a reset for the series. It begins with an initially interesting premise: humanity becomes aware of Lycans and vampires, and wages a war against both of them. However, right after the opening scene, it takes a massive time jump, and when Selene wakes up, Lycans are near extinct and humans are now focusing their attention on vampires. It feels like a waste to just skip through most of that whole war. Another notable aspect is that Selene’s love interest Michael, the vampire and Lycan hybrid played by Scott Speedman, is seemingly killed and removed from the story. Either Speedman really didn’t want to return or the character and performance wasn’t the most liked from the last movies. In any case, removing the character feels very out of place, almost like the writers and filmmakers were rushing to reset everything except Selene. Even accepting these changes however, Awakening’s story just isn’t interesting and was rather forgettable. It almost feels like a riff on the Paul W.S. Anderson Resident Evil movies (even some of the environments are reminiscent of them), and as someone who actually largely likes those movies, that wasn’t the best direction for Underworld. It even manages to render the whole concept of humanity waging war against Lycans and vampires into being boring here.

Kate Beckinsale returns as Selene and as usual does well with both the action and emotions. If there were any moments where I was invested in the story, I’d put that up to Beckinsale helping to sell it. The rest of the cast are fine. Theo James is okay, maybe slightly less bland than Scott Speedman. This movie also includes Charles Dance, who always adds weight and gravitas to his roles. In Awakening, you get to see Dance attempt to do that while battling with distractingly fake plastic teeth every time he tries to speak.

The direction from Måns Mårlind and Björn Stein really isn’t anything special. It takes a strong departure from the blue tinted look and dark aesthetic of the past three movies. While I am not against changing it up the visual style, the more familiar human locations and environments just aren’t nearly as interesting here. Placing the action in blank looking locations is a pretty easy way to make it boring. The action also isn’t as entertaining or memorable. Aside from the opening action scene and Selene’s breakout scene after the time jump, nothing else stands out. It really doesn’t help that the editing and camerawork makes it difficult to keep track of what’s going on at times. It pretty much lacks all the practical effects which added something to the action, and on top of relying more on CGI, the quality of those effects have taken a notable downgrade. Even the designs of the creatures aren’t that special.

Underworld: Awakening was mildly entertaining at times, but generally uninteresting and underwhelming, and a definite step down from the last three movies. From this entry, the Underworld series is definitely showing signs of losing steam.