By Ridhima Vakkalagadda (’24) | May 10, 2021

We all know superheroes, right? They are the amazing fictional characters who spend their days saving the world and stopping the bad guys; however, what do they look like? Are they the ones in the fancy costumes with the incredible looks and values, or are superheroes different from that? This is what Thunder Force is about: breaking the stereotypes of superheroes. 

The movie starts off with the story of how the villains, the Miscreants, came to life: after Earth was subjected to cosmic rays, sociopaths affected by the rays gained superpowers and were transformed into supervillains. After one of the Miscreants kills her parents, Emily Stanton, one of the main characters, vows to stop the villains. Emily becomes friends with another girl by the name of Lydia, the other main character, but after a while, their friendship drifts off. Years pass, and Emily becomes a very successful scientist for her own company, while Lydia is a construction worker. They get in contact again for a high school reunion, and while Lydia is visiting Emily’s company, she accidentally injects herself with a super strength serum. Emily is disappointed at first, but reveals to Lydia that she has a superpower as well: invisibility. Emily responds to Lydia stating that she created these serums to help get revenge on the Miscreants for killing her parents. Lydia agrees to help her, and they begin training together. The two characters learn to trust each other and also learn to truly understand what it means to be a superhero. 

This movie, even though it is interesting, has multiple scenes with plot repetition, and is lacking comedy in the acting. The jokes are not very funny, and feel more immature than hilarious. The idea of “learning to be a superhero with all of its burdens” is very common, and the movie doesn’t have anything that particularly makes it stand out. The cast acted well in the movie, but even with all of their hard work, the movie, overall, is very underwhelming. Additionally, the parts about friends getting over old problems is very overused, and with the superhero idea added on, it doesn’t have memorable themes. It is a movie that I would not look back at and reminisce about and as a result, I would not recommend it as well.