Doom: Annihilation Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		1.0
Video		3.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		2.0

Doom: Annihilation Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Martin Liebman September 26, 2019

Little is expected of Doom: Annihilation, and little is delivered. This is a 2019 direct-to-video movie based on a video game franchise, a genre that doesn't exactly have a sterling track record even for theatrical releases and certainly not for anything in the DTV category. The movie releases ahead of the video game Doom Eternal (release date November 22, 2019), which is a followup to 2016's critically acclaimed Doom, a modern reboot of the classic video game series of the same name that began back in 1993 with Doom, widely regarded as one of the most influential video games of all time (and it was amongst the inaugural titles to be voted into the Video Game Hall of Fame in 2015 with other titles like Tetris, Pac-Man, Pong, and Super Mario Bros., which for non-gamers is rarified air). Unfortunately the same cannot be said of Doom: Annihilation, a horribly dull Action film that cannot escape its budgetary, script, and technical limitations. It's a slog of a movie if there ever was one, a film that is obviously doomed from the start.

Yes but...not a lot.

The plot is unsubstantial and absolutely paper-thin, and that it follows the same basic premise from the core game series is a testament to how well a thin story can work on the back of great gameplay but how it can absolutely doom a movie adaptation. The story involves some scientists on a Martian installation called "Phobos" who unearth ancient portals. A man is sent through to disastrous results when he returns horrifically changed. A detachment of marines is sent to investigate. Phobos is “the very worst draw a UAC marine can get,” and they are about to find out why. Upon arrival they find the station's power down and nobody opening the door. They gain access via a secondary point of entry only discover that most of the personnel has been turned into inhuman creatures bent on killing them. Meanwhile, hellacious demons seek to establish reign on Earth.

The movie is obviously inspired by Aliens, and there are a lot of scenes that hearken back to that film, from the beginning when the Marines awake from cry-sleep en route to Phobos all the way to the end when what's-her-name rides the elevator with the BFG (and it's not the first time for a video game franchise to look to a James Cameron classic for inspiration). The video game is the base, but it wants its doom cake and its alien ice cream, and the film is a disservice to both of them.

Where to begin? How about the incomprehensibly (or expectedly, based on countless other chintzy Sci-Fi/Horror DTV snoozers) flat and uninspired character roster. A few faces become identifiable through repetition but there's absolutely no character depth whatsoever. Literally none, save for one character who is dealing with trauma following her mother's death that, of course, comes back to mean something at the end. A couple of science types remain alive on the station, but as for the soldiers, they may as well all be wearing masks. Remember how in Aliens even the secondary and tertiary characters who die relatively early on -- Apone, Drake, Frost, Crowe -- manage to stand out even if they're not vital to the movie, even as they all dress in basically the same attire and wield the same guns? Not so here. Everyone gets lost under the knock off SWAT-like Halloween costumes while lugging around horribly obvious fake guns. There's zero personality, no ability to really identify who has died, no reason to care. Maybe if the movie were worth watching more than once -- once is a herculean chore in and of itself -- one might be able to start adding names to faces and noticing who it is that dies, when, and how...but there's nothing here to capture the audience, to pull them alongside the characters, to make them worth cheering for. They're nothing more than fodder for demons to eat and trigger fingers to shoot off guns.

How about the production values? The costumes are boring, the sets are spartan, and it feels like the most prominent props in the movie are the recreations of the classic Doom access cards. The movie makes a point to highlight the famous yellow, blue, and red cards in several close-up shots that serve no real purpose but fan service. Speaking of, there's the obligatory chainsaw kill, a character wielding a double-barrel shotgun, monsters killed by way of an exploding barrel, and an appearance of the game's most popular weapon, the BFG9000, all key components in the video games. Too bad most fans will have already tuned out and gone back to shooting demons in the game, and all of that stuff is more fun in the game, anyway. The movie does nothing but go through the motions. A slow start is not remedied by fast action to finish, and the go-nowhere story, which has no real direction despite a few salient but ultimately futile stabs at metaphysical, religious, and dramatic relevance, are only interferences to the action, which is not particularly good, anyway. Expect the worst and get something that is maybe a step above bottom scraping dreck, but not by much.

Doom: Annihilation Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Doom: Annihilation was obviously shot on video, if not obvious by looking at it then obvious by the fact that practically everything low budget is being done on video these days. The image is capable and stout, showing good essential details without any major malfunctions to report. Facial details are intimate, the SWAT-like costumes are appropriately dense and tactile, and the various locales around Phobos, comprised primarily of slick and smooth surfaces, look fine. Much of the movie is made up of steely blue and gray color schemes, especially as the action takes place in the Phobos facility overrun by demons. Some examples of color splash -- red blood and red tones giving would-be frightening demonic accents to the monsters, the BFG's green plasma bursts, a few shorts of Mars from space -- are handled well. The image is fairly noisy but there are no other major source or encode anomalies to report. This is probably best-case scenario for the movie outside of a UHD (which is of course unsurprisingly absent...it's almost a surprise the movie warranted a Blu-ray release, but since PlayStation and Xbox consoles and PCs can play BD discs, it was probably hoped the game franchise's legion of fans would pick it up).

Doom: Annihilation Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Doom: Annihilation's DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack is capable if not a bit limited by the film's sound design, which makes good use of surrounds but lacks that killer instinct (to call out another video game franchise). The track enjoys fairly large scope and scale. Music is well detailed and flows with quality width and some surround integration. Atmospherics are well defined, for the most part. There's a feel of heavy, industrial undertones on Phobos as the Marines arrive, sounds of pending dread and doom. There's a good chunk-chunk-chunk sound to weapons fire, a quality pop and zip and some squishy resultant gore. When the portal is activated, the effect is defined by a good, immersive presence and a solid low end sensation. Dialogue is clear and center focused. The track might show a few limitations, but it's appropriately robust and a good compliment to the movie.

Doom: Annihilation Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

This Blu-ray release of Doom: Annihilation contains no supplemental content. A DVD copy of the film and a Movies Anywhere digital copy code are included with purchase. This release ships with an embossed slipcover.

Doom: Annihilation Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Doom: Annihilation amounts to nearly unwatchable genre fodder. It looks and plays as cheap as it sounds. Poor acting, a zero-sum script, unimaginative atmosphere, uninspired production design...the list goes on. There's very little reason for even hardcore franchise fans to watch. Have another go at the original classic or the more modern and atmospheric 2016 game in anticipation of Doom Eternal instead. Universal's Blu-ray is unsurprisingly featureless. Video and audio presentations are baseline effective. Skip it.