Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		5.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		3.0
Overall		4.0

Halo: Nightfall Blu-ray Movie Review

"Game over, man! Game over!"

Reviewed by Kenneth Brown March 13, 2015

Executive producer Ridley Scott and director Sergio Mimica-Gezzan's Halo: Nightfall follows Forward Unto Dawn as another ambitious foray into the world of Master Chief, the UNSC and the deadly Covenant. The goal? To expand the Haloverse in interesting new directions, establish characters we'll meet in Halo 5: Guardians this fall, and provide a proof of concept for bigger, better things. The hope is obvious. A successful live-action series could feasibly persuade Hollywood to invest in a proper Halo feature film. Unfortunately, Nightfall isn't going to convince anyone that Halo belongs on the big screen. It not only squanders a precious opportunity, it fails to accomplish anything more than delivering a decent, frustratingly disconnected side story. As direct-to-video sci-fi goes, you could certainly do worse. Much worse. But as a Halo film, it comes up short.

'Nightfall' tells the personal story of Jameson Locke (Mike Colter), a legendary manhunter and agent with the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI), Earth's most powerful and secretive military branch. Investigating terrorist chatter on the distant colony world of Sedra, he and his team are soon caught in a horrific biological attack. Led by Locke, ONI agents are left with little choice but to coordinate with Randall Aiken (Steven Waddington), a local commander with a remarkable history and deep-rooted mistrust of ONI. As they unravel a plot that draws them to an ancient, hellish artifact, they're forced to fight for their survival, question their comrades' loyalty, and ultimately choose between their honor and their lives.

After an initial, very Halo-esque introduction to Sedra and a shady Covenant Elite who's without a doubt, most definitely, with the utmost certainty up to no good, Nightfall slowly devolves into a very un-Halo like survival story that, for one reason or another, systematically eliminates elements of the Halo universe with growing indifference. First, the featured Elite goes down easier than the first Elite encountered in Halo: Combat Evolved (with the game set to Easy mode), and no other Covenant make an appearance. (For that matter, why does the Elite need to sneak into the city to detonate a device whose blast radius extends well beyond the boundaries of the entire city? Plot hole #1, and it doesn't stop there.) Add to that the lack of any armored Spartans, Warthogs or Scorpions, and it isn't hard to spot the film's first problem. No worries, though, right? Between the familiar gear, fan-favorite weapons, and the team's post-Sedra destination (a secret I won't spoil here), there's plenty of Halo goodness to go around... right? For a moment. Until, that is, a swarm of feral Lekgolo (the worms that compose the Covenant's hulking Hunters) -- creatures that hone in on electronic equipment of any kind -- force Locke and his fellow warriors to ditch their gear, switch off their guns, and go off the grid, effectively removing some of the only remaining Halo touches in the film.

So why would a Halo story aggressively withdraw from everything gamers have loved about the franchise it supposedly celebrates? Your guess is as good as mine. Perhaps the filmmakers assumed fans were desperate to see something different, something outside of the realm of the games, when in fact, most gamers just want to see a live-action adaptation of Halo, Master Chief and all. Or perhaps the fact that Master Chief isn't available at this moment in the series' canon wedged the creators into a tight corner; one that forced them to focus on an interim hero. Yes, Forward Unto Dawn took a while to get rolling, but once it did, it hit a great stride. Spartan insanity, Covenant assaults, full-fledged invasion... by the end, almost every scene was screaming Halooooo! Strangely, Scott and Mimica-Gezzan's newer, higher profile production doesn't represent a step forward. It's several steps back. It isn't going to leave anyone itching for Halo 5, it doesn't position Locke as a particularly compelling character (spoiler alert: the most interesting characters don't make it to the end credits), and it doesn't further Halo's status as a viable live-action commodity.

What remains isn't bad, you've just seen it all before. When confronted with certain death, a team of diverse, highly trained operatives and a group of rough-and-ready space grunts begin turning on each other, all while attempting to survive the onslaught of an alien menace. There's a time clock in play too, so "certain death" is even more pressing. For all except Locke, of course. (Not that he's the only one to necessarily make it through to the end.) Locke has been billed as a prime player in Halo 5 for months, so any suspense surrounding his Nightfall fate is null and void from the get-go. Instead, we're left to wonder who else will make it off the volatile, worm-infested rock, which ends up being about as predictable as these scenarios come. If I sound especially harsh, it's because I've lived, breathed and consumed all things Halo since I took a chance on a system called the Xbox and a little game called Combat Evolved fourteen years ago and have been hooked ever since. I want a Halo film. I need a Halo film. And this isn't it. It was a fine DLC bonus when it arrived with the Master Chief Collection last year, but there was plenty of Halo to go around on the disc (four games, one newly remastered!) so the film's flaws didn't sting so severely. It's still a missed opportunity and an average movie, though, leaving one to wonder if 343 will ever deliver the live-action showstopper Halo junkies have been clamoring for since 2001.

Halo: Nightfall Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Microsoft Studios' Blu-ray release of Halo: Nightfall offers a more refined and proficient presentation than its 2014 Master Chief Collection counterpart. In fact, the film's 1080p/AVC MPEG-4 video encode orbits perfection, without any sign of significant compression artifacts, banding, aliasing, ringing or errant noise. Colors, though often submerged in shadow and extremely subdued, are carefully saturated, primaries seep through the veil of darkness naturally, contrast is stark but consistent, and black levels are deep and oh so satisfying. Detail impresses too (despite the very literal nightfall), thanks to crisp, clean edge definition, precisely resolved fine textures and excellent delineation. Any crush the pops up, meanwhile, is inherent to the source, and the digital color grading rarely, if ever, hinders the intended clarity of the photography. There are a few less-than-ideal FX shots (most involving the swarm of alien worms), but that's hardly the fault of the encode. All told, I doubt Nightfall could look any better than it does here.

Halo: Nightfall Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Aside from a few instances of somewhat thin weapons fire, Microsoft's DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 surround track doesn't disappoint. LFE output is bold, weighty and powerful, with plenty of low-end oomph backing explosions, spacecraft thrusters, collapsing worlds, crumbling mountains and pulse-pounding chases. The rear speakers follow suit, creating an enveloping soundfield rife with neck-twisting directional effects, silky smooth pans, and the convincing ambience of the film's cities, structures, forests, ravines, caverns and lost worlds. Dialogue remains clear and intelligible throughout as well, prioritization is spot on, and dynamics are able-bodied and reliable. The score is a bit overwhelmed by the soundscape at times, sure, but it doesn't seem to be a product of any deficiency in the lossless track. Nightfall's AV presentation is the undisputed high point of the disc.

Halo: Nightfall Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Beyond the Game: Expanding the Halo Universe (HD, 4 minutes): An overview of 343 Industries' efforts to expand the Haloverse through Nightfall and ties to the original videogames, along with hints as to what to expect from the story in Halo 5 this fall.
• Canon Fire: Developing the Story of Nightfall (HD, 6 minutes): The filmmakers and cast discuss the evolution of Nightfall's plot, characters, conflicts and themes. Plenty of spoilers abound, so be sure to watch this, and the disc's other featurettes, after the film itself.
• Old Dogs & New Tricks: The Tech of Nightfall (HD, 4 minutes): Ships, armor and gear, new and old; created from both a practical and design perspective. The challenge? Striking a balance between videogame nostalgia, believability and screen viability.
• Try to Keep Up: The Stunts of Nightfall (HD, 5 minutes): Punching, tumbling, crashing, jumping, sprinting and sprinting harder with stunt coordinator Nick Chopping, his team, and a very grateful group of actors.
• Return of the Ring: The Locations of Nightfall (HD, 6 minutes): From Northern Ireland to Iceland, Nightfall utilizes craftsman and a keen eye for locations to create the hotspots of the film.
• Heroes Evolved: Introducing Agent Locke (HD, 4 minutes): A quick look at Mike Colter's Agent Locke courtesy of the filmmakers and the 343 powers that be, as well as the arc that will take the character from Nightfall to Halo 5.
• Character Building: The Cast of Nightfall (HD, 6 minutes): Mike Colter, Steven Waddington, Christina Chong, Luke Neal, Christian Contreras and newcomer Alexander Bhat, front and center.
• New Horizons: Forging the Worlds of Nightfall (HD, 5 minutes): Another rapidfire featurette, this time digging into the choice to set the film on a fragment of the *spoiler* and depicting such a crumbling, chaotic environment on screen.
• Second Stories (HD, 45 minutes): Accessed after clicking on a lock symbol, this collection of "Second Stories" follows various supporting characters glimpsed throughout the film.

Halo: Nightfall Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Nightfall dabbles in corners of the Halo-verse you didn't know you'd even care about, but as it does, it slowly eliminates everything that makes Halo, well, Halo, replacing it with an all too familiar, run of the mill sci-fi action thriller. It isn't bad, it just isn't remarkable, and the franchise and its fans deserve a remarkable live-action adaptation, regardless of whether it focuses on 343's expanded universe or Master Chief himself. Fortunately, Microsoft Studios' Blu-ray release features a terrific AV presentation. I would have liked to see additional extras -- a commentary especially -- but what's available is appreciated, if not a bit repetitive. Halo addicts will find something to love in Nightfall, I'm sure. But even its biggest fans will know, deep down, that it could have been so much more.