Archenemy (2020) User Reviews

I like the premise

[SnoopyStyle · 6/10 · 10 January 2021]

Hamster is a black teenage aspiring to be an investigative reporter like Hunter Thompson. He finds his subject in homeless man Max Fist (Joe Manganiello) who claims to be a hero with superpowers. He comes from another world and the problem is that his powers only exist in his home world. Hamster's sister gets into trouble with drug dealers after stealing their money.

I really like the premise but I would slow-roll the comic book animation. The first half of the movie shouldn't have the animation. The audience should be conflicted about Max Fist's story and his home world. He should be equally crazy and equally heroic. I like the fight against the car and there should be more of that. This is smaller indie and the movie struggles to be a big action superhero movie that it wants to be especially in the third act. All in all, I like the characters, the actors, and the premise.

Good B-movie, interesting

[joeyford-55342 · 6/10 · 26 December 2020]

Hey, better than most of the seasonal Hollywood crap coming out right now. Movie about a fallen hero from another world. Interesting and compelling. Special effects weren't the best. Worth a watch.

First Movie By Legion M, A Little Amateurish

[stevendbeard · 6/10 · 13 December 2020]

I saw "Archenemy", starring Joe Manganiello-Rampage, Spider_Man_2002; Skylan Brooks-Empire_tv, The Darkest Minds; Zolee Griggs-Bit, Cory in the House_tv; Glenn Howerton-It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia_tv, Crank and Amy Seimetz-Pet Sematary_2019, Stranger Things_tv. This movie is the first movie financed-& co_produced-by a new fan owned entertainment company called Legion M. It tells portions of the story using animation, usually the parts when Joe is telling his background stories. Joe plays a bum living off the streets-ragged clothes, living in alleys, etc. Skylan is a teen that wants to be a reporter so he is always looking for a story when he crosses paths with Joe. Joe tells stories of his life on another planet as a super hero-it seems for some reason, he lost his powers when he came to our dimension. In his stories, Amy-his archenemy-cast him through a wormhole during a fight and he is trying to get back home to finish his job. Joe drinks a lot of whiskey, saying, 'It's not as strong as it is on my planet so I have to drink more of it!' and he also uses drugs, saying that it has restorative powers to get him into fighting shape. Is he telling the truth or is he just a bum looking for his next high? Skylan believes his tall tales but his sister, Zolee, does not. Of course, Zolee has her own problems. Her boss, Glenn, is a drug dealer and she does something stupid to get on his bad side. I love super hero movies but this one is a little amateurish-it could have used the touch of a professional writer. It's not rated but it contains violence, language, drinking and drug use and has a running time of 1 hour & 30 minutes. It's not one that I would buy on DVD but it would be alright as a rental.

Good idea, BAD execution

[foxpowell · 2/10 · 13 December 2020]

I liked the idea of it and actually think Joe Manganiello did a solid job but the entire thing felt low budget. The 'Indigo' character ruins the movie with her consistent bad decisions but gets the most rewarded at the end? One of the worst endings I've ever seen, completely brought my rating down. Tried to keep an open mind but it just failed on multiple fronts. Don't waste your time!

Nope...

[Wookieetreiber · 4/10 · 20 March 2022]

Too bad, because the trailer was promising. Unfortunately, the film takes three steps back whenever it could finally get going, massively slows down and drifts into boredom again.

The silly cartoon interludes don't really help to make the whole thing more interesting. The film struggles, agonizes until the end and closes on a Kafkaesque note.

Well, it had potential...

[paul_haakonsen · 2/10 · 25 March 2021]

Yeah, this movie just didn't work out as it was intended to do.

Sure, I mean the concept of the movie was interesting enough. And a story about a fallen superhero sent to another dimension where he is stripped of his super powers definitely sounded interesting.

And I must admit it was on that concept that I opted to sit down to watch the movie, because it sounded like writers Adam Egypt Mortimer and Luke Passmore were on to something here. But the movie was a swing and a miss.

It was so difficult to buy into the movie and get submerged into the storyline, especially so since nothing overly interesting actually happened as the movie took its sweet time going from A to B. Yeah, this movie was amazingly slow paced, and that was something that took a massive toll on the overall enjoyment of the movie.

The acting in the movie was adequate, though the actresses and actors had little material to work with in terms of a proper script and proper character. At least actor Joe Manganiello was adequately cast for the movie.

Visually then "Archenemy" wasn't impressive. I absolutely loathed the comic book sequences, especially since it was poorly drawn and it just seemed like a discount and B movie way of skipping on having to spend a ton of money on proper special effects.

My rating of "Archenemy" lands on a mere two out of ten stars, as "Archenemy" offered very little entertainment to me. If you enjoy superhero movies, which I don't really do, then you might as well skip on this 2020 movie.

interesting approach

[maciejem-38428 · 7/10 · 14 December 2020]

Few movies shot in this twisted style. Comic book inserts that are perfectly woven into the storyline lend a good narrative to this yet grim story.

Good idea, bad portrayal

[tdwren1109 · 4/10 · 26 December 2020]

Archenemy starts off with a good idea, and as the movie goes on it gets bad. The acting is awful to start, but it's a low budget film so you can't expect anything more. The action scenes when they're are any are semi good. Overall this film fell super flat for me and I probably would not recommend it to anyone.

Almost had it; great concept, poor execution

[Top_Dawg_Critic · 7/10 · 14 January 2021]

As a novice filmmaker, Adam Egypt Mortimer had a unique superhero concept, but the delivery just wasn't there.

I feel the story tried to be too many things at once, and that convoluted the execution. The ending also seemed rushed, as there were far too many questions that needed to be answered - about the ending, and some of the vague backstory I was expecting clarification at least by the end of the film. I mean you can't just throw in a villain in the last 10 minutes and expect to get away with it, especially when you also try to throw in some twists.

The decent 90 min runtime felt longer with some slow pacing, and with the plot and technical issues. His directing was decent, although the comic strip portions could've been better. Cinematography and score were on point. Casting was decent, with Manganiello stealing the show with his outstanding performance. Had that character not been as good as Manganiello, this film may have been a huge flop. It was a fun watch with so little other options, but I wouldn't see it again. It's a generous 7/10 from me.

Boring

[nrdtunday · 4/10 · 13 December 2020]

Just boring and dry, the tempo wasn't there for me at all

Had to write this after reading the crappy reviews.

[gsmiller01 · 8/10 · 6 January 2021]

Im not sure if people were trying to compare this to block buster films with 150 million dollar budgets. Apples and bananas, come on. I know these are just other peoples opinions and I am doing the same but give the people who put the work in credit. Sometimes stories require imagination to fill in the blanks.

I thought this was well done. The mesh between the worlds was well executed and the visuals were crisp. Im not sure what the lack of character development comments were either. The entire movie is the main character narrating his past through the eyes of a young writer.

The acting was spot on for the story and the length.

If this was the directors debut film I tip my hat to him and his team. You can tell that is was well executed . I am excited to see the future films that are produced. Its nice to see something out there that is not made to fit everyones marketing ploy to reach "every demographic".

Great job to all involved!

A decent premise, but a drab execution

[siderite · 6/10 · 1 March 2021]

I like Joe Manganiello. No matter how many bad roles he does, I still have something in my heart for him, some hope that he will do better and shine. Unfortunately it's not this film. The plot is not that original, but OK: a guy pretending to be a superhero from another dimension, while we have to struggle to believe him in lack of any real evidence, the hapless kids that get into something bad and need help, the comic book vibe, the resolution at the end. And it kind of starts promising, too. Yet from the middle on it just gets depressing and slow and badly acted.

Bottom line: I would have liked to like this film, but it just wasn't the case. It felt like an episode of Powers with an even lower budget and worse acting.

An Interesting Concept

[lilliangordiana · 5/10 · 12 December 2020]

Needless to say not an original one. The concept of this movie has been used by the sci-fi sector in so many ways, it may even bore you when you first started the movie. Later things get interesting because you too wonder what is real and what is not alongside the main character. This movie caught my eye because of its beautiful poster and I can't say I regret watching it but I am slightly disappointed because even though I watched this without any expectations I guess a small part of me wanted this to be good. As I said, I loved the main idea and I would love to see it handled better but not as a 90mins movie but as a tv mini-series. The format would have been more suitable because there was no chance to see any character depth or to understand why someone is doing something other than just guessing. Action scenes could have handled better if this was a tv series alongside well... everything. I don't recommend it if you are hoping to watch a really good movie but if you wanna watch a movie that could trigger your imagination to think of a better scenario based on this one, then you can give it a try because you can't help but to think the ways it could have been better.

A basic predictable storyline with no character development building

[dheepak10 · 5/10 · 17 December 2020]

The only novel thing where time was spent on during the brainstorming process is the premise. Everything around it seems to be rushed to get a movie in time. Sadly, it's not an enjoyable watch - I finished it since I started it.

halfbaked

[nim-rod77 · 5/10 · 13 December 2020]

Poor writing, and poor supportive cast. and some logical slip ups now and there. i think the character talks too much. . when you have little to say and you know ur writing competency is not .. dostoyevski like .. try to move toward a slient movie as much as possible. 2c

Must stink being a guest star in your own movie

[sign1in · 3/10 · 24 June 2021]

With tv production values akin to the Heroes tv show, this one should be more about Max Fist, his fall, his life, but this is an origin story for some kiddy future superhero nonsense.

There was so much potential here for Joe to really let loose, and yet he the STAR of the show, barely gets any screen time.

So glad I got a free rental to see this, it's not good, and is really strange there are so many people in this who care about making good movies, and this just isn't it.

Mortimer struts his stuff

[A_Different_Drummer · 6/10 · 2 March 2021]

Viewers on Netflix do not realize that making indie movies is one of the only legit outlets for solo auteurs determined to do their own thing without help from Hollywood. In this context, Mortimer shows he has serious skills in that he takes a weak premise -- not unlike KPAX 2001 -- and uses it like a demo reel to show his skills. Serious skills. The film is remarkably engaging and technically punches above its weight class. But at the end of the day it is still a weak premise.

Epically Bad

[keithdustindesigns · 1/10 · 16 December 2020]

It's not as bad as I thought it would be....its way way worse. Like people said....nice concept, but a horrible written story and poor execution.

Went in with low expectations came out good

[mindlessmoviemaster · 6/10 · 29 January 2021]

It was pretty good to bad the kill off the best characters at the end.

This is the kind of film that deserves a remake

[reginamia · 2/10 · 6 June 2021]

What at first felt like the waste of a likable talent (Joe Manganiello) finally was an interesting idea badly developed. The dialogue was cringingly bad so I could not tell if the acting, for the most part, was as well. The fact that Manganiello managed to stay charismatic and nuanced despite huge lapses of logic and even continuity, suggests that the other actors were as bad as they seemed.

I say that it deserves a remake because it is unwatchable as it is, but with a more coherent story, better dialogue and competent actors to support Mr. Manganiello, it could be an entertaining and thought provoking hero/anti-hero film.

The one exception is the animation, which was quite effective and gave more depth to the whole production.

Better than I was expecting

[imdb-98947 · 8/10 · 1 March 2021]

Acting was decent and the the way that the comic style depictions of another dimension were woven in was great. If they made a sequel I'd watch it.

A fun watch

[aarondh · 7/10 · 12 December 2020]

It is a fun film to watch but I feel like it was just missing something. I feel like it didn't do a great job explaining max's archenemy and the other dimension where they came from

Also I think that some of the action wasn't great. I think that the first a hour was great and I was thinking of giving it a 9 but I think the ending was bad, i think it was really random to just give indigo the powers, I feel like it would have been better if hamster got the powers as he was closer to max

I was a fan of the art style when max was explaining his backstory, but when they mixed it with real life it looked off.

Overall I think that the full mystery of who max was, was great in the first 50-60 minutes but then the film loses its stride and tries to make a twist only to go back on what they decided to do

I would recommend giving it a watch to see for yourself

So dissapointing

[mko-03654 · 1/10 · 14 December 2020]

I'm a huge fan of Joe and watch movies and series for his grittyness but this is a bad pill to swallow. Good concept but no character development, spotty plot and some bad casting. At times hard to follow and the lack of funds is quite apparent in this.

No sensible plot.

[kenzibit · 3/10 · 21 December 2020]

Disappointing movie with no plot and character build. Got pissed with the cartoon scenes and wondered the essence of it all. Not recommended.

Show, don't tell

[desrocchi · 2/10 · 26 July 2021]

This movie is one exposition after the other, from the beginning to the very end.

The protagonist talks, the boy talks, the sister talks, the bad guy talks, the archenemy talks... they have to explain the story to the viewers over and over again because the film does not do it.

The actors have very little to act upon because all they're doing is tell us what we're supposed to know.

Nice idea, very bad writing.