Recently, there’s been an abundance of live-action films coming out in theaters with more still in development. On April 4th, “A Minecraft Movie” was released in theaters after a decade in production, with the main twist being that it featured real actors rather than animated characters. Since being released, it has grossed over $301 million worldwide against a $150 million budget, making it 2025’s fourth highest-grossing film.
With a McDonald’s collab, packed theaters, and high-energy crowds shouting iconic lines like “Chicken jockey” and “ I am Steve,” the hype is real. Cameos from creators like LDShadowLady, Aphmau, DanTDM, Mumbo Jumbo, and even a touching Technoblade tribute, have only added to the excitement but that’s about it. Many students at MLEC have strong opinions on whether the movie was good or not.
“I think it’s a fun movie and I don’t think anyone was expecting it to be a masterpiece or anything for sure, or at least I wasn’t. I wouldn’t have liked it if it were animated, it wouldn’t be as iconic as the beautiful trash fire we got,” said junior Ariyana Strickland.
For now, the movie has a 47% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and a 46/100 on Metacritic. Professional critic Katie Walsh from the Tribune News Service stated in a review, “For a wildly imaginative world-building project, the film is mostly ghastly to look at… if the possibilities of this world are endless, why does it all devolve into violent, ugly, boring warfare?”
Another main critic of the movie is the way all the actors are well-known. Jack Black is an actor and comedian that was hired to convey the character of Steve. They also casted other famous actors like Jennifer Coolidge and Jason Mamoa, which gives off the impression that the movie is just taking advantage of the status of those who are famous rather than building up lesser-known actors.
“In my opinion, the movie feels like a cash grab, like they made it just for TikTok clips. Honestly, I don’t think there should even be a Minecraft movie. Minecraft is really about the player, it’s not about telling a set story. It’s supposed to be about your own experience, not someone else’s,” said junior Antonio Quintanal.
The fact that the movie wasn’t animated is throwing viewers off and is probably one of the main reasons many people dislike it. Some just believe that if they were going to make a movie about such an unrealistic, appearance-wise, game, they should’ve made it animated. The whole Minecraft feel of the movie was gone the second that they decided to make it so realistic.
“Minecraft has played a big part in everyone from this generation’s lives and while, yeah, I’m excited for the movie, I have a feeling ‘underwhelming’ will be the best way to describe it. I don’t care about the game accuracy because Minecraft within itself is a pretty basic game, so hopefully they adapted it well, but it would’ve been better if they had animated it instead,” said freshman Luigi Farrugia.
Generally, people enjoyed “A Minecraft Movie” thanks to the joyful audiences in theaters and the cheer they brought to the moment. Still, it’s evident that the film lacked the direction and quality that would’ve bolstered a “good’ movie to a “great” movie.
