UNDERWORLD 3: THE RISE OF THE LYCANS (2009)

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"From the acting to all the inconsistencies and some ridiculous scenes made me think about other films and why I wasn’t watching them instead."

I've never been a huge fan of the Underworld franchise, which is very surprising since I find vampire and werewolves to be entertaining in the world of film and if they just happen to end up in the same film together you will see me have a good ol' time. The first installment is neither horrible nor great is but somewhere in between and the same goes for the second film, Underworld: Evolution. I feel the series had never been able to reach its true potential of being something to remember, but maybe that would all change with Patrick Tatopoulos taking up directorial duties and a new approach to the Underworld story with Underworld: Rise of the Lycans, a prequel explaining how the feud between vampires and the lycans (werewolves) began.

Michael Sheen returns to reprise his role as Lucian, a lycan living as a slave with many others of his kind and serving as daytime protectors of the vampires and that's the way things have been since he was born, but nothing ever stays the same. Lucian has been involved in something unheard of, a secret relationship with Rhona Mitra's character Sonya, a vampire and the daughter of the vicious vampire lord Victor, once again portrayed by Bill Nighy, and if he ever was made aware of his daughter's action there's no telling what he may do. Soon other factors come into the equation raising the tension between the two races that leads to a bloody battle to the death.

I had a lot of hope for Rise of the Lycans but I knew 15 minutes into the film that I was in for quite a bad experience when a sex scene involving Sheen and Mitra that not only looks identical to the one in 300 but manages to come off as goofy and very laughable. Afterwards, the cast treats viewers to lots of dull acting (as it has the previous films) and even some overacting on behalf of Nighy whose attempts at being menacing made me once again laugh out loud. Even with all the good action sequences displaying vampires and lycans ripping each other apart wasn't able to hide how much of a joke the film is and by the end the film becomes more of a laugh-fest than anything else.

I mentioned briefly how one scene looked exactly like one that can be seen in 300 but I was more amazed about how the film looked more and more like something out the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Besides the fact these films were all shot in New Zealand, it looked as though the sets for Rise of the Lycans were either leftovers from LOTR or the exact same ones which had me start thinking if this was supposed to take place after the fall of Sauron (the main villain in LOTR). The similarities can even be seen during the battle sequences were the Lycans are charging the Victor's castle, much like the troll army did in LOTR: The Two Towers, which had me thinking again that if the trolls had lycans they would have no problem conquering the castle of Helm's Deep.

Now when a prequel is made one would think that key points would be shown or at least eluded to but not the case in this film. The ending is so vague that details explained in the first film are left untouched such as Lucian's tattoo (which is never shown), the existence of Craven and what he accomplished, or what happened to Victor afterwards. It seems that either the film was cut own dramatically due to budgeting or the filmmakers thought fans of the series would just forget about certain aspects and the thought of another prequel to explain what they didn't cover is absurd and insipid because honestly at this point I think fans are more interested in finding out what happens Selene and Michael (played by Kate Beckinsale & Scott Speedman in the previous films) now.

I couldn't take Underworld: Rise of the Lycans seriously. From the acting to all the inconsistencies and some ridiculous scenes made me think about other films and why I wasn't watching them instead. Bottom line, the film offers more of the same mediocrity with nothing new to go crazy over and brings up more questions when it should be providing answers. If you haven't seen the other films then you may have some cheap fun but when you decide to watch the other films you'll start to notice that something is askew.