As an admirer of sci-fi films, I was quite excited after seeing the trailer of ‘The Tomorrow War’ and since Chris Pratt is one of the very few actors I like in Hollywood, my expectations were much higher. Unfortunately, all my hopes and excitement was shattered after I saw the film.
Directed by Chris McKay, ‘The Tomorrow War’ is actually about a war taking place tomorrow or, you can say, in the future. The film starts with a soccer game being played in 2022. Dan Forester (Chris Pratt), an Iraq War veteran and biology teacher at a high school, is watching the FIFA World Cup in his home with his family. Dan always dreams to provide the best for his family and for that he struggles to find a better job. While everyone thinks Dan is old school and should be content with what he has, his nine-year-old daughter, Muri (Ryan Kiera Armstrong), believes him.
Watching the game, the family sees a wormhole device called Jumplink materialising right in the middle of the field at the FIFA game and several people stepping out from it. The men claim to be from the future, in the year 2051, almost 30 years from now. They reveal that some aliens known as the White Spikes are attacking and invading the Earth and now, in 2051, humanity is on the verge of extinction. All they want is more humans to travel into the future to fight the aliens and save humanity.
Dan was abandoned by his father James (J.K. Simmons) for his whole life after having bad experiences in Vietnam. James was fearful for his family’s safety and so he left them. But Dan wants to be a better father for his daughter and since he is an ex-soldier, he gets himself recruited among men travelling into the future to fight the aliens.
It takes almost a year to get the draft ready for war. Emmy (Betty Gilpin), Dan’s wife, is a therapist who now deals with the survivors of the Tomorrow War. Since she knows the traumas of the survivors, she urges Dan to avoid going to war. But Dan wants to save the world for his daughter. Hence, he joins hands with Colonel Muri Forester (Yvonne Strahovski) and his father James to rewrite the fate of the planet. Among the other soldiers in his troop are Charlie (Sam Richardson) who has a PhD in Earth and Atmospheric Sciences and Norah (Mary Lynn Rajskub).
Famous for his roles in the Guardians universe and Jurassic World, Chris Pratt’s character of Dan as an ex-militaryman is easy to witness but his portrayal of a usual science teacher is difficult to digest. In short, it’s dull and boring. He tries hard to balance between being a family man and saving humanity. It’s just that Dan isn’t Pratt’s strong suit as the character dulls his natural charisma.
Sam Richardson as Charlie brings sweetness to his character and Mary Lynn Rajskub as Norah has a good sense of humour. Yvonne Strahovski as Colonel Forester plays a strong-willed woman, ready to save the world.
People might now understand my displeasure at the film. They would also understand why Chris McKay’s first film ‘The Lego Batman Movie’, as the director, didn’t work out. Even the writer Zach Dean fails to give a decent storyline. Hence, the film lacks in everything. The premise keeps shifting from one mode to another without properly giving away what the scene is actually about. And just when you are into a particular scene and enjoying it, a character or a lineappears out of place and spoils the whole immersion. Shot expensively, the film is noisy with over-rated action sequences and low on humour.
The only thing that is genuinely impressive about ‘The Tomorrow War’ is its CGI sci-fi elements. There’s also a twist as we learn that Colonel Forester is none other than Dan’s daughter Muri. She is the one who organises the project to reach into the past and seeks the youthful spirit of her dad out after all these years to help save humanity. There are even traces of a more promising film in the final act and one might think probably that’s the reason the film is extended for another half an hour but just like tomorrow, the film never quite stands out. 
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