If you don’t feel like investing over four hours of your life in Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon films on Netflix, here’s the perfect sci-fi alternative.
We’ve been waiting a long time to see what Zack Snyder has come up with for his big sci-fi epic on Netflix. Now we have the two-part answer: Rebel Moon – Part 1: Child of Fire and Rebel Moon – Part 2: The Scar Maker take us to the distant planet of Veldt, which is oppressed by the Empire.
Kora (Sofia Boutella), the heroine of the story, then sets off in search of brave warriors to defend her homeland. The characters are introduced and collected in the first movie, followed by the inevitable battle in the second. Wait, haven’t we seen this story countless times before? Yes!
Rebel Moon is based on the masterpiece The Seven Samurai – and there is also a Star Wars version of it
Snyder has never made a secret of the fact that the Rebel Moon saga is based on the 1954 classic The Seven Samurai. It has been remade numerous times in various forms. The best known is the western remake The Magnificent Seven from 1960. And yes, there is also a Star Wars version.
(The Mandalorian)
The 4th episode of season 1 of The Mandalorian is also based on The Seven Samurai. The taciturn bounty hunter Din Djarin (Pedro Pascal) arrives on the green planet Sorgan with his protégé Grogu aka Baby Yoda and finds shelter in a peaceful settlement. But it is regularly plundered.
The Mandalorian only gathers one other warrior around him. Ultimately, however, the story follows the same pattern: a village is exploited and cannot defend itself alone. Battle-hardened characters come in from outside and train the village community before the final battle against the bad guys.
Stream now: Here you can watch the 4th episode of The Mandalorian
The Seven Samurai in Space: The Mandalorian only takes 43 minutes, whereas Rebel Moon takes 256 minutes
The Star Wars love letter to The Seven Samurai is one of the best episodes of The Mandalorian – and it tells the familiar story in just 43 minutes. If you get bored of Snyder’s eternal slow motion in Rebel Moon, you can quickly switch from Netflix to Disney+ and watch the brisker version of the story.
Or go straight to the source and plunge into the original by Akira Kurosawa. Last but not least, the Japanese master director proves that the story can also be staged in an extremely exciting way with an epic running time of over 200 minutes. Unfortunately, The Seven Samurai is currently not available to stream anywhere.
Watch it now: Akira Kurosawa’s The Seven Samurai in the Blu-ray edition
Originally, Rebel Moon started out as a Star Wars pitch. Snyder wanted to tell The Seven Samurai in the galaxy far, far away. Only later did he turn the project into the current Netflix films. And in the meantime, Star Wars has delivered its own version of The Seven Samurai with The Mandalorian.
