Critical Dissent: Debating Insurgent with Alexandra Donald

Insurgent, the first sequel of the dystopian young adult series that began with last year’s Divergent, hasn’t exactly been welcomed with open arms by the critical community. It’s currently sitting at 31% on Rotten Tomatoes, with widespread accusations that it’s little more than a cut-rate Hunger Games clone. I’m not entirely convinced by that argument,…

Insurgent (2015)

On the surface, Insurgent appears to be a substantial upgrade to Divergent. The cast is fleshed out with the likes of Naomi Watts and Octavia Spencer, we’ve got a new director (Robert Schwentke, responsible for The Time Traveller’s Wife and, uh, R.I.P.D.) and we’ve even moved to the third dimension. Visually, we’ve definitely stepped things…

Shailene Woodley and Theo James in Divergent (2014)

Divergent (2014)

The consensus on Divergent, the latest piece of young adult literature to be rendered onto the big screen, is that it’s a watered-down Hunger Games ripoff (often accompanied by an uninspired pun on the title and the film’s lack of originality, and an underlying assumption that art directed at teenage girls is inherently inferior). I’m…