My review of Choose or Die (2022)

Great idea, horrible execution

I am a big fan of Visual Novels and Interactive Fiction games (I even made some) and I am also a huge fan of Black Mirror and when I heard about their interactive episode Bandersnatch, I just had to get Netflix, cause only on Netflix is it actually interactive. And what shall I say, it was totally worth it. But now I am stuck with a Netflix subscription and wondering if there aren’t more movies like that.

So Netflix recommends “Choose or Die” to me, which seemed like a non-interactive version of Bandersnatch and it actually kinda is. But it seems they just copied the idea of Bandersnatch and then just went nowhere with it.

So, put simply, this just resulted in a bad movie. It's not even one of those it's so bad it's good movies. Admittedly, it was a great idea (though it wasn’t even their own) though it was somewhat intriguing and fun to watch, but only till about the middle part and then the movie just stopped caring and so did I.

So, even though it turned out really badly, it did have potential. So I really hope someone picks up this idea again and does it justice. Because it's not a bad idea, it's just poorly executed.

For example; at the beginning of the movie there are numerous hints at them being in hell, such as all the company names (the "pell" signs, the Kismet company, the Ferryman company, the soul company and her soul shirt) and the metaphysical power of the game and it's ability to alter reality and do seemingly impossible things and them being confronted with their sins and the conflicted, traumatized, dreary and remorseful life of all the characters, even before the game begins, also hint at that, but then it's just never picked up again.

The somewhat Saturnian and occult looking imagery for the game is also interesting, but again that's all it is. They just made it LOOK like that, but it's actually totally inaccurate and is also never really picked up or really explored as part of the story. Same with the retro aspects, they are just used as decorations and that's the extent to which it is used and the extent of the research they did.

Resulting in a horror movie that reminds me of a sleazy stripper. It dresses itself up nicely, but is just ugly and empty inside and just makes you feel dirty and immoral for having watched it.

Netflix sadly has a lot of shows like that. Shows with great ideas, but poorly executed. And it’s those shows that sadly always stay on Netflix. If Netflix has a great success, it often times gets sold to another studio or wasn’t made by Netflix to begin with and was just on Netflix temporarily. So at the end of the day you are stuck with countless shows and movies like this one on Netflix, shows and movies that look promising but end in disappointment.

In the end I cancelled my Netflix subscription again.