The Maze Runner, a film based on the first installment of James Dashner’s book trilogy, hit theaters Friday, Sept. 20. Along with Dashner’s hypnotic plot and male lead Dylan O’Brien’s boy-next-door charm, this film was sure to be a box office success.
O’Brien, (Stiles Stilinski of the MTV series Teen Wolf)plays Thomas, one of the film’s protagonists. Thomas, a 16-year-old boy, wakes up to find himself in “The Box”– an elevator that delivers him and other supplies to “The Glade”. The Glade is in the middle of an enormous intricate maze and is home to a group of boys, including Thomas. They refer to themselves as “The Gladers,” and they are all without any recollection of their lives prior to being planted in “The Maze.”
Unlike The Maze Runner novel, the film does not explain the tense relationship between characters Thomas and Gally. The film merely hints at the animosity rather than going into great detail about the matter. Gaining some of his memories back after a serious injury, Gally remembers Thomas from their previous life and grows to hate him. Without reading the books, it’s easy to get confused at how the tension in the relationship becomes disastrous, leading up to a heart-wrenching ending in the film. Throughout the book, the tension between Gally and Thomas grows and eventually boils over, but in the film it is unanticipated and hasty.
In comparison to a 400 page book, a two hour movie does not leave room for a lot of explanation. Things that work in books, may not work in a movie. An example would be the telepathic relationship between Thomas and Teresa, the only girl to ever step foot into The Maze. In the book, the complexity between Thomas and Theresa’s relationship is explored; like how they knew each other before The Maze, and how this connection ties them to one another and establishes a growing fondness. Teresa has a habit of referring to Thomas as “Tom” in the book; however, in the movie she may have called his name all of once.
This film also includes choppy jumps from scene to scene, which do not build as well as in the text. One minute all is calm in The Glade and in the next instance chaos breaks loose. The Maze Runner text is able to build at a stable pace, but the movie rushes to the ending, making it hard to grow close to or develop opinions on the characters.
This film makes some characters easy to be forgotten, glanced over, and difficult to establish a connection with, where as in the text each character was easy to follow. The beloved or even hated characters given life by The Maze Runner trilogy become just a passing name in a scene of the film.
Dashner’s text is a thrilling dystopian society novel. However, the film does a poor job of illustrating what the text conveys to readers. While the Maze Runner book series progresses exponentially, becoming more captivating with its different twists, this movie slowly runs out of steam.
Kyetra Bryant can be reached at Kyetra.bryant@spartans.ut.edu