Everything Everywhere All At Once: The Multiverse of Madness We Deserved

Before the year started and before this month, we all thought the movie that was going to blow our minds in presenting an explorative and insane cinematic iteration of 'The Multiverse'  was going to be Dr Strange in The Multiverse of Madness. But the film didn't exactly live up to it's title as Sam Raimi went for a more dark grounded narrative and subverted the expected multiversal madness the title suggests.

Anyways, it's alarming how the MCU has been completely left in the dust so soon, as the new sci-fi blockbuster from Daniel Quan and Daniel Scheinert (The Daniels), Everything Everywhere All At Once brings maximum fulfillment of our multiversal aesthetics, with enough quality to already be called the best of it's kind.

The story follows Evelyn Quan Wang, a Chinese immigrant laundry owner dealing with several domestic issues regarding her husband, Waymond and daughter, Joy. She suddenly gets pulled into a crazy adventure when Waymond gets possessed by a variant of himself from another universe to inform her of the existence of a dark entity that threatens the balance of the multiverse, which only she can stop.

Now the aging mother must do all she can by using an interdimensional device that allows her to weild the abilities of her variants from other worlds to thwart this evil.

For a movie with a $25 Million budget, its a redeeming thing to see how impeccable the production elements of this film are.

There was a lot of visual flexing at play in this film as one would expect from a Sci-fi of this nature. It may not have the over-the-top magic battles of the preceeding multiverse film, but we still got an even bigger visual feast of a movie. 

Mind-melting visual imagery illuminate the scenes with insane sequence transitions like never before, flamboyant flashes of it's elegant set designs and radiant cinematography, all excellently making the wild multiverse not only seen but fully felt in literal flying colours.

It goes without saying given its genre and Chinese roots, but this film is highly action packed.

Every single fight is exceedingly well executed and exhilirating, with intensity impinged by it's mouth-watering stunt choreography representing 'Kong-Fu' with such quality that even the likes of Jackie Chan would be amazed.

Remarkable visual editing, sound effects and scene transitions contextualize the interdimensional powers of the combatants, adding to the amazing martial arts to make the fight sequences insane, addictive and aesthetically pleasing.

The acting wasn't any joke as well. 

A film that needs to make it's viewing crowd feel a myriad of emotions through its comedy, action, sci-fi explorations, drama and overall craziness needs a powerful lead cast, and Michelle Yeoh delivered on that perfectly, with an energetic, compelling and simply amazing portrayal of Evelyn Wang.

Stephanie Hsu also gave an elegant performance as Joy Wang, being the most emotionally significant side character of the story.

Ke Huy Quan (Waymond Wang) and the rest of the side cast all did amazing jobs in their roles, and it's through the hardwork the entire cast put into their craft that every scene hit the intended way and this film reached it's full potential.

Now on to the writing.

This film not only presented, but explored the concept of multiverse in extraordinary ways. Creative doesn't even begin to describe it.

Unlike the other Multiverse film, the entire exploration of the vast multiverse wasn't summized into one collapsing sequence, but rather made very instrumental in every piece of the story being told.

The universes shown clearly highlight how vastly different the lifepath of the characters are in the different worlds, and even make an effort to show bits of their stories during the sequences of their abilities being summoned. It's a really beautiful and nuanced multiverse, one that even accompanies even worlds of ridiculously bent realities, all adding to make it the most ingenious portrayal of the multiverse ever seen in pop culture.

The characterization is done spectacularly. Evelyn was a seemlessly interesting and lovable main character and the rest of the supporting cast were also very compelling. Waymond, Joy and the other side characters felt properly developed and truly vital in the story, and not only their main versions, but their variants from the other worlds that came into play as well. It's an astounding feat for a film to not only make you feel the main story but simultaneously captivate you with short side stories from other worlds alongside it. 

The story itself is the real winner here. Split into 3 parts symbolically titled "Everything", "Everywhere" and "All At Once", this film gives a wild, thrilling ride of an enchanting story. The most spectacular thing about it is that amidst all that craziness and multiversal fun comes a grounded drama about a troubled family. 

After exploring the crazy world, the narrative still came back home to hit a thematically heavy tone, almost like a plane that took off to the skies and still landed and started running again.

The dialogues alternated from immensely comedic to philosophically explorative to heart-gripping and captivating moments of serenity, all brilliantly executing the phenomenal script written for this film.

The entertainment value is unlike anything else this year. Everything Everywhere All At Once presents not only a viscerally layered multiverse but a well grounded story, sizzled with non-stop fun and thrills to give undoubtedly the best cinematic experience of the year so far.

The uncanny jokes and comedic displays were truly hilarious, the plot progression perfectly paced, properly fixing its intense and insightful moments, and with the proper execution of all the craziness that follows such an eccentric setting, I can't help but call this one of the best sci-fi films of all time.

I haven't had this much fun while watching a movie in a long time. Excellent not only as a sci-fi film but as a drama-comedy, Everything Everywhere All At Once is no doubt an unforgettable movie and the best movie of 2022 so far.

With the amount of perfection in this film, I think it's only fitting to give this A24 masterpiece a 10/10, and tag as one of the best films from the production company.

It should be no argument that the previous Multiverse film of this month, Dr Strange In The Multiverse of Madness isn't a match for this film at all in any aspect, whether it's the narrative quality or fulfilling the thirst for a satisfying multiverse.

Go see this movie if you haven't, preferably on the big screen with some pop corn, and you are bound to be amazed. It's phenomenal and definitely worth any hype it gets.

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Thank you all for reading this

I'll see you all in my next review.