Underneath: Children of the Sun

I was ready to have a good time with Underneath: Children of the Sun, but it wasn’t good or ready. The film, at its core, is a backyard Star Wars sword fight like millions of us filmed with camcorders when we were children. There’s nothing wrong with this impulse, as quite a few filmmakers have developed decent sci-fi from the same urge. They add their own embellishments and further develop their own version to obscure the inspiration’s origin. However, Kirkman wears his core on his sleeve here by marking every big confrontation with another sword fight. And the glowing swords used only serve to make this look even more like that beloved property.

Imagine if George Lucas had not obscured his inspirations for Star Wars and had everyone in space who was sword fighting dressed like Captain Blood pirates. There are a few unfortunate instances of unintentional humor. After a scene where someone fighting with swords just punches out their opponent at the end. There is also a scene where a 19th-century slave refers to something as a super ninja. Thankfully these don’t appear often enough to make Underneath: Children of the Sun a target of ridicule or brand it as a “so bad it’s good” movie.

“…decent costumes and makeup effects…”

The biggest mistakes Kirkman makes all stem from assumed audience investment. He obviously sees this movie as the first chapter in a series, but he declined to establish something extraordinary enough to warrant more installments. Instead, it feels the title card about Enki’s galactic ascension summarizes the movie that should have been made before this one. It works as well as if they had started the Dune films with Dune Messiah, with the first book summarized on a title card. Also, there is a serious case of bait and switch by dangling a sci-fi setting and then putting the audience in an overly familiar slavery drama. It is the same sickening feeling of being had that we all got when He-Man went to a high school prom in Masters of the Universe. If the audience was already invested in the property, then such genre-crossing would be better received.

All Underneath: Children of the Sun leaves us with some decent costumes and makeup effects; they just so happen to be the most afro-futurist part. The outfits worked with their cool 1970s sci-fi vibe, like the Logan’s Run TV series. Kirkman needs to hone his craft further before his movies will match the grand vision he has. I hope he keeps attempting because I like what he is trying to do. But in the end, Underneath: Children of the Sun doesn’t meet its own lofty expectations.