My quick rating - 7.4/10. Well, that was a fun flick. The opening of Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die wastes absolutely no time telling you what kind of flick you’re in for. A mysterious “Man From the Future,” played armed with mayhem by Sam Rockwell, bursts into a Los Angeles diner and bluntly informs a group of random, very annoyed patrons that they’ve been specifically selected to help him save the world from a rogue artificial intelligence. That’s it. That’s the pitch. No slow burn, no gentle world-building. Just Rockwell acting like a caffeinated time traveler who skipped several doses of sanity. And it’s perfect.
After that absurdly direct introduction, the film rewinds a few days to begin introducing the people who will eventually fill those diner seats. First up are Mark and Janet, played by Michael Peña and Zazie Beetz, whose storyline unfolds during a school shooting that the movie treats with an intentionally bizarre sense of “business as usual.” The kids are so buried in their phones that they barely register the chaos, which lands as a pretty sharp jab at modern tech addiction. The teacher at least knows they’re awake, because they never look up from their screens. It’s uncomfortable, but also hilariously on point.
From there, the movie splinters into several character threads that slowly start weaving together. Susan, played by Juno Temple, introduces a storyline revolving around cloning. Always a topic guaranteed to start arguments at family dinners and science conferences alike. Then there’s Ingrid, played by Haley Lu Richardson, who suffers from an extremely unusual allergy that becomes both a character trait and a clever piece of world-building. Her segment dives into virtual reality culture with some pointed social commentary about living life inside headsets and digital escapism. Let’s just say if you’ve ever spent a few too many hours inside VR on your Quest 3, you might feel personally attacked.
What’s impressive is how confidently director Gore Verbinski puts all these ideas into the same blender. Technology obsession, cloning ethics, AI apocalypse fears, brain rot caused by social media use. It’s all in there, and it’s all being satirized in this meat grinder. Sometimes it feels like someone took a bunch of Black Mirror episodes and just went crazy with the budget.
Case in point. Even the heroes look shocked when a giant minotaur-cat hybrid casually roams the streets eating teenagers. TBH, their reaction is fair. I say that because it perfectly summarizes the movie’s energy.
If there’s one thing holding Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die back slightly, it’s that the film sometimes feels like it’s not quite sure how hard it wants to commit to its darker tendencies. We get razor-sharp satire, deliciously dark humor, and the visuals can get downright haunting. But with the film’s violence? Sometimes it feels like the film wants to go hard but doesn’t quite commit enough. It’s not quite sure if it wants to be playfully chaotic or fully commit to the brutal madness of the dystopian world.
Thanks largely to Rockwell’s unhinged performance and a story that constantly throws new wild ideas at the screen, this flick ends up being a gleefully weird cinematic experiment. And while you are enjoying this strangely insightful trip, remember, Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die!
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