In the widely-anticipated followup to the Oscar-winning Parasite, Bong Joon-ho returns to the screen with his signature darkly-comedic rebuke of unchecked capitalism, classism, and politics in Mickey 17. The film is based on the 2022 Edward Ashton novel called Mickey 7 and boasts an impressive cavalry of stars including Steven Yuen as Timo and Toni Collette as Yifa.
Mickey Barnes (Robert Pattinson) is a macaroon baker who gets caught up with a ruthless loan shark and signs up on a mission to the ice planet Niflheim to escape them and his miserable life on Earth after he becomes delinquent in his repayments. He inadvertently signs up to the Expendables program whereby he’s “copied” ad infinitum via the program’s Human Printer. The process comprises a full body scan and Mickey’s memories are archived. Copies are made as often as required. When one copy is no longer useful, a new one is made. Easy in today’s disposable society.
Things go awry when Mickey realizes that the Expendables are… expendable and live under the constant threat of “permanent deletion.” (Note to self: Always read the fine print before signing anything).
When Mickey 17 is falsely believed to have died during the expedition to the ice plane, Mickey 18 is printed in his place which catapults the story into bigger action. In the case of “Multiples,” every copy must be destroyed.
Aside from its body double world-building and its rules, Mickey 17 is more than a story about keeping up with the Mickeys as it embodies its contemporary social themes. There’s an emotional bedrock and familiarity to all of Bong’s eccentricity.
Bong Joon-ho doesn’t have a strict plan in terms of which film he wants to make next. He relies heavily on his immediate surroundings for his cinematic muse to strike. He stays alert and keeps his antennas up to guide his intuition. Like many writers, he finds the writing process painful and isolating, but in six months or so, he finished Mickey 17 and he could breathe a sigh relief until filming started.
Bong Joon-ho on the set of Mickey 17. Photo courtesy of Warner Bros.
Known for his peculiar blended genre mashups and abrupt juggling of tonal shifts, the filmmaker insists that he doesn’t deliberately set out to make hybrid genre movies. The stories lead him to them. Ostensibly, Mickey 17 is a sci-fi movie, but don’t tell Bong Joon-ho that. The comedic elements are specific, sometimes bordering on the farcical, but paradoxically, remarkably grounded and poignant.
The Joy Of Human Printing
Similar to Bong Joon-ho’s prior work, Mickey 17 examines the social ills arising from unfettered capitalism in his offering. The filmmaker adapted his screenplay from the novel firstly because it examines the fascinating concept of human printing. Bong explores the diminishing value of our humanity if we can be disposed of like scrap paper and reprinted like a new 3D PDF file.
Bong Joon-ho doesn’t consciously set out to make “propaganda films” either. The message is an inherent component of his storytelling. “I try to make films that are beautiful and entertaining on their own,” he claims. The underlying political statements become apparent in how Mickey 17 and Mickey 18 are treated.
Thematically, Mickey 17 can be distilled into a thesis of how people treat each other – ranging from the extremities of kindness to extreme cruelty. The filmmaker also illuminates the “foolishness” of some people which makes them more endearing – silly losers if you will.
Mickey 17 has a bitter taste embedded in its absurdity as it examines the concept of “human expendability” – a common theme in today’s corporate climate and social connections. Bong even tackles the concerns of the church creeping into state matters.
The ubiquitous and contemporaneous nature of the characters in Mickey 17 showcase the veritable working class struggle – a powerless stratum of people who can’t break out of their social and economic ruts. Mickey is an unlikely hero who manages to do so by leaving an increasingly inhospitable Earth to a planet with better prospects. He even finds live in the insatiable Nasha (Naomi Ackie).
Meet Mickey Barnes
Mickey is the epitome of averageness in this world – bordering on the wretched and sad.
In line with many of the filmmaker’s characters, Bong’s Mickey is even more average than the one in Ashton’s novel. He’s more disenfranchised, desperate and devoid of prospects.
Nasha (Nami Ackie) & Mickey (Robert Pattinson). Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
The audience meets Mickey as a kind of lovable goofball. He’s actually manifesting unresolved trauma, but is wrongly perceived as simple-minded. He’s an orphan struggling with cripplingly low self esteem. It’s almost a coming of age story where Mickey steps into his power.
Mickey dies and is reborn (actually reprinted) in sequential order, both physically and metaphorically. Mickey 18 is the aspirational version of Mickey 17 who’s simply rolled over and accepted his lot in life thinking he can’t change. Psychologically, the two Mickeys represent the two opposing forces in many people – the lazy fighting the active, the accepting fighting the searching.
