Assassin's Creed

I go to see a lot of movies that I think will be bad because occasionally I'm pleasantly surprised but, as expected, this was not one of those times. I've seen more than my fair share of video game movies to know they're typically nonsensical and either loved by a fanbase despite its failings or universally derided. All I knew about the game franchise beforehand was that its appeal seemed to hinge on being Batman, but in the past. I tried to play the second game once but couldn't even get started because of all the bugs.

Michael Fassbender plays Callum Lynch, and things haven't been going well for him. His mum dies in the opening scene to provide him with A Tragic Backstory. Flash forward, and he's executed by the state, before waking up in a compound where he's been resurrected(?) by Marion Cotillard and her dad, Jeremy Irons. Lynch is the last living descendent of 'The Assassins', who fight against 'The Knights Templar' to protect an artifact called the Apple of Eden which somehow contains the ~~~genetic code for free will~~~. The Templars want to destroy free will because they're Evil Brits trying to make hard determinism happen fascists. Is free will literally in our biological makeup? Is this gene somehow never missing in any human? What would happen if it were? Why haven't the super-scientists tried finding the gene for it instead of building their giant Evil Plot Device? We'll never know. The Plot Device in question is 'The Animus', which can allow someone to relive moments from their ancestor's lives because of ~~~genetic memory~~~. Eventually Lynch is convinced by some other Assassins & his dad that letting the Templars get the Apple is a bad idea, so all the Assassins team up and stop them.

As you'd expect, the visuals were great, and if the film was more Renaissance parkour and less fakedeep philosophy, this might have been an ok action movie.