Reel Entropy

10/10 The Creator is a searing tapestry of emotion, an uncompromising labyrinth of peak action scenes, a scorching hate letter to American imperialism and exploration of the human cost of war measured in screams.

The Republic of New Asia, 2065- In an alternate history Earth where fully functioning artificial intelligence is developed shortly after World War II and 10 years after a rogue program nuked Los Angeles, the U.S. has banned all artificial life forms and wages a brutal war against New Asia, a confederacy of what appears to be all the countries underneath the elbow formed by India and China from Nepal all the way to Vietnam on the coast, which became a haven for the machines. Sgt. Joshua Taylor (John David Washington), on a long-term undercover mission to find Nirmata – Hindi, “the creator” – a mysterious engineer behind recent AI advancements who the machines worship as a creator god, is caught unaware when American forces attack backed up by the USS NOMAD (North American Orbital Mobile Aerospace Defense). The space station, an all-in-one spy satellite and nuclear weapons platform that can seemingly cover the entire war by itself, is a massive blade that hangs ominously in the sky, the Sword of Damocles dangled carelessly over an entire continent.

Another five years later, Nirmata has built a new weapon capable of destroying NOMAD. Taylor, now a dejected veteran cleaning the rubble of Los Angeles, is lured back to New Asia with evidence that his wife, Maya (Gemma Chan), who was also his main subject of surveillance, survived the attack. He discovers the weapon, the first ever AI child called Alpha-O (Madeline Yuna Voyles), capable of controlling technology remotely through what appears to be prayer, whom the machines worship as a messiah. On the run from both the American military and the New Asian police, he shepherds the child across the continent in search of Nirmata.