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If you like ambitious sci-fi, wild action set pieces, mind-blowing visuals, and emotional character arcs, you’re gonna love The Wandering Earth, China’s first sci-fi blockbuster. (thread) 
Frant Gwo’s film, based on a short story by the godfather of Chinese sci-fi Liu Cixin, borrows from popular American sci-fi and disaster films, then builds on those existing formulas to craft an exhilarating odyssey through space.
The premise is bonkers – set in the future, the aged sun is on the brink of engulfing Earth. To save humanity (and the planet), a global government decides to propel Earth into *another* solar system. No biggie.
But things also go wrong (like real wrong) and Earth is suddenly on track to smack right into Jupiter. It’s like Gwo’s film looked at Armageddon and Deep Impact and was like, “Psh, asteroids? Comets? Let’s up the ante and put Earth on a collision course with ANOTHER PLANET.”
There’s tons of allusions to Roland Emmerich’s disaster movies all over The Wandering Earth. The planet is completely frozen over, much like New York City in The Day After Tomorrow. There’s also worldwide aftershocks, so it’s pretty much 2012 all over again.
Gwo’s film owes a lot to Interstellar too. Both are about finding a new home for civilization in space, and just as the Endurance uses the gravity slingshot maneuver around a black hole, The Wandering Earth astronauts try to get a gravity assist from Jupiter.
Similar to Christopher Nolan’s sci-fi epic, Gwo’s film also places an importance on emotional character moments. I couldn’t help but think of Coop’s weepy moment during one teary scene between Liu Peiqiang (Wu Jing) and his son Liu Qi (Qu Chuxiao).
Oh and remember how in Deep Impact POTUS Morgan Freeman built caves to save people chosen by a lottery? Same thing here, except the people live in hi-tech underground cities that look like something out of Blade Runner.
The allusions to other iconic American films continue. Did I mention The Wandering Earth has a HAL-esque A.I. computer who runs the international space station and has a red eye?
Similar to Total Recall (2012), there’s massive elevators in The Wandering Earth that plunge through the Earth’s mantle towards the core.
I haven’t even gotten to The Wandering Earth’s totally wild action scenes yet! In one, astronauts hover outside a spacecraft when things go very wrong. Gwo alternates between wide shots & extreme close-ups to create a pulse-pounding intensity, much like the opening of Gravity.
In one scene our heroes climb an elevator shaft in the 2,073-ft Shanghai Tower... with a massive engine in tow. It recalls the preposterous nature & thrilling tension of scenes from Live Free or Die Hard and Poseidon (2006), not to mention M:I Ghost Protocol’s Burj Khalifa climb.
The Wandering Earth is a blast because Gwo knows exactly what audiences love about over-the-top disaster movies and visionary space adventures. It takes the familiar and expands it into new, ambitious territory. Watch it on Netflix now!
