Been There: Ready Player One

Name of the place you visited:
Cinemark, Gateway to see Ready Player One
Thank goodness for the reserve ahead recliner seats!

Who went with you?
My husband, 13 year old son & 12 year old daughter.

How did you hear about it?
My son, husband & I read the book.

What made you want to check it out?
We all really enjoyed the book so we had the release date of the movie on our calendars.

Best things about it:

• The visuals are great. The book goes between the real world & a virtual world & the movie does that really well. The virtual world is very cool & fun.
• The characters are just as likeable as in the book. We all had experience with them, of course, so maybe that's why it felt that way, but my 11 year old hadn't read the book & she liked the characters, too.
• No sex at all. There were a couple of comments like 'She's hot' but beyond that it was oogle free. (Thank you book author & movie director)
• 80's music!
• The premise of the movie is puzzle focused & that is such a neat twist. The puzzles were different from the ones in the book & we liked that, too.
• Great twists!

Not so great things about it:

• We all LOVED the book & we just liked the movie. Not sure that's a bad thing, it's pretty standard for book to movie. The book just gave us such a good feelings & was so exciting that the movie didn't quite live up to it.
• So many battle scenes. Way more than the book. I get that the movie is aimed at boys (& men, I guess?) but it really didn't need so much battling. On the bright side, no one can die in the battles because it's virtual reality, so that's nice :) (Note: some people do die in the real world part of the movie, not at all brutal or bloody)

I'd totally tell __________________ to see it.
Anyone who read the book
Fans of puzzles & figuring things out
Teen boys
Anyone who enjoys action, humor, fun & a tiny bit of romance.

Here's what I really think:
Go see it! It's fun & exciting & a pretty great movie for older kids & adults.

Ps.
My 12 year old daughter got kind of bored midway through. She cozied up for a little nap but I don't think she actually fell asleep :) She said that she liked it when we talked about it afterward.

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Have you seen Ready Player One?
What did you think?