Review of The Huntsman: Winter's War (2016) by Michael1208 — 22 Apr 2016

Not sure whether Universal Pictures is desperate to repeat their box office dominating success as in 2015, this prequel/ sequel to 2012's Snow White and the Huntsman feels to be pointless, uneven and unnecessary.

The film does not learn from the mistakes of its predecessor especially in term of pacing that is two times much slower for the entire first hour, fills with relentless cheesy and humorless dialogues, irrelevant romantic scenes, then immediately rushes into short and unimpressive climax.

It gathers a great cast, Charlize Theron as the Evil Queen looks tremendous with her outstanding performance but unexpectedly limited by screen time; Emily Blunt is cool as the Ice Queen while the chemistry between Chris Hemsworth and Jessica Chastain is dull due to the main theme about love and betrayal is poorly crafted into this clumsily-penned fantasy tale.

Overall, it is an easily forgotten sequel that has totally wasted the talents of its cast, lacks of moral satisfaction and seems to be an empty lackluster concept of Frozen - Lord of the Rings combination that clearly should have "let it go" at the first place.