15 years after a tear in the fabric of reality brought creatures to our world from an alternate dimension bent on humanity’s destruction, a father isolates his young daughter on a remote island, training her to survive a collapsing world and the battles to come. A film by Brad Anderson, starring Luke Evans, Billie Boullet, Mila Harris, Kevin Glynn, Meadow Williams, Steven Calvert, Nadia Violet Johnson, Brian Devlin, Chris Finlayson, Charis Agbonlahor, and Milla Jovovich.

Directed by Brad Anderson and written by Joshua Rollins, WORLDBREAKER is a sci-fi horror drama set fifteen years after an interdimensional rift unleashed monsters upon the Earth. The story follows an unnamed father (Luke Evans) who retreats to a remote island to protect his daughter Willa (Billie Boullet) in the ruins of civilization. Meanwhile, Willa’s mother (Milla Jovovich) leads an army of female soldiers in a last stand to save humanity from total extinction.

They say the Breakers have destroyed this world time and time again, and they never look the same. Sometimes they drop from the sky; sometimes they crawl up from underground. They can be human, animal, or entirely invisible, like a virus or a wave of energy. But they always bring death.

This time, the end began fifteen years ago when the first Stitch was torn open. Many believe we brought it on ourselves. A lot of folks blame climate change. They say that by razing the forests and melting the ice, we ruptured the fabric of reality itself, unleashing monsters from another dimension to wipe us out.

Legend has it that Kodiak (Chris Finlayson) was the first man to witness the Stitch and the Breakers that crawled out of it. Armed with an indestructible axe, he was the first to kill one and went on to slay hundreds more. His stories have since become a symbol of hope, inspiring warriors to keep fighting against these creatures.

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@pradt

WORLDBREAKER 💥
How far will you go to survive?
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A film by Brad Anderson, starring Luke Evans, Billie Boullet, Mila Harris, Kevin Glynn, Meadow Williams, Steven Calvert, Nadia Violet Johnson, Brian Devlin, Chris Finlayson, Charis Agbonlahor, and Milla Jovovich.

Breakers are large, multi-legged, spider-like creatures with black eyes and jagged mandibles. These highly aggressive monsters operate through a shared consciousness, allowing them to communicate and coordinate complex attacks. Bullets can slow them down, but the most effective way to kill a Breaker is decapitation.

They actively target human settlements to slaughter the inhabitants or infect the men through bites and scratches. The venom mutates these male victims into Hybrids, which the swarm then uses as its eyes and ears.

Women have proven far more resilient to Breaker venom, making them the backbone of humanity’s fighting forces and the frontline defenders. However, women are not completely immune. In rare cases, women can be turned into Hybrids as well.

The first problem is that its trailer makes this film look like an epic sci-fi action flick. But in reality, it’s 90% family drama and maybe 10% actual action.

Milla is basically a glorified extra who shows up briefly at the beginning, in flashbacks, and again at the end. It makes me wonder whether the budget could only afford her for a couple of days. If the budget was that tight, it might have been better spent on a decent screenwriter instead.

The screenplay is the film’s biggest failure, which is a shame because the premise is interesting. Monsters from another dimension that not only hunt humans but can infect men through bites and scratches, mutating them into Hybrids that serve as the swarm’s spies, all connected through a hive-mind faster than 5G. Women are largely immune, so they take up arms and fight on the frontlines instead. (If a monster physically stabs them, they’re still going to die.) Good concept. Terrible execution.

Almost the entire runtime is stuck on a remote island where the dad is hiding out with his daughter, Willa. They waste a ridiculous amount of time recounting the legend of Kodiak, this mythical hero who supposedly wiped out hundreds of beasts with a single swing of his ax, like he’s Thor or something. And every single time dad brings up the story, we get slapped with another annoying flashback. Tell the story, cue the flashback. It’s maddening. Meanwhile, absolutely nothing happens in the present day. It’s just endless scenes of them chopping wood, planting vegetables, and practicing sword-fighting.

To make matters worse, Willa herself is insufferable. She constantly whines and throws tantrums about being locked away, demanding to go out and fight the creatures just like her mom did. But the second she actually comes face-to-face with a real monster, she completely freezes up and does absolutely nothing. Character development: 0. Annoyance level: 100.

On top of everything, Willa secretly smuggles a shipwreck survivor into a cave without telling her father. It takes no effort at all to guess that the kid turns out to be a Hybrid. Willa is not the hero of this story. She is the liability.

The film clearly wants to be the next A QUIET PLACE, but it fails at the most fundamental level: making you care. By the time the Breakers close in, you feel nothing for the father or Willa. No dread, no investment, no reason to root for either of them. A survival story only works if the audience is emotionally tied to the people trying to survive. WORLDBREAKER never bothers to earn that connection.

WORLDBREAKER was theatrically released in the United States on 30 January 2025.