Review: The First Purge

Are you a fan of the Purge franchise? Me? Guilty!

I remember seeing ads for the first one, simply The Purge, as opposed to the newest one, which is called The First Purge. (And which I will review in this post. Hold tight. I’m getting there.) Kind of interesting to watch them go back and show exactly how it all began.

Anyway, I was curious about the first one, but after seeing it I wasn’t initially crazy about it. It was just okay. Not what I had expected, based on the trailer. Yet…it stayed with me. That was the truly horrific part of it all: the concept.

A Surprising New Franchise

I was surprised when a new one, The Purge: Anarchy, was released the following summer (2014).

If there’d been buzz about the first one, I’d missed it. Had people liked it after all? Not if its Rotten Tomatoes (39% on the Tomatometer, 36% audience score) and IMDB (5.7/10) numbers were any indication.

Ratings be damned. Apparently it had done well enough at the box office to warrant a follow-up

The trailers –and concept– once again intrigued me, so I gave the second one a shot. I was surprised to find I liked it better than the first one. Then I started hearing others admit they felt the same, which the ratings reflect: 56% for both the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer and audience score; 6.5/10 on IMDB.

Is Liking it Wrong?

Is it one of those things it’s uncomfortable to admit liking?

As horror movies go, it’s not normal. In so far as it’s not your typical good vs. evil horror movie scenario.

Yes, there are scary Purgers, but at the end of the day the true villain is the movie’s fictional government, the NFFA (New Founding Fathers of America). It’s really a statement on our society and where we feel it could go.  That’s where the real terror comes from, because in some ways it’s not that ludicrous to imagine this happening -especially given present day circumstances.

That’s also what made the third movie in the franchise, The Purge: Election Year, interesting. It was very timely, with all the real-life Election Year tension playing out at the time.

But I was also surprised there was already another one out.

Wow. There must be more Purge fans than I’d realized. (For the record, this one scored 54% on the Tomatometer with a 48% audience score, and 6/10 on IMDB.)

Clearly there was. Because in 2018, the fourth Purge movie in five years was released.

The First Purge

Again, I don’t know what it says about me that I like the Purge movies, but I’m not going to lie. I was psyched when they released The First Purge last year.

I didn’t get to see it in theaters, though. However, I realized this past weekend it was available to stream on HBO, which I took advantage of via my Roku. Whoop! Let the purging begin!!! (Well, in a manner of speaking –er, writing.)

I have to say, I think this is my favorite of them all, even though it’s not everyone else’s favorite. Far from it. (With a 54% Tomatometer and a 29% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, and a 5.1/10 on IMDB, it’s the second worst-rated one after the original.)

Yet, I liked it. Maybe because I wasn’t expecting to?

Although I didn’t like all of it. It was fictionally set before the #MeToo movement. I have a little more confidence that no whack NFFA party could come to power now in light of that. (Back in 2013, when the first movie came out, I was less sure of that, though.)

I did have to suspend disbelief that anyone in power would really think a concept like Purging would make for a good experiment. However, if I did it for the other three movies, I couldn’t very well hold that against this one, could I?

Still, as scary as the concept is, in the end it’s the characters that sold me on this movie. The main protagonists personify heart, truth, and goodness. Their loyalty to not only each other, but their community as a whole, was inspiring.

Imagine what the world would be like if people put that much passion into benefiting their families and neighborhoods, not just on Purge Night, but year-round. I bet they could love the hate right out of all the haters.

Rating

I fell in love with the characters. (All the actors did great jobs, by the way.) The story line was somehow fresh, even for being part of a franchise. It hit me in that uncomfortable part of my gut and made me sick in parts, yet also tugged at my heartstrings.

Because of its complexity and entertainment value (again, not sure what it says about me that I’m entertained by such a movie), I think The First Purge deserves four out of five skulls.

 

Check-In

Would you Purge? Or would you hunker down somewhere and try to stay safe? And if you’ve seen the movie, share your thoughts.