Best to be said for multiverse fantasy The Dark Tower is that it is not as dull or infuriating as some of 2017’s biggest duds (I’m looking at you, Pirates of the Caribbean 5 and A Dog’s Purpose). There also are plenty of ripe concepts and potential plot threads which are glimpsed during this lukewarm “adventure”. But they all fail to come to the boil.

The Dark Tower proves to be painfully simplistic

The Dark Tower manages to squander great source material (Stephen King’s books about other universes, good and evil, and the meaning of everything), a great cast and great screen potential. As a novice to The Dark Tower universe, I was bored and left to seriously wonder what all the fuss has been about King’s books. The Dark Tower proves to be painfully simplistic as a 90-minute movie, complete with sigh-worthy dialogue, an anaemic plot, sleepwalking actors and subdued visuals

Somehow, a potent battle between light and darkness has been undercooked. This flimsy fantasy only winks at bigger themes about what evil is capable of and whether there is some cosmic battle raging between opposing forces. The Man In Black character played by Matthew McConaughey is, basically, The Devil yet the power or terror he might confront us with is nowhere to be seen.

… It could have led to a cool investigation into one person’s desire to question “God”.

One of the key elements of King’s novels has not made it to our screens – gunslinger Roland wants to reach The Dark Tower, so he can interrogate whoever it is that controls the universe from it. The Dark Tower movie doesn’t touch that idea, even though it sounds like it could have led to a cool investigation into one person’s desire to question “God”.

I’m still amazed at how this disappointing movie makes a mess of such incredible material.

Meanwhile, in another pop-culture galaxy, The Big Picture’s Mark Hadley reports on how God is being blacklisted from Star Trek.