Film

The Bad Batch

Name: The Bad Batch
Genre: Action, Horror, Science Fiction, Thriller, Romance
Released: 2017
Cast: Suki Waterhouse, Jason Momoa, Yolonda Ross, Keanu Reeves, Giovanni Ribisi

Survival adventure
Very dark

A neon-soaked fever dream set in a desert prison colony where society's unwanted are left to fend for themselves. Suki Waterhouse navigates a landscape of freaks, cannibals, and strange beauty with deadpan determination. It's visually audacious and deeply weird, less interested in plot coherence than in creating a fully realized nightmare aesthetic. For viewers hungry for something aggressively unconventional.

TMDb rating

2.6

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like dusty, dreamlike post-apocalyptic odysseys where strange characters and bursts of violence matter more than plot mechanics, and you don't mind a love story running through the grime.

Skip it if you want brisk momentum or tight logic, since long hazy stretches drift and the cannibal violence arrives suddenly and graphically.

What it asks of you: It runs just under two hours and asks you to sit with silence, heat and odd rhythms, letting scenes breathe rather than explaining themselves.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

A Clockwork Orange1971

Kubrick's dystopian nightmare uses similar visual excess and moral ambiguity to explore violence, beauty, and survival in a broken system. Waterhouse's journey echoes Alex's odyssey through a warped world.

But The graphic violence and sexual content remain deliberately shocking fifty years later. It's stylish cruelty, not catharsis, which some find alienating.

Mad Max: Fury Road2015

Both follow a lone figure traversing hostile desert wastelands populated by bizarre cults and scavengers. The same kinetic visual storytelling, practical creature design, and strange tribal aesthetics dominate every frame.

But If you need a coherent plot or emotional clarity, this isn't it. Both films prioritize atmosphere and spectacle over narrative accessibility.

Suspiria1977

Dario Argento's masterpiece shares The Bad Batch's commitment to style over sense, creating a world where visual beauty and horror coexist. Both celebrate artifice and color as tools of psychological terror.

But The narrative is deliberately obtuse. If you prefer stories that explain themselves, this cryptic approach will frustrate you.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from The Bad Batch

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Videodrome1983

Both are hallucinatory narratives about outsiders trapped in systems that deform reality itself—where the landscape (video signal or wasteland) becomes a character reshaping the human body and mind.

Cronenberg's reality-bending nightmare about a man lost in layers of video, sexuality, and violence. Like The Bad Batch, it's a descent into a nightmarish system that reshapes perception and identity. The same fever-dream logic and body horror.

But The plot is deliberately confusing and the sexual content explicit. It's more interested in making you *feel* confusion than providing clarity.

Tusk2014

Kevin Smith's body-horror nightmare about transformation and captivity. It shares The Bad Batch's unflinching grotesquerie and willingness to make viewers deeply uncomfortable in service of a strange vision.

But The premise (man becomes walrus) is intentionally repulsive. It's more interested in shock than sense, and the humor lands only for a specific audience.

Annihilation2018

A sci-fi expedition into a mysterious zone where reality warps and beauty becomes dangerous. Both films create immersive worlds where the visuals convey more than exposition, and survival means understanding alien logic.

But The ending is deliberately ambiguous and unsatisfying if you want answers. The pacing is slow-burn and hypnotic rather than propulsive.

Under the Skin2014

Scarlett Johansson glides through a landscape of industrial Scotland encountering humanity like an alien scientist. Both are meditative, visually striking genre films more interested in mood and abstraction than plot clarity.

But Glacially paced with minimal dialogue or character development. If you need narrative momentum or character arcs, you'll find it deliberately withholding.

Only God Forgives2013

Refn's Bangkok fever dream uses neon, violence, and silence to create something hypnotic and strange. Like The Bad Batch, it's more interested in creating a visual and emotional texture than coherent storytelling.

But The protagonist is passive and unlikeable, the plot is thin, and the style can feel like style for its own sake. Patience with aesthetics over narrative is essential.

The Love Witch2016

A meticulously artificial film about a woman in a heightened reality where Technicolor dreams and horror collide. Both celebrate artifice, bizarre character design, and a commitment to visual language over realism.

But The deadpan tone and deliberate artificiality might read as campy rather than intentional. If you prefer naturalistic performances, this will feel mannered.

Kamikaze '891982

Both use exaggerated visual design and isolated protagonists to critique systems that have deemed people expendable—whether through exile or surveillance. Both are skeptical of authority wearing beautiful clothes.

Rainer Werner Fassbinder's neon-drenched techno-thriller about a cop navigating a fascistic surveillance state. It shares The Bad Batch's visual excess, alienated protagonist, and commitment to style as political commentary.

But This is a German science-fiction film from 1982 and it shows. The pacing and tone are unfamiliar by modern standards, and it requires patience with its deliberate artificiality.

Possession1981

Both depict worlds where psychological collapse manifests as literal grotesquerie, where survival means accepting that reality has become incomprehensible and beautiful in equal measure.

Andrzej Żuławski's apocalyptic marital horror set in a decaying Berlin where psychological breakdown becomes literal monstrosity. The same commitment to visceral transformation, contamination, and a world that reflects inner chaos.

But Deliberately incoherent and aggressively unpleasant. The relationship at its core is toxic and the violence is graphic and sexualized. It's not cathartic—it's designed to alienate.