I would love to be able to start off my review for Matchbox: The Movie by calling it an outlier. Like it’s some sort of weird social experiment to try to create a film based on Matchbox cars, as if there’s actually something there. Some story, some deep lore in which to explore the Matchbox universe. A battle that has long been waged, characters that we grew up with and related to, a devoted fan base that still runs around today with their Matchbox T-shirts and jumps onto Reddit subforums to debate theories about the Matchbox universe. But unfortunately, it’s not that much of an outlier. It’s a brand, and studios have been trying to figure out how to turn brands into continuing intellectual properties for quite some time. Some of it makes sense, or at least they figure out an interesting way to make it make sense. For example, Tetris, which was also an Apple release, could have been absolute nonsense, considering that the game itself doesn’t really allow for an adaptation. How would you even do that? It’s just blocks falling from the sky, lining up, and rows being deleted. But somebody decided instead that we should have a story about how Tetris came to be, which was a far better movie than anything we possibly could have gotten from a literal adaptation. And the weekend after Matchbox, we have yet another attempt at making a Street Fighter movie. A game that was basically punch, kick, repeat, but did manage to create a loyal following of fans obsessed with its various characters. So the desire is there because the fans are there. I honestly don’t know why we have a Matchbox movie, but then again, I don’t know why we had a Playmobil movie either.

I’m not really sure Apple knows why they have a Matchbox movie. If I had to take a swing, I would say that the screenplay for Matchbox was likely something that originally had nothing to do with Matchbox, was floating around trying to find someone to buy it as a generic spy action movie, and then Mattel, in their infinite wisdom, saw the potential of a film with at least a few car chases as being the future for Matchbox. I don’t know if kids these days still play with Matchbox cars, so perhaps simply putting this out there with an accessible rating so families can watch it together might move a few toys. But this is barely a Matchbox movie. The last attempt at making a live-action Power Rangers film was more of a Krispy Kreme movie than this is a Matchbox movie.

The actual Matchbox cars really only come into play at the beginning and the end, as the Matchbox gang, a group of middle schoolers, revolves around collecting these cars. There’s one specific car that a boy wants to use to impress a girl, but then we abandon that storyline and jump into the future, when they’re all adults and haven’t seen each other since middle school. That boy has turned into Sean, played by John Cena, who now works for a secret subsection of the CIA that nobody’s ever heard of because it doesn’t exist except inside this film. He’s being framed for stealing a nuclear warhead, and not knowing who he can trust, including his bosses, played by Corey Stoll and Danai Gurira, he heads back home to lay low. There, he runs into his old friend group, collectively still somehow in the same place, played by Jessica Biel, Sam Richardson, and Teyonah Parris. None of them has any particular set of skills that would make them useful in this situation, yet they all get pulled into this international action scenario because the film requires it.

It’s a pretty by-the-numbers action film, except it’s a tame version of everything because it has the Matchbox name attached to it. There’s little to no sexual chemistry or romance, the action scenes are bloodless and rather uneventful, the profanity is basically nonexistent, and they’ve made sure that the action sequences aren’t too violent because they want to pull in the whole family. It has just enough action to keep adults awake, but it’s also incredibly neutered due to the brand. This is one of those head-scratchers where I wonder who thought there was an audience for this. Who is this movie for? Who did they think this movie was for? Does anyone actually like Matchbox: The Movie? Is it going to end up starting a franchise for Apple, or is it going to be one of their biggest regrets?

Apple, having somehow managed a massive success last year with F1, probably thought Matchbox had a strong chance of following that up. Except this one is basically devoid of a plot, especially a plot that you haven’t seen before or one that isn’t incredibly predictable. While F1 had a cast that actually seemed like they were attempting to turn in really great performances, Matchbox can’t really be accused of that. Granted, these actors aren’t really being given anything to do, but even within their limited range, it’s hard to say anybody here is a standout. There was nothing about this movie that surprised me. None of the twists and turns along the way. Everything felt incredibly predictable, and I was just surprised that this was what they ultimately decided the Matchbox movie should be.

Instead of putting the Matchbox cars front and center, possibly in a more absurd way where someone creates a device that allows a Matchbox car to become a reality, turning a toy into something you could actually drive, or shrinking everybody down so they can drive Matchbox cars, we get something that feels like a Fast and Furious knockoff with a rebrand. It’s an instantly forgettable, not aggressively terrible, but below-average actioner that will leave you wanting to watch something else as a palate cleanser. It does have audio description, but the simple presence of accessibility doesn’t grant a film automatic admission into the realm of fresh. Often, we use the term derivative broadly, but this is highly derivative. It feels like this could have easily been written by artificial intelligence based on a prompt to write a film similar to other things that were successful, for reasons this film doesn’t understand.

I also can’t say I’m disappointed because I’m not really sure I expected Matchbox: The Movie to be Oscar caliber. I was hoping that, at best, it would be cheesy, fun, and entertaining, but it struggles to even be that. It’s too long, and it stalls right out of the gate. Apple needs to pay attention to its check engine light because this John Cena vehicle has no gas, goes nowhere, and could really use a jump-start.

Rotten: 4.6/10