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Insurgent

Nothing happened in this Divergent sequel, at least while I was awake

Forgive me if all these YA dystopian sci-fi fantasy franchises are starting to blur together (The Divergent Maze Games?). Nothing much happens in this second installment—of four!—in the Divergent franchise. At least it didn’t while I was awake.

There’s little character development and the silly conceit of dividing the populace into five behavioral types is not advanced. The film industry’s thousands of CGI technicians, however, are kept employed. This amounts to great-looking, plodding padding. It’s franchise management. Shailene Woodley remains strong, though, and all the actors deserve more to do. Japanese title: Divergent Neo. (119 min)