Based entirely on the trailers, you might be expecting Netflix’s They Cloned Tyrone – premiering on July 21 – to be a defiantly old school and entirely offbeat sci-fi comedy… which it is.
However, despite being exactly the movie that was promised by the marketing, it’s also something completely different altogether. As oxymoronic as it sounds, the greatest strength of co-writer and director Juel Taylor’s feature-length debut is that it both is and isn’t what everyone expects it to be, and it toes that line beautifully from beginning to end.
To call it a genre-bender would be an understatement, too, considering there are elements of science fiction, action, comedy, thriller, mystery, and Blaxploitation all in play simultaneously in a story that unfolds in what appears to be somewhere around the present day but not quite, all wrapped up in a biting social satire that has plenty to say on the current state of the world.
It’s one hell of an ambitious juggling act, but one that’s pulled off with supreme confidence, no shortage of style, and plenty of aplomb. As much as Taylor deserves immense credit for wrangling so many disparate parts together into such a satisfying and remarkably cohesive whole, an equal amount of praise deserves to be lavished on the film’s three main stars, both individually and collectively.
John Boyega’s Fontaine is the audience surrogate and way into the story, with the low-level drug dealer getting gunned down in his car, only to wake up the next day with no recollections of what happened, despite everyone around him being shocked that he’d survived a guaranteed fatality.
Attempting to discover why, he ends up partnering up with Teyonah Parris’ prostitute Yo-Yo and Jamie Foxx’s pimp Slick Charles to try and unravel the secrets of his resurrection. As you can gather from the title (even though his name isn’t Tyrone), Fontaine swiftly discovers he’s a clone, but that’s merely one thread that gets pulled as the intrepid trio head deeper into the conspiratorial abyss, and their palpable chemistry crackles every step of the way.
The costumes, cars, and even musical score give off deliberately 1970s vibes, but there are pop culture references from the last decade thrown around with reckless abandon, creating a vibe of uncertainty that leaves you questioning exactly what’s going on in a small town that seems as if everyone and everything is exactly as it should be, but remains ever so slightly askew. That’s without even mentioning the deliberately scuzzy and scratched filter over the film that deepens the grindhouse aesthetic, although it never compromises the narrative’s desire to shine a light on issues that exist in the present.
Boyega has always been heralded as one of his generation’s finest talents, and while Fontaine is a man of few words who operates under the assumption the entire world is against him – something that fittingly gets proven true in one way or another – his physical presence, subtlety of expression, and body language do more to convey his feelings than any monologue could.
Foxx and Parris are every bit his equals, too, with the former spewing out one-liners like it’s nobody’s business but occasionally allowing vulnerabilities to shine through the splashy suits and uber-confidence, with the latter’s Nancy Drew-obsessed and overly enthusiastic sex worker proving to be the most switched-on and determined of the central trio by quite some distance.
As reductive as it sounds, the easiest way to describe They Cloned Tyrone is as a Blaxploitation-infused riff on John Carpenter’s They Live, because digging any further into specifics would be running the risk of giving away spoilers that are best discovered firsthand. That being said, it’s not a revelation to say that there’s a lot of anger, resentment, confusion, and ultimately resignation fueling Fontaine, Slick Charles, and Yo-Yo as they quite literally venture under the surface of their existence to discover some seriously shady goings-on.
Netflix takes a lot of flak – and deservedly so – for churning out so many identikit blockbusters that boast big names, cutting-edge visual effects, and several showstopping action sequences that don’t even make a concerted attempt to try anything new, exciting, fresh, or daring, but those are accusations that can’t be leveled at They Cloned Tyrone.
Sure, it’s got three popular and proven talents in the main roles, and it does involve plenty of CGI-assisted shenanigans and bursts of gunplay at various points, but at no point does it ever feel as though Taylor has been forced to compromise, water down, or sand the edges off anything his movie is trying to say.
For those who love their sci-fi stories to have more going on than first meets the eye, the streaming service’s latest foray into cosmic mind-bending is a triumph. For those wanted something more from from Netflix than relentlessly uninspired original stories that play it safe at the expense of imagination, then the exact same sentiment applies.
In short; They Cloned Tyrone is everything you want it to be, and plenty more you weren’t expecting but will enjoy anyway, and it’s sure to leave a lasting impression as one of the platform’s most singular, striking, and inimitable exclusives to drop this year.
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'They Cloned Tyrone' is comfortably Netflix's most original blockbuster of the year, and being exactly the movie you think it is and something completely unexpected at the exact same time is easily its biggest strength.