Incoming (2018) Review

“Incoming” Theatrical Poster

Director: Eric Zaragoza
Cast: Scott Adkins, Aaron McCusker, Michelle Lahane, Vahidin Prelic, Lukas Loughran, Alaa Safi, Milan Kovacevic, Arkie Reece, James MacCallum, Vladan Dujovic
Running Time: 89 min.

By Kyle Warner

SCOTT… ADKINS… IN… SPACE! For a certain group of movie viewers, that’s hand over the money, give it to me now sort of entertainment. Me, I like Adkins. Though he hasn’t reached the popularity of the high kicking stars of yesteryear (the mainstream action movie landscape has changed a lot since then), he is a more than capable lead for action-packed B-movies. Viewer expectations for these sorts of movies aren’t exactly high; all we really want is to be entertained. Sad to say, Scott Adkins’ space movie Incoming does not meet even the lowest of expectations.

Incoming begins with the bombing of London’s Big Ben. A terrorist group known as the Wolf Pack claims responsibility. We’re told that the Wolf Pack is responsible for other terrorist attacks all across the globe. Many of the Wolf Pack terrorists have been captured alive and are questioned in relation to whereabouts of their leader, known only as Alpha. Instead of executing the captured terrorists, the nations of the world work together to lock them up in a top secret black site prison, the International Space Station codenamed Hammer. The Hammer orbits the Earth with a staff of only one man who tortures, questions, and tends to the needs of his dozen or so prisoners from an automated control room. We enter the story as an inspection is scheduled that will take the American agent (Scott Adkins), a doctor (Michelle Lahane), and a pilot (Aaron McCusker) to the space station in order to assess its progress in finding Alpha and also the condition of its prisoners.

There is something like political commentary in the movie about what is, essentially, Guantanamo in outer space. Michelle Lahane’s doctor has strong objections to the treatment of the prisoners. They are burned with hot steam, forced to endure death metal at ear-shattering decibels, never allowed to speak to anyone, barely fed, and so on. The doctor questions how any of this can be legal under the Geneva Convention, to which Adkins replies with what might be my favorite line in the movie, “The Geneva Convention doesn’t apply in space.” The film doesn’t seem to know where to go with the conversation about torture, though. It seems to suggest that torture is a necessary evil in fighting a war for humanity, while also making clear that torture doesn’t actually work.

Of course, things go wrong during the assessment of the facility. The doctor comes to the cell of one of the prisoners who she believes has evidence of torture, only to be taken hostage by that prisoner, thus resulting in a riot that frees all terrorists from their cells. From there it’s up to Adkins and co. to fight in order to retake the space station before the terrorists use it to crash into one of Earth’s metropolitan cities. That sounds like a pretty cool set up for a sci-fi actioner but Incoming drops the ball almost immediately.

The sci-fi is only setting. The movie doesn’t embrace the possibilities of the concept by any means. Some of this is due to a tight budget. Too many sets are just dark rooms with big LED monitors displaying snazzy technological whatever, hoping you ignore the fact that that’s all it is; a dark room with wobbly chairs and a bunch of TVs. And the prerequisite sci-fi doors that swish open horizontally to recycled sound effects. So many recycled sound effects. It’s cheap but that’s not the real problem. With exception to the final act, the rest of the movie could’ve been set in almost any isolated location. It’s strange that the movie’s genre hook – Scott Adkins in space! – begins to feel like an afterthought before long.

So, it’s not much of a science fiction movie. But sadly it’s not a very good action movie either. The fights are very choppy and the cramped corridors of the space station are not used to the film’s benefit. The action scenes—which are all different variations of ‘run at each other with makeshift weapons and try not to die’—have a few cool beats but the script betrays any momentum that the onscreen talent tries to create.

Incoming has zero flow. It sputters to life then stops itself whenever things start to get exciting. After every confrontation between the crew and the terrorists, the two groups retreat to their opposite corners of the Hammer to collect themselves and plan the next move. While the terrorists plot to destroy a city to make a point (their actual beliefs are never explored, they’re just very bad people), Adkins’ group talks about how to retake the station. “We need a plan,” says McCusker’s pilot. “There’s no time for a plan!” says Adkins. And so they clash with the terrorists and then retreat again. You can overlook a movie for being cheap and simple, but you can’t overlook boring.

I did kind of enjoy the film’s finale, though. Here Incoming commits to a cynical worldview as it invites us to question our heroes and our governments as things get bloody. It’s also the only part of the movie where Incoming isn’t just playing for time. At long last, it’s do or die, and there is no time to retreat. Plus, the heroes make bombs out of bottles filled with urine, so there’s that.

There’s a kernel of a good idea in Incoming, but the film didn’t explore its themes deep enough, didn’t have enough money to pull off its vision, and, worst of all, it forgot to have some fun.

Kyle Warner’s Rating: 4/10