‘Mickey 17’ Is Like Bong Joon-ho’s Previous Movies Blended Together
Whenever a director has a decently sized body of work, patterns might begin to emerge. South Korean writer and director Bong Joon-ho’s latest movie, Mickey 17, feels like a culmination of themes he’s focused on since 2006.
Mickey 17 is about Mickey Barnes (Robert Pattinson), a kind yet naive man who signs up for an multi-year expedition to a faraway planet where humans will start a colony. Mickey has no specific skills, so he registers for the trip as an “Expendable” without knowing the details of the work.
Mickey soon finds himself dying. A lot. An expendable is someone who is sent into the most deadly situations for research purposes, dies, and is cloned with all of their memories up until their death remaining intact. The process is then repeated over and over again. Mickey’s life is literally expendable, and it takes a remarkable situation for him to finally see himself as worthy of life, love, and happiness.
Mickey 17 is ultimately a story about the human condition, but it makes that point by incorporating numerous themes and plot threads that have become common to many Bong Joon-ho’s films. His films can (and have been) analyzed deeply. The below sections take a look at some of the most clear connections between his previous movies and Mickey 17, sort of like a starting point for deeper analysis. Beware of slight spoilers.
Parasite (2019)
Parasite is Bong Joon-ho’s masterpiece. It tackles capitalism by putting into conflict two families on opposite sides of a wealth gap. For the Kim family at the low end of the gap, struggling to keep their heads above water (literally and figuratively) motivates their every action.
Similarly, Mickey is motivated to join the expedition to another planet because he has no other options. He has fallen through the cracks of a failing society. He has no money and no education to speak of, so he takes whatever job he can get… and his life is treated like trash because of it. The gap between the haves and have-nots is also readily apparent aboard the spaceship, with the leaders of the colony living extravagantly with delicious food and sauces while the rabble dine on various sludges and nutrient bricks.
Okja (2017)
Capitalism is a common theme among Bong Joon-ho’s films, Okja included. However, Okja also includes themes involving animal rights and environmentalism. Okja, the genetically modified pig of the title, is saved from slaughter by a young girl who forms an emotional bond with the animal.
Similarly, Mickey 17 features a race of alien creatures the humans name “creepers.” The creepers look like large bugs, but they are actually intelligent and sensitive creatures. Mickey comes to understand this, and his dealings with the creepers—and saving their lives and environment from planned destruction in the name of “human progress”—is a large driver of the plot in the latter half of Mickey 17.
Snowpiercer (2013)
Snowpiercer is Bong Joon-ho’s most action-forward film to date. It is set in a future where human intervention exacerbated an inevitable environmental disaster. Now, humanity is confined to a train where the elite are housed in the front and the poor are crammed towards the back. Tired of being treated as less than human, the citizens of the back of the train rebel and work their way towards the front.
Mickey 17 is also set in a future where environmental damage is rampant. That’s one of the reasons why so many people are willing to start life anew on another planet. Also, the abuses made by the elite aboard the spaceship create a simmering rebellion among a portion of the crew which culminates in the final act of the film. In Bong Joon-ho’s films, the elite are often held accountable for their actions.
Mother (2009)
Among Bong Joon-ho’s films over the past two decades, Mother is the one that stands apart from the rest. It is about a woman whose intellectually challenged son is accused of murder, so she goes to great and horrible lengths to find the real killer. It is an excellent movie, but the themes so prevalent in Bong’s more recent works aren’t as immediately apparent.
However, the mother/son relationship of Mother can be seen in Mickey 17 in certain ways. First is Mickey’s backstory. Mickey holds onto guilt for a tragedy involving his mother, showing that the bond between parent and child can leave lasting effects. Perhaps the better connection involves the creepers. A creeper is captured by the crew of the human colony, and the leader of the creepers is the hostage’s mother, a mother who is willing to kill every human on her planet if she doesn’t get her baby back.
The Host (2006)
And finally, we have The Host. The inciting incident of The Host happens when an American facility in South Korea dumps waste into the Han River and creates a monster. Years later, the monster abducts the daughter of an underachiever who runs a snack bar with his father. Major themes include critical reactions of citizens towards the actions of government entities, both American and South Korean.
In Mickey 17, the failings of the government lead to a “cult of personality” politician, Kenneth Marshall, being able to exploit people to a horrific degree. Marshall’s entire crew is subjected to exploitation of some degree, but the lowest of the low, Mickey, deals with the worst. His job as an Expendable isn’t even legal on Earth, but Marshall somehow convinces the regulatory bodies to allow it off planet. It’s baffling, but it imitates real-life political buffoonery frighteningly well.
