This Underrated Emily Blunt Box Office Bomb Is Now On Netflix 

There is no shortage of captivating action movies on Netflix, even when the streamer’s own original movies don’t always fit the bill.

If lifeless, leaden husks like Bright or humorless slogs like Red Notice don’t seize your imagination, then there are genuinely great action options like Black Hawk Down and Mad Max: Fury Road waiting to save you. However, once September 1 rolls around, you can kiss Fury Road goodbye because there’s an Emily Blunt box office bomb that deserves your immediate attention.

Though Edge of Tomorrow only made $370 million against its $178 million budget when it came out in 2014 (a bonafide disaster if you’re a Hollywood exec), it still earned critical praise and good word-of-mouth from audiences. It only suffered from a poor marketing strategy. The director had wanted to name the movie Live Die Repeat, which surely would have turned heads, but some nameless, stubborn exec insisted that their title was perfect and beautiful. 

Anyway, Edge of Tomorrow is also the movie that introduced us to Emily Blunt, Action Star. While it’s impossible to imagine that any movie with Emily Blunt could be labeled a “bomb,” that’s unfortunately the case with Edge, even though it wasn’t her fault. That said, here are five reasons why you should watch it on Netflix.

1. The storytelling throws you for a loop

Time loops aren’t unheard of in the movie world, but Edge of Tomorrow reimagines the idea by heaping on gripping action and an alien invasion to boot. Each reset of the timeline brings new high stakes and clever ways to escalate tension, uncovering new story layers and preventing the whole affair from feeling too redundant. This is the fresh sci-fi concept you’ve been craving.

2. Tom Cruise plays against type

We’ll get back to Emily Blunt in a moment, but it bears mentioning that Tom Cruise is in this, too. In fact, he’s the protagonist, and actually pretty entertaining. Cruise is often portrayed as a fearless, polished action Messiah who can drive any vehicle ever invented, but in Edge of Tomorrow he’s a hapless PR official with zero combat experience. Watching him stumble his way into becoming a hardened warrior is amusing and a bit cathartic, even though Cruise would never allow himself to appear in such an imperfect role today. He doesn’t have any problem appearing in flops, though. Final Reckoning lost $300 million for Paramount Pictures.

3. Emily Blunt, Action Hero

Cruise might unexpectedly embody “everyman appeal” in this movie, but Emily Blunt steals the show as Sergeant Rita Vrataski, the battle-honed “Angle of Verdun.” She’s brave, impervious, and knows how to rock a mech suit. As Cruise’s trainer, mentor, and superior, she also creates an inspiring female role model in a genre awash with male leads. This pairs well with the next item in our list.

4. Inventive action

From Edge of Tomorrow’s very first beach offensive (a reference to Saving Private Ryan), the movie sucks you in with its endless array of intensely chaotic battles. Even as the timeline resets, you’re able to witness multiple variations of the same battle. The overall effect is a mix of dark humor and heartpounding thrills. Meanwhile, the “Mimics” are patently terrifying antagonists rocking exosuits, out-of-world artillery, and possibly undiagnosed ADHD, and who are all just one stomach flu away from their goal weight.

5. A high moviemaking IQ

Despite its sardonic tone and sci-fi premise, Edge of Tomorrow never stoops too low. The script respects your intelligence and never over-explains anything, allowing you to parse everything out alongside Cruise’s character. The emotional beats and character development never detract. Plus, the humor is not as cliché and goofy as you might expect from an action-first movie like this. Whether Cruise’s character is getting run over by a truck or deploying another excruciatingly inept battlefield maneuver, you’ll find yourself laughing at the absurdity of it all. For these reasons and more, the movie is also quite rewatchable. With one rewatch you’ll start to notice clever foreshadowing, brilliant nuances, and subtle humor hidden between the cracks. And now that Edge of Tomorrow is on Netflix, it’s the perfect time to see that for yourself.