Underworld: Rise of the Lycans is a 2009 action horror flick directed by visual effects specialist Patrick Tatopoulos, who had worked previously on other films on the Underworld series, and written by Danny McBride. The film stars Michael Sheen, Bill Nighy, Rhona Mitra, Steven Mackintosh, and Kevin Grevioux. On its release, the film did less on its opening weekend than the last two entries but it didn't bomb at the box office either, so more sequels were expected to come years later.
A prequel to the previous movies, the film follows Lucian, a werewolf, trying to set the Lycans free from the slavery vampires have imposed on them. While the film doesn't outright depict the start of the war between the two monster factions it does give us more insight into the conflict.
The momentum of the franchise was pretty much running low by this point and this third film can barely deliver the gothic horror thrills the series was at least decent at before in the two previous movies. There's no Selene, so that right there takes away several points as this series doesn't really work without its main heroine, it's like taking away Alice from the Resident Evil movies. Since this is a prequel that's kind of understandable, but in her place we have Rhona Mitra as Sonja, who isn't bad in the role but she’s given very little material to work with and has barely any real action scenes, no moments to shine. Ultimately, this is what made her character forgettable.
While I can commend the crew for doing a great job in the technical aspects such as cinematography and set design, the whole movie feels lacking and pales in comparison to the flashy art direction from the original film. It doesn't look bad but a lot of it fits perfectly into that generic fantasy period look a lot of blockbuster movies tried to copy after the success of Lord of the Rings, add in the Twilight influence on pop culture at the time and you get some typical stuff both visually and story-wise.
Not a horrible movie but a terribly generic one. The weakest in the series so far but can still entertain if you simply enjoy these unabashed fantasy gothic epics.
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