Dave Bautista's 2025 Western-Fantasy Movie Deserves A Second Chance After Flopping

George R. R. Martin's impressive body of work isn't just confined to medieval fantasy. Indeed, he kicked off his career by writing several sci-fi-focused works (including the 1980 sci-fi horror novella "Nightflyers") and even branched out into horror later on. His short story "In the Lost Lands" is a similarly intriguing blend of fantasy and Western that presents a mystical witch named Gray Alys as being equivalent to a catastrophic force of nature. And while Alys is no Melisandre from "A Song of Ice and Fire," she always finds a way to doom people with her wish-granting abilities, even as her troubling lack of empathy adds a horrific element to this already uneasy tale. But as brilliant as Martin's source material is, it's frustratingly misinterpreted by the shallow and lackluster 2025 movie adaptation of the same name.

Paul W.S. Anderson's "In the Lost Lands" became a box office failure upon opening in theaters in March 2025. The movie's critical response was equally abysmal, as most reviewers felt it had few redeeming qualities. Anderson had previously enjoyed financial success with his 1995 "Mortal Kombat" film adaptation and especially his "Resident Evil" movies, but the "Event Horizon" director was unable to replicate the blockbuster formula that had once worked in his favor. Moreover, the issues that plague "In the Lost Lands" extend to its very foundation, as the film is mainly a superficial retelling of Martin's story that plays more like a standard CGI-heavy genre hodgepodge.

And like Martin's source material, Milla Jovovich and Dave Bautista feel wasted as the leads here, although the latter does inject some urgency into the otherwise lifeless proceedings. Thus, if you're a Bautista completionist or keen to unwind with a silly Western-fantasy flick featuring some decent-ish action, "In the Lost Lands" might deserve a second chance.

Anderson's film takes place in a post-apocalyptic world where Alys (Jovovitch) is declared a heretic by the all-powerful Church and sentenced to be hung to death — a fate she avoids with the help of her witchy powers. While fleeing the Church, she crosses paths with Melange (Amara Okereke), a woman who asks Alys to assist her in gaining the abilities of a shapeshifter so that she can finally unite with the love of her life. This, in turn, leads to Alys meeting Boyce (Bautista), a gunslinger who has also been hired to track down a shapeshifter for Melange. Along the way, though, their quest is repeatedly thwarted by the folks who want Alys dead.

Plot-wise, Anderson's movie and Martin's original story are fairly similar. The main difference is that Martin's work has competent world-building and well-written characters. Alys and Boyce are also complex individuals as envisioned by Martin, yet Anderson's adaptation turns them into flat caricatures with flimsy motivations. His decision to shoot the film using the Unreal Engine tech is just as baffling, as the movie's video game aesthetics make it look blander than it should. The result is a film that isn't visually engaging, which is a shame, considering how evocative Martin's writing is when he describes the desolate beauty of the wastelands that Alys and Boyce traverse.

The main thing that "In the Lost Lands" has going for it is ridiculous, over-the-top action, which showcases Anderson's knack for crafting stylized set pieces that require a whole lot of suspension of disbelief. If that's something you're partial to, it may be enough to make this undeniably absurd ride worth taking.

"In the Lost Lands" can currently be streamed on Hulu and Lionsgate Play.