The last movie I saw was San Andreas. I've done what I can to hide spoilers since it's still in theaters :P

Now, it wasn't bad at all! I quite enjoyed all of the action scenes!

...But... I'm getting rather tired of everyone dragging in
Spoiler:
"family issues" and "rediscovering love"
into disaster movies, and not only that, but it was extremely predictable on what was going to happen next. That's not to say not all movies did it wrong, it's just becoming such a norm now that it's getting rather irritating. Into The Storm had this, but other plotlines as well - although that movie suffered from "WE HAVE TOO MANY PEOPLE TO FOLLOW IN DIFFERENT PLACES" syndrome, so it felt disorganized, whereas this movie was much more organized. 2012 was a fun romp with surprising twists, The Day After Tomorrow, while having some issues that were present in San Andreas, I felt just pulled it off more notably.

Also, Twister, which started the disaster genre (or is at least considered to be the huge contributor, way back in 1996), did not have these. Heck, it wove a love story in that was a sub plot. The main plot was trying to get a device into a tornado, and all the misfortune that happens afterwards. What made it was how convincing and diverse the characters are, and even if I don't know all their names after 20+ views (some of them flat out aren't named!), they're memorable.

And that's where San Andreas ultimately fell flat. "The Rock" felt...rather off in this movie, like his acting wasn't top notch. Two characters that come in a bit later in the story are pretty awesome, and they're memorable (so is the daughter of the main character). The wife of the main character was kinda there, and another character that I shall not name for plot reasons (although it becomes apparent in the first like, 20 minutes), he was not all that memorable.

The biggest issue here, however, and I'll hide it for spoilers, is that

Spoiler:
"The Rock"'s main role is part of California's Fire Department. In fact, he's the pilot of the helicopter. The movie goes through a huge deal at the very beginning of this job, showcasing several of his coworkers, one even nearly getting killed on a rescue. They come back, yadda yadda, some interaction with one of them, and then later on when all heck breaks loose they're completely gone. He's flying out to refuel the helicopter ON HIS OWN. His entire crew? The fact he worked for the Fire Department? It is completely and utterly dropped. Heck, the Fire Department doesn't even really do anything in this! He never gets back in contact with them! This is such a sin - it's such a dropped plot point it was staring me in the face.

I kept waiting through the entire movie for his crew to show up again, but it never happened. Why go through the point of showing all of this off if you don't use it? It's "Chekhov's gun" done wrong - the rifle was put on the wall, loaded up, but never fired. This is not good storytelling and was a glaring problem on the movie.


Recommended: Yes, but take many of the scenes with a grain of salt, be prepared to see some extensive cliches and dropped plot points, and some of the acting feels incredibly off. However, it's pretty fun for all the action scenes! One can never get too tired of everything going to heck. I will readily recommend Twister (tornadoes!), 2012, (EVERY DISASTER POSSIBLE) and The Day After Tomorrow (global warming gone berserk) first, however. Into The Storm (more realistic Twister at the cost of sidelining said tornadoes for human interaction) is a maybe, although I admit I'm incredibly biased with my love for Twister on that movie and demands a rewatch from me first.