I got interested about this movie when the trailer came out, but then I forgot it. Last weekend I got a change to look it and woah! It was just like Donald Marshall has told us about cloning, cloning centers, how they dispose clones in so called chipper. All of the key items are renamed of course, but the idea is crystal clear. Even one of the key characters in the movie is called Kenneth Marshall, coincidence? I don’t think so.
Mickey 17 is a 2025 science fiction black comedy film written, produced, and directed by Bong Joon Ho, based on the 2022 novel Mickey7 by Edward Ashton. The film stars Robert Pattinson in the title role, alongside Naomi Ackie, Steven Yeun, Patsy Ferran, Cameron Britton, Daniel Henshall, Stephen Park, Anamaria Vartolomei, Toni Collette, and Mark Ruffalo. Set in the year 2054, the plot follows a man who joins a space colony as an “Expendable”, a disposable worker who is cloned every time he dies.
Mickey 17 had its world premiere at Leicester Square in London on February 13, 2025, and was released theatrically by Warner Bros. Pictures in South Korea on February 28, 2025, and in the United States on March 7. The film received generally positive reviews from critics and grossed $133 million worldwide.
Plot
In 2050, to escape the global reach of a murderous loan shark, Mickey Barnes and his friend Timo join a spaceship crew to colonize the ice planet Niflheim. Timo becomes a shuttle pilot, while Mickey joins as an “Expendable”, a controversial job involving extremely dangerous tasks, with death resulting in a new clone of him with restored memories being created through a process called “reprinting”. During the voyage, a romance develops between Mickey and security agent Nasha.
Four years later, the spaceship arrives at Niflheim. After experimenting on and sacrificing multiple iterations of Mickey, the ship’s scientists develop a vaccine for the planet’s pathogens. The seventeenth Mickey is sent to capture one of native lifeforms dubbed “Creepers”,[a] but falls into a fissure. Timo retrieves Mickey’s valuable flamethrower but, out of convenience, leaves Mickey to die. The Creepers swarm Mickey, but instead of eating him, they carry him to the surface.
Mickey returns to the ship and is surprised to find an aggressive[b] Mickey 18 has been printed. The expedition’s leader, politician Kenneth Marshall, has sworn that in the event of “Multiples” of clones, all clones will be eliminated.[c] As a result, Mickey 18 attempts to kill Mickey 17, but 17 suggests they secretly rotate duties and deaths to survive. The two are interrupted when they witness Timo selling flamethrower fuel as drugs. Furious at Timo’s abuses, Mickey 18 tries to kill Timo, but relents when they are interrupted by Nasha. 18 leaves with Nasha, while 17 is taken to dinner with Marshall, his wife Ylfa, and security agent Kai. At the dinner, Mickey 17 reacts severely to being fed experimental vat-grown meat and painkillers. Kai saves Mickey 17 from being executed and brings him to her quarters, but Mickey 17 flees back to Nasha when Kai attempts to seduce him.
Nasha learns of the clones and accepts them, but Kai stumbles across the trio and tries to report them. When Mickey 17 informs 18 of the dinner incident, an enraged 18 decides to kill Marshall at a public ceremony unveiling a Niflheim rock to commemorate the expedition. Two baby Creepers, Luko and Zoco, emerge from the rock, causing panic. Mickey 17 captures Zoco, but Luko is killed by security when it startles Marshall. Nasha stops Mickey 18 from killing Marshall, but the Multiples are exposed, leading to Mickey 17, 18, and Nasha’s arrest.
Meanwhile, thousands of Creepers gather outside the ship, calling for Zoco. In the brig, Mickey 17’s description of the Creepers helping him causes Nasha to realize they are sentient. Timo arrives to dismember Mickey 17 on orders from the loan shark, who has an agent on the expedition. Mickey 18 offers to take 17’s place in a ruse, allowing Nasha to escape and overpower Timo, but security intervenes and takes them all to Marshall.
Marshall announces his plan to eliminate the Creepers and destroys Mickey’s memory backups to prevent him from being reprinted. Ylfa convinces Marshall to take the Mickeys outside and compete to collect Creeper tails for culinary use, with the winner allowed to live. The Mickeys are fitted with remote-detonated bomb vests to ensure compliance.
Once outside, the Mickeys seek out the Creepers’ leader. Marshall follows up with a security team to eliminate them and the Creepers when they fail to fulfill their task. Mickey 17 uses a translation device to warn the mother Creeper about Marshall’s plan, and the mother demands Zoco’s release and the sacrifice of a human in compensation for Luko’s death. Mickey 17 signals to Nasha to free Zoco. She takes Ylfa hostage to ensure Zoco’s release, and security agents, secretly working against Marshall, arrest Ylfa. Mickey 18 fights Marshall and detonates his vest, killing himself and Marshall to meet the Creepers’ demands.
Afterwards, Mickey 17 and the rest of the expedition make peace with the Creepers, Marshall and Ylfa’s collaborators face justice, and Ylfa kills herself. The loan shark associate attacks Timo, but Timo kills him in self-defense and uses the incident to testify against the loan shark. Nasha joins the colony’s leadership council. Spring arrives, and during the colony’s groundbreaking ceremony, Mickey 17, called Mickey Barnes once again, destroys the cloning device, ending the Expendable program.
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