I skipped Rogue last year because it was a Megan Fox action movie where she fights lions and I had better movies to watch. But then I saw review that said it’s better than you think… and then I saw it was on Hulu, I said, “what the heck?” Maybe a good, fun 1 star review. And then, dammit, a funny thing happened on the way to that stinker score… I started to enjoy the opening action scene.

Rogue stars Megan Fox as a mercenary soldier working in Africa to free some kidnapped girls from a local militia / human traffickers. Before you can say “oops they shot down our helicopter” they are also set upon by a rogue lion. Now they have to survive the night while being hunted by both human and CGI animals.

I thought this movie was going to follow the Predator template. It starts as a big slam bang action movie before settling down into a whole other genre (in this case, a “when animals attack” film as opposed to a sci-fi action flick). And when the atrocious CGI lion does attack via some less-than-stellar jump scares, I just shrugged and figured this is where the movie goes south.

But a funny thing happened there too… perhaps because the lion effects were so terrible, perhaps because they were too expensive, or perhaps because the script is all over the place, the human enemy shows up to continue the actually-pretty-good-action scenes. And the crappy CGI lion gets relegated to the background. So this somewhat generic but well executed action movie can continue to be a pretty good action movie.

The lion effect… I kept thinking “eh. Maybe it’s not so ba… oooh that was a really rough shot” any time it appears. It’s animated so poorly and the blending/lighting fails ever time in the night shots. Probably should have used a real lion or gone full Predator alien. But, based on the incongruous closing title card, apparently the writer/director really wanted to showcase the plight of lions in Africa. So… ok… probably should have made that movie instead… but fair game.

I liked the characters – led by Megan Fox but most of the good guys were – within the narrow constraints of the film – fairly well realized. In fact, I wish we’d seen more of them before the action kicked off since it they seemed to have defined characters and backstory. Sure, some of the dialog was hammy and a weird reliance in a Backstreet Boys song was… random… but I think the actors pulled it off. And Megan Fox was convincing as a soldier and they never tried to sexy her up (take that, Transformers movies!).

And that’s where I come down with my final score. Did I enjoy this as a pure human v. human action / combat flick? Yeah… I’m quite surprised at how good the shoot ’em up bang bang was. Yes the “when animals attack” plot was pretty bad but it got relegated to the back-burner. So… I’m startled to say, but I liked this movie.

Score: 81