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Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials | 2015 | PG-13 | - 2.6.4
The young people who survived the Maze from the first installment find themselves running for their lives through a city in rubble to find what they hope will be a place free from danger. With Dylan O'Brien, Ki Hong Lee, Kaya Scodelario, Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Dexter Darden, Alexander Flores, Jacob Lofland, Rosa Salazar, Giancarlo Esposito, Patricia Clarkson and Aidan Gillen. Directed by Wes Ball. [2:11]
SEX/NUDITY 2 - A young woman and a young man kiss passionately. Many people are shown in a stupor and dancing in a club-type setting.
► Several young people shower (we see a young man's upper back). Several women in a club-type setting are shown wearing short tops and pants that reveal bare abdomens. A young woman changes clothes behind a partition (only her bare shoulders and arms are seen) and a young man watches until another young man averts his eyes.
► A young man talks about another young man and says, "His maze was nothing but girls."
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VIOLENCE/GORE 6 - People who have been infected with a virus transform to zombie-like beings and have bloody gaping wounds; some are shown with their eyes missing and others are malformed with what looks like black goo in their mouths; they move very fast and they growl and screech.
► A young man who has been infected asks his friends for a gun so that he can kill himself; he lifts his shirt to show an infection spreading and his friend gives him a gun (we hear a shot echo later and understand that he is dead). Several gunmen enter a compound and shoot guards (no blood is shown, but we hear impact and grunts). Guards shoot at young men and a woman running away; one young man turns back and kicks a guard in the chest, knocking him out. A young man shoots a guard in the chest with a taser weapon that renders him incapacitated. A woman is shot in the abdomen and we see her fall to the ground with a bloody bullet wound. A young man shoots a taser weapon at several guards and a man, then runs toward a security door as it closes and slides under it just before it closes. A man with a gun threatens several young people and he is shot in the shoulder from off-screen (he falls to the ground when struck with no blood shown). A young man holding an explosive device threatens to blow everybody up; he throws it and jumps clear of the blast (we do not see people blown up).
► Helicopters swarm an area and open fire with explosions and people on the ground screaming and running; gunfire is exchanged and we see people falling after being hit (no blood is visible); soldiers slide down ropes from the helicopters and shoot many people (some with a taser weapon that stuns the victim), then round them up and put them on a transport plane.
► A young man and a young woman walk through a sewer and find an area where there are thick tendrils along the walls; a rat crawls out of a pipe and seems to be sick and as it runs away an infected person grabs it and bites its head off (blood gushes) causing many other infected people wrapped in the tendrils to push free and toward the blood spilled; the young man and the young woman run and are chase out of the sewer and into the skeleton of a collapsed building where the young woman kicks one infected person off the structure, a filing cabinet falls and knocks another off, the young woman falls and lands hard on a window that begins to crack under her weight before an infected person falls next to her and tries to bite her; she struggles, the infected person falls through the broken glass and the young woman is grabbed and pulled to safety. Many people are gathered in a room where an infected person is tied to the wall by his hands; he lunges toward the crowd until one man shoots him (we hear the shot and do not see the result).
► A young man is grabbed by infected people and dragged back through a door as others try to push the door closed; the young man is pulled to safety as we hear a crunch and understand that he has been bitten by an infected person (we see a bloody bandage on his abdomen later). A young man is tackled by an infected person, he struggles to get free as the infected person opens its mouth and we see some slimy, blackened strands coming out of its mouth (the young man gets away). Two young men are chased by many infected people and they run toward their group of friends; they all run then confront some of the infected hitting and kicking them. A young man is charged by an infected person in a caged area and we see that it is missing its eyes and its mouth is stained with black goo. Many infected people lunge toward several young people in a dark compound (we see that they are chained). A young man and a young woman walk through a dark sewer and hear screeching in the distance.
► Several young people run from a storm and lightning strikes the ground around them as huge clouds swirl overhead; one lightning strike throws a young man and leaves another unconscious and smoldering (he is fine later). Several young people run out of a compound and up a large sand mound while being chased by men on 4-wheel vehicles and carrying guns; they find a broken window in a structure and climb inside where they hide. Several young people are ushered out of a flying vessel and into a compound while armed guards shoot at infected humans that we cannot see but we hear them growling and snarling. Several young people slide on a cable to get away from gunmen and a young man and a young woman are trapped; they run through a structure as explosives detonate, they jump down an elevator shaft as the structure collapses around them and we see a large pile of rock and rubble when the dust settles (they are unharmed). A man in a truck speeds through an area where there is gunfire, slams into a helicopter and causes it to tip over and explode.
► Several people walk along a mountain pass and gunfire rings out; they hide behind abandoned vehicles and are held at gunpoint by two young women who take them to a compound.
► A man punches another man tied in a chair in the face and we see that he has a very swollen eye and bloody nose and mouth from early blows; the man then kicks the chair backward and the seated man hits the floor hard.
► Several young people are shown hanging from their feet over an opening and a man shifts a lever that drops them a bit while questioning them. A young man tries to get through a door and guards stop him; he charges them and they shove him back and yell at him. Several men try to enter a dorm room and cannot get the door open; they force the door open and enter the room to find no one there. Two young men are grabbed and forced onto tables where their necks are scanned by a hand-held laser gun. A man in a helicopter threatens to kill everyone in a compound; people inside are shown running and screaming. A man with a gun threatens to kill an infected young woman.
► A young man finds a body with a plastic bag over its head when rooting through belongings in an area where people had been living, but is now abandoned. A young man collapses after he has been bitten by an infected person; others build a sled and drag him along as he moans. A young woman collapses from an infection and is injected with a serum that calms the symptoms.
► We see many people suspended in the air in a lab with tubes attached to t heir heads, IVs in their arms and breathing tubes in their mouths. We see several things that look like octopus in liquid-filled glass containment tubes in a laboratory.
► A flashback sequence shows people crowding around a fenced in area secured by guards wearing gas masks and barking dogs on leashes; a woman carries her young son to the gate and leaves him for a guard to pick up and we see the boy calling out for his mother as he is taken away. A dream sequence shows a young man waking up in an elevator speeding upward and he screams as he is awakened. A young man under the influence of a drug imagines seeing his friends infected with a virus and we see their skin blue and gray-tinged.
► Two young men crawl through vents and observe a body on a gurney being wheeled into a secure area; we see an X-ray image on a screen attached to the gurney. Several young men are locked in a dorm room. A young woman is startled by mannequins in a room and one is shown with a charred face.
► Several young people walk through a sand storm and complain about the sand being painful. Several young people walk through a city in rubble. Several young people walk through a desert and run out of water; we see them sleeping huddled on the ground as a huge storm approaches. A man says that another man is in a different zone and a woman says, "That's where they burn the bodies." A woman yells at a man and orders him to speed up a process or she will find someone else to do it. A man with a large hypodermic needle approaches a young man and presumably injects him (we do not see the needle enter the young man); he is told that the hypo contains a "cocktail" of vitamins. A man talks about the "horrors of the outside world." An organization is called "wicked." A young man says, "I remember watching my friends die in front of me. A young man says, "When they go through that door, they never come back out." A man tells a man, "make sure they are sedated and prepped for harvest." A woman tells a man, "I don't want them to feel any pain." A young woman talks about her brother being taken away and they didn't let her say goodbye. A young woman talks about when her mother got sick, that she locked her in a room and the mother gouged her own eyes out.
► A young man is shown with a bloody bandage on his abdomen after a bite and we hear rasping as he breathes and moans; he gasps and collapses as he spits up dark blood. A young woman pulls up her pant leg and we see a bloody and irritated bite mark on her lower leg as she wraps it with a strip of cloth. A young man is shown with a tube in his arm after having blood drawn. A young man spits blood when he showers and we see the blood in the water.
► We see a tattoo on a young woman's neck and she talks about having memories.
LANGUAGE 4 - 2 obscene hand gestures, 16 scatological terms, 3 anatomical terms, 21 mild obscenities, name-calling (ugly shank, stupid, dumb, cranks), exclamations (shut-up), 6 religious exclamations (e.g. Jesus, Oh My God, My God).
SUBSTANCE USE - A young man is injected (off-screen) with a hypodermic filled with what he is told are vitamins and minerals, a young man is shown with a tube in his arm after having blood drawn, many people are shown suspended in the air and with IVs in their arms, and a young woman is injected with a serum that calms the symptoms of an infection. A man drinks something (presumably alcohol) from a flask and demands that a young man and a young woman drinks some and they do (they appear to be influenced by the beverage).
DISCUSSION TOPICS - Viruses, greed, means to an end, survival, ghosts, memories, power, promises, sacrifice, revenge.
MESSAGE - Doing something for the greater good isn't always the best way.
CAVEATS
Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.
We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.
Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.
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