Bong Joo-ho’s films always have his own offbeat sensibility to be cherished. Even his phenomenal Oscar-winning film “Parasite” (2019), which is incidentally the most mainstream work in his career, shows that odd and interesting quality at times behind its almost perfect genre exercise, and his latest film “Mickey 17” continues that trend. While it initially looks like another typical Hollywood SF flick on the surface, the movie also cheerfully wields numerous offbeat touches here and there along with its fearless lead performer, and it shows us that Bong will continue to go his way even after the unexpectedly enormous success of his previous film.

Robert Pattinson, who gives his most humorous performance since his deliberately hammy supporting turn in David Michôd’s Netflix film “The King” (2019), plays Mickey Barnes, a young man who has been a literally expendable employee of some big corporation. He and many other people were sent to some inhabitable alien planet located somewhere in the space, and the first act of the film shows and tells us how he has got himself cloned again and again during last several years. Whenever he is sacrificed as a human guinea pig in one way or another, Mickey gets promptly cloned and then injected with the memories from his previous self via some high-tech equipment, and he has been already cloned no less than 16 times at the beginning of the story.

As he is probably going to die soon as “Mickey 17”, the story, which is based on Edward Ashton’s SF novel “Mickey7”, frequently goes back to how things were pretty bad for Mickey even before that. He and his friend/business partner Timo (Steven Yeun) could be killed by some very vicious loan shark at any point, so they decided to join the space travel just for getting away from that loan shark as far and quick as possible. Unfortunately, there was no other option for Mickey except being hired as an “expendable” to be cloned and then discarded during the space travel and the following colonization of that alien planet.

The whole process is supervised by Kenneth Marshall (Mark Ruffalo), a superficial politician who will instantly remind you of not only that orange-faced prick currently living again in the White House but also a certain egomaniacal South African billionaire associated with that prick. This dude is so vain and obtuse that he does not realize at all that he is often controlled and manipulated by his devious wife, who certainly enjoys every moment of being the power behind the throne unless she is occupied with making any new delicious sauce to be savored.

While certainly toiling a lot under the corrupt leadership of Mr. and Mrs. Marshall just like many others in the spaceship, Mickey found some solace from Nasha Adjava (Naomi Ackie), a young woman who incidentally works in the security department. As shown from several flashback scenes, Nasha actually cares a lot about Mickey besides being carnally attracted to him, and there is an amusing moment as they discuss a bit on how to get more pleasure from their developing relationship.

Although its first act often feels a bit slow as looking like merely warming up for whatever may follow next, the movie is constantly buoyed by Bong’s distinctive offbeat touches. Just like “Okja” (2017), it does not hesitate to go for sheer absurdity and ridiculousness, and this brings some unconventional qualities to its familiar genre territory. The resulting quirky sense of black humor is often contrasted with the inherent pathos in Mickey’s gloomy human condition, and the juxtaposition between these two different elements brings some extra personality to the story and characters, though the result is not always successful in my inconsequential opinion.

It certainly helps that the story is driven by another rich performance from Pattinson, who surely has a ball here as playing more than one different version of his character. Just like his director, he frequently brings out an unexpected moment of humor or pathos as many different versions of his character struggle in one way or another along the story, and he ably holds the movie together even when the movie stumbles a bit during the last act where a lot of things happen here and there.

Around Pattinson’s multi-faceted acting, Bong assembles a bunch of notable performers, who also embrace Bong’s offbeat sensibility as much as they can. As Mickey’s love interest, Naomi Ackie clicks well with Pattinson during several key scenes, and I was particularly tickled by when she demonstrates that she can be as sexy and daring as Zendaya in Luca Guadagnino’s “Challengers” (2024). While Steve Yeun is suitably obnoxious as Mickey’s opportunistic friend, Mark Ruffalo and Toni Collette are quite committed as chewing every scene of theirs as much as Richard E. Grant and Sandra Bernhard in Michael Lehmann’s “Hudson Hawk” (1991), and Holliday Grainger, Anamaria Vartolomei, Thomas Turgoose, Cameron Britton, and Steve Park are also well-cast in their small supporting roles.

In conclusion, “Mickey 17” is another interesting work from Bong, who is incidentally already working on the next work to be released around the next year. While it does not reach to the level of his better works including “Parasite”, it is equipped with an ample amount of wit, style, and personality besides being commendable for its top-notch technical aspects including the cinematography by Darius Khondji. It did not surprise me a lot, but it amused and entertained me much nonetheless, and, just like many of Bong’s works, I may look back on it more as time goes by.