I think I know why so many didn't like the latest Independence Day-movie. As most of us know, our feelings and opinions about a movie weighs mostly on how it ends. If it's a great movie with a bad ending, you'll leave the cinema or sit in your sofa feeling disappointed and then you'll attribute that feeling to the entire movie.
I enjoyed the movie, it captured the tone of the first one very well - very cheesy, action packed and humorous. The two biggest problems however was the duration and ending. Without giving anything away, it ends too abruptly. I get the idea, but ending a movie like that almost never works, especially not when the original movie ended the way it did: with a spectacular burning debris rain. This just... ends.
The other problem I had with it was that they tried to cram in too much in just two hours. The first one had a perfect pacing, almost just as much sh*t happening as it was in this one. But the fact that it was a whole 30-minutes shorter made half the movie seem rushed, especially the second half. Which is too bad because it had potential to be just as good as the original. Other than that, it was pretty spot on. I especially enjoy the fact that it doesn't hold off any cheese, like the trend we've seen in most of our latest sci-fi epics. Everything's so dark and gritty nowadays and it's nice to see this movie take a step backwards towards what made the original movie so special.
I give it a 6/10. Good, enjoyable popcorn flick. Could be better, but could've been a hell of a lot worse.
