Spoiler Warning: Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)
The recently released A24 film Everything Everywhere All at Once, if one can ignore the foul frankfurter fingers, is a poignant look at life and its many cruel fluctuations. Wrapped in a shiny exterior of wanton violence and colorful set pieces, the all-star cast includes Michelle Yeoh (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings), Ke Huy Quan (The Goonies, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom), Stephanie Hsu (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings), Jenny Slate (Bob's Burgers, The Lego Batman Movie), Harry Shum Jr. (Glee, Step Up 2: The Streets), James Hong (Chinatown, Mulan), and Jamie Lee Curtis (Halloween, Halloween Kills).
On its surface, Everything Everywhere All at Once is a universe-bending science fiction romp that'd make even a certain web-slinger blush. Yet, the film transforms into a heartwarming and gut-wrenching depiction of unfulfilled dreams and the horrific manifestations of living an examined life. The film's official synopsis reads:
"When an interdimensional rupture unravels reality, an unlikely hero must channel her newfound powers to fight bizarre and bewildering dangers from the multiverse as the fate of the world hangs in the balance."
Though at times it's preposterous, Everything Everywhere All at Once strikes a chord with contemporary audiences, and Evelyn Wang can be seen as a stand-in for our own struggles with indecision. Everyone contains a multiverse, and failing to examine how one's decisions ultimately unfold will inevitably lead to conflict, albeit conflict significantly less karate-centric.
Choosing Chaos
The only end product of interdimensional exploration is chaos. It's been proven time and time again and will continue to be proven until Marvel runs out of characters to put on the silver screen. In Everything Everywhere All at Once, this standard-bearing chaotic characterization of the multiverse is stretched to its absolute limit. In order to tap into the multiverse, the film's characters are made to power their multiverse-linking devices via unexpected, and often unpleasant, random actions: eating chapstick and sticking an IRS award where the sun doesn't shine, for instance. Additionally, Stephanie Hsu's Jobu Tupaki (the peculiar nature of said villain's nickname being a recurrent joke in the film) is presented as chaos incarnate, able to manipulate the infinite realities to her whim, and a continued insistence that, quote, "Nothing matters."
The decision to power the interdimensional headpieces through unlikely occurrences seems to reflect the unpleasant nature of decision-making itself. Often, the fear surrounding stepping outside one's comfort zones, and making a potentially life-changing decision, can be far more unpleasant than a cherry-flavored chapstick snack or even, as the film depicts in gruesome detail, systematically slicing between one's fingers with razor-edged paper. Furthermore, Jobu Tupaki's insistence that nothing matters definitely resonates with modern audiences, who spent the past several years in lockdown over Covid, an entirely unexpected reality. If a pandemic, or in the case of Evelyn Wang, everything is possible, then nothing is.
Catastrophic Consequences
At one point in the film, Evelyn Wang and her daughter, Joy, who is also the villainous Jobu Tupaki, finds herself to be a rock. Joy/ Jobu transported the two of them to an alternate universe timeline
where human life on Earth never developed -- the norm in the multiverse, as Jobu explains. There are profound consequences to those random elements of life that are entirely outside of our control. Therefore, as the film explores, one must be incredibly careful when a consequential decision is available; one cannot choose, for example, that their daughter can be born gay, so they must take advantage of every opportunity to let that reality blossom.
The ravages of time, and age's propensity for inspiring self-examination, are often cinematic themes. However, Everything Everywhere All at Once goes a bit further than simply waxing poetic on wrinkles. Decision-making is not exclusive to those with graying locks. From the twelve-year-old middle schooler choosing between going out for football or cross-country to a twenty-five-year-old freelance article writer currently deciding whether or not to move to Knoxville, Tennessee, in a few months, everyone is at times plagued by indecision. Recent years have shed a light on the fact that life continues on, regardless of one's personal level of comfort with decision-making. Though it's nice, at times, to picture lives that may have been lived, it's essential to consistently and ruthlessly examine the consequences of the decisions one did make.
We are all Evelyn Wang. Day in and day out, we make seemingly inconsequential decisions that ultimately become our very essence. Our stomachs are twisted with regret at imagined potentialities, yet we frequently find solace in the eventuality. Everyone is Everything Everywhere All at Once, and as such, everyone must go see it at once.