Underworld: Awakening Review

I just got back from seeing Underworld: Awakening on January 25, 2011. This is the fourth installment in the series and in my opinion along with the original is the best one by far. This movie was beyond awesome!!! I was thoroghly entertained throughout the entire movie. The plot of the movie is very interesting from the start as we learn that humans have sent forces to purge the world of the vampires and the lycans in what is known as The Cleansing. They sent two purges over the course of 12 years. They basically made it look like genocide of both species through extreme amounts of silver nitrate and ultraviolet light as well as dragging vampires into the sunlight. Kate Beckinsale returns as the vampire warrior Selene and is shown fighting off the attacks with Michael played by Scott Speedman from the original and Underworld: Evolution. What occurrs during the battle is Selene is taken into captivity and for 12 years is taken to a research facility. Selene breaks out and through amazing visuals and action she fights her way through orderlies and scientists even breaking a guy's arm so his bone goes through and basically dominates everyone. Another vampire named David played by Theo James joins her in a quest as they want to find out what is going on in this facility. They encounter a girl in an alley who is being chased by Lycans. What occurs next is beyond awesome as we find out this girl named Eve (played perfectly by India Eisley) is actually a hybrid born child which makes her stronger than everyone. Charles Dance who plays Thomas, basically a leader of the vampire cult and who also appears in Game of Thrones as Tywin Lannister (excellent casting choice in my opinion in both instances) wants to know what the deal is with Eve. I will not delve into the details of that as its an awesome plot twist and I predicted it from the outset but when you actually hear how she came to be it's awesome. One of the most epic battle scenes I've ever witnessed occurs between vampires and lycans and I was extremely impressed at how much they put into it. They really went all out with the battle scenes and I'd say they're the best of the series by far. The original story is still the best, but the occurrences in this movie are by far more entertaining to me. Then we find out that humans aren't even behind what has been happening at the research facility led by Dr. Jacob Lane played by Stephen Rea. I will not delve into that either, but I loved the twist and we find out that Selene and Eve were Subjects 1 and 2 at the facility and had been used to find a way to make a certain species stronger. With the help of Detective Sebastian played by Michael Ealy who I immediately recognized from Californication (interestingly the humans that Selene is originally led to believe are behind the whole research facility) assists her in getting into the research facility where she makes a discovery of somebody she thought was dead 12 years ago. The new leader of the Lycans Quint played by Kris Holden-Reid is awesome, but I was wondering what Lucian would think of this. I am sure that if he was the leader certain things wouldn't happen in this and he would bond with the vampires in this instance. The second best battle scene is when Eve finally realizes her strength and takes it right to the chief villain of the movie and its beyond epic. Absolutely loved this movie. They set it up for a 5th one at the end, but these movies rake in cash and the original and this one definitely deserve recognition in my opinion. A couple other notes: I absolutely loved India Eisley the girl who played Eve. She was just awesome. It reminded me of Chloe Moretz in Let Me In. Both were extremely bad ass in their respective movies and definitely showed how amazing you can make these stories. Also, Kate Beckinsale always rules the screen in these movies. I love Selene because she is a strong female character which is a nice refresher from male action movie characters and personally I like female characters better, but hey that's probably just me. I'll give this movie a 4/5. It's definitely worth a watch. I know I'll be getting this one on DVD.