⚡ Byte-Sized Overview:
When three high schoolers discover a glowing alien thing in a hole (as one does), they gain telekinetic powers. At first, it’s harmless pranks and sky-high fun. But when one of them starts slipping into darkness, the story pivots hard from X-Men Lite to tragic supervillain origin tale. It’s found-footage meets falling morality — and it hits harder than you’d expect.
🎬 Chronicle
Release Year: 2012
Director: Josh Trank
Starring: Dane DeHaan, Alex Russell, Michael B. Jordan
Subgenre Tags: Found-Footage Sci-Fi, Superpower Sci-Fi, Teen Sci-Fi, Tragic Origin Story
Watch it now on Prime Video | Buy it in 4K Ultra HD | Buy it on Blu-Ray | Buy it on DVD
🧠 Why Chronicle is a Sci-Fi Icon (of the camcorder chaos variety)
Chronicle is what happens when you strip down the superhero genre to its emotional core: power, isolation, and what happens when the wrong person gets both at once. Shot in found-footage style (but without the nausea), it captures a level of realism and escalation that’s both thrilling and unnerving.
Dane DeHaan gives us dark energy Anakin Skywalker vibes, Michael B. Jordan is effortlessly likeable, and Alex Russell is… well, trying his best to hold things together while everyone else is levitating dangerously.
🔍 Chronicle Deep Dive Highlights
- Andrew (Dane DeHaan): Emotionally damaged teen with a camcorder and a very bad home life. Goes from shy outcast to floating menace.
- Matt (Alex Russell): Andrew’s cousin and reluctant moral compass. Likes philosophy, dislikes murder.
- Steve (Michael B. Jordan): Charismatic golden boy. Gets powers, makes flying look cool, doesn’t deserve what happens.
- The Glowing Hole: Mysterious, plot-convenient, never explained. We love it.
📼 Spoiler Mode: Story Sync for Pub Chat
Spoilers float gently at first, then throw buses.
After stumbling into a strange underground chamber during a party, Andrew, Matt, and Steve are exposed to a glowing alien… something. They develop telekinetic powers — at first, lifting Legos, moving baseballs, and pulling pranks in supermarkets. Classic teen superpower montage stuff.
But their abilities start growing — quickly. They learn to fly. They push the limits. And most dangerously… Andrew discovers that power is the one thing in life he can finally control.
Andrew’s home life is a nightmare: an abusive father, a sick mother, and no friends besides Matt and Steve. The powers give him confidence… then detachment… then delusions of superiority. He begins calling himself an “apex predator.”
When Steve tries to help him, Andrew accidentally kills him during a lightning storm. From that moment on, it’s a sharp descent into chaos.
Andrew spirals, robbing thugs, attacking civilians, and eventually unleashing havoc on downtown Seattle in a destructive telekinetic meltdown. Matt, now the only one left who can stop him, is forced to kill his cousin to prevent further destruction.
The film ends with Matt traveling to Tibet — the location Andrew had always dreamed of — to leave a video message promising to find out what happened to them… and to make it right.
🧠 Chronicle Core Question
What happens when power doesn’t corrupt — it reveals everything that was already broken?
🎲 Watch If You Like:
- Superpowers without capes or costumes
- Emotional sci-fi with escalating tension
- Found footage done right
- Tragedies in disguise as origin stories
- Flying scenes that actually feel like flying
🎛️ Chronicle Signal Strength:
- Rewatch Potential: Moderate — More gripping the first time, but still worth revisiting for the character arc and emotional gut-punch.
- Sci-Fi Purity: Moderate — The source of the powers is vague, but the consequences are undeniably sci-fi.
- Intensity Level: High — A steady burn into explosive mayhem and one very public meltdown.
- Mind-Bend Quotient: Low — No timelines or twists, just the slow horror of watching power corrupt in real-time.
- Zombie Head’s Take: “This is what happens when you give powers to kids who still sleep with their phone charging under the pillow. Emotional damage in 1080p.”
🛰️ Want to Go Deeper?
- Watch the trailer on YouTube (Warning: contains telekinetic teen angst)
- Explore the cast and trivia on IMDb (Fun fact: some scenes were improvised — the destruction was not)
Watch it now on Prime Video | Buy it in 4K Ultra HD | Buy it on Blu-Ray | Buy it on DVD
