Darkest Minds, The
Entry updated 2 November 2026. Tagged: Film.
US film (2018). Legendary Pictures. Directed by Jennifer Yuh Nelson. Written by Chad Hodge, based on the novel The Darkest Minds (2012) by Alexandra Bracken. Cast includes Skylan Brooks, Miya Cech, Gwyndoline Christie, Harris Dickinson, Patrick Gibson, Mandy Moore, Amandla Stenberg, and Bradley Whitford. 111 minutes. Colour.
In the future, a mysterious plague has killed most children and given the survivors certain Superpowers identified by different colours – increased intelligence, pyrokinesis, Telekinesis, control of electricity, and the ability to mentally compel people to follow their wishes (see Psi Powers). Ruby Daly (Stenberg) is one young person who can affect others' minds, but conceals her power because the oppressive government slaughters such people as threats to their regime. Ruby is placed in a camp where she is confined with other young people and meets Dr Cate Connor (Moore), but she escapes with the assistance of a group called the Children's League. Ruby then leaves them when she suspects that their intentions are not entirely benign. Soon, she has joined forces with three others, Zu (Cech), Liam (Dickinson), and Chubs (Brooks), and they eventually reach a purported safe haven headed by Clancy Gray (Gibson), son of the dictatorial president (Whitford). But Clancy also has sinister plans, so Ruby and her friends rejoin the Children's League, now seen as their best option in opposing the government.
By the time this film was released, audiences had probably grown weary of iterations of the favorite scenario of twenty-first century Young Adult novels and their film adaptations – a future totalitarian government dedicated to alternately tormenting and exploiting virtuous youngsters – explaining why both this film and The 5th Wave (2016) failed to generate sequels, and why the concluding film of a series based on a similar product, Divergent (2014), was cancelled. The Darkest Minds ups the ante by making every seemingly helpful ally of the put-upon young people turn out to be suspect, making Paranoia its dominant theme, accounting for its references to Richard Adams's Watership Down (1972) and its constantly fleeing and endangered rabbits. Thus, the film is most disturbing as a commentary on the put-upon attitudes of contemporary youth. [GW]
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