The Maze Runner: A Story of Twists and Turns

By Aditya Rajan

A movie that wades through the slurry of the various tropes that haunt traditional teen films, Maze Runner manages to emerge as its own unique blend of dystopian horror. The magic of the Maze Runner lies in the relationships between each of its characters and how it carves out each personality in a minimal amount of time.

The story begins as we’re introduced to Thomas, the newest in line amongst a group of teenage boys who find themselves imprisoned in the Glade, a small forest clearing surrounded by a massive maze that obstructs them from freedom. Thomas quickly learns of the social hierarchy that the group has established amongst themselves to hold accountability and ensure that the community’s needs are met, from farming to cooking to the exploration of the maze itself.

The costume design in Maze Runner is done with a phenomenal yet deliberate eye, ensuring that the roles of each character is made apparent simply through their outfits, from the leaders like Alby to the Runners like Ben and Minho. This unique style keeps each character memorable in our mind. The sound design is ambitious, yet imposing, however it truly shines in highlighting the ambiguous and almost sentient nature of the Maze, constantly twisting and rearranging itself in the background.

This leads us to the titular highlight of the movie, the Maze itself. The set with which the directors work looks absolutely rustic and phenomenal, displaying the maze as a structure that almost looks ancient. Its most striking feature, however, is that it exerts a sense of emptiness and abandonment from the perspective of the reader. From the moment we see it, it seems to appear unexplored and untouched, which only adds to the ambiguity and mystery of the setting. However, it is not until we step into the Maze that we appreciate these qualities. It's at this moment, where our protagonist finally steps into the Maze, that the music, lighting, cinematography and sound design weave together to create a gripping and horror-inducing scene. The lighting and up-close shots fill the viewer with an overwhelming sense of claustrophobia and despair. The crushing weight behind the isolation of the scenes within the Maze is owed entirely to its grandiose scale and design that emphasizes its neglect.

Ultimately, however, The Maze Runner boils down to an action-thriller. Its setting and horror raise many questions to be answered in the mind of the viewer, however the answers don’t quite feel fully developed. As we near the conclusion, we face a revelation that entirely changes the world of the Maze Runner as we perceive it, however it leaves us with a feeling as though we never got to see the entirety of the extent of the Maze’s secrets. Although the movie sacrifices some of its mystery for more action-packed and heart-wrenching sequences, it does ultimately leave you asking more questions as the teen-dystopia expands to a whole new world with so many issues left to tackle.