Cockroaches won’t be the only species to survive the apocalypse. Teenagers will breeze through whatever deadly pandemic, ecological armageddon or global breakdown of law and order kills off the rest of us. Think about it, their generation has been raised on dystopia; as long as the mobile networks are up, and they can start a WhatsApp group to join forces, these kids are well-equipped to survive almost anything.
‘The 5th Wave’, based on a bestseller by Rick Yancey, is the latest YA sensation to get the big screen treatment. Forgettably similar to every other girl-saves-the-world franchise, Chloë Moretz (on a downward turn since playing Hit Girl in ‘Kick-Ass’) stars as 16-year-old Cassie, a like-totally-ordinary teenager until aliens invade.
Earth’s new houseguests, known as The Others, hover in a giant mother ship in the sky, unleashing waves of plagues to wipe out humanity (earthquakes, tsunamis, avian flu) before finally making an appearance as body-snatchers. Cassie is trekking cross-country to find her little brother when she’s rescued by a muscly dude in the forest. But can she trust him? Meanwhile, the US military is training an army of teens to take down The Others, including Cassie’s high school crush. Hormones rage (like cockroaches, teenagers can be prolific breeders), and after a while, it's all so ridiculous as to be dopily sweet as pint-sized kids bark bad-ass military slang at each other. Still, it's no successor to ‘The Hunger Games’.