“Parasite” Director’s New Sci-Fi Film Holds Up a Mirror to Life Under Trump

Despite its otherworldly setting, South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho’s new science fiction epic, Mickey 17, bears some uncanny echoes of life today in the United States. The country’s working and (to a lesser extent) middle class are sure to recognize themselves in its titular hero, Mickey Barnes (played by Robert Pattinson). Mickey escapes a loan shark by joining a space expedition as an “Expendable” whose body is reprinted whenever his dangerous jobs result in a slow, gruesome death. These jobs include exploring the icy surface of the ship’s destination, the planet Niflheim, as well as playing guinea pig in dubious scientific experiments.

Americans will also recognize the film’s antagonist, Mickey’s employer-slash-supreme leader, Kenneth Marshall, a failed politician-turned-intergalactic colonizer played by Mark Ruffalo, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Donald Trump. In addition to Ruffalo’s unmistakably Trumpian speech and mannerisms, both Marshall and Trump are vulgar, prejudiced and cunning. Both are driven by instinct rather than intellect, their success in life the result of boundless selfishness and a lack of empathy, treating everyone around them as disposable (or, better yet, expendable). Both are obsessed with appearing masculine, yet ultimately are rather childlike: ids unrestrained by superegos, seeking approval and self-satisfaction, propped up by legions of vampiric sycophants.

Both move from one failed venture to another — Trump from business to politics, Marshall from politics to outer space. Both understand the power of media, surrounding themselves with cameras that create misleading, larger-than-life public personas which fool themselves as much as their own underlings. Both enjoy the support of church organizations and talk of destroying different, kinder cultures — human or alien — to establish white, Christian dystopias where the strong are free to dominate the weak. Crucially, both survive assassination attempts that scar the sides of their faces and hasten their devolution from vainglorious leaders into vindictive dictators who mistake brutality for justice.

These similarities are neither accidental nor involuntary. Although the film’s cast and crew have — for obvious legal reasons — not expressly cited Trump as the inspiration for his fictional double, they have provided the occasional, tongue-in-cheek confirmation in interviews and talks, with Bong himself referring to Ruffalo’s character as having “faintly orange-tinged skin.”

Considering how closely Mickey 17 mirrors recent political developments in the U.S., viewers may be surprised to learn that the film — loosely based on Edward Ashton’s novel Mickey 7 — wrapped up shooting back in 2022, when Trump’s eventual return to the White House still seemed relatively unlikely, and his near-death encounter on the campaign trail in Pennsylvania was years away. “Ruffalo was quite surprised to see it play out in reality and wondered, ‘Were we oracles predicting the future?’” Bong mentioned in a recent interview, while the actor himself has said it now feels as if they made a documentary. (Some, like SF Gate columnist Drew Magary, speculate the film’s release may have been delayed due to alleged concerns of Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav over antagonizing the new administration.)

Now that the film is finally out, some critics are speculating that Bong turned Marshall into a foil for Trump out of revenge for the latter’s disparaging comments about his previous film, Parasite, which was released during Trump’s first term. “How bad were the Academy Awards this year, did you see? ‘And the winner is … a movie from South Korea!’” the president said at the time, expressing anti-Asian sentiments that would mature during the COVID pandemic, which he blamed (baselessly, as always) on Chinese people.

Although when confronted with this theory during a recent appearance at the British Film Institute, Bong told audiences that he was “not that petty,” the fact remains that Mickey 17 — like most of his filmography — is unapologetic about showcasing all the horrible things the U.S. has unleashed onto the world. Like Parasite and Snowpiercer (the latter another English-language science fiction epic), Mickey 17 is, at its core, both a critique of capitalism and an argument in favor of proletarian revolution. Unlike those films, however, Mickey 17 expressly references the current state of U.S. politics. Although this may seem like a stretch, it’s possible that Bong changed the name of his source material from Mickey 7 to Mickey 17 not only for satirical purposes — strengthening his critique by way of exaggeration — but also to reference the very year that Trump, the film’s real-world antagonist, first entered office.

Unlike, say, Ali Abbasi’s scathing 2024 biopic The Apprentice, Mickey 17 doesn’t concern itself with how Trump came to power — Earth is already in the midst of collapse when the story begins — but how Trump has changed as a person and politician once that power was finally obtained. The first time we see Marshall following his botched assassination attempt — and, for many, the moment his resemblance to Trump really hits you in the face — he’s changed his colorful designer clothes in favor of a dark military uniform, his curly hair slicked back with gel, ready to kill a baby alien and threatening the entirety of Niflheim’s native population with nuclear annihilation. The attack on his life — the clearest possible expression of criticism against his rule — doesn’t compel Marshall to alter his ways; it only exacerbates his worst character traits, bringing him closer to the predestined fate that awaits any person incapable of changing.

Trump, too, has put himself on such a collision course following the July 2024 assassination attempt in Pennsylvania, causing him to become even more bitter and malicious than he already was. Where his first stint in the White House commenced with an air of uncertainty, with Trump himself too astounded by his own victory to effectively formulate policies, he began his second term with a clear goal: to eradicate all the enemies he’s made in the past. Previously, those around him were offered a chance to demonstrate their loyalty. This time, he won’t be so gracious.

Like Marshall, the failed assassination has also left Trump — and his followers — even more convinced of his own destiny as a leader, spared and ordained by God to reshape the world in his own, half-formed image. “Those moments really make you consider a higher power, why you are so committed to helping save the country,” Republican New York Rep. Elise Stefanik said after the shooting. “I think it has further empowered and energized President Trump.” Trump himself agreed, writing on Truth Social that he was saved by “God alone” and that Americans should “remain resilient in our Faith” — faith in God, and faith in him.

In Mickey 17, the revolution against Marshall is led by Mickey 18, who is printed after the ship’s scientists wrongly presume the film’s protagonist, the titular Mickey 17, to have died while exploring the caverns of Niflheim. Where Mickey 17 is friendly to the point of passivity, submissively accepting his mistreatment and dehumanization at the hands of his crewmates, Mickey 18 — dubbed “Habanero Mickey” by his girlfriend Nasha, in contrast to “Mild Mickey” — is rebellious, willing to stand up for himself and take revenge on those who wrong him, including Marshall. Where the literal and figurative proletarian uprisings in Snowpiercer and Parasite ended either in failure or ambiguity, Mickey 17’s revolution succeeds. Accordingly, Mickey 18’s murder of Marshall is depicted in a positive light: a morally just response to oppression that ushers in a better future.

Mickey 17’s radical, unambiguous climax thus reflects how U.S. politics has turned increasingly existential, approaching a point where violent confrontation between the country’s pro- and anti-democratic forces is starting to seem unavoidable to people on both sides; where someone like Luigi Mangione is regarded by many as a hero of the people, and where Trump’s second term marks either a beginning or an end. A documentary indeed.