The Dog Stars is different enough from the trailer, and it’s hurt by it. After watching the trailer you’re expecting this young man to be haunted by a ton of Reapers, but they end up being more of a nuisance than an actual threat. What you get instead is Hig, a likeable, hard-working protagonist searching for something normal in a post-apocalyptic world, alongside his older friend Bangley — annoying at times, but fiercely loyal — and an awesome dog named Jasper rounding out the team.

From the beginning you can tell Hig is in mourning, having lost his wife and unborn child to the flu. She shows up consistently in flashbacks, which doesn’t help as much as it should — every time the movie cuts back to his old house, the pacing slows down badly. She’s never given any good lines beyond getting sick and needing Hig to give her mercy in the end, which makes those detours feel like dead weight rather than emotional grounding.

The film also leaves tension on the table. I’m shocked not one Reaper or anything dangerous ever showed up while Hig kept flying to the same gas station over and over — the only thing that saved those stakes was one crazy guy who nearly got the drop on him, and even that needed more follow-through. Flying the same route that often should’ve drawn attention; someone from the Reapers watching his patterns and ambushing him would have raised the thriller factor and made his journey genuinely scarier. As it stood, that gas station felt too safe.

Then there’s the trip to Grand Junction. After losing Jasper, it makes sense Hig needed some good news, but the grass wasn’t greener on the other side — and leaving Bangley behind to fend for himself felt selfish, especially with Hig offering him a spot to tag along instead of staying at a camp that was already guardable.

The bright spot of the movie is meeting Cima and Pops. Interacting with them opens Hig up to the possibility of a brighter future — Pops is stubborn early on but slowly warms up, and Cima gives Hig a reason to keep living. If Hig hadn’t left the airport, he never would have met either of them, which would have been a real shame. The three of them work together with a genuine level of mutual respect, and Cima’s medical background ends up healing much of the Mennonite group and giving them a place to live by the end.

Overall, the movie never made me fear for Hig — you’re left expecting something bad to happen that never does. The one moment of real fear comes from Bangley instead, during his fight with the Reapers at the airport. He puts up a good fight, but the numbers start working against him, and I genuinely thought he was dead. Watching him walk away with only minor injuries was a relief, but it also tipped the fight into feeling cartoonish rather than earned.it looked like plot armour saved him. While I was happy to see he came out of the fight with only some injuries it also made the fight seem cartoonish.