Everything Everywhere All At Once

Set in the drab dead-end drudgery of an IRS cubicle farm, and far out in the endless possibility of the multiverse, Everything Everywhere All At Once is about the struggle of love, life, family, and the occasional tax audit, and also how the whole of existence is once again under threat by an agent of chaos, as is wont to happen on occasion.

It’s fantastic.

The Daniels continue to impress, using the strange as a vessel for the profound. Michelle Yeoh once again demonstrates to America something that the rest of the world is already well aware of… she’s a superstar. So is Ke Huy Quan. And Stephanie Hsu too. And also Jamie Lee Curtis, of course.

The film takes place across the Multiverse, a term both physicists and comic book nerds are intimately familiar with, but one that might seem confusing to the Normies out there, at least at first.

The idea is that every choice you take in your life, and every choice you don’t take, creates a separate reality, all of it branching out like a tree. All of these choices then create more new realities, more branches with endless possibilities, and on and on and on. Endless worlds without end. To switch metaphors… imagine a ream of paper. Each sheet is a different reality, each different reality with a different version of you, each different version of you living a slightly or maybe vastly different life from the one you live now, all of them (metaphorically) stacked one on top of the other, right next to each other, one after another, cheek to jowl, forever. An endless stack of paper, an endless stack of yous. On one, you’re an Astronaut. Another, an dog groomer. On another, you work the exact same job, but it’s in the office next door to the one you work in now. Or, maybe you’re a lizard person.

The film (EEAAO for short) centers on Evelyn and Waymond, their estranged daughter, and an IRS agent, all embroiled in the mundane life and death issues of everyday life. Also, the multiverse is collapsing, and Evelyn must leap between worlds in order to save everything, everywhere, all at once... another mundane life and death every day issue.

Everything Everywhere All At Once is at once a bittersweet family drama, a martial arts comedy, an immigrants in America tale, and the story of a mother and daughter’s love. The action sequences are an absolute blast. The sci-fi argle bargle is generally easily digestible. Equal parts awesome, touching, silly, and relatable, this is an all-time great film, and the Daniels are proving every time out that they are all-time great filmmakers.