Allegiant is the third (and tragically not the last) in the “Divergent Film Series”. While the book’s penned by Veronica Roth did end here with Allegiant the studio executives over at Lionsgate are money hungry (considering their big franchise Hunger Games just ended). So like the predecessors before it, Allegiant ends on an monumental cliffhanger, which makes the film serve as more of a mid-season finale to a ABC Family show than to the landscape of a feature length film. Most of the material get’s stretched, and the big budget payoff looks hokey with no clear sense of where this series could possibly be going. Roth’s original source material was intriguing, I enjoyed how society was divided into factions which I thought served as a nice sociology experiment with a great undertone about reform in our own country. In Divergent and Insurgent the message usually outweighed the second rate action set pieces. This time I feel the integrity of Roth’s beloved novels have been compromised. Allegiant still has the beautiful Shailene Woodley in its corner as Tris and Theo James playing Four, who are basically the dopplegangers for Peeta and Katniss.

The idea of picking and choosing where to begin is a tough one, and I will be amazed to see if fans will remain “allegiant” after seeing this latest installment in what is a dying franchise. I’ve been told this film detours much from the original source material (inventing new plot holes) – so if you’re like me and did not partake in the novels, Allegiant might serve as a satisfying taste ahead of the finale set to hit theaters next summer. For those who did read the books, I feel like Twitter would be a good place to vent your frustrations.

As Allegiant begins, the wall which divided the factions still stands tall and the days of Jeanine are over and Evelyn (Naomi Watts) reigns supreme over the general public. Through her new found power, Evelyn orders the executions of all the conspirators in Jeanine’s schemes to thwart the factions, while keeping things just the same as they were before. As armed guards do what they can to make sure the city is cut off from the outside world, five characters attempt to break out to see what lies beyond the wall. Tris (Woodly – sporting another new hairstyle) her brother Caleb (Ansel Elegort), Four (James), the always unreliable Peter (Miles Teller) and Dauntless ally Christina (Zoe Kravits).

Instead of finding hope and prosperity the squad discover a wasteland with toxic rain and no signs of life. That all changes once a futuristic force field reveals itself to the group where they find sanctuary with survivors of an event called the “purity war”. Tris and her team are picked up and brought back to what remains of an abandoned Chicago international airport – where FINALLY after three films we get to truly discover WHY the cities were set up the way they were. It’s a long story, so I won’t bore you. Basically, the government wanted to mess with human DNA and genetically modified human populations, those people got pissed and revolted.

Stick with me, I know.

Here is where the new potential villain gets introduced by the name of David (Michigan native Jeff Daniels in another commanding role) who is obsessed with genetic purity, and apart from Tris – does not really care about anyone else. What are his motives? Gosh to ask such questions would merit another paragraph, and by this point I feel like I may have already lost you.

Unlike Divergent where we could identity with Tris in this world being created around her much like Katniss in The Hunger Games. Here she really doesn’t take care of much, instead we have Four running around going to “the Fringe” where he takes care of David’s dirty work unknowingly and then tries to convince the others of what a terrible scheme he has going on. This is all routine and we have seen these plot holes about a dozen times before. Yawn.

I hope with the impending final chapter we get back to the roots of Tris’s heritage and we have a reason to care for her again, and maybe Daniels can do some more vile and nasty things so I can have a real reason to hate him because right now, I could care less. The series is running on fumes at this point and will need an extra push at the finish line next summer in order to truly deliver on what has been a rather average three film buildup. C