History YMMV / Cube

* SoOkayItsAverage: The game is generally regarded as an inferior version of VideoGame/SeriousSam, with the two saving grace is that it came with a level designer and it's free and open source, which for the latter, a rarity among video games.

** [[spoiler:Worth using all of his strength to hold Quentin's leg so that the bridge can tear him apart. It's a fitting end for Quentin because he's killed others to escape the cube, and yet when the exit is close by and he could have chosen to peacefully escape, he instead attacks the protagonists only to met his end by the cube he sought to escape, and by the hand of one his victims, no less.]]

* CompleteMonster: [[spoiler:Quentin, a police officer, is one of several people who are mysteriously trapped inside a giant cubical maze which is composed of smaller cubical rooms, some of which are [[RubeGoldbergHatesYourGuts booby-trapped]]. He initially presents himself as a levelheaded leader and assists in navigating the group to the maze's outer edge, but is slowly revealed to be a cruel, violent man who proves to be a [[PsychoPartyMember bigger threat to the group's survival]] than the deadly maze itself. He drops Holloway to her death merely because he dislikes her, then lies about it to the others. He [[AttemptedRape tries to rape]] Leaven not soon after. He's stopped in time by Worth, for which Quentin savagely beats him. When the others finally try to leave him behind for what he did, he finds a way back to them at the exit room. He quickly stabs Leaven to death, fatally wounds Worth, and prepares to do the same to the mentally disabled Kazan before he is stopped by the dying Worth.]]

* CompleteMonster: [[spoiler:Quentin, a police officer, is one of several people who are mysteriously trapped inside a giant, cubical maze which is composed of smaller cubical rooms, some of which are [[RubeGoldbergHatesYourGuts booby-trapped]]. He initially presents himself as a levelheaded leader and assists in navigating the group to the maze's outer edge, but he's slowly revealed to be a cruel, violent man who proves to be a [[PsychoPartyMember bigger threat to the group's survival]] than the deadly maze itself. He's implied to have been abusive towards his wife and children, dropping Holloway to her death shortly after she accuses him of such, then lies about her death to the others. He [[AttemptedRape tries to rape]] Leaven not soon after. He's stopped in time by Worth, for which Quentin savagely beats him, and continues to use threat of force against the group in order to stay in charge. When the others finally try to leave him behind for all he's done, he somehow(??) finds a way back to them at the exit room. He quickly stabs Leaven to death, fatally wounds Worth, and prepares to do the same to the mentally disabled Kazan before he is stopped by the dying Worth. It's safe to say he definitely deserves getting turned into a smear of blood by the moving cube.]]

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Was [[spoiler: Quentin]] always just a violent asshole? While it is strongly implied he abused his wife and kids, we [[OffscreenVillainy never actually see that.]] As such, there are some people who theorize he was originally just a normal person, and became an evil psycho-killer rapist [[WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds due to all the terror he experienced in the Cube causing his mind to snape like a twig.]]

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Was [[spoiler: Quentin]] always just a violent asshole? While it is strongly implied he abused his wife and kids, we [[OffscrenVillainy never actually see that.]] As such, there are some people who theorize he was originally just a normal person, and became an evil psycho-killer rapist [[WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds due to all the terror he experienced in the Cube causing his mind to snape like a twig.]]

* TheWoobie: All of the trapped people (with the exception of [[TokenEvilTeammate Quentin]]) are this to some degree, but of particular note are:

* Catharsis Factor: [[spoiler:After all the horrible and monstrous things he's done, it's really nice to see Quentin cut in half just before the exit he's been aiming for the whole movie.]]

** Worth using all of his strength to hold Quentin's leg so that the bridge can tear him apart. It's a fitting end for Quentin because he's killed others to escape the cube, and yet when the exit is close by and he could have chosen to peacefully escape, he instead attacks the protagonists only to met his end by the cube he sought to escape, and by the hand of one his victims, no less.

* CompleteMonster: Quentin, a police officer, is one of several people who are mysteriously trapped inside a giant, cubical maze which is composed of smaller cubical rooms, some of which are [[RubeGoldbergHatesYourGuts booby-trapped]]. He initially presents himself as a levelheaded leader and assists in navigating the group to the maze's outer edge, but he's slowly revealed to be a cruel, violent man who proves to be a [[PsychoPartyMember bigger threat to the group's survival]] than the deadly maze itself. He's implied to have been abusive towards his wife and children, dropping Holloway to her death shortly after she accuses him of such, then lies about her death to the others. He [[AttemptedRape tries to rape]] Leaven not soon after. He's stopped in time by Worth, for which Quentin savagely beats him, and continues to use threat of force against the group in order to stay in charge. When the others finally try to leave him behind for all he's done, he somehow(??) finds a way back to them at the exit room. He quickly stabs Leaven to death, fatally wounds Worth, and prepares to do the same to the mentally disabled Kazan before he is stopped by the dying Worth. It's safe to say he definitely deserves getting turned into a smear of blood by the moving cube.

* MoralEventHorizon: Quentin grows steadily more hostile over the course of the film, but he doesn't make the full transition into becoming a genuine threat to the group until he [[spoiler: lets Holloway fall to her death, tries to rape Leaven, and beats up Worth for stopping him. This causes both Worth and Leaven to keep their distance from him as they've seen that he has become a bigger threat to them than the Cube ever was. It's not very surprising that our protagonists eventually try to get rid of him afterwards]].

** After everything Quentin does, it is satisfying to watch Worth pushing one of the doors up on Quentin's neck after he has had enough enough of being his punching bag.

!!The original film
* AssPull: The ending where [[spoiler: Quentin suddenly shows up and kills Leaven and Worth]] really comes across this way, as he'd seemingly have to have both OffscreenTeleportation and PsychicPowers to know where they went, and [[spoiler: the last we see of him, he's fallen and hit his head with a pool of blood forming, which makes it pretty obvious that the original intent was to just have him die then and there.]]

!!Film.{{Cube}}

* SoOkayItsAverage: The game is generally regarded as an inferior version of VideoGame/SeriousSam.

* MoralEventHorizon: Quentin grows steadily more hostile over the course of the film, but he doesn't make the full transition into becoming a genuine threat to the group until he [[spoiler: lets Holloway fall to her death then tries to rape Leaven and beats up Worth for stopping him. This causes both Worth and Leaven to keep their distance from him as they saw that he has become a bigger threat to them than the Cube ever was. So it's not very surprising that our protagonists eventually try to get rid of him afterwards]].

** After everything Quentin did, it is satisfying to watch Worth pushing one of the doors up to his neck after he has enough of being his punching bag.
** Worth using all of his strength to hold Quentin's leg so that the bridge can tear him apart. It's a fitting end for Quentin; he killed others to escape the cube, and yet when the exit is close by and he could have chosen to peacefully escape, he instead attacks the protagonists, only to met his end by the cube he sought to escape, and by the hand of one his victims no less.
%%* {{Narm}}:
%%** "PRIME NUMBERS!!!! PRIME NUMBERS!!!!"
%%** "IT'S ASTRO-NOMICAL!"
%%** "Holy ''cats''!"

** Folks who watch the movie nowadays might be surprised to see [[Series/StargateAtlantis Dr. McKay]] in the Cube. Some viewers probably were also surprised to see [[Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine Ezri Dax]] in here too.

* SignatureScene: The infamous first kill, where a man is diced into cubes by a grid of razor wire, is the best-known scene in the film.
* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: Despite being dated nowadays, the effects were well-done (and are still very impressive) for a NoBudget film. Especially since the CG was done free.

** Leaven, who is the most terrified by far at first, even saying "I never did anything to deserve this!" Making this even worse, [[spoiler: Quentin [[AttemptedRape almost rapes her near the end]]]] and [[spoiler: she [[HopeSpot almost escapes, only to get stabbed by Quentin and die.]]]]

* AssPull: The ending where [[spoiler: Quentin suddenly shows up and kills Leaven and Worth]] really comes across this way, as He'd seemingly have to have both OffscreenTeleportation and PsychicPowers to know where they went, and [[spoiler: the last we see of him, he's fallen and hit his head, with a pool of blood forming, which makes it pretty obvious the original intent was to just have him die then and there.]]
* CompleteMonster: Quentin, a police officer, is one of several people who are mysteriously trapped inside a giant cubical maze which is composed of smaller cubical rooms, some of which are [[RubeGoldbergHatesYourGuts booby-trapped]]. He initially presents himself as a levelheaded leader and assists in navigating the group to the maze's outer edge, but is slowly revealed to be a cruel, violent man who proves to be a [[PsychoPartyMember bigger threat to the group's survival]] than the deadly maze itself. He's implied to have been abusive towards his wife and children, dropping Holloway to her death shortly after she accused him of such, then lies about her death to the others. He [[AttemptedRape tries to rape]] Leaven not soon after. He's stopped in time by Worth, for which Quentin savagely beats him, and continues to use threat of force against the group in order to stay in charge. When the others finally try to leave him behind for what he did, he finds a way back to them at the exit room. He quickly stabs Leaven to death, fatally wounds Worth, and prepares to do the same to the mentally disabled Kazan before he is stopped by the dying Worth. It's safe to say he definitely deserved getting turned into a smear of blood by the moving cube.
* ContestedSequel: It's often debated whether the second and third movies were worthy additions, or if it would have been best to let the first movie stand on its own. Even people who believe the first film to be far superior can't agree on whether ''Cube 2: Hypercube'' or ''Cube Zero'' was the better sequel.

* GenreTurningPoint: Less for a genre and more for a nation's film industry. Save for the "tax shelter era" of 1975-82, which eventually ended due to [[TheNewRockAndRoll the public's outrage]] over the use of their tax dollars to fund lurid {{exploitation film}}s, Canada's public film production agencies preferred to support "prestige" films that would win awards and respectability for Canada's film industry. In practice, this meant lots of films that [[CriticalDissonance critics adored but nobody saw]], and American TV shows coming north of the border for the tax credits (the reason for the CanadaDoesNotExist trope). ''Cube'', however, was an unapologetic horror movie partially funded by Telefilm Canada that [[OutOfTheGhetto won Best First Feature]] at the Toronto International Film Festival that year, and went on to become a {{Sleeper Hit}} that made back its budget over twenty-five times over. With the success of ''Cube'', Canada became a major hub of "genre" filmmaking, and hasn't looked back.

* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: Despite being dated nowadays, the effects were well done for a NoBudget film. Especially since the CG was done free.

** Leaven, who is the most terrified by far at first, even saying "I never did anything to deserve this!" Making this even worse, [[spoiler: Quentin [[AttemptedRape almost rapes her near the end]]]] and [[spoiler: she [[HopeSpot almost escapes, only to get stabbed by Quentin and die.]]

* TheWoobie: All of the trapped people (with the exception of [[TokenEvilTeammate Quentin]] are this to some degree, but of particular note are:

** Leaven, who is the most terrified by far at first, even saying "I never did anything to deserve this!" Making this even worse, [[spoiler: Quentin [[AttemptedRape almost rapes her near the end]] and [[spoiler: she [[HopeSpot almost escapes, only to get stabbed by Quentin and die.]]