YMMV / Metropolis (1989)

• Accidental Aesop: The story seems to have a Green Aesop, as it takes place in a post-apocalyptic setting where the environment has been destroyed, but, much like WALL•E, it's likely that the setting was only created to allow the plot to happen.
• Adaptational Context Change: Sort of. The play keeps the line "Let's watch the world go to the devil" from the film, but it now has the workers thinking that Futura herself is the devil (as opposed to "just" a witch). This means that, as far as they are concerned, the meaning of the line changes from "Let's watch the world burn" to "Watch as I conquer the world."
• Audience-Alienating Premise: A science-fiction musical based on a German expressionist silent film. This may be why it wasn't much of a hit.
• Awesome Music: The soundtrack is actually really good. Even the unintentionally funny songs are rather catchy.
• Complete Monster: Futura is a cognizantly sadistic version of Maria's robotic double. After having the heroic freedom fighter likeness grafted onto her by the orders of John Freeman, Futura is sent to disrupt the planned rebellion of Metropolis's working class by impersonating Maria. Distracting the workers through cruel manipulation, Futura gleefully tries to suffocate them all as the unmanned machines drop the oxygen levels, and takes a child hostage to keep them at bay, stabbing hero Steven when he tries to stop her.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Judy Kuhn who, much like Brigitte Helm before her, plays both Maria and her evil impersonator and nails both of them.
• Harsher in Hindsight: John Freeman, the creator of Metropolis, committing suicide and taking his city with him becomes this when - in an especially tragic case of Life Imitates Art - Joe Brooks, the main creator of this play, commited suicide in 2011 and essentially took Metropolis with him by forbidding others to perform the musical after his death.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: John Freeman's name, which he just happens to share with the Saver of Humens.
• Narm:
  • Some of the music is a bit too lighthearted for such a dark plot, leading to the wrong kind of Soundtrack Dissonance.
  • John Freeman can sometimes be so cartoonishly evil that it becomes hard to take him seriously.
  • "A double shift will kill him." True, It Makes Sense in Context, but still...
• Pragmatic Adaptation: Steven and Maria are both given more character development and portrayed as less over the top than they were in the 1927 silent film.
• Questionable Casting: Some fans of the Fritz Lang movie are rather baffled that this version of Joh Fredersen - originally portrayed by The Stoic, clean-shaven, skinny Alfred Abel - is now played by the scenery-chewing, bearded, heavyset BRIAN BLESSED. This is made even weirder by the fact that BRIAN BLESSED both looks and acts much like the movie version of Grot, and would probably have been better suited for that character.
• So Bad, It's Good: Some of the Narm-ier moments in the play makes it all the more entertaining.

---