Hideo Kojima Just Gave Ridley Scott’s ‘The Dog Stars’ a Brutally Honest Review

Ridley Scott’s latest venture into post-apocalyptic storytelling has had a rough go with critics since hitting theaters, but the reactions keep rolling in from unexpected corners of pop culture. This time, the commentary comes not from a film critic, but from one of gaming’s most cinephile-minded creators.

‘The Dog Stars,’ based on Peter Heller’s 2012 novel, follows Hig, a pilot navigating a world devastated by a pandemic, alongside a hardened survivalist named Bangley. The film arrived in theaters on August 28 carrying a cast stacked with Jacob Elordi, Josh Brolin, Margaret Qualley, Guy Pearce, and Allison Janney.

Now, Metal Gear and Death Stranding creator Hideo Kojima has weighed in with his own take, and it’s a fittingly literary one. Kojima revealed that Heller’s original novel, previously published in Japanese under the title “Itsuka Boku ga Kaeru Basho,” had been sitting unread on his bookshelf for years, and that going in expecting something along the lines of Cormac McCarthy’s ‘The Road’ shaped how he watched the film.

Kojima also noted the score was composed by Harry Gregson-Williams, and pointed out that theaters weren’t selling, and hadn’t made, a pamphlet for the film. It’s a small but telling detail from someone known for obsessing over the physical, tactile side of media.

The comparison to ‘The Road’ isn’t one Kojima invented out of thin air. Critics reviewing ‘The Dog Stars’ have repeatedly drawn the same connection, with one review noting that Scott, who previously collaborated with McCarthy on ‘The Counselor,’ seems to have landed on something closer to an airport-bookstore version of McCarthy’s Pulitzer-winning novel rather than a true successor to it.

That framing captures much of the critical conversation swirling around ‘The Dog Stars’ right now. The film has landed around a 40% score on Rotten Tomatoes, a number that ranks among the lowest of Scott’s career and puts it in the same territory as ‘Kingdom of Heaven’ as one of his more poorly reviewed efforts. Reviewers have pointed to a meandering pace and a script that flattens Heller’s original meditation on grief into something closer to survivalist adventure fare.

Audiences, meanwhile, have responded quite differently. ‘The Dog Stars’ has pulled in a much stronger audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, creating one of the widest critic-audience gaps of Scott’s recent output, comparable to the disconnect seen with films like ‘Kingdom of Heaven’ and ‘Legend’ in years past.

Kojima’s post fits into that broader pattern of mixed reactions, offering a more literary, almost wistful lens on the film rather than a straightforward pan or rave. His comparison to ‘The Road’ suggests he went in with certain expectations about tone and depth, given the novel’s roots as literary fiction rather than straight science fiction.

It’s not the first time Kojima has publicly engaged with film in this kind of reflective, almost essayistic way, given his well-documented reputation as someone whose creative work draws heavily from cinema. Whether or not ‘The Dog Stars’ ultimately finds its footing with wider audiences, it’s clear the film has sparked plenty of conversation, from professional critics to some of the most recognizable voices in entertainment.

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