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After several delays, the live-action Borderlands movie is right around the corner. While you may be curious about the Eli Roth-directed sci-fi romp, it’s easy to get confused by the trailers if you know nothing about the universe or the games it’s based on. With this primer, we hope to demonstrate why we hope this flick is at least a decent enough at bringing the universe of the Frontier to life.
The Frontier video game franchise transports players to Pandora, a hostile planet colonized only on the edge of the known universe. With its inhospitable weather conditions, dangerous flora, and hostile fauna, it is difficult to ‘tame’ a planet. Despite these harsh conditions, the lure of Pandora’s mineral wealth and ancient secrets attracts many fortune seekers and mega-corporations.
Now, it’s important to note that the movie doesn’t take place within the ‘video game canon’ and is rehashing elements from all the games. This is why the main group of adventurers does not resemble any particular roster from the series.
The Borderlands games themselves are first-person shooters (FPS) with role-playing game (RPG) elements similar to Diablo and other action RPGs that pay particular attention to loot and cool weapons. Back in 2009, developers Gearbox introduced a bold mix of genres that was incredibly refreshing. Today, the series is trying to reinvent itself to remain relevant amidst fierce competition. Word on the street is that Borderlands 4 could be coming sooner rather than later.
If you’re looking to jump into more legendary sci-fi FPS video game franchises, you shouldn’t skip our ranked lists of the Halo and Half-Life games. We have also compiled a list of the best space settlement games available today in case you just want to relax with something much more peaceful (but still located in outer space).
Interstellar megacorporations are at the top of the food chain
The Six Galaxies, a collection of galaxies settled by humanity by the time the events of the games take place. The years are not overtly stated, but several Easter eggs suggest that it is the 29th century and that Earth is barely remembered anymore, although references to ancient traditions and nationalities can be found throughout the games. Humanity might have left its home planet to die after exhausting all its resources and instead began exploring the stars about three centuries before the events of the first Frontiers.
During the final phase of this new colonial era, mega-corporations began to rebel against the central government of humanity. These eventually led to their victory, which allowed them to become the ‘new rulers’ of humanity beyond the stars. Less than four months after signing a trade and defense agreement, however, war broke out between these corporations. The Corporate Wars ended with arms manufacturers rising above the others and later absorbing them. This group included Atlas, Dahl, Hyperion, Jakobs, Maliwan, S&S Munitions, Tediore, Torgue, and Vladof.
After discovering ancient Eridian ruins (more on that later) on Pandora, the Atlas corporation invaded the planet in search of a second dome after finding another Eridian site on the planet Promethea. The corporation succeeded in reverse engineering the Eridian technology, which advanced the design of the weapons and put them ahead of the competition. However, Atlas’s search for Pandora is fruitless, and Dahl then comes in hoping to mine Eridium (a universal power source) and trying to discreetly find the legendary Vault.
Ancient aliens called Eridians are crucial to the main plot
Long before humans began to explore the Six Galaxies, the Eridians, an ancient extinct race of aliens, had highly developed technology that allowed them to manipulate entire life and even toy with space itself. Most of what is known about them by the time the games take place is written on stone slabs by Nyriad, a Siren who lived among them – Sirens are individuals with incredible inherited powers and a mysterious connection of them with Pandora.
The general assumption is that Eridians came from somewhere unknown and far away from the Six Galaxies, perhaps running away from a cosmic threat. In the vaults that megacorporations began to reveal not only relics, but also giant eldritch beings like the ‘Destroyer’ found inside Pandora’s Great Vault. It is also implied that the Eridians had to sacrifice entire populations to seal these Globes, which could explain their downfall as a direct result of their capture.
Pandora is a savage world meant to mirror the Old West
Pandora, the main location of the Borderlands games, is a world that is mostly too clean and full of dangerous creatures and even more vicious people. It has a single moon called Elpis, which has been heavily exploited by corporations such as Dahl and Hyperion.
The big twist about Pandora is that, thanks to the aforementioned world manipulation technology, it was ‘built’ by the Eridians as an eternal prison for the Destroyer who is discovered at the end of the first game. This explains its unusual features, unpredictable climate, and very aggressive fauna and flora. Furthermore, the presence of eridium and deadly mutations that affect many living beings on the planet come directly from the work done on the planet by Eridians long ago. That said, Pandora’s human-breathable air is still not fully explained (no, it’s not the result of terraforming).
When we associate the murderous ecosystems of Pandora and the harsh climatic conditions, it’s hard not to think of the Old West, especially given all the visual callbacks to cinema’s depiction of the Wild West. After the first game, as more parts of Pandora are revealed, we realize that the entire planet is not like a desert. It’s still a tough enough world to live in, but the call to adventure like the Gold Rush has attracted many colonists and fortune hunters with its lure of wealth and new opportunities. It all sounds familiar, but the sci-fi twist of the Borderlands universe is a very engaging remake, fully loaded with dark humor and colorful characters.
Not everyone on Pandora is a murderous psycho
There is a larger human presence on Pandora than you might expect, although the planet remains largely ‘unconquered’ due to the aforementioned hostile conditions. It is believed that the Eridians made sure that almost everything on the planet was designed to challenge and repel conquerors and researchers of other races that came along after they were gone.
By the time the first game begins, the presence of corporations on Pandora is very limited despite its colonial history led by Atlas and Dahl. However, large structures and military camps were left behind, and the last search for the Big Dipper reactivates the planet’s corporate interest. For the most part, the planet is inhabited by civilians who live in small towns and poorly put together establishments using scraps, garbage, wood, or bricks. In these places, most people are trying to get by running traditional businesses that serve adventurers, miners, and anyone else trying to grab a piece of Pandora.
But, of course, there are large groups of it badly people as well. Whether left behind by journeys, born into poverty, or lured into a world of evil, bandits are far too plentiful on Pandora. They will use whatever is left by the corporations, they have created their own self-sufficient societies, and they are constantly at war with each other and threaten the ‘better’ towns and villages that try to destroy human civilization. conservation. Think Mad Max but science fiction and Pandoran mutations are often barely touched. Scary!
“Borderlands” comes to theaters from Lionsgate on August 9, 2024.
