The Last Witch Hunter feels like a slightly more mature young adult novel adaptation. It is an origin story with plenty of fight scenes to enjoy, mythology to learn and an ending that clearly sets up future sequels. However, it also displays some of the worst qualities of those films as well, with stilted dialogue, poor CGI effects and flat characters. It’s not an overtly bad film, but it’s not particularly good either.

During a prologue set in the 1300s, Kaulder (Vin Diesel) destroys the cause of the Black Death, Witch Queen (Julie Engelbrecht), but not before she curses him with immortality. In the present, Kaulder now acts as a witch hunter, with Dolan the 36th (Michael Caine) acting as his friend and mentor. After an attack leaves Dolan incapacitated, Dolan the 37th (Elijah Wood) steps up to take his place. Kaulder and the new Dolan begin an investigation, eventually teaming up with a local witch named Chloe (Game of Thrones‘ Rose Leslie) who helps them to discover a secret plot to resurrect the Witch Queen and unleash a new plague.

Surprisingly, it is Leslie who is the real star of the film.  She steals nearly every scene she is in. After her star-making turn in last year’s Honeymoon and now, with her ability to make her poorly-written dialogue in The Last Witch Hunter sound convincing, one can hope that we will be seeing more of her in the future. Both Wood and Caine are sorely underused in the film (they pretty much disappear after the first 30 minutes, only to re-appear during the climax). Diesel is the weakest link of the film, spouting off quite a bit of expository dialogue that he doesn’t seem particularly interested in.

Speaking of expository dialogue, The Last Witch Hunter has it in spades. The film apparently thinks the audience is incapable of figuring things out for themselves, as there are voiceovers aplenty and stilted dialogue that sounds forced and out of place, all for the sake of explaining things that you are fairly capable of figuring out yourself. Out of all of the film’s flaws (of which there are many), the dialogue is the most egregious. Critics of CGI will find little to love about The Last Witch Hunter, though there are a few practical effects, mostly involving the Witch Queen, that impress.

The film falls apart in its final act, with an anticlimactic showdown that features editing so choppy that is difficult to ascertain exactly what is happening. It’s also a shame that Leslie is incredibly underserved in the film’s final scenes. The first two acts seem to be setting up Chloe as the real hero of the story, only for her to be relegated to a typical damsel in distress by the time Kaulder faces off with the witch queen. There is also an 11th hour twist that feels contrived and completely shoehorned in. Had the film not gone for the “gotcha!” route, it would have been all the better for it.

This is disappointing since everything that came before, while by no means Oscar-worthy, has been so much fun. Ultimately though, it serves to set up a potential sequel for this would-be franchise. It would be interesting to see where the story (and these characters) go from here, so on that level The Last Witch Hunter is a success, but is it a good sign when the idea of a sequel sounds better than the film you’re already watching?

All of this being said, The Last Witch Hunter is a lot of fun. Dumb fun, to be sure, but fun nonetheless. The fight scenes are highly entertaining and, with the exception of the aforementioned climax, well choreographed. There are moments of humor sprinkled throughout the film that surprisingly work in the film’s favor. It’s also never boring, which is always a plus with mindless action flicks nowadays.

The Last Witch Hunter is harmless action fluff. There isn’t anything particularly memorable about it, but it’s nowhere near the trainwreck people are making it out to be. There are worse ways to spend 100 minutes, and if you can shut your brain off and enjoy the ride, you may just find yourself liking The Last Witch Hunter.