Miles Teller And Anya Taylor-Joy's New Movie The Gorge Is Absolutely Nutso, But The Most Unbelievable Thing To Me Isn't Even Supernatural

Spoilers below for the new genre-mashing thriller The Gorge, so be wanted if you haven’t yet streamed it with an Apple TV+ subscription.

After working for CinemaBlend for more years than I have fingers, I rarely experience movies or TV shows without leaning into months of promotional build-up. Yet with Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy’s streaming thriller The Gorge, I managed to make it to the week of release without knowing a single thing about it. Which is perhaps why it immediately became a candidate to go down as the most WTF, kitchen-sink movie release of 2025.

That isn’t a bad thing as far as I’m concerned, as I didn’t have any real expectations that could be either toppled or unreached. (I did watch the first trailer after the fact, and would have had a far different experience had I done so ahead of time.) In fact, I was almost definitely more entertained by the bizarre, genre-shifting film due to never having a real clue about what unbelievable new story divergence would come next. It appears I stand in opposition to the largely negative critical reviews, but I digress.

The story starts simply enough before veering into batshit-bonkers territory, with Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy playing deadshot snipers in their respective countries — he's from the U.S., while she’s out of Lithuania — who are tasked with standing watch on opposite sides of a huge gorge filled with colorful vapors and screeching creatures. But director Scott Derrickson's monster movie vibes soon give way to a cutesy rom-com before turning back into a stunt-filled, sci-fi action flick with governmental conspiracy vibes sprinkled throughout.

In fact, let’s talk about some of the movie’s more baffling elements before then addressing The Gorge's most unbelievable detail, which pretty much set all of the events into motion.

Some Of The Gorge's Wildest And Most Questionable Details

• Both Levi and Dasha seem like the same person, as they're both record-breaking snipers who blindly parachute into unknown areas and are also quite astute at free-soloing.
• The proximity bombs on either side of the gorge are seemingly just below the metal walkway barriers, rather than much farther down, resulting in parts of the barriers being destroyed every time there's an explosion.
• There are apparently supplies and leftover belongings in both fort-like building, but Levi barely took anything with him.
• The first two times Levi and Dasha hear and/or see the creatures, it's seemingly because of gunshots and loud music, and yet they continue to disrupt the silence with gunshots and loud music regularly afterward.
• The colors of the gases and fumes at the bottom of the gorge change from orange to purple and beyond, without addressing it.
• Levi seems like an extremely smart and practical person, yet doesn't suspect any secret surveillance or other nefarious issues, despite everything else being shady as shit.
• Skull spiders. I loved the spooky fuckers, don't get me wrong, but the sheer number of them is still enough to make my entire body clench.
• The mutated creatures in the gorge have for years survived attempts to destroy them, to the point where the guard towers became the go-to option, and yet it took just two two rule-breakers from opposite sides of the world to destroy it all.

That really is just picking at the surface, since so much of the narrative crafted by screenwriter Zach Dean works purely through movie logic. But even in a movie that supposes the idea that a tech company allows clandestine mutants to thrive under surveillance, the catalyst for my own sense of disbelief stemmed fro

I Call B.S. On How Often Levi And Dasha Knew What The Other Was Doing

I'll casually preface this by saying that I've never had great eyesight, a fact that is likely fueling my argument more than I'd like to admit. And yes, I fully understand that both characters would need impressive eyesight to achieve such marksmanship achievements. Plus, I don’t cop to actually knowing the extents of excellent eyesight, nor specifically how large the titular gorge is, or how its vapors would affect the air above.

All that noted, at no point while watching The Gorge was I ever convinced that either Levi and Dasha could pick up on so many of the small details happening on the other person's side, especially at night. Obviously when using those ridiculously powerful binoculars, it’s a piece of cake to read handwritten messages and witness tears falling down cheeks. But Dasha in particular seemed to have a sixth sense for Levi’s actions, and always seemed to know when he’d be looking.

But I’d have even bought it if the story introduced the idea that Dasha was gifted with precognition abilities either through science or magic, since that would fall in line with the rest. Not the case, though, and throughout the course of the two characters’ bonding experience, one scene after another lightly implies that they only really need those binoculars to read words, and not so much for other details like facial reactions, hand gestures, and other bodily movements.

I might not have questioned that element quite so hard had the movie not featured as many drone shots that highlighted just how far apart the two sides were. Even beyond that, Levi and Dasha made it seem like a formidable challenge to nail a successful rifle shot from one side to the next, further indicating a lengthy distance.

In the end, I don’t think that factor is going to have a huge impact on whether or not The Gorge ends up in a list of the best movies on Apple TV+, but I do think I would have had an easier time watching it had part of Levi’s “interview” with Sigourney Weaver’s Bartholomew specifically addressed how hard or easy it would be to see the opposing side, rather than just telling him not to look.