The Divergent Series: Allegiant

The Divergent Series: Allegiant is a 2016 American dystopian romantic thriller film directed by Robert Schwentke with a screenplay by Bill Collage, Adam Cooper, and Noah Oppenheim. It was intended as the first of two cinematic parts based on the novel Allegiant, the final book in the Divergent trilogy by Veronica Roth, and the third installment in The Divergent Series.

The film stars Shailene Woodley, Theo James,  Jeff Daniels, Miles Teller, Ansel Elgort, Zoë Kravitz, Maggie Q, Ray Stevenson, Bill Skarsgård, Octavia Spencer, and Naomi Watts, and is the sequel to Insurgent and will be followed by the concluding entry, Ascendant (Allegiant and Ascendant were originally to be titled Allegiant – Part 1 and Allegiant – Part 2).

Allegiant was released on March 18, 2016, in theaters and IMAX and received generally negative reviews from critics, who criticized the lack of originality and character development. The film was a box office bomb, grossing just $179 million worldwide against its $142 million budget, becoming the lowest-grossing Divergent film. This led initially to budget cuts on the fourth and final film. A theatrical release for Ascendant was later cancelled in favor of it being a television film and spinoff series.

Plot
After Evelyn forbids anyone from leaving Chicago, she announces that all Erudite members involved in the previous coup attempt are to be put on trial and executed if found guilty. Tris and Four rescue Caleb from execution and try to escape over the wall, along with Tori, Peter and Christina. The group is ambushed by Edgar, who kills Tori, but the group escapes, and pass the wall and are intercepted by soldiers with advanced weaponry who take the group to the Bureau of Genetic Welfare, a city of advanced technology hidden behind a cloaking shield. They learn that years ago the U.N believed that society's problems were caused by "damaged genes". In an attempt to create a better society they began to tamper with people's genes; this eventually led to the Purity Wars and the destruction of most of the planet. To try to reverse the destruction a series of "experiments" were set up in an attempt to repair this mistake, establishing isolated cities across the remains of the world.

Tris and Four are tested by Matthew and Nita to verify and study their Divergence. Tris is shown to be truly Divergent, and the first Chicago Divergent to be 100% genetically pure, but Four's genetic structure indicates that his genes still carry damage. Caleb and Peter are assigned to surveillance teams that remotely monitor Chicago, while Christine and Four are assigned to the military. Matthew then brings Tris to the leader of the Bureau, David (Jeff Daniels). David gives Tris a device that allows her to view her foster mother's memories, and she sees that her mother was rescued from the wastelands as a child before volunteering to join the Chicago experiment out of dedication to the project. In return for his help in restoring peace to Chicago, which David claims only the council has the power to intervene in, Tris agrees to help David continue the experiment.

Meanwhile, Four and Christina train with Nita. They join the military on a rescue mission to a nearby wasteland village, though Four becomes mistrustful of the Bureau's intentions after realizing that they are simply kidnapping children and wiping their memories with amnesia gas. Four also attempts to warn Tris of the Bureau's intentions, but they are interrupted by a video call from David.

Caleb warns Four of a rapidly escalating conflict back in Chicago between Johanna's group of Allegiants and Evelyn's factionless. Four appeals to Tris for her to return to Chicago with him to end the bloodshed, but she decides to go with David. David agrees to reinsert Four back into Chicago, escorted by Matthew and some Bureau soldiers. Once in the air, Matthew quietly reveals to Four that the flight is a trap and he is meant to be killed. A skirmish breaks out and Four defeats all of the soldiers, though the transport crashes as a result. Matthew gives Four a device to allow passage through the cloaking shield, and Four proceeds to Chicago while Matthew remains behind to be rescued by the Bureau and warn Tris.

Meanwhile, Tris and David meet with the council. Tris disagrees with the council's objectives and criticizes how they have done nothing to stop the violence in Chicago. The council responds that David has full power to intervene whenever he desires, revealing that he has lied to her from the beginning. During the return flight to the Bureau, Tris ends their partnership. Upon her return, she gathers Caleb and Christina in David's hovercar to return to Chicago. Nita helps them escape, revealing that David's rule is not popular with everyone in the Bureau.

Four is captured by the factionless and confronts Evelyn to end the violence. Tris, Caleb, and Christina arrive to find the city tearing itself apart at the opening stage of a full assault by the Allegiant. Back at the Bureau David makes a deal with Peter in exchange for Peter's promotion and inserts him into Chicago to convince Evelyn to deploy a hidden Bureau stockpile of amnesia gas to wipe the memories of the attackers and force a peace in her favor, to which she agrees. Peter takes her to a hidden vault.

Tris and Christina fight through the factionless and arrive at the vault, having rescued Four along the way. At the vault door, Four convinces Evelyn to stop the gas attack, as he would not remember that she was his mother if she carried it out. She capitulates and stops the release, but is shot in the leg by a frustrated Peter. Peter gloats until the same gas starts flooding the vault as well. Realizing David has betrayed him, Peter opens the vault so Tris and Four can stop the gas release, and flees back towards the cloaking shield, as Four says he will find and kill Peter.

Caleb arrives and aids Tris in destroying the gas dispersion hub, stopping the release. The group gathers atop the Erudite building as they watch David's shuttle autopilot back towards the Bureau, heavily laden with explosives. Tris transmits a message to the whole world, revealing to them the existence of the Bureau and that Chicago was an experiment in genetic purity. Her message to the Bureau is that Chicago is no longer their experiment, but the home of its citizens. Caleb detonates the explosives at the end of the message, tearing a massive hole through the cloak wall and revealing the Bureau. As the group watches, David's image is revealed standing behind Tris via a Bureau remote viewing device.

Cast

 * Shailene Woodley as Beatrice "Tris" Prior
 * Theo James as Tobias "Four" Eaton
 * Ian Belgard as Young Four
 * Miles Teller as Peter Hayes
 * Ansel Elgort as Caleb Prior
 * Zoë Kravitz as Christina
 * Jeff Daniels as David
 * Maggie Q as Tori Wu
 * Naomi Watts as Evelyn Johnson-Eaton
 * Octavia Spencer as Johanna Reyes
 * Bill Skarsgård as Matthew
 * Ashley Judd as Natalie Prior
 * Anna Stevenson as Young Natalie
 * Keiynan Lonsdale as Uriah Pedrad
 * Nadia Hilker as Juanita "Nita"
 * Ray Stevenson as Marcus Eaton
 * Daniel Dae Kim as Jack Kang
 * Mekhi Phifer as Max
 * Xander Berkeley as Phillip
 * Jonny Weston as Edgar
 * Joseph David-Jones as Hollis
 * Andy Bean as Romit

Production
Initially intended as a final film based on the final book of the series Allegiant It was later decided to split the novel into multiple parts, similar to what have been done with other young adult novel series adapted into films. Initially donning the subtitle "Part one", this idea was later dropped in favor of each installment donning a unique name.

By March 2015, all of the series regular casts had confirmed their involvement with newcomers Jeff Daniels and Bill Skarsgård added to the cast that April and May respectively.

Filming began on May 18, 2015, in Atlanta, Georgia and concluded on August 23, 2015. From June 11 to June 23, filming took place at the Lindale Mill in Lindale, Georgia, where the set was being built in late May. and additional filming set in Chicago, Illinois.

Music
In December 2015, it was confirmed that Joseph Trapanese would return to compose the score for the film. The first track for the Allegiant soundtrack, "Scars", written by Tove Lo, Jakob Jerlström, Ludvig Söderberg, and performed by Tove Lo, was released as a single on February 19, 2016.

Promotion
A teaser trailer was released on September 15, 2015, followed by a full-length trailer two months later, on November 12, 2015. Another full-length trailer was released on January 22, 2016.

Box office
Allegiant grossed $66.2 million in North America and $113.1 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $179.2 million.

In the United States and Canada, the film was projected to gross around $28–30 million in its opening weekend from 3,740 theaters, which would make it the lowest opening among the franchise. It earned the lowest previews among the series, with $2.35 million from 2,800 theaters. On its opening day, it made $11.9 million (including previews), down 43.6% from Insurgent, becoming the first film in the series to fail to open with over $20 million. Scott Mendelson of Forbes compared the decline in opening day to the third installment of The Chronicles of Narnia film series, Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which had a similar amount of drop. In comparison, the third Hunger Games film, Mockingjay – Part 1 fell only 21% from its previous film. In its opening weekend, the film grossed $29 million from 3,740 theaters, finishing second at the box office behind Zootopia. It was the first film of the franchise not to finish in first at the box office, and its opening was 46% below Divergents and 44% behind Insurgents. Lionsgate president of domestic distribution Richard Fay labeled the opening "pretty solid". As a result of the poor opening, Lionsgate's stock fell the next day, on Monday. Due to Allegiant's poor box-office resulting in Lionsgate's stock declining 3.3% by 72 cents to $21.13 in trading, Moody's Investors Service lowered Lionsgate's Speculative Grade Liquidity rating from SGL-2 to SGL-3.

The Divergent Series: Allegiant also struggled internationally where Lionsgate does not have operations in most countries and sells distribution rights to partners. It opened in 45 international markets a week ahead of its US debut, from March 9, and will receive a scattered release worldwide. Unlike its predecessor Insurgent, Lionsgate decided not to have a day and date release for Allegiant, instead intending to take advantage of various school holidays in international markets, and at the same time avoid competition with Walt Disney's animated Zootopia. Allegiant took the top spot in its opening day in France, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Sweden. In its opening weekend, it earned $25.2 million from over 7,000 screens in 45 countries. It added 32 markets in its second weekend, earning a total of $22 million from 77 countries, which is down 13%. The top openings were in France ($5 million), Brazil ($2.7 million), the United Kingdom and Ireland ($2.6 million), Mexico ($2.5 million). In the United Kingdom, it posted the lowest opening in the series, opening at No. 2 behind Kung Fu Panda 3 including previews, which is 37% behind the opening of Insurgent. It had a very unsuccessful opening in South Korea with $523,000 from 392 screens. In China, it opened in third place behind The Angry Birds Movie and Captain America: Civil War with $10.8 million. As a result, it helped the film cross the $100 million mark internationally and immediately became the film's second biggest market behind Italy only. In terms of total earnings, its largest markets are China ($18.7 million), France ($15.1 million), followed by Brazil ($6.9 million), the U.K. ($6.5 million), Russia ($6 million) and Spain ($5.1 million).

Due to its underperformance, The Hollywood Reporter called it "the second big-budget miss for Lionsgate this year after Gods of Egypt". Many critics have blamed the underperformance of the film on Lionsgate's decision to split the last novel into two pictures. As a result, Lionsgate will cut the budget of the fourth and final film in the series, Ascendant. Due to the box office struggles of Allegiant, Lionsgate had planned to wrap up the film series with a television movie which it then hopes to continue as a television series spinoff. Made on a total budget of $183.6 million, including net production budget, advertising and promotion costs, and domestic home entertainment costs, Deadline Hollywood projected the film to make a mere profit of $3.5 million should it earn a net total of $187.1 million from various platforms (including theatrical revenues, TV rights and DVD sales). By comparison, Divergent made a net profit of $71.8 million and Insurgent $30.6 million. By contrast, The Hollywood Reporter estimated the film lost the studio around $50 million, when factoring together all expenses and revenues.

Critical response
The Divergent Series: Allegiant was met with mostly negative reviews by critics, who criticized the lack of originality and character advancement. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a rating of 12%, based on 172 reviews, with an average rating of 4.1/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Allegiant improves on previous entries in The Divergent Series on a few superficial levels, but they aren't enough to counteract a sense of growing boredom with a franchise that's gone on too long." Metacritic gives the film a score of 33 out of 100, based on 33 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale.

Cancelled fourth film
A theatrical sequel, based on the latter half of the Allegiant book, was originally meant to wrap up the series and was originally planned for a March 24, 2017, release, later a June 9, 2017, release, with Lee Toland Krieger directing after Robert Schwentke backed out.

Ascendant (TV series)
In July 2016, after Allegiant underperformed at the box office, it was announced that Lionsgate would instead release the final film as a TV movie and follow it with a television spinoff series, in which both projects would add new characters to the story, moving beyond the books.

In September 2016, Shailene Woodley stated on Today that the film versus television decision was not finalized, and that it was "a limbo waiting game". In the same interview Woodley spoke despairingly of the chances of her returning to the project in a television format, although noting that she would be open to returning to it as a theatrical film. In February 2017, when it was announced that the fourth film will be a television project, it was announced Woodley had backed out of her starring role.

In August 2017, Starz and Lionsgate Television announced that they were beginning to develop the TV series.