On April 4, 2025, “A Minecraft Movie” opened in theaters. The social media sensation grossed a record-breaking $300 million dollars worldwide opening weekend, shattering the box office expectations. The movie now holds the current record for highest-grossing film of 2025 and the reason for that is obvious—”A Minecraft Movie” is peak cinema.
The film stars Jason Momoa as Garrett Garrison, Jack Black as Steve, Emma Myers as Natalie, Jennifer Coolidge as Vice Principal Marlene, Danielle Brooks as Dawn Runcie and Sebastion Harrison as Henry. On top of that, there are a handful of characters that are CGI but still necessary to the cast, making for a well-saturated group of characters.
The film starts off with a young Steve eagerly approaching a mine entrance, as he yearned for the mines from his beginnings. An angry miner gestures towards a sign saying, “No Kids Allowed,” leaving Steve disheartened and leaving his mining dreams behind. Fast forward years later, Steve is now an adult struggling as a doorknob salesman, with his previous dreams crushed, he feels unfulfilled with his life and that yearning still lurks within him. To bring back his childlike wonder dreams, he returns to the now-abandoned mines and goes mining. He ends up finding the Orb of Dominance and the Earth Crystal. Upon putting the orb inside the crystal box, he opens a portal deep within the mine, transporting him into the Overworld of Minecraft. Here, he begins to build and craft, exploring the creativity he had longed for.
While exploring this blocky world, using flint and steel, he opens a portal to the Nether, a hellish dimension overrun by Piglins devoid of joy. In the Nether, Steve is captured by Malgosha, the gold-obsessed Piglin ruler who despises creativity. Malgosha seeks the Orb of Dominance and knowing the mayhem she will cause with the orb, Steve sends his dog Dennis to hide the Orb of Dominance and the Earth Crystal in the real world under his bed.
Following the previous events, the film is now years in the future, introducing Henry and his sister, Natalie, as they are moving to the small town: Chuglass, Idaho. Their realtor, Dawn Runcie, gives them the keys to their new home, Steve’s former home. On Henry’s way to his new school, he stops at Garrett’s store, where the two briefly meet. Henry then goes to school and gets suspended by Vice Principal Marlene for his jetpack invention ruining the Chuglass Potato Chip Factory’s statue. He calls Garrett to pretend to be his dad while picking him up. Vice Principal Marlene knows of Garrett’s legacy of the 80’s, so she lets Henry go. This leads to the two going back to Garrett‘s shop, where Henry puts the Orb of Dominance and Earth Crystal together, which begins pulling him towards the portal in the mines. To Natalie, Henry is missing so she gets help from Dawn to help find him. All together, they end up at the mines with the four of them getting sucked into the portal to the Overworld.
While in the Overworld, it quickly becomes night spawning monsters everywhere, leading to the four having to fend for their lives. Henry figures out how to build in this strange world, leading to him tossing together a house for them to take refuge in, only for a hole to be exploded by a creeper. With zombies now pouring in and stumbling up the stairs to the roof where the four hide, they seemingly have no way out of death. When all seems hopeless, Steve appears and takes down the zombies with an epic battle until daylight.
Steve introduces himself with one of his iconic catchphrases, “I, am Steve.” He then proceeds to take the four to the village and introduce them to the Villagers and the Iron Golem. Afterwards, Steve shows them what happens when you combine hot lava with chicken, leading to an all-out ditty. This is when Malgosha notices that the Orb of Dominance is back in the Overworld, so she sends a horde of Piglins, led by General Chungus. Garrett tries to be a hero and fights Chungus, ending with him getting absolutely pummeled. Garrett, Henry and Steve, now run to a structure on the cliff side, where Steve proceeds to put Elytras on the two. Realizing that he forgot his own, Steve dived down onto Garrett’s back and rode him like a bull.
With the three now flying between valleys being chased by Ghasts and Piglins, Garrett and Steve see an escape hole in the cliffside ahead of them, but they are too big to fit, leading to them having to make a very sensual “man sandwich” while flying. The three then come back together and have to do what’s referred to as an “MLG bucket clutch” to save their lives.
During this, Natalie and Dawn discover Dennis, Steve’s long lost dog. Dennis begins to lead the two to where Garrett, Henry and Steve are. Meanwhile, those three take a supposed-shortcut through the Redstone mine, where Steve uncovers his stash of diamonds as a bribe to get the Orb of Dominance back from Garrett, who had picked it up during the first night’s battle. Malgosha had built the strongest and most dangerous Piglin, The Great Hog. He had hunted down the three to the mines, so they had to escape using minecarts. During their minecart ride, they ran into a huge cave full of hundreds of Creepers and the powered rails had gone out, leading to Garrett having to push the minecart back to rails with power, all while still being chased by The Great Hog. As the three narrowly escaped, the hog was blown up by all of the Creepers.
Garrett, Henry and Steve finally arrived at the Woodland Mansion, where the three developed a plan. Garrett and Steve wore mushroom hats and played saxophone to distract the Illagers, evil Villagers that own the mansion. This allowed Henry enough time to sneak by and raid the mansion’s chest room, where he would then find the rare Earth Crystal. As Henry was about to leave, an Enderman teleported in, a tall mythical creature that gets deathly angry if you look him in the eyes. As Henry struggled to not look him in the eyes, he narrowly slipped out of the trance the Enderman’s eyes had put him in and killed the Enderman with one blow, leading to it dropping an Ender Pearl, a orb that can teleport the user anywhere they throw it. Meanwhile, Garrett and Steve were taken hostage by the Illagers and Garrett was made to fight none other than the Chicken Jockey!
As the three attempted to flee the mansion, they were ambushed by Malgosha and her advancing forces. Before they could react, Malgosha ripped the Orb of Dominance from Henry’s pack, reclaiming its corrupting power. Chaos broke loose as the Piglins began their attack. Amid the chaos, Henry and Steve jumped aboard a nearby ghast and cut the ropes loose, just as Garrett turned back to hold the Piglins off. In a final act of bravery, Garrett held them at bay near a stockpile of TNT until it exploded, destroying the bridge and supposedly killing Garrett. The ghast was flung into the wind, crashing miles away with Henry and Steve barely surviving the landing.
The two were eventually found unconscious by Dawn, Natalie and Dennis, who had been searching tirelessly. The reunion was bittersweet, as the group now believed Garrett to be dead. Mourning their friend’s sacrifice, they knew time was short. Malgosha had already begun casting darkness across the Overworld, using the Orb The group, determined to restore balance, prepared for one final stand.
With Iron Golems marching beside them, the five launched an assault on Malgosha and her army. Henry began climbing the twisted spire, aiming to retrieve the Orb of Dominance. But before he could reach it, Malgosha blasted the tower’s side with a burst of corrupted magic, sending Henry plummeting toward the ground. Just before impact, a familiar ghast swept in. Garrett had returned in dramatic fashion, catching Henry mid-fall as the two soared back up the tower. With their strength combined, they battled their way to the top and took the Orb, shattering the Orb’s grip on the realm. As the Piglins begin to zombify, Malgosha, desperate to escape defeat, attempts three poorly-executed sneak attacks on Steve, but they are foiled. With no tricks left, Malgosha collapsed and vanished into dust.
The portal to the real world reopened soon after. Though the group prepared to return, Steve lingered, uncertain if Earth had anything left for him. Natalie reminded him that while the world may not offer him much, he might have something to offer the world. With that, Steve followed, stepping through the portal once more.
In the final moments of the film, Steve narrates the aftermath. With Steve’s help, Garrett rebuilt his store, transforming it into a local hit complete with an arcade cabinet of their own game. Dawn opened a petting zoo, populated with Overworld creatures, including Dennis. Natalie launched a self-defense class for kids and Henry, at long last, perfected his jetpack at school, becoming a school legend. The heroes celebrated together at Garrett’s shop, bringing their story to a well-earned and heartfelt close.
“A Minecraft Movie” is the pinnacle of cinematic perfection, from the animation down to the elegant way that Steve yells his iconic line, “Chicken Jockey!” The film has already proven to be the best performing movie of 2025, with an outstanding humor that captivated audiences, it’s clear that this is the best film of all time.
