The biggest cinematic battle of the year ignites tomorrow, with Barbie and Oppenheimer set to run headlong into a conflict that’s already been dominating the cultural conversation for months on end.
At the minute, Christopher Nolan’s sprawling biographical thriller is ahead in the race for critical acclaim, but Greta Gerwig’s toyetic tale of self-discovery is poised to handily win at the box office with an opening weekend projected to be at least twice as high, if not more.
Barbenheimer excitement has reached fever pitch, then, and while Nolan’s collaborators have done nothing but praise the meticulous filmmaker for his attention to detail and masterful execution of a complex story, none of them will be able to describe Oppenheimer in the way Barbie’s Issa Rae summed up stepping foot onto the set in an interview with Digital Spy.
“It was a dream. It was a pink wet dream. It was beautiful. The childhood version of me just immediately got excited and it put me in the mood to be a doll. You’re in a living dollhouse neighborhood. It was everything I dreamed of.”
We’d go out on a limb and wager that Oppenheimer won’t find itself in the same sentence as “wet dream” anytime soon, unless of course you’re one of the people who hopped on the “Oppenhorny” bandwagon, but we’re not here to judge.
Suffice to say, there’s going to be even more twists and turns to come as the hype reaches its crescendo, regardless of whether you prefer the darker hues of Oppenheimer or the candy-colored Barbie.