The Ready Player One movie’s marketing campaign has hit the “character posters” stage, and the internet is ready to tear this movie apart. Which I don’t understand, at all. First of all, this is marketing. We all know marketing campaigns don’t always reflect the finished film, and on a pure foundational level the marketing campaign is not the movie. So love or hate the posters, viral websites, etc., but those actually have very little to do with the film at hand—which, I remind you, is a new movie from one of the greatest directors who’s ever lived. Secondly, stop taking Steven Spielberg for granted. Even Minor Spielberg is better than 90% of what else is out there, and I’ll never understand people who choose to skip a chance to see a new Steven Spielberg movie in the theater—especially a massive, VFX-intensive blockbuster like this one.

So with that out of the way, these Ready Player One character posters are actually quite revealing. They run down the main ensemble of the film and those characters’ avatars from the OASIS. For those unfamiliar, the story of Ready Player One (based on the novel of the same name by Ernie Cline) follows Wade Watts (Tye Sheridan), an unlikely hero in the virtual world of the OASIS where he and anyone else can be whomever they want, but must protect their online lives from the evil Innovative Online Industries (IOI) company that wants to control the OASIS and monetize it.

In the posters below we see of course Wade and Olivia Cooke’s Artemis, but also The Chi creator and Master of None writer/star Lena Waithe as Aech, Philip Zhao as Sho, Win Morisaki as Daito, Mark Rylance as the avatar of OASIS creator James Hallida, Anorak, and Ben Mendelsohn’s villainous Sorrento. I especially like how Sorrento’s avatar is modeled after every 1980s Wall Street supervillain, and I’m insanely curious to see the visual effects that bring all these avatars to the screen. Spielberg is back in Tintin territory here, using performance-capture technology to bring the OASIS to life, and call me crazy but that’s a neat thing.

So check out the Ready Player One posters below and keep in mind that we’re getting a brand new Steven Spielberg blockbuster in theaters in less than a month. That’s something to be excited about, so nitpicking for a bit. Ready Player One hits theaters on March 29th.

Here's the official synopsis for Ready Player One:

From filmmaker Steven Spielberg comes the science fiction action adventure “Ready Player One,” based on Ernest Cline’s bestseller of the same name, which has become a worldwide phenomenon.

 

The film is set in 2045, with the world on the brink of chaos and collapse. But the people have found salvation in the OASIS, an expansive virtual reality universe created by the brilliant and eccentric James Halliday (Mark Rylance). When Halliday dies, he leaves his immense fortune to the first person to find a digital Easter egg he has hidden somewhere in the OASIS, sparking a contest that grips the entire world. When an unlikely young hero named Wade Watts (Tye Sheridan) decides to join the contest, he is hurled into a breakneck, reality-bending treasure hunt through a fantastical universe of mystery, discovery and danger. Spielberg directed the film from a screenplay by Zak Penn and Ernest Cline.

 

The film was produced by Donald De Line, Spielberg, Kristie Macosko Krieger and Dan Farah; with Adam Somner, Daniel Lupi, Chris deFaria and Bruce Berman serving as executive producers.