New Minecraft Trailer Line Leaves Us With One Question

After the teaser for "A Minecraft Movie" was met with some nasty pushback from fans, the introduction for the first full trailer has us wondering — is this new preview designed to give expectations for the video game adaptation a full teardown and rebuild? 

The very first thing viewers see in the new trailer is a set of hands shutting a clapboard as someone off-camera says, "'Minecraft' trailer, take two." Sure, this may be a simple reference to this being the second go at giving fans a look at the big-screen adaptation of the video game phenomenon, but when you do a second take, it usually means there was something you didn't quite nail the first time around.

And, let's be totally clear: the first trailer for the film, which is helmed by "Napoleon Dynamite" director Jared Hess and stars Jason Momoa, Jack Black, Jennifer Coolidge, Matt Berry, and Steve Carell, did anything but "nail it." As a result, fans, quite frankly, savaged the first look at the film when it was released back in September, making us worry about whether Minecraft's initial foray into movie theaters would be a flop.

Lots of fans contended that the first "A Minecraft Movie" trailer was not giving the people who work their pickaxes to the bone playing the game what they wanted. One user on X (formerly Twitter), @SebsterSpeaks, compared the teaser to the Adam Sandler video-game-themed comedy "Pixels," which was definitely not meant as a compliment. User @Nevermore_414 then replied with the knockout punch, declaring, "['Pixels' is] looking like a masterpiece compared to this."

Another X user, @Krinois, put it all out there, stating, "Anyone could've guessed this but this is very clearly a movie worked on by people whose kids play 'Minecraft' and not by anybody who actually plays 'Minecraft.'"

Some even referred to the movie the first trailer presented as an abomination, evoking lots of unfavorable comparisons to the recent "Jumanji" films, which, ironically, also star Jack Black. Clearly, the second trailer had a lot of work to do to get fans back on board with "A Minecraft Movie."

The attempt to make the full trailer more appealing to "Minecraft" fans than the original teaser does seem to have been effective, at least for some vocal commenters. For example, in the top YouTube comment, user SB737 states, "This one is definitely a better trailer than the first!" Another commenter, DvirMC, clocked the "second take" of it all, writing, "I like how they said 'take two', as if the first trailer was a bad one and they needed to make another take of it."

Quite a few other commenters said they were happy about the decision to use the original "Minecraft" theme (composed by C418) as a way to prove the adaptation's bona fides to longtime fans. YouTube user AndrasBandi-cz9nw wrote, "The second trailer is a huge improvement over the teaser! Added real Minecraft music!!! I love it." That said, at least one person noted that it seemed weird that the music was remixed in a stereotypical thumping movie trailer style.

One key line in the new "A Minecraft Movie" trailer seems to have struck a chord with fans. Pretty much right after the "take two" at the very beginning, Jack Black's character Steve says, "As a child, I yearned for the mines." That's not something children in our world typically do. Or, at least, that's not what someone who isn't plugged into the "Minecraft" fandom would think.

However, fans quickly clocked that the line is an overt reference to a 2022 tweet by X user @Froggenthusias1, who joked, "Minecraft proves that abolishing child labour was a mistake. The children yearn for the mines." This tweet has become a meme shared among "Minecraft" fans and even became a point of reference when state legislatures began passing laws allowing younger children to work in some parts of the United States. Following the new trailer's debut, X user @Tomularity replied to the original tweet a full two years later to let the poster know, "This tweet has now led to a plot point in the new Minecraft movie."

Some YouTube commenters clearly got the reference; others didn't quite see what it was getting at. Either way, it definitely seems like the second attempt to rope fans in to see "A Minecraft Movie" worked better than the first. Let's just hope the final product is just as successful, lest this become another movie Jack Black ends up regretting shooting. The film opens on April 4, 2025.