Legion / So far this winter, we’ve seen the world end by Mayan prophecy, a man and his son struggle to keep the fire burning amidst cannibals in a post-apocalyptic dust-scape and Denzel Washington protect the Bible from Gary Oldman after a nuclear war. Thus, it’s fitting and not entirely surprising that we end the cinematic cycle with, what ghostbuster Raymond Stantz referred to as, “real wrath of God type stuff.”

As Legion opens, Michael, an angel played by Paul Bettany (A Beautiful Mind, Master and Commander), drops from the sky and cuts off his wings. He steals a Schwarzenegger-sized load of pistols and machine guns, and heads out to a diner at the edge of the Mojave Desert to protect a pregnant girl named Charlie and her unborn son. The establishment is subtly named Paradise Falls.

The film posits that God has decided to exterminate mankind. After witnessing the white shirts at the Hawaii State Capitol, Tiger Woods’ shenanigans, the rebooting of the Spider-Man franchise and NBC’s treatment of Conan O’Brien, one can’t really blame Him. Still, Michael is the only angel who still has faith in us and he fell from heaven to protect our only hope for survival, Charlie’s son. We never learn what is so special about this particular child, and later we realize Michael didn’t have to cut off his wings to fall from heaven.

Because this is a low-budget flick, instead of seven angels, we only get two. In their place are a ragtag band of celebrities trapped in the diner with Charlie. Lucas Black (Friday Night Lights) is the nightmare-plagued boy who feels he must protect Charlie. Dennis Quaid is his father and owner of the diner with Charles Dutton as his short-order cook. Kate Walsh (Private Practice), Jon Tenney (The Closer), and Willa Holland (The O.C.) play a stranded family from the city. And Tyrese Gibson is a tough guy just passing through, only there to say street-smart lines like, “You expect me to explain the behavior of motherf*cking pestilence?” This is way too huge a cast for a movie of this genre and length (100 minutes) and each gets his own time-swallowing, woe-is-me monologue to take the place of nifty Armageddon FX. Quaid looks particularly embarrassed shedding tears for his script section; he looks like he’s crying for the days of The Big Easy.

Too bad, because some of the eye candy is actually fun, all backed by a chorus chanting what sounds like “Hey!” at the top of their lungs. Earning a hoot is a granny with a walker who turns into a foul-mouthed, ceiling walking, shark-teethed demon; to our delight, she is bashed with a frying pan and shot-gunned. A large, dust cloud on the horizon turns out to be a swarm of flies. And the final confrontation between Michael and Gabriel is a kick-ass smackdown with whooshing wings, furious flapping and a nifty, spiked mace with a retractable spear tip and whirling blades–a future collector’s edition prop on the Internet.

If only the rest of the movie was as keen. Bettany tries to make it work but there’s really little opportunity for him here. He obviously buffed up for the role but all his gym-time is bundled under a trenchcoat, which is symbolic of the entire movie: it’s swaddled beneath layers of unnecessary bulk. Towards the end, one of the characters wonder why God chose to exterminate them. “Maybe He got tired of all the bullsh*t.” After seeing Legion, we’re tired of it too.