Michael (2026)

Michael is one of those films that had the potential to be a total train wreck and the negative reviews that came out in the days after it was released made it seem like this was doomed to be one of the worst films of 2026.  This film tells the story over 20 years from Michael’s early days in Gary Indiana to performing at Wembley Stadium in 1988. Michael and the rest of his brothers form the Jackson 5 led by their domineering father Joe and as the years pass, Michael tries to form his own path much to his father’s annoyance.  

The film has involvement from the Jackson family including Jermaine, Tito, LaToya and Prince and they clearly didn’t like their father because he does not come out of it very well. It was fairly common knowledge that Joe wasn't particularly nice to his kids. I thought that Colman Domingo was very good as Joe. He almost stole the show because even though what Joe does is terrible and when Michael has his accident, Joe’s first response isnt asking about how long his son will take to recover but when he will be back on stage. Jaafar Jackson is very good as Michael. Usually you either look like the person you are supposed to be or have the mannerism but rarely both but Jaafar Jackson manages to pull off both. He comes across as a likeable if slightly immature talented musician. The dance and singing scenes were really well done and the attention to detail is something that should be applauded.

The general response seemed to have been negative because the film doesnt cover the controvesies that plagued his life in the 90’s and 2000’s. I think that in the years to come with the sequel that will be made that this film will be seen for what it is, a fun if somewhat flawed film. I think that Rocketman is the gold standard of music biopics and Bohemian Rhapsody is the low bar to clear and Michael is more in the Rocketman territory. The back story to the film is that it was supposed to be a three hour film which featured the allegations in the final third of the film but when it became knowledge that they couldn’t use character featured in the story meant that restricting was needed and whilst they could have padded things out to give the film a longer runtime it might be in the long run a brilliant idea to keep the two sides of his story separate. Antoine Fuqua has done a good job in making this a film that was fun and told a story that felt close enough to be being true and yet clearly cherry picking what aspects of his story they wanted to tell and for the most part got it right.