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Summary
- The Borderlands movie (2024) differs greatly from the game, focusing on comedic elements and a star-studded ensemble cast.
- Main characters like Lilith and Roland are portrayed differently in the film, with changes in age, personality, and background.
- The addition of original characters like Atlas and changes to fan-favorites like Tiny Tina showcase deviations from the game’s storyline.
The new Borderlands movie arrived in theaters in 2024, but Eli Roth’s Borderlands cast vs. game differs greatly in their portrayals. The Gearbox video game series of the same name blends first-person shooting with role-playing elements in a space-western environment. There were three main games and several spinoffs focusing on different parts of this universe. For example, in the games, Lilith is a vault hunter, but things change in the movie as she is sent to find someone’s missing daughter.
As a movie, Borderlands is a sci-fi-action comedy with an all-star cast that attempts to deliver as many laughs as it does explosive battle scenes. Lilith (Cate Blanchett) ends up teaming with a group of misfits, including a weapons expert Roland (Kevin Hart), demolitions expert Tony Tina (Ariana Greenblatt), bandit Krieg (Florian Munteanu), and robot Claptrap (Jack Black). Add in more actors like Jamie Lee Curtis, Edgar Ramirez, and Gina Gershon, and it is clear this isn’t exactly what video game fans expected.
Cate Blanchett As Lilith
First Appearance In Borderlands (2009) As Playable Character
Cate Blanchett was the first actor announced for the Borderlands movie, and she plays the lead character from the game, Lilith. She was one of the original Vault Hunters the player could choose in the first Borderlands game, representing the powerful Siren class, and is an important NPC in the sequels and pre-sequel. In the movie, she is also the group leader and is easily the main lead in the ensemble cast.
Blanchett is 54, and Lilith in the game is 22.
Blanchett is a good choice for the role as she comes with a rich pedigree, including two Oscars in eight nominations (The Aviator, Blue Jasmine). However, there are some major differences here. While both Blanchett and Lilith in the game have dyed red hair, Blanchett is much older than the video game character. Blanchett is 54, and Lilith in the game is 22. The other main difference is that Lilith is not a Siren until the end of the movie, where she has always been one in the game.
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Kevin Hart As Roland
First Appearance In Borderlands (2009) As Playable Character
Roland is another of the Vault Hunters playable in the first game, and he represents the Soldier class. While Borderlands is known for having a dark and over-the-top sense of humor throughout the games, it still has dramatic weight to its story and certain characters are more straight-laced than others. Roland is a good example of this, as he often takes on a more serious role as a soldier people look up to and even as a romantic interest for Lilith.
Kevin Hart has stepped into dramatic roles occasionally but does not do so for his portrayal of Roland.
Kevin Hart has stepped into dramatic roles occasionally but does not do so for his portrayal of Roland in Borderlands. Instead of being the stoic soldier that he is in the video games, he is comic relief with small hints of an action hero thrown in. He is also very different from Roland, who is an imposing figure in the games, but the movie does little to hide the fact that Kevin Hart is barely taller than Ariana Greenblatt’s Tiny Tina. This is more distracting for game fans than Blanchett’s age difference.
Jamie Lee Curtis As Dr. Patricia Tannis
First Appearance In Borderlands (2009) As NPC
Patricia Tannis is an archeologist and scientist who has a tenuous grasp on her sanity after her experiences on Pandora researching the Vault. She’s crucial to the plot of the first game and also appears in the series sequels. However, she is not a playable character and is an NPC that players just interact with along the way on their missions. With that in mind, Eli Roth still chose a superstar to play the role, with Jamie Lee Curtis.
The casting of Blanchett and Curtis made it seem impossible to make this a franchise.
Curtis is a great actor and is a good fit for almost any role she takes on. However, in Borderlands, she was seen by many as an awkward casting choice similar to Kevin Hart as a serious soldier. Much like the other characters in the film, Roth chose to take a character from the game and make her completely different. Like Lilith, Tannis is also young, much younger than Curtis. The casting choices opted for strong actors rather than accurate game depictions.

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Jack Black As Claptrap
First Appearance In Borderlands (2009) As NPC
Jack Black seems like a natural choice to play the series mascot, Claptrap. Claptrap is a brash and overenthusiastic robot NPC who appears throughout the games, and Black is an actor who can bring enough energy and comedic chops to the role to keep him entertaining, as in the wrong hands, he could be potentially annoying.
Claptrap was one of the better video game-to-movie portrayals as he shares many of the game’s signature parts. This includes the trapezoid shape of the body and the mechanical arms with the claw tools attached. The yellow color scheme is the same, and the single blue, glowing eye in the circular lens is straight from the games. The only real difference is Jack Black’s voice, and that really doesn’t hurt. He gets most of the best lines, including some that should have gone to Tiny Tina based on the games.

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Ariana Greenblatt As Tiny Tina
First Appearance In Borderlands (2009) As NPC
Tiny Tina is a fan-favorite Borderlands character. She is a small teenager who is whimsical yet feral. She is the demolitions expert and is deadly as they come, yet she maintains the immaturity of a child. The movie needed to find a young actress who could play innocent yet often angry or even vulgar at times. They seemingly found this in Ariana Gleenblatt, who was 16 when the movie came out.
Greenblatt has been acting since she was a child, getting her start in the Disney Channel’s Stuck in the Middle when she was just nine. It seems almost shocking to see her playing this more adult role just a few years later, but it worked well for the character from the game. Tiny Tina’s entire origin was changed. While she looks like the character from the games, in the film, she is actually genetically engineered, which changes her origin, even if her personality and appearance remain similar.
Edgar Ramirez As Atlas
Atlas Is Not In The Games
Atlas is a character who is not in the various Borderlands video games. He was created as an original character for the movies to move the plot and change the entire mission that Lilith is known for in the games. In the movie, Édgar Ramírez plays Deukalian Atlas, and he is the villain. He hires Lilith to find his daughter who is missing, but that isn’t what he really wanted. He had genetically engineered Tiny Tina and sent Lilith to find her to open the Vault.
Tina is the only person who can open it, giving Atlas the dangerous weaponry that he believes it contains. With that said, there is a connection to the video games. In the games, Atlas is one of the many companies that produce weapons and shields. It is a company and not a person or a villain. However, the company is a threat throughout the games, and no one is ever shown to be in charge of it. It is possible that Atlas in the movie is the never-seen CEO of Atlas in the games.
Gina Gershon As Mad Moxxi
First Appearance In Borderlands (2009) As DLC
Mad Moxxi is a DLC character from Borderlands, a sadistic, alluring, dangerous, and violent fighter. She is also promiscuous and has had many lovers throughout her time in the game’s fictional world. Despite that, she isn’t very old and is likely in her 40s, which is older than the other characters in the game but younger than at least Lilith and Tannis in the movie. This is a recurring theme, though, as Gina Gershon plays Mad Moxxi, and Gershon is 62.
It seems like Roth went out of his way to cast some older actresses to play the roles of otherwise younger action heroes from the video games, which should be commended. However, while it is nice to see these ladies still getting major roles, it still makes them very different from the video game in both age, looks, and origin stories. Gershon has a long list of credits to her name, including Cocktail, Pretty in Pink, Red Heat, Showgirls, and many more.
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