Although Gearbox Software has already shown Borderlands 4 twice, it still hasn't revealed much about its plot or characters. The company has confirmed that the upcoming game will take place on an entirely new planet separate from the previous entries in the Borderlands series, and that it will feature a major antagonist called the Timekeeper, but other than that it's remained pretty tight-lipped on the matter. Borderlands 4 is slated for release sometime in the next 12 months, so it's somewhat surprising that Gearbox is still keeping so much about the game under wraps.
One aspect of its upcoming looter shooter that Gearbox hasn't been too reluctant to share information about, however, is its sense of humor. Borderlands 4 Narrative director Sam Winkler has played on the disc several times, explaining the role comedy will play in the highly anticipated game. Winkler told PC Gamer back in August 2024 that there was humor Borderlands 4 would be more situational and that comedic events would appear naturally during the course of the game. He also noted in a Twitter post in mid-December that BL4 would have much less toilet humor compared to Borderlands 3which was heavily criticized by many for its poor writing. While these sound like promising changes to the show's comic formula, what would undoubtedly be done BL4 even better if it contains scenes that satirize the latest Borderlands Film.

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6 villains who should return in Borderlands 4
These characters from previous Borderlands games should reappear in the upcoming installment.
Borderlands 4 should satirize the critically panned Borderlands movie
Despite having a star-studded cast, the Borderlands movie failed to take off
Way back in 2015, the film production company Lionsgate announced that they were making an adaptation of the film Borderlands franchise. However, this film didn't materialize until early 2023, and it wasn't released in theaters worldwide until last August. The movie, simply with the title Borderlandswas directed by Eli Roth, by Hostel and Cabin Fever fame, and was co-produced by Avi Arad, best known for his work on Marvel films such as Leaf and Iron Man. It also starred a handful of notable actors, including Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, Jamie Lee Curtis and even Jack Black. Despite a star-studded cast, the film was far from high quality.
Video game adaptations have historically failed to live up to fan expectations over the years, but Lionsgate's Borderlands was particularly disappointing. The film received generally poor reviews from both film critics and audiences. On Rotten Tomatoes it received a dismal 10% rating, while on IMDb it received a user score of 4.6/10. Borderlands was criticized for its unfaithful interpretation of Pandora, underdeveloped characters, bad humor, and PG-13 rating, among many other things. Despite being in the works for nearly a decade, the film ended up being arguably one of the worst video game adaptations of all time.
Pandora is the name of the planet like most Borderlands games take place on.
The Borderlands movie would be a good source of comedy for Borderlands 4
With how poorly received Borderlands movie was, it would make sense to Borderlands 4 to take a few jabs at it, just for the sake of satire. The Lionsgate film is frankly a gold mine of potential parody content that Gearbox could tap into. The film's annoying repetition of Claptrap and the apparent lack of violence can be easily mocked in-game during a side quest or two, along with the film's unusual use of older actors to play the roles of younger characters.
There are, of course, a handful of problems with such an approach. Gearbox and its owner, Take-Two Interactive, may not want to openly mock what is actually their own official product and directly criticize the film in Borderlands 4 could risk angering both Lionsgate and some of the film's few defenders, such as Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford. At the same time, however, is Borderlands the movie is so unanimously disliked that it feels like it wouldn't hurt too much if Gearbox and Take-Two made fans laugh at themselves a little. Meta humor like this would really fit perfectly Borderlands 4.

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Looter Shooter
Action
Adventure
RPG
- Franchise
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Borderlands
- Released
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2025-00-00