Not terrible, but exactly what it looks like: a pretty 'meh' and uninspired 'Hunger Games' wannabe...

Rating: 4/10 (7 December 2014)

This movie isn't shocking or terrifyingly bad. The premise is kind of interesting and the young cast does a pretty good job of selling the whole thing. The problem with this movie is that we'll never know how good it might have been because it exists purely as a desperate attempt to play catch up with the wildly successful 'Hunger Games' franchise and therefore lacks even the hint of any genuine creative spark, vision, or passion behind it.
By playing follow-the-leader and clinging so desperately to the whole 'Hunger Games' template/play book, 'The Maze Runner' is dead on arrival and never even seems to be trying to carve out an identity or vision of its' own. After the first few minutes, your eyes just kind of glaze over as you realize with dread that you're getting a pale imitation of a movie that wasn't very good to begin with. (NOTE: I haven't read either 'The Hunger Games' or 'Maze Runner' books, so I can't comment on either as adaptations, just going by the films here).
And please keep in mind, 'The Hunger Games' is pretty much a rip-off of the much better Japanese cult gem, 'Battle Royale,' but at least Hunger Games took that idea and did its own thing with it, giving the property a distinctive feel and vibe by successfully aiming it at the young adult 'Twilight' crowd. Even though I'm not a fan of the movies, I can appreciate that and give 'Hunger Games' at least some credit for pulling it off.
'The Maze Runner' isn't even ambitious or interesting enough to try to do that in any way, shape, or form. It's just very obviously going through the motions and I really believe that a viewer would find the movie totally bland and uninspired because of this, even if they had never seen or heard of 'The Hunger Games.' They just wouldn't know why.
The studio executives and creative teams behind movies like "The Maze Runner," "Divergent," and God-only-knows whatever other 'Hunger Games' facsimiles are coming down the pipe line really need to read up on their Ralph Waldo Emerson, because he said it best: "Imitation is suicide."