“Alita: Battle Angel” is an adaptation of a manga series titled Gunnm  so you know it is going to be weird, dark and strange.  Alita is a cyborg whose head and partial torso are found in a garbage dump by Dr. Dyson Ido (Christoph Waltz) who puts these discarded machines back together.  He also moonlights as  a bounty hunter who turns in the bad guys for a reward.  Waltz is surprisingly subdued in the Ido role, and appears to be sleepwalkiing through a pretty under developed character.  Other supporting players are Marshala Ali and Jennifer Connolly, whose roles are also poorly developed and add little of interest to the narrative other than conventional and trite ‘bad guy’ activities.  Edward Norton makes the briefest apperance, not  even getting a minute of screen time. He’s unidentifiable anyway. The special effects are pretty incredible though.  Iron City and the world of a futuristic motor ball competition are well developed; and Aita is definitely a great fighter, using a combination of martial arts, speed, strength and an almost impenvious cyborg body.  Despite the action, I found many parts of the story slow and even down right boring.  Characters are not developed, one dimensional even.  There is so much that people like me who haven’t read the original source will not understand and may even find confusing.  There were also many opportunities to inject a little humor or fun into the proceedings, but  no such luck.  I guess if you are looking for a movie with great CGI and special effects, some good fight scenes but not much of a plot and wooden acting – this is the movie for you.