Does ‘Oblivion’ borrow too heavily from the 2009 film ‘Moon’?

Warning: This post contains spoilers for "Oblivion" and "Moon."

Like the old Hollywood saying goes: Who needs originality when your movie is topping the box office?

Of course, that’s not actually a saying, but it might as well be -- at least, in the case of Disney’s big budget sci-fi epic “Oblivion.” The Tom Cruise flick, which hauled in nearly $40 million domestically at theatres over the weekend (and nearly $110 million worldwide already). Even a casual fan of big screen science fiction will notice that the Joseph Kosinski (“Tron: Legacy”) film, while visually stunning in its own right, quite liberally borrows concepts and themes from other lesser known sci-fi movies.

See also: 'Oblivion' and other visions of a miserable future

Set decades after a devastating war with an alien race, “Oblivion” follows Commander Jack Harper (Cruise), a futuristic repairman charged with keeping a fleet of extraterrestrial-fighting robotic drones in working order.

Viewers will probably recognize the influence that movies like “Independence Day,” “2001: A Space Odyssey,” “The Matrix,” and “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” had on “Oblivion” – either through the many deliberate nods the film makes to those sci-fi classics or by way of elements from those films that clearly left an impression on the producers of “Oblivion.” But there is one movie, a film likely not all that familiar to the majority of moviegoers, that evidently struck a chord with Kosinski and company: director Duncan Jones’s 2009 debut feature “Moon.”

Sure, glossy concepts like clones and cloning are pretty standard sci-fi tropes. But the similarities between “Oblivion” and "Moon" in this respect are a little too glaring to ignore.

Central to the plot of “Oblivion” is the fact that Jack Harper is one of many clones carrying out the seemingly mundane task of repairing the drones that are keeping the now earthbound aliens in check. As it turns out, the clones are actually under the control of the alien invaders, and the menace being kept in check is in fact the surviving human population of Earth. Harper is only made aware of all this after crash landing in an off-limits area and coming face-to-face with another Jack Harper.

Similarly, “Moon” follows Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell), a lunar astronaut given the innocuous task of mining Helium-3 ore from the surface of the moon and delivering it back to Earth. Like “Oblivion's” Harper, Bell is unknowingly one of many clones working in indentured servitude for unseen masters – a fact that becomes apparent to him only after he encounters another Sam Bell outside of his assigned sector. Both characters (and their innumerable clones) are also imbued with false memories to make their own lives seem more real – an element that both “Moon” and “Oblivion” plucked from the sci-fi classic “Blade Runner.”

As previously stated, neither movie can really claim to have invented this intriguing sci-fi angle involving unwitting clones. But it's a little coincidental that a $120 million major studio picture should have so much in common with the more indie "Moon," a $5 million cult film that also happens to be one of the most talked-about sci-fi flicks of the past decade. Science fiction writers and screenwriters are always borrowing interesting concepts and ideas to fill out their fantastical worlds, and while no one is actually accusing Disney of plagiarism in the case of "Oblivion," it will likely be difficult for some to get past this particular instance of "borrowing."