Joey King Learns Some Dangerous Beauty Secrets In The Trailer For Sci-Fi Drama Uglies

Move over Millie Bobby Brown, Netflix has a new favourite star! Okay, no, we're not tempting the wrath of someone who can melt our brains from the inside out, merely making the point that Joey King is now in another movie for the streaming service, following quickly on from A Family Affair. But for Uglies, she's going down more of a sci-fi route, learning some tough truths about beauty in a futuristic world where it's attainable… but with a price. Check out the first trailer for the film.

In Uglies, which adapts Scott Westerfeld, King plays Tally, a young woman eagerly counting down the days until she can undergo a cosmetic procedure that all city-dwellers in her world experience at the age of 16, transforming their faces and bodies into flawless model-like physiques.

This is the great promise of her society, pushed by Dr. Cable (Laverne Cox) and it's all Tally’s known her whole life… until a new friend of hers called Shay (Brianne Tju) runs away and exposes her to a different way of living. Torn between the world Shay has shown her and her now beautified best friend Peris (Chase Stokes), who waits for her in the city after his surgery, Tally must choose between all she has ever known and a form of society that will challenge everything she believes.

There are definite traces of previous YA adaptations (and wannabe franchises) such as Divergent here, though Uglies will surely look to succeed in an arena where few have ever quite matched up to the results of, say, The Hunger Games. The presence of three writers (Vanessa Taylor, Whit Anderson and Krista Vernoff) sets some alarm bells ringing, as does McG in the director's chair.

Still, we'll see if this one ends up sitting pretty on Netflix's streaming charts when it arrives on 13 September.