I would consider adding another star to the score if it was called “The Maize Runner,” and the movie was about a gargantuan corn maize.

Unfortunately, that’s not the movie we got. However, it turns out “The Maze Runner” (based on the 2007 novel of the same name) is a totally decent addition to the “Teens Taking on Dystopian Worlds” genre with a slightly more unique premise than its peers.

Our generic white male chosen one this time around is Thomas (Dylan O’Brien), who wakes up without any memories in the Glade, a mostly tranquil, walled-in oasis surrounded on all sides by a colossal maze that closes up and shifts around every night.

The Glade is populated by a couple dozen young men, most of whom have taken on communal labor roles while a handful of them run through the maze each day trying to map it out. Basically, it’s a more peaceful “Lord of the Flies” situation but with a mysterious, dangerous maze instead of the ocean.

While Thomas is indeed a fairly generic protagonist, O’Brien’s performance makes the character tolerable, at least. He probably won’t win any awards for it, but he does a good job of making incredibly bewildered facial expressions at the beginning, and he’s generally inoffensive, like the rest of the cast.

What makes “The Maze Runner” a little more interesting than some of these stories is the ambiguous nature of the threat the characters face. In this genre, the villain is usually a well-defined authority figure, like President Snow in “The Hunger Games.”

Here, the maze, its heretofore unseen horrors and those pulling the strings aren’t fully divulged until a somewhat clumsy exposition dump at the end. Even then, the ending raises more questions than it answers because, of course, there are two more books in the series.

That kind of vague storytelling is by no means original, but having an amnesiac protagonist puts him on a level playing field with the audience, and it makes those scenes where someone sits him down and explains things to him feel less contrived. The amnesia angle is usually contrived in and of itself, but it works alright here.

As one would hope, “The Maze Runner” is at its best when it takes place in the maze itself. The visual design of the maze is appropriately dystopian and oppressive, and that there’s no upper limit to what kind of obstacles are in it makes those parts of the film decently tense.

I wouldn’t say you should run to the theater (I’m sorry) to see “The Maze Runner,” but if you like this genre or the book itself, it’s worth a shot. It’s definitely better than the recent adaptations of “The Giver” and “Ender’s Game,” but still in a tier below “The Hunger Games.”