TL;DR – When the past catches up to her, Natasha Romanoff needs to confront more than her previous sins, she needs to confront her family.

Review (warning: spoilers)

In the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), this movie occurs after the events of Captain America: Civil War and before Avengers: Infinity War. It’s not an origin movie for Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) a.k.a. Black Widow but more an examination of past choices and their impacts on her present life.

For fans of the Marvel comics (note I said ‘comics’ and not ‘movies’), there will be a number of elements adapted into MCU that may rub the comic purists the wrong way. For example:

• Natasha was raised by a man named Ivan Petrovich. She was given to him as a baby during the Battle of Stalingrad in 1942 by a woman who perishes in a burning, collapsed building. In the movie, Melina (Rachel Weisz, ex-Black Widow) and Alexi (David Harbour a.k.a. Red Guardian) are depicted as Natasha’s surrogate parents.
• Speaking of Alexi, in the comics, both he and Natasha meet through the KGB and are trained as agents (no familial ties through blood or otherwise). They fall in love, get married and are husband and wife until Alexi is trained to be the Red Guardian and told he can no longer have contact with his wife by the Soviet government.
• In MCU and the comics, both Natasha and Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh) are trained in the Red Room. But they were never adoptive siblings as depicted in the film. In fact, the story-line in the comics has Yelena as Natasha’s foe and is sent to kill her.

All the above may be acceptable differences when adapted to make a movie, and in fact, I found Yelena as the younger sibling allowed for much greater character development for Natasha. Their relationship also serves as an integral stepping stone to what is revealed at the end credits (yes, there’s a post-credit cut scene so stick to the end). There is also a scene where Yelena mimics Natasha signature, superhero landing pose (one leg spread apart, crouch position, hand hitting the ground… you know the one).

“Why do you always do that thing?” asks Yelena.

“Do what thing?” asks Natasha.

“The thing you do when you’re fighting. The….like, the…” Yelena proceeds to do the superhero landing, flicking her head back, crouched position, hand out and making her long hair fly backwards. “…you’re a total poser.”

It makes you gravitate toward the pair in ten seconds of screen time.

However, there will be one difference that comic fans may take particular exception to, and that is Taskmaster (Olga Kurylenko).

Taskmaster is the Red Room’s ultimate weapon and plays a role as the main one-on-one kick-ass threat to Black Widow. The fight scene on the bridge where Natasha is ambushed by Taskmaster is brilliant. Taskmaster’s abilities involves “photographic reflexes” where she is able to copy the fighting style of her opponent. She is part of the (predictable) twist in the Black Widow film.

The problem that purists will have with Taskmaster isn’t that she’s female (in the comics, Taskmaster is a male character), it’s the fact that the character is so far removed from the comic story-line that the MCU writers might as well have created a new character. Heck, it’s revealed Natasha’s belief that she destroyed the Red Room and its spymaster was mistaken. Both are alive and well and there’s a bunch of Black Widows all over the world. The writers could have honed in on one “other” Black Widow and given her the ability to copy the exact fighting styles of her opponents. Oh wait… that’s exactly what the writers did. The problem is they called her Taskmaster.

In the comics, Taskmaster has different origins entirely, and his history is complex using his unique abilities on both sides of the hero/villain fence; he’s not in it for the power, he’s in it for the money and thus is more a mercenary type figure. He has fought against HYDRA and the Avengers at different times; assisted both the US Government, S.H.I.E.L.D and criminal organisations. Was the teacher responsible for training the likes of Crossbones, Diamondback, Spider-woman and U.S. Agent. And clashed with Spider-man, Fantastic Four and Deadpool to name a few. None of this fits the story-line in the Black Widow movie, yet they tie the name to one of the characters anyway.

Putting all this aside, the story still struggles in some other key areas:

• The surrogate parents in Melina and Alexi are confused; do they care more about their jobs or their adoptive children? It doesn’t even seem that they know. It takes Natasha and Yelena together to make their parents realise what their actions have cost them and for the ‘family’ as a whole.
• In the prologue start of the film, Red Guardian gives his two girls over to the Red Room program. Twenty years later, it is revealed the Red Guardian is locked up in an arctic, maximum security prison because he criticised his own government (forget the fact that he gave over his two girls to be brainwashed into assassin drones). Doesn’t really make much sense but I guess those Russians can be a stickler to critique.
• Then there’s the puppet-master behind the Black Widow program, Dreykov (Ray Winstone), whose global machinations never feel quite as earth-shattering as they should be (it probably doesn’t help that we know that what is around the corner is Thanos, a much greater threat to humanity).

Still, for all its shortfalls, Black Widow is carried through to the end by the great chemistry between Johansson and Pugh. Their sibling rivalry and bond is the highlight. Every scene the pair are together is where the Marvel magic is unleashed.

Fast forward to post-Avengers: Endgame (or the Black Widow post-credit cut scene), and Yelena is visiting Natasha’s grave. A mysterious woman appears next to her, but those who have watched “The Falcon and The Winter Soldier” series on Disney+ will know she is Valentina Allegra de Fontaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus). Her exact character role is not revealed in either movie or TV series but if you can’t wait, you can search and get the character bio. Valentina hands Yelena a photo of Clint Barton a.k.a. Hawkeye and says he is the one responsible for Natasha’s death. Thus Black Widow 2.0 is born, and I look forward to seeing Florence Pugh taking on the title character in future MCU movies.

7 out of 10

TL;DR – Hutch is an auditor. A man who assesses risks and consequences. If he perceives you as a risk, he’s happy to be the consequence.

Review (warning: spoilers)

Hutch Mansell (Bob Odenkirk) is nobody. Technically, this isn’t true. He’s a father of two kids, a husband to wife, Becca (Connie Neilsen), and holds down a day job as an office worker. So he’s somebody.

However, to police and law enforcement and Russian criminal syndicates, he’s a nobody. But that will change by the end of the movie.

When we’re introduced to Hutch, we sense straight away that he’s unhappy. There’s a lifelessness to him that comes from living a groundhog day existence repeating the same routine over and over again. He goes for a jog in the morning, takes out the garbage, makes a cup of coffee to go, catches the bus to work, clocks in at the metal fabrication company where he crunches numbers on a computer spreadsheet, clocks out, returns home where his kids mostly ignore him, and then goes to bed with no intimacy with his wife. On some days, he’ll vary his routine by doing chin ups at the bus stop shelter while staring at a poster of his wife who is a successful business woman.

The beginning sets wonderfully the struggle Hutch experiences with his mundane life. When one night two thieves break into his home and his son tackles one of them, Hutch has the opportunity to help and catch the thieves. Instead, he freezes and the thieves get away. When later Hutch is talking to his half-brother Harry over a radio in his office and reveals he let the thieves go because they were desperate and the gun they had wasn’t loaded, you realise Hutch is much more than he seems.

When his daughter can’t find her cat bracelet. Hutch springs into action, suspecting the two thieves and hunts them down to their apartment. But when he arrives, he discovers the thieves are parents themselves with a sick baby. Disappointed and angry, he leaves, takes out his frustrations on a brick wall and takes a bus home, bloody knuckles and all.

However, on the way, a bunch of hooligans crash their car at a red light. They’re drunk and stumble out to see the bus waiting at the intersection. When Hutch starts an inner monologue and begs the powers that be to let these hooligans onto the bus, you know Hutch will no longer be a nobody but a somebody. The scene unfolds as the thugs get on the bus and start harassing the passengers to the song I Gotta Be Me by Steve Lawrence & Eydie Gorme. When the gang singles out a young, female passenger, Hutch stands up with a grin, escorts the protesting bus driver out the front door and then turns around to face the thugs and proclaims in no uncertain terms that he’s going to send all these guys to the hospital (actually, he’s more blunt than that but you get the idea).

The fight scene had me on the edge of my seat and Hutch dishes out as much as he gets. It is by far the best action sequence in the entire film and carries immense weight because it’s the first time you see Hutch unleash the beast. It’s brutal, visceral, and completely spell binding. The camera work is brilliant and you can’t help but feel every hit to the face, dislocating bone, knife stab and breaking glass.

In the aftermath, Hutch feels alive. But what Hutch doesn’t know until later is that one of the thugs he treats as a nobody is actually a somebody also. Specifically, the thug is the younger brother of Yulian Kuznetsov (Aleksey Serebryakov), a Russian crime lord that reacts as all crime lords would react when he finds out his younger brother is in hospital with a busted wind pipe, he sends an army to deal with Hutch and his family.

Derek Kolstad, writer of the John Wick series, also wrote Nobody and he has a knack for building suspense and unleashing mayhem. Odenkirk is perfectly cast as Hutch, and the disconnections (at the beginning) and connections (after the bus fight) with his family bring much needed depth to his plight. The scene where Hutch ushers his family down into the basement and the kiss he gives Becca is poignant and yearning. You’ll care about Hutch like you did with John McClane in Die Hard.

The final showdown at the factory has Hutch going MacGyver with an assortment of inventive traps to obliterate Yulian’s henchmen. It’s all a bit silly but by this point, you’re satisfied because of what has happened before.

One of the better action thrillers I’ve seen this year.

8 out of 10

TL;DR – straight forward action thriller with plenty of action but lacking the thrills.

Review (warning: spoilers)

Nothing annoys an assassin more than when the employer they work for sends them on an assignment without the proper intel. When Sam (Karen Gillan) is given a job by her employer, The Firm, and she’s told the target is not heavily guarded, only to find out that the target is heavily guarded, and she has to go all Rambo to get out alive, you can understand she’s peeved.

However, that’s not how The Firm sees it, and they give her another assignment in order for Sam to get back into their good graces. The target this time is a man who has stolen from The Firm. Sam hunts down the thief, shoots him in the abdomen, and then finds out that the man actually stole the money to pay a ransom for his daughter who has been kidnapped. The Firm, of course, doesn’t give a crap about any of this and just wants their money back.

Somewhere in the assassin’s playbook, or perhaps it’s an unwritten rule, you’re to be a mindless, efficient killing machine and not question any orders unless a child is involved (or a dog in case of John Wick). Then all bets are off.

But Sam doesn’t even need much convincing to go against her employer. She’s got mother issues from having been abandoned at the diner where she traditionally shared a milkshake with Scarlet (Lena Headey) who is also an assassin as well as Sam’s mother. So, the last thing she wants is to become like mommy-dearest by abandoning this girl to whatever grisly fate her kidnappers have in store. Also having killed the man who stole the money to save his daughter can leave even the most hardened hit-girl with a mountain of guilt.

The Firm also finds out one of the henchmen that Sam went Rambo on was actually the son of a powerful crime boss, Jim McAlister (Ralph Ineson). Naturally, The Firm wanting to smooth relations over with Jim and company, gives Sam’s location up. Who knew employer loyalty to their assassin proteges was so fleeting?

There’s plenty of potential across the board here. The cinematography is full of colour and quirkiness; Gillan gets to use a bowling ball, a panda bear suitcase and a giant ceramic tooth as weapons; girl-power is in full force as Headey, Angela Bassett (as Anna May), Michelle Yeoh (as Florence) and Carla Gugino (as Madeleine) all join in on the action; Paul Giamatti (as Nathan) plays the face of The Firm; Chloe Coleman (as the kidnapped Emily) is a revelation; and there’s much needed humour from Michael Smiley (as Dr. Ricky) and the three goofy assassins – Ivan Kaye (as Yankee), David Burnell IV (as Shocker) and Jack Bandeira (as Crow).

But for all the potential the story never delivers as it should and there’s way too many (or too long) slow-mo action shots. The trio of Anna May, Florence and Madeleine are under developed, and when Madeleine gets killed, it feels obligatory because one of the female assassins needs to die otherwise there’s no emotional pull… right? But it didn’t matter to me because it felt like they were simply padding out numbers.

The relationship between Scarlet and Sam is also never properly explored. You could remove Scarlet entirely from the story and just have Sam scarred as an abandoned girl at a diner, and you would still have the same film. Headey does what she can with what she’s given, but in the end, she’s like whipped cream on a milkshake; you can remove the whipped cream and still have a milkshake.

Director Navot Papushado has created a film that is more style than substance. Forget about all the plot holes (for example, the diner introduced in the first scene is meant to be neutral ground and no guns are allowed inside, but in the final scene the same diner is filled with every man and woman carrying a firearm), the film could have reached the thrills of a John Wick film even if it was unable to attain the lofty heights of Leon: The Professional.

With all the blood-letting and brutality, there was Tarantino-level action, but the film left behind the Tarantino-level dialogue that would have built the tension and made you care about the characters. Instead, Papushado appears more interested in ensuring each female character gets enough screen time for a slow-mo action scene.

5.5 out of 10

TL;DR – ludicrous plot, over-the-top action, and predictable = turn off your brain + pass the popcorn.

Review

Every now and then a sequel comes out that surpasses the original. The Godfather Part II, Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Aliens and The Dark Knight to name a few.

This movie sequel is not one of them.

Mind you, it never aims to be. Instead, it takes the first movie, throws in Salma Hayek and takes the road most travelled. Car chases, guns, gruesome deaths, and plenty of fist fights with the basic premise that somehow only a bodyguard suffering from mental health issues (Michael Bryce played by Ryan Reynolds) and an assassin that caused said issues (Darius Kincaid played by Samuel L. Jackson) can prevent a European meltdown concocted by bad guy (Aristotle Papdopolous played by Antonio Banderas).

All the cast (except Morgan Freeman) play their roles with relish. Reynolds and Jackson bounce off each other with enough chemistry that you remember why the first film gave you all those chuckles.

Salma Hayek plays the wife in the movie’s title, Sonia Kincaid, and the glimpses of her in the first movie is unleashed in the sequel with enough vitriol and censorship-be-damned dialogue that you won’t know whether to laugh or be shocked, but more than likely it’ll be a combination of the two.

Banderas is suitably smooth and slimy in equal measure as the terrorist seeking to collapse the European infrastructure. I won’t reveal his dastardly plans but I think the writers attempted a “Mission Impossible” type evilness but came off more “Austin Powers-Dr. Evil” type evilness. Nevertheless, Banderas uses his eyebrows with enough frown that you are never quite sure when he’s going to blow his lid.

This leads me to Morgan Freeman who plays Senior. The writers have Senior in this movie for a specific comedic reason. But once that comedic reason is revealed, his character is then meant to dive into a sort of relationship gravitas with Michael Bryce. These sequence of events are sorely lacking and Freeman, for all his acting genius, looks disinterested in trying to make more out of his role. Not that the writers give him much assistance in this regard either. It’s all rather ho-hum and leads to predictable twists that feel superfluous.

Overall though, if you switch off your brain, you can enjoy the ride as much as the first movie albeit with fewer laughs probably because you’re expecting them now.

6 out of 10