![]() ![]() In a conventional shoot-‘em-up, the protagonists deliver snide quips while dispatching dozens of bad guys in gory fashion. The “action hero who walked away from his old life” narrative trope also has a handy moral escape clause - for the filmmakers, as well as the audience. In a sense, a film like The Equalizer 2 is an elaborate action-movie humble brag: This isn’t even my job, but I’m just so good at it. Washington, who turns 64 in December, is certainly part of that ilk, but The Equalizer 2 aims for a more sophisticated tone, draping the proceedings in somber underpinnings as McCall glumly goes about his grisly business. In recent years, we’ve seen a wave of “geri-action” movies (including Taken and the Expendables franchise) that cater to older guys who don’t want to think they’ve lost a step. For one, it plays into a romantic notion that a lot of men indulge - the idea that, hey, they’ve still got it. There are a few reasons for the enduring appeal of this deeply disingenuous subgenre. ![]() It’s never the character’s choice, mind you - it’s always some terrorist or rogue agent who ruins everything. Just kidding: Those films (and plenty of others) use the conceit of the main character “who walked away from his old life” as a precursor to finding a way for the hero, oh-so-reluctantly, to pick that sword back up. Will Sawyer, Dwayne Johnson’s Skyscraper hero, used to be in the FBI, but after losing a leg in a blown operation, he now works in security, telling a colleague ponderously at one point, “I put my sword down” - a farewell to his ass-kicking past.Īs we all recall, Taken and Skyscraper were muted, intimate G-rated dramas that concerned the tranquil adventures of reformed men who were now happily non-violent. Bryan Mills, Liam Neeson’s Taken hero, used to be in the CIA - now he does security so he can be closer to his daughter. The Equalizer films are part of a proud tradition of movies involving awesome enforcer/hitman types who, for character reasons, don’t choose to pursue the line of work they’re really good at. He doesn’t want to kill people! Circumstances just keep forcing him to. EQUALIZER 2 DRIVERHe kills so many people in The Equalizer - and he gets to kill a whole bunch more in The Equalizer 2, where McCall is minding his own business as a Lyft driver before being compelled to avenge the murder of his close friend (Melissa Leo), a fellow agent. Soon enough, though, he gets a chance to show off his old skills, protecting an innocent prostitute (Chloë Grace Moretz) from deadly Russian gangsters. And so, in the 2014 original ( based on the 1980s series), McCall is working at a Home Depot, a seemingly ordinary dude who is, in fact, a superhuman killing machine. His reason? He promised his wife before she died that he would. In The Equalizer 2, Denzel Washington once again plays Robert McCall, a former CIA operative who walked away from his old life. ![]()
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