Manners Maketh Man redux

Kingsman 2 (2017)

7.4/10 on IMDb
50% on Rotten Tomatoes

Chloe's thoughts: It's alright;
Low-energy entertainment

Watch it if you: Are a fan of the first Kingsman

When the Kingsman headquarters are destroyed in a mass terror attack, the Kingsmen resort to getting help from their US ally, Statesman.

I loved Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014), and really wanted to love this sequel, but it was a bit disappointing. While it was enjoyable, it tried too hard to be like its original, without actually being anywhere near it.

Ahh yes, we've got another ridiculously crazy save-the-world situation happening. What made the first Kingsman so great was that it was nothing like what we expected. The movie swept us off our feet unexpectedly and we had no choice but to just go along for the ride, loving it all the while.

Unfortunately, this has set a precedent for The Golden Circle, because we expect another weird, whacky, hilarious, and gory movie that's at least just as good as the first. And knowing that, Matthew Vaughn, the director, as well as the producers/studio have all tried to deliver an even crazier and even more action-packed film. And while this paid off in some respects, this film definitely does not live up to its predecessor.

The first half in particular was not that great, and it was obvious that a lot of elements that were happening were put in purely to try to outdo the craziness of the first film. They were just trying too hard, particularly with some of the directing and the camerawork.

After we all loved the impressive tracking shot of the crazy church sequence from the first movie, they must have thought it would be a good idea to do a lot more of that, even if the scene itself didn't call for it. So, especially in the beginning, some of the fight scenes looked really artificial and weird to watch. They spent too much time trying to make everything look cool and smooth, so much so that it had a really unrealistic and digital look to it.

And I think this is where most of my issues with this film lie. They constantly try to add things in for the sake of "people liked it in the first movie, so let's do it AGAIN!" They were never actually adding things in because it made sense to add them in.

For example, they tried to recreate an iconic scene from the first movie and it just did not work. I'll talk about this more in the spoiler section, but it was so ridiculous and illogical to incorporate that in except to have a fun fight scene that also serves as a throwback to the first film. The fight itself was cool because of the choreography, but the reason the fight started in the first place was so silly!

Another thing is that the soundtrack is also super loud and quite distracting. I don't know why I had a gripe against this, though, because I enjoyed when they did this in the first film. For some reason, it just seemed really distracting when they would blare up a song during a fight scene.

But it did get better towards the end, when it got back to being ridiculously badass with all the weapons they were using in the epic fight scene.

However, in the middle there seemed to be just a lot of a waste of characters and actors, and there were certain scenes where you just didn't believe the characters were in any danger at all. More about this in the spoilers.

One thing I did like was how they sort of tied every element together in the final fight scene. Throughout the movie there seemed to be a lot of unnecessary things being shown through the movie, but they do all pay off towards the end.

However, I think the message of the film was a bit... odd. Again, it's hard to discuss this in a non-spoiler way but where the first movie focused on climate change, this movie focused on the war on drugs. And I just don't think they did a very good job at making a stance on the topic of drugs, maybe because the studio wanted to keep it safe. But when your films depict violent and gory fight scenes (which include people being cut in half or having their heads explode colourfully), or even when your film unapologetically makes recurring jokes about anal sex or fingering someone, I don't think a safe stance on a heated societal debate is really the way to go.

So most of the issues come down to the directing, pacing, and writing of the film. The cast itself is great though.

The very handsome Taron Egerton is back as Eggsy, our favourite kid-off-the-streets-turned-gentleman-spy. He did a great job in the first film and was still able to hold his own alongside the very impressive cast of this sequel.

Colin Firth returns (not a spoiler, it was in trailers and on posters), and he does a great job in this. I actually quite like what they did with his character, although I do have some gripes about his arc which I will leave to the spoiler section of this review.

Julianne Moore also plays the villain, and she looks so great in this film! She also looks like she really enjoyed herself, but her villain character was a bit too whacky and comical for my liking. I get that there is an element of suspension of belief here, but it just felt too parodic, even for a Kingsman film.

There's also Jeff Bridges and Channing Tatum in this, but I felt like their characters could have done so much more. The marketing for this film implied they would have a really big role, but unfortunately they don't do all that much and it seems like a waste of casting.

However, Pedro Pascal is great in this film, and I loved it whenever they showed him using his whip and lasso. I actually really liked the idea of the classy Kingsmen having these country-bumpkin-like Statesmen as their cousins. It allowed them to show us some new styles of uniform and weaponry, and was a good contrast to the idea of the gentleman spy that we're used to.

So before I start my spoilers section, I think in the end there are just too many things happening in this movie that the film feels like a mess. It's a very fun and very enjoyable mess, but most of the things here are unnecessary call backs to the first film, or unnecessary sequences specifically made to try and outdo the first film. There are a lot of whacky characters and crazily far-fetched plot devices, but when we loved these in the first film, it's a bit cringey and unrealistic in this film. So while the movie is really fun and enjoyable, and I would still definitely watch another sequel, I probably won't watch this film again. If I wanted to watch another Kingsman movie, I'd just watch the original again.

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Okay, so this is the start of my spoilers section. I was going to incorporate spoilers throughout my points, but there are just way too many things I want to talk about.

Click to show/hide spoilers:

(A word of warning: this spoiler section is a bit all over the place and is mostly me just ranting and nitpicking.)

So the biggest thing that was running through my mind was: I know they killed Roxy, Eggsy's friend Brandon, his dog JB, and the entire Kingsman headquarters and staff homes to raise the stakes, but to me it sort of reinforced the idea that no matter what happens, our beloved Eggsy would still be safe.

This also branches out into a heap of issues I had with the film:

1. Why did Roxy have to die? She did jack all in the first movie, I was excited to see her do so much more here. Also there wasn't really any emotional weight to Roxy's death even though her and Eggsy were such great friends.
   
2. Why was it so easy for Brandon to see all the guns and weaponry in Eggsy's room? Surely they would have better security measures than that?
   
3. I loved how Eggsy put up his own newspaper clippings on the wall, that was very sweet.
   
4. Why did Merlin have to die? I thought they specifically gave Eggsy a minesweeper? Correct me if I'm wrong but I thought the whole point of a minesweeper is to make sure no one dies from a mine?!
   
5. You honestly want me to believe that when you put two people into the equivalent of a free-falling human salad spinner, they would come out unscathed? I mean, if you don't want to kill them, then at least injure them or something! Even just having a shoulder dislocate and then making a scene out of them popping it back in or something, I dunno! Anything! They literally just walked away from that debacle.

Okay let's talk the bar fight scene. They were obviously trying to do a throwback to the first movie, but there was almost no logic behind that fight.

Firstly, the guy at the bar was listening in on their conversation, but he didn't realise like holy shit they're talking about hacking and showing each other crazy spy gadgets, maybe they're SPIES?!

Secondly, his reason for picking a fight with them was so ridiculous, it was just, "You're British, get out of here, I have no foundings for my feelings of anger towards you."

Thirdly, it's so out of character for Harry to start fighting them over that. That is not very gentlemanly. In the first film, he was about to walk away until they personally insulted him, and only then did he start fighting them. And the only reason he started killing these people violently was because he heard that his colleague Lancelot had died and he needed to "let off a bit of steam". I understand, though that perhaps he just wanted to fight again after spending such a long time not fighting since he was amnesic, but still the whole thing seemed really forced. It made more sense for Whiskey to step in and have fun with them, but I think it would have been better for the redneck to pick the fight with Whiskey in the first place.

Speaking of Harry, how on earth did he suddenly improve his coordination? They show him accidentally stunning a computer instead of the security guard, then he doesn't really do any more fighting except throwing a freeze bomb at people and shooting Whiskey (who is right in front of him and would have been hard to miss), and then he can suddenly take on all of Poppy's goons? Almost as if his near-death never happened?



As to some things on the characters:

• Channing Tatum was a huge waste in this film. All he did was one small fight scene, and then a scene where he danced a bit and they didn't even get him to dance very well! They could have at least asked him to pull off some sick moves
  
• Also Jeff Bridges hardly did anything at all! Elton John did more than Jeff Bridges!
  
• Speaking of, at first I was not keen on the Elton John cameos. I liked them and I found them funny, but just thought there were too many of them and they were overdoing it. However it did pay off at the end though, especially when he just intercepted the robot dogs eating Harry (ELTON JOHN DETECTED - FRIEND)
  
• Also Halle Berry's character could really have been played by anyone but I guess they're just trying to set up a sequel with Channing Tatum and Halle Berry
  
• I was surprised to see that Princess Tilde and Eggsy were so committed. It was nice to see that (especially the asking-for-permission scene) because it was so different to the James Bond spy movies we're used to (and the first movie made it a point to show they were different to James Bond movies). I also think they tried to make Tilde look younger than she did in the first movie so that it wouldn't look too weird that she was dating Eggsy.
  
• I think Charlie was a better character in this film than the last one. His shaved head made him look more menacing, he wasn't being a whiny pompous brat, and I liked his upgrades. The only thing was that it made it ridiculous to see Eggsy fight him. He literally casually chucked a bowling ball through layers of walls, and yet when he throws Eggsy around, his suit doesn't even get scuffed by the teensiest bit. Sigh, I miss Gazelle I wish she didn't die.
  

Nearly finished, I promise.

Do you think they went a bit too far with the fingering joke? I mean, it was funny, but there was an entire like 10 minutes dedicated to that joke. There was seriously no other way to track someone? It was such a lengthy gag.

Also, they put down cannabis and ecstasy in the same class as meth and heroin? Like, really? This was the point I was trying to make about the film trying to not really make a stance on the war on drugs. On one hand, they have Poppy say that sugar is more addictive and deadly than drugs, and they have the President's employee say that people who do drugs aren't bad and sometimes it even helps them function properly at work. Then on the other hand, they have people saying to their friends, "I told you not to use that stuff!" or even "Maybe you should stick to booze!" It just seemed so weird, almost like the studio wanted them to go against drugs just because they were concerned about regulation...

And with that, that's the last of my spoilers points! Congrats on making it to the end.