The Boys are Back in Town

Rating: 10/10 (25 August 2012)

I try not to get to excited about sequels because they usually just do not have the same passion and awesomeness as the film it follows but this one was an amazing surprise. I was disappointed that Jet Li was so marginalized and that Nan Yu's character Maggie seemed to be more of a place holder. She has maybe 2 fight scenes and only one of those are truly memorable, not due to lack of talent but of camera time. I was hyper happy that touched on Dolf Lundgren's real educational background, my only complaint is that there is a scene in which he attempts to use that intelligence and it quite literally just fizzles out and then Church(Bruce Willis) appears a few moments later in a rather unlikely manner to rescue everyone. In my opinion that should have let Gunner (Dolf Lundgren) have his 15 seconds of wow, it would have added some kudos to his character and it would have been a touch more believable than Church's rescue. Jason Statham (as always!) was absolutely incredible. My only dismay in terms of Mr. Christmas was that he seemed to be more gun heavy than knife suave in this second film. He still rocked hard core regardless of which weapon he wielded and this man was born to do fight scenes but there is just a certain brutal grace in the way he throws knives and that was one of the main things that got me hooked on the Expendables in the first place. The underlying hook that got me addicted to the Expendables films is the witty and sarcastic banter between Christmas and Barney (Sly Stallone). Mostly all of the dialogue between the characters is perfectly done and definitely gives you the sense that these guys have been through a lot together and know each other very very well. I haven't made up my mind about Liam Hemsworth's character "Billy the Kid". It seems like his only function in the film was to be the catalyst. He's not in there long enough for the audience to develop any kind of emotional attachment to him and the talk that he has with Barney outside of the bar gives you a gut feeling about what's coming, and then the story he tells Maggie on the plane, they both serve as quick attempts to get your heart in the right place for Billy but the film just doesn't give you the time to do that. My last complaint is Booker (Chuck Norris). His smile seemed to be super-glued in place and for a film that centers around violence he seemed oddly somewhat out of place, he simply did not have the savage, die hard fire of the rest of the characters and I found that a little disheartening because I grew up adoring Chuck Norris. If you go back and watch anything he did in the 80's and 90's and compare it to his bit in the Expendables 2 you will see exactly what I'm talking about. I do like, nay, love that he takes a pot shot at Chuck Norris witticisms in his statement about the cobra, and I love that all of the characters take pot shots at all of the other characters previous films. They did this in the first film as well but the references were much more subtle where as in the Expendables 2 you can't miss them (unless of course you've never seen any of their previous movies). It is a very precious, special, and awesome movie that drags me to a theater to buy over priced tickets and popcorn after standing in a mile long line for half an hour but this is definitely one of those movies and one that I will probably watch a dozen more times before it ever hits DVD.