Netflix continues to try to make very good original movies on their streaming platforms and this film had all the recipes for success. It was directed by the Russo Brothers. Yeah, those guys who brought Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame to life. The writers were Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, the same writers who also brought Infinity War and Endgame to the big screen in resounding fashion while also writing one of the best political action thrillers ever made, Captain America: The Winter Soldier. And it starred Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans, two actors who have had their fair share of successful movies and memorable performances.

So how did something that seemed so perfect go so wrong? Honestly, I’m not quite sure.

The first half is a hot, laughable mess as the story bounces from location to location and storyline to storyline like a pinball machine. It then eventually becomes clear that this is another boring ripoff of The Mandalorian with a gruff tough guy having to take care of a kid. In this case, Ryan Gosling’s protagonist has to rescue the kid kind of like Mando had to rescue Grogu in the second season. This is the new trope that a lot of these stories are going after these days.

A few years ago, he most likely would’ve had to rescue a love interest since that was the thing to do at the time. But women are tired of being damsels in distress so, hence, he has to rescue a kid instead.

Through this rescue mission he has to keep dodging the deadly advances of Chris Evan’s deliciously vicious antagonist who was, honestly, the only good thing about the movie.

Chris Evans’ horribly mustached villain Lloyd was hilarious in every scene he graced and he undoubtedly stole the show. Maybe the reason for that is you could tell Evans was having a ball playing this horrible guy.

The second half of the movie is a lot more straightforward and bearable and some of the action scenes are kind of good.

My favorite scene just so happened to be an action scene with an assassin played by Bollywood Dhanush who utterly stole the show. Honestly, he should’ve been the lead instead of Ryan Gosling because he was way cooler. And he actually felt like he could fight. Gosling just wasn’t convincing me that he was this incredible secret agent. He just seemed like he had worked really hard on getting the choreography right.

And these studios keep trying to convince us that Ana de Armas can be an action movie star but I’m going, to be honest. The lady doesn’t look like she knows how to hold a gun…and she’s had practice!

The amount of suspension of belief that you have to have while watching this film is at an all-time high. It’s just one more ridiculous scene after the other until eventually, the movie ends in an eye-rolling fashion.

I knew this movie was going to be bad and it was. Thankfully Chris Evans’ Lloyd was as fun as he was. The movie has already gotten a sequel and a spinoff and I’m honestly hoping we get more Lloyd. He was just such a fun character in the midst of the chaos and I need more with him.

I’m giving this movie 2.5 out of 5 stars and 70 out of 100.

If Netflix wants to stop losing subscribers they have to work harder to give us better content.

I thank you for reading and I hope you have a spectacular day.