Oh man, so get this. I was in my car when I got a call and the guy was like “hey, don’t get out of your car or else for real.” But I was like don’t believe you, got out, and it exploded in my face. Now I can’t remember a thing (and I have no face, it’s a real Johnny Got His Gun situation up in here). Do you remember what happened in Retribution?
Pop Quiz Hot Shot!
1) Well, this should be an easy one. What is Liam Neeson’s job in the film?
2) And then a mad bomber attacks! How many people, ultimately, did the bomber kill with his bombs?
3) Early in the film the car Liam Neeson is driving is behind followed by a motorcycle which he thinks is the bomber. Who was actually on the motorcycle though?
4) What is the bomber after in actuality and why does this look super suspicious to the authorities?
5) In the end there is a big twist. How did the actual bombing culprit almost get away with it?
Bonus Question: Right at the end, yet another mysterious phone appears and Liam Neeson gets a call. Who is it?
Answers
1) He is a financial advisor at a major hedge fund (presumably) in Berlin. As a matter of fact, he is one of four partners, and he’s one of two people who can unlock a secret secure backup financial account (more on that later), so he is probably a founding partner.
2) I’m pretty sure the answer is five. We see a single person die at the beginning which is also on the news when Liam Neeson wakes up. Then we see the other founder (the guy from Succession) get killed along with his girlfriend and a cop who was nearby, so that’s another 3. And finally, the bomber himself dies in the end.
3) It is Liam Neeson’s son’s girlfriend on a motorcycle because Liam Neeson’s son was planning on skipping school to hang out with his super cool German girlfriend. What a twist.
4) The bomber is looking to liquidate the aforementioned financial account in Dubai which only the partners of the firm know about. This looks ultra suspicious because Neeson is the main strategy advisor it seems and the fund has been having a disastrous performance the prior few years. I’m sure the bombing escapade by the head honcho isn’t going to help with that though.
5) Well, Matthew Modine did a pretty solid job in deciding that Liam Neeson would probably not shoot him in the head. After that he knew German trains were super punctual, so he left his car as the train passed and timed the explosion to occur just after the train cleared his car so Neeson wouldn’t have realized Modine had escaped. All he really needed was Neeson to enter his code to open the account, but no such luck, Neeson was too good for that.
Bonus Answer: It’s … Liam Neeson?! A young Liam Neeson at least, played by Liam Hemsworth, and he needs his future self’s help! Suddenly Neeson is blasted to the past. And as the world of 1985 New York swirls around the shocked Liam Neeson the sounds of Don’t You Forget About Me by Simple Minds rings out to indicate that, yup, it’s 1985. Young Liam explains, old Matthew Modine showed up and is holding him hostage. You didn’t think he would have a backup plan? You know what else you can get on the Dark Web? Time machines. And so, if Old Liam doesn’t preemptively put his code in the lock box so that future Matthew Modine doesn’t have to blow up cars to steal everyone’s money, he is going to preemptively kill Liam Neeson’s wife so that his children are never born. Take that idiot! Well, Old Liam says, two can play at that game. Put on your Blackhat starring Liam Hemsworth (“That was my brother Chris,” says Liam Hemsworth. “You shut the fuck up.” says Liam Neeson, “don’t you ruin this for me.”) They, of course, invent the internet, hack the Gibson, and snag the plans to the Time Machine. Just as they give Modine the code his Time Machine explodes. Two can play at that game, they changed the Time Machine plans to include a bomb. “You ready to go back to the future?” Says both Liams at the same time. Huey Lewis and the News guitar lick. The End.
It’s called Retribution -1 obviously, and it is a real passing of the torch moment where we get to follow Liam Hemsworth as he enters the exciting world of (checks notes) … hedge funds I think.
Bad Movie Twins 