Jamie
Disaster! Now that I have your attention I think this is an appropriate forum to further discuss the steady decline in available BMT films entering our BMT Treasure Chest (BMTTC). From time immemorial we have used a simple calculation to differentiate wheat from chaff. A rottentomatoes score <40% (because let’s face it, 60% is far too high… that’s a crazy number) and the requirement that the film was a “wide release” (typically >600 theaters, although we’ve at times gone with a more qualitative “vibes” based approach). Recent events, however, have conspired against us. This is likely because our vast bad movie funds and legions of fans have put the fear of god into movie studios across the globe and they’ve banded together to foil us. How? By making only good movies? No! By releasing fewer and fewer movies to theaters and then paying reviewers to give good reviews to the crap that do make it that far (the views of the author do not reflect the views of BMTCorp). Fiends! In all seriousness, we actually are heading for a breaking point and I think we really would have had to consider some changes to our rulez if Expend4bles hadn’t qualified. But boy did it ever. It’s still a horrible sign that the BMT Live! films this year consisted of two Jason Statham sequels and a Liam Neeson film (plus the dino flick, 65). Feels like we are playing in an ever shrinking pool. But we persist and we survive and Expend4bles means we can put off such drastic rulez changez for another year. Yay!
To recap! Barney Ross is back, Jack! And so is Lee Christmas. They are getting the “gang” back together, which really means they have two old timers (Dolph Lundgren and Randy Couture) plus a bunch of randos like 50 Cent. They are tasked with flying into Libya to prevent a terrorist named Suarto from getting his hands on some nuclear weapons and delivering them to the big bad, Ocelot. They punch and kick and shoot real hard, but it’s not enough. Not only do they lose the warheads, but Barney is shot down and definitely dies for sure. No chance Sly Stallone survived the plane crash. Because if there’s one thing I know about Sly it’s that he loves to pass his franchises onto the next generation. Everyone is sad (because Sly definitely died) and Christmas gets even sadder when he’s informed by their government handler, Marsh, that he’s off the team and his GF, Megan Fox, is taking over. After planting a tracking device on Fox, Christmas tracks them to a tanker in the Pacific Ocean with the help of former Expendable, Decha. When they get onto the tanker, though, it’s a trap! All the Expendables are captured and Marsh is forced to negotiate for the release of a prisoner who can identify Ocelot. When Christmas arrives the Expendables have already escaped so they all team up to take down Suarto. However, when the prisoner arrives it’s revealed that Marsh is Ocelot (what a twist!). All the expendables leave the boat, which is set to explode and spark a war, while Christmas stays behind to try to turn the boat around. Just when it appears all is lost and Marsh’s plan will succeed, Sly Stallone arrives (what a double twist!). Turns out he just faked his death to lure out Ocelot (who could have guessed?). He kills Marsh with a helicopter, scoops up Christmas, and sinks the tanker to reduce the impact of the explosion (all in about 20 seconds). They then celebrate good times. THE END.
Wooooooow. And I thought the third film was bad. This is basically not a film. At times gross. At other times super dumb. Always terrible looking. This film really exemplifies what has become a common theme in BMT: Jason Statham is game. Doesn’t matter what the script is or what you have him do. That check clears and he’s ready to sell whatever line you are having him say. The acting in this is terrible and the twists are inane. Never for one moment did I believe Sly Stallone was actually dead. Why? He is famous for forcing people to pry franchises out of his grip. You think he’s giving up Expendables? Get out of here. I just really can’t express my pleasure in watching this terrible, terrible movie. It’s gives me BMT hope for our BMT future. My one concern? This still ended up at 14% on RT. This is a <10% film if I’ve ever seen one.
Hot Take Clam Bake! Sly Stallone actually did die in the film. “Barney” who showed up at the end was actually his twin brother. That’s the mega-twist of the film. That Barney was a secret twin and that secret twin, let’s call him Rarney, is even more badass. You know what? I’m starting to vibe with this super-secret twin film. Expend4bles? More like Twin-pendables. Let’s make them all twins. Technology can do anything! We’re going to live foreeevvveeerrrrrrrr. Hot Take Temperature: Sizzling Megan Fox/Statham sex scene.
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! Are we talking about ancient Methuselah Stallone showing up for, oh say, 15% of a film and then pawning off the rest to BMT Legend Jason Statham? Hell ye4h we 4re! Let’s go!
I will say it again: don’t you dare allow Jason Statham anywhere near his natural habitat of water. He’ll Olympic dive right into your stupid face.
Right off the top, and I don’t know if other people noticed this, but this film basically doesn’t have a soundtrack. It is mostly scored. There are songs on occasion, but they are mostly played for jokes (Some Blue Oyster Cult during the not-funeral which Statham makes light of, and, naturally, some 50 Cent they got for free). I guess my point is, if there was ever a movie which demanded some sick tunes in the action scenes, this one is it, and yet … really nothing. Bizarre. I think my actual point is: is this the cheapest film of all time. What did they spend any money on?
Could anything have been more telegraphed than Stallone not actually dying in the beginning. God forbid they do something daring or interesting in these films like let someone die a plot advancing death.
Megan Fox is awful, but so is everyone else. She did do that flippy thing where she like jumps on a person and spins around them for the take down. It is like an obligation at this point.
This entire film is kind of an obligation now that I think about it.
Half the film takes place, ultimately, on a rather silly tanker set with way too wide of hallways, and it looks dumb (aka like a set).
And then in the end there is a different dumb twist where Andy Garcia was the bad guy all along, who would have thunk it?
Oh and of course Stallone comes back and details how he killed a man in cold blood for funsies, and everyone laughs and laughs and laughs.
This film is aggressively dumb, and the only regret is that it did so poorly it is almost certain that the planned sequels won’t be made or, if they are, they’ll Escape Plan it and they’ll be sold off to VOD. Which is all the worse for the long term BMT health. In reality, to put this in terms we all understand: Meg 2: The Trench is a Happy Statham for BMT because it made a lot of money so they’ll probably make Meg 3 and it’ll probably also be bad. Expend4bles on the other hand is a Sad Statham for BMT because it made no money and so it won’t be fruitful and multiply creating little BMT sequels for us to watch.
I guess for Expendable5 we’ll just have to cross that bridge. Maybe by then we’ll have to unveil our new criteria to allow for 52 films to actually qualify instead of the paltry 22 so far. We had 23 last year. We haven’t had a full 52+ BMT slate since 2017, and I have a feeling we’ll hit 10 years quite easily by that metric.
I do love an odd Product Placement (What?) and this time you can see quite a few advertisements for Helix Vodka sprinkled in the film which is kind of funny. As for Setting as a Character (Where?) why are so many Statham films vaguely set around Thailand, ultimately though this ends up being set around the easternmost tip of Russia. Obviously you need a sweet MacGuffin (Why?) in the form of an actual genuine undisarmable nuke. And a double dose of Worst Twist (How?) for the reveal of Garcia as the big bad, and Stallone as not having died. This film is oh so so so so Bad.
Read about my idea for Expendable5: Esc4ape Plan in the Quiz. Cheerios,
The Sklogs
Bad Movie Twins 