Review: The Equalizer 2 (2018)

The Equalizer 2 (2018)

Rated R for brutal violence throughout, language, and some drug content

Score: 4 out of 5

The Equalizer is a movie that has slowly grown on me upon rewatches. Its combination of moody character drama with spurts of brutal violence, capped off by an all-out third-act bloodbath and anchored by an excellent performance from Denzel Washington, has held up remarkably well, the film being less about the destination than the journey getting there -- meaning that, even if you know all the story beats, you can still have a great time soaking them all in. It makes sense, then, that director Antoine Fuqua and writer Richard Wenk decided to not try and fix what wasn't broken. And so The Equalizer 2 is more of the same, a methodically-paced drama where the central plot is of secondary concern to putting us into the shoes of Washington's protagonist Robert McCall as he goes about his daily routine. It's an unapologetically old-school action thriller in both its pacing and its down-to-Earth feel rather than the non-stop bombast of many modern action movies, with the focus on its characters melded well with a story that slowly comes into relief as the film goes on, and the action scenes, interspersed throughout the film, being quick but vicious when they arrive.

The structure of the film feels almost episodic, appropriately given that these films are adapted from a TV show. McCall is now a Lyft driver instead of a Home Depot employee, but beyond that, his day-to-day life has changed little, as he interacts with his neighbors, keeps notching off entries on his list of 100 Books to Read Before You Die, and takes jobs "fixing" various problems people come to him with that can only be solved through extralegal means. Keeping with the "episodic TV show as a movie" train of thought, the cutaways to Bill Pullman and Melissa Leo's husband-and-wife secret agents (and McCall's former colleagues at the DIA) Brian and Susan Plummer, given a greater focus this time around, feel like the season mytharc to McCall's case-of-the-week episodes. They are investigating the apparent murder-suicide of an informant in Brussels and his wife, suspecting (correctly) that it was actually a hit, and as the two of them grow ever closer to the culprits and find themselves hounded in turn, they turn to McCall to lend some extra firepower.

The film does an excellent job dropping the viewer into McCall's life as moments of brutality and ass-whoopings are contrasted to his seemingly boring life as a semi-retired veteran living in Boston. A slew of interesting characters surround him, from his immigrant gardener neighbor Fatima to an elderly Holocaust survivor and frequent Lyft customer named Sam who is searching for his long-lost sister, with the one who gets the most development being an artistically-inclined teenager named Miles who McCall seeks to keep from heading down the wrong track. McCall's world feels lived-in and authentic, the film and Washington's performance ably selling him as a seemingly ordinary Joe with a badass secret, thus making me more invested in him and the people around him once the climax rolled around. Swapping out the Home Depot from the first film with a quaint New England fishing village that's been evacuated due to a hurricane, the ending is once more where all the glimpses we've had before of McCall's particular set of skills come together in an explosive finale that feels like an R-rated version of Home Alone, or a version of a Friday the 13th sequel that drops all the pretense and makes Jason the hero (complete with kills bloody enough to match up to many a slasher movie). Once again, perhaps the most substantial criticism I can level at this film is that it is very slow-moving, with only one of the various sub-plots really connecting back to the main story. Like I said earlier, plot is not the main attraction here. This is a mood and character piece, and your enjoyment of this film will depend heavily on how much time you want to spend living in McCall's world. Adrenaline junkies need not apply to this one, though fans of old-school thrillers will likely have a blast with a movie where one of the most intense scenes involves McCall staring down Pedro Pascal's villain and telling him and his goons that he is going to kill them -- but not now, because they're all standing on a suburban street in front of the villain's McMansion, with his wife getting ready to drive the kids somewhere.

The Bottom Line

There's really not much more I can say that isn't a repeat of my thoughts on the first movie. It's got a great cast, punchy action scenes breaking up a seemingly mundane yet still interesting story, and a feel that throws back to the best of the action movies of the '70s. If you liked the first one, then you'll like this as well.