Movie Review: The Equalizer 2 (2018)

Synopsis: After successfully taking down the Russian mafia's operations in Boston, Robert McCall works as a Lyft driver while secretly using his fighting skills and government connections to help people in need. Things turn personal for Bob when his long-time friend, Susan Plummer, is murdered in Belgium and he realizes someone is targeting former employees of the agency he used to work for.

Who's in it? The movie stars Denzel Washington, Pedro Pascal, Ashton Sanders, Orson Bean and Bill Pullman.

Review: After being pleasantly surprised by The Equalizer a couple nights ago, my wife and I decided to watch The Equalizer 2 last night. While it turned out to be an OK movie it was, like many sequels, a big step down from the original.

I'll start out with the good. The action scenes are pretty intense and fun to watch while, at times, also being filmed in a way that adds a little extra anxiety (I mean that last part in a good way). There are also plenty of times when Bob (Washington) is put in a situation that looks impossible to get out of, especially when he figures out who he's up against.

I also found I liked the relationship he formed with his young neighbor, Miles (Sanders), choosing to be a mentor to the artistic college student and try to keep him from joining the neighborhood gang. The connection between the two felt real, especially when Bob took a tough love approach.

The main problem with this movie is there is just too much going on. Bob is investigating Susan's death while also trying to help Miles. When he's not doing those two things, he's trying to help an elderly man (Bean) recover a valuable painting that was stolen from him during World War II and picking random fights to help a woman whose daughter was taken from her and another woman who was drugged and raped at a party.

It's a lot to take in and, because there is so much, the main plot of the story regarding Susan is pushed to the side and ultimately rushed. There's no attempt to build up the main bad guy as a formidable opponent or set any real stakes and that final battle scene, despite Bob being outnumbered, seemed heavily one-sided in his favor. For a bunch of "highly trained" assassins, those guys were pretty easy for him to beat. 

In fact, the more I think about it, the more I think that part of the film should have just been removed so the film could focus more on his relationship with Miles tasked with protecting them from a well-armed neighborhood gang. I think it would have been a lot more believable and much more difficult for him since he would need to be worried about keeping multiple people safe from retaliation. 

That much more concise plot also would have given the film an opportunity to explore the potential legal repercussions for taking the law into his own hands. Or at very least, it could have explained why the police aren't sending a SWAT team to kick in his door when some of his vigilante efforts weren't exactly done in secrecy (does Boston even have a police department?).

Final Opinion: It's an OK action film but it tries to do too much. It doesn't give the main story enough attention to make it interesting or unique while missing out on what could have been a much better main plot.

My Grade: C+

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