The Library: The Expendables
Three new reviews from my home library.
The Library is my attempt to watch at least 50% of the films in my DVD, Blu-ray, and 4K Ultra HD home library. To be included, I can't watch it streaming or catch it at a repertory screening - I have to watch the disc.
And we’re back after a six month hiatus! I must confess that this entry might be the last for awhile, as we are moving soon and the discs will unfortunately be packed up for some time. But when it comes back, it’ll come back full force - including VHS and Laserdiscs in the library’s total. And it will return, I’m not stopping until I get to that coveted 50%.
In the mean time, I hope you enjoy reading about me watching The Expendables more than I enjoyed watching The Expendables.
Current Count: 844 of 1,925 - 43%
The Expendables (2010)
Barney Ross leads a band of highly skilled mercenaries including knife enthusiast Lee Christmas, a martial arts expert Yin Yang, heavy weapons specialist Hale Caesar, demolitionist Toll Road, and a loose-cannon sniper Gunner Jensen. When the group is commissioned by the mysterious Mr. Church to assassinate the dictator of a small South American island, Barney and Lee visit the remote locale to scout out their opposition and discover the true nature of the conflict engulfing the city.
By 2010, Sylvester Stallone was in full cashing-in mode. He had a pretty good fifteen-ish year run from Rocky to Cliffhanger (yes, I'm including Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot) before his heydey began to fade. He sought reinvention in the late '90s and early aughts (Cop Land is a great movie) before just saying screw it and turning to his highest-profile and most nostalgic characters in the Rocky and Rambo reboots in 2006 and 2008, respectively.
Having run out of things to reboot, he then made up a new group of mercenaries called The Expendables, a rag-tag bunch of old farts past their prime and using their recognizability to create a new franchise. At least that's how I remembered it in the marketing materials. Watching this first entry for the first time, however, I realized that it's not really like that. Sure, there's Sly and Dolph Lundgren, with appearances from Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger (his first film appearance back from his Governator hiatus), but it seems like either the Rolodex was empty or nobody answered the phone. Where's JCVD or Seagal or Chuck Norris or Wesley Snipes? Sure, they will probably show up later in the series, but it feels like he had to turn to plan-b...
Heavy action all stars! He enlists Jason Statham (who plays a character called Lee Christmas) and Jet Li...and then the roster thins out. Randy Couture? Sure. Stone Cold as a heel? Naturally. Terry Crews? I guess - in 2010, he was best known as the dad on Everybody Hates Chris, while his most muscular endeavors where his time on Battle Dome (remember Battle Dome? I do!) and his turn as the Old Spice guy. David Zayas, of Dexter fame, plays one of the main bad guys. Really? I love the guy, but come on.
The movie is just fine, not particularly memorable (other than the Planet Hollywood reunion scene) or particularly bad, but it feels like a false promise. Perhaps the series can make good in future entries...
The Expendables 2 (2012)
Mr. Church reunites the Expendables for what should be an easy paycheck, but when one of their men is murdered on the job, their quest for revenge puts them deep in enemy territory and up against an unexpected threat.
The Expendables 2 does try to make up for some of the misgivings of the first film, but a few of those fixes only cause more problems...
Let's take Chuck Norris, for example. He seemed like an obvious choice for the first film, but it seems like he, and others, wanted to see if the first one would work before joining the team. Chuck doesn't join the team, exactly, instead just offering them a helping hand in this sequel's latest mission. And that's because, bear with me here, he considers himself a "lone wolf." Yup, they reverse-engineered a Lone Wolf McQuade joke. And that doesn't even touch on the "Chuck Norris jokes," of which there are a few.
In writing the sequel, Stallone (he chose not to direct this one, Simon West, director of Con Air and the "Never Gonna Give You Up" music video takes over) and co-writer Richard Wenk (of the Equalizer series) decided that a screenplay full of nods, references, and easter eggs would be best, opting for on a pretty hollow throughline. This has its advantages (Schwarzenegger says some variation of "I'll be back" like three different times and I get a kick out of every time) and its disadvantages (it can get old fast.)
The problem is...that's probably all I really want anyway. I want more action stars (Scott Adkins also joins while JCVD plays the villain - a massive upgrade) and I want them to do silly bits. This is full of bits, but I don't think it's the right temperature for the porridge just yet. Perhaps I, Goldilocks in this analogy, can find the third film (and final entry I own on DVD) to be just right.
The Expendables 3 (2014)
Barney, Christmas and the rest of the team comes face-to-face with Conrad Stonebanks, who years ago co-founded The Expendables with Barney. Stonebanks subsequently became a ruthless arms trader and someone who Barney was forced to kill… or so he thought. The latest mission becomes a clash of classic old-school style versus high-tech expertise in the Expendables’ most personal battle yet.
And...nope! Although these movies do have their moments, they're overall just more bad than good. The Expendables 3 brings in Wesley Snipes (good, very good), but one of the first things out of his mouth is a joke about tax evasion (bad, very bad.)
Snipes is just one of a few all-timers to join the cast for this third entry. While we lose folks like Chuck Norris (we'll live) and JCVD (the best villain in the series), the A-listers finally come out to play: Mel Gibson, Harrison Ford, Antonio Banderas, and noted action star Kelsey Grammar. Most of the film, however, is about recruiting the new generation of Expendables: Randa Rousey, Kellan Lutz, and pre-fame and hair-buzzed Glen Powell. It took four years for Stallone's series about still fightin' old farts to get a little too old. It's like how Daniel Craig made five Bond movies and three of them were about how old he was.
We also get our third director in three movies. This time it's Patrick Hughes, who would go on to direct The Hitman's Bodyguard (a real movie) and The Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard (a fake movie). His work here is even shakier than before, while there's a lot less action overall. Stallone's script (this time he's joined by co-writers Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedikt, the married duo behind the screenplay for Olympus Has Fallen) is much more serious, melancholic, and morbid than before. It actually made me miss some of the zingers in the second film (which I'm just going to say is the best one because I will not be watching Expend4bles, which I promise is the actual title) - at least that movie was having fun. And it's probably the most fun I can have with these movies.
Credit: Each plot synopsis comes from Letterboxd via TMDb.