The Expendables 2 (2012) Movie Review

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The Expendables 2, continues with the big egos, muscles, guns, spectacular fights, explosions, and funny one liners from the first film. Much like the first one it isn’t a film you watch for great acting and character development since this is an action movie.

The additions of Nan Yu, Liam Hemsworth, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Chuck Norris, and the expanded roles for Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger unfortunately led to a decrease role for some of the actors such as Jet Li.

Mr. Li was in it only for two scenes in the beginning. In his appearance he had a rather funny exchange between him and Dolph Lundgren’s character. I laughed at this line as the two characters begin to bond,

Gunner Jensen: Who am I going to pick on?

Yin Yang: You find some other minority.

It would have been nice to see their buddy relationship grow, since I really like Jet Li and Dolph Lundgren as actors. A decreased role for Jet Li aside, the film is an improvement to the first one with the one liners being less forced and the script being better written.

The Expendables 2 goes straight into a spectacular action sequence with a more epic battle after the brief intro. Expendables 2 has a story of revenge since the new recruit played quite well by Liam Hemsworth was killed off early in the film by the rather nasty Jean Vilain.

I also like that the characters other than Stallone get their moment to shine. Most especially Jason Statham who is really impressive with his natural charisma and excellent fighting skills on display. I didn’t really see the point of adding a female to the cast, because Nan Yu really did nothing for me other than that she is pretty.

Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger have expanded roles. They lend their aid to Stallone and his Expendables as they are up against an even more formidable enemy than the first film. The chemistry between Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger is really great.

The two action movie legends have a really cool exchange depending on what you find is humorous. They parody themselves with the lines that made them famous stars.

Trench: I’ll be back.

Church: You’ve been back enough. I’ll be back.

Trench: Yippee-ki-yay.

The Expendables 2 has some cheesy moments such as when Chuck Norris makes his entrance to the theme song from the Clint Eastwood film, “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly” playing in the background. I didn’t find that part funny as it just failed flat on its face.

Chuck Norris didn’t really make much of an impact for me and hardly looks like himself anymore. It is understandable since he is 73. I never was impressed by Chuck Norris movies except for a few of them. Someone else such as Donnie Yen should have been in place of him.

I like the improved role that Dolph Lundgren has in this sequel. He has some great lines as he shows great screen presence and charisma this time around as one of the good guys.

The action scenes are shot really well with wide angles and great stunts. I do not like the usage of CGI blood which makes its return in this sequel. I especially thought it looked ridiculous when Jet Li was punching the crap out of one the bad guys in the opening sequence. I much prefer the artificially made blood of yesteryears to the video game looking blood of today.

The music in Expendables 2 was disappointing to me. I consider the first films usage of Classic Rock based music more in tune with the buddy buddy atmosphere of the ensemble casting of action movie star legends.

Jean-Claude Van Damme made a good villain as he is a very cold and evil in this sequel. It was nice to see Van Damme back on the big screen as I have not really kept up with his films much after “Street Fighter: The Movie”. The fight he has with Stallone at the end could have been longer though. He does look like sh*t though, like he is really sick. His face looks horrible.

Flaws aside this is still an entertaining fun film to watch. I look forward to seeing The Expendables 3. Hopefully Jet Li and Jackie Chan have decent screen time in it.