Saturday Sequel presents The Equalizer 2
By Paul Anthony
Here we are still in the first week of black history month and this week I have been doing some work on Denzel Washington this week, honestly it was more than timing then anything because his latest movie was just released called The little things which please check out and Justin’s reviews regarding that, then I did a actor profile o him during our podcast episode, as I was doing my research on him I came across something that I never notice before and that out of all his films, he has never done a sequel for except one film. Out of 49 films that he has been only one had a sequel in it and that film was none other than this film. With that being said you would have to guess that this film had to be a success if Washington only pick this role to come back to. The first film was released in 2014 and 7 months before that release Sony had already greenlighted a sequel. The film had a 73 million dollar budget but than grossed 192 million so Sony made the right choice, this film was released four years after the film. The budget was pretty much just a few more million dollars and basically grossed the same amount as the first film making it another hit under Washington’s belt. Washington wasn’t the only star in this film others return as well such as Melissa Leo and Bill Pullman but than you had the newcomer Pedro Pascal as well, Now did this film live up to the previous film?
The film starts with McCall (Washington) on a train traveling to Istanbul, basically he is on a mission to rescue a girl that was taken from her mother but the guy is her father nevertheless he completes his mission and returns the girl back to her mom though it appears her mom doesn’t realize this. At the same time Susan and McCall’s former partner Dave York investigates a murder. When Susan returns to her hotel she is then attacked and killed, After some time Dave is greeted by McCall who is shocked to see him since McCall faked his own death. McCall shares information to Dave that he has found and soon after that McCall who works as a Lyft Driver is attacked by assassin who pretends to be an passenger and there McCall learns the truth that Dave is the true one that killed Susan and he opens up on why he did it. McCall sees the rest of his former team is at Dave’s house as well and he tells them he is going to kill them all and the only sad thing is that he only gets to do it once. Never the less McCall keeps his word and in a epic battle kills everyone, including Dave and film ends With McCall returning to his old house.
I did enjoy this film and I did ask in the beginning of this blog if it lived up to the first film. I have to say yes it but it didn’t improve anything, we basically got the same thing and doing it twice is very risky. Don’t get me wrong Washington was great and Pedro carried his weight. The action was on par as the first however the story was lacking. The plot tries be something better than what it really was. The movie seemed like it was leading to bigger things but never did. In the end I am giving it a good B plus for a grade.
Sequel Saturday presents Sister Act 2: back In The Habit
By Paul Anthony
With Black History month coming to an end, I decided to review a sequel that honestly I long have forgotten about. Whoopi Goldberg has been famous in this generation for being a talk show host and all of that fun stuff but for previous generations she was a comedian and a actress. One of her more famous roles was in the Sister Act franchise, which she played Deloris Van Cartier / Sister Mary Clarence. the first film of the series proved to be a big box office hit because the budget was 31 million and the movie grossed 231 million and when you make a 200 million dollar profit you know a sequel would soon follow and they didn’t waste no time. Just under two years and honestly it doesn’t seem like because the first film came out in 1992 and part 2 came out 1993 just towards the end of the year. Now with rushing a sequel would it be better than the first better question would it do better? Well the budget was 38 million just 7 million higher than the first film but the gross was far lower than 231 million in fact it did not even clear 100 million. The total gross came to 57.3 million which basically made it disappointment but was it really that bad?
Sometimes when a movie comes out and its a hit but the story proves that it doesn’t need to be a sequel. I felt like this was the case but here we are. In this film since the events of the first film Deloris is a headliner in Vegas and all seems to be going well until her old nun friends come to see her with some bad news. The nuns are actually teachers at St. Francis Academy where Deloris went as a child. Problem is the school is going to close if the school’s reputation does not change. So the Nuns need her to be Sister Mary once more and teach Music because the school use to be good in music, where they won awards and everything, so they need her to teach music and get these kids to sing. The problem is the school’s administrator, Mr. Crisp, who wants to shut the school down and retire. Sister Mary now has to deal with him and getting these kids to see that they have beautiful voices. In the end everything works out well because they school win the state championship in Choir. Of course Sister Mary saves the day and the school and once again she part ways for Vegas until she is needed again.
Now I will have to say this movie didn’t have the magic and charm of the first one and jokes well flat. To be honest it felt like the cast was tired and didn’t want to return. The acting from the rest of the cast seem stiffed at times and the plot was predictable. Now In the end I am giving this film a C or 70 percent because in the end it felt like an average sequel!
SmashWriting 
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