Kingsman: The Golden Circle – Movie Review

Kingsman: The Golden Circle is a 2017 action/adventure film directed Matthew Vaughn, and the sequel to Kingsman: The Secret Service, which is based on the comic book series of the same name. The film stars Colin Firth, Taron Egerton, Mark Strong, Edward Holcroft, Sophie Cookson, and Hanna Alström while being joined by Julianne Moore, Halle Berry, Pedro Pascal, Elton John, Channing Tatum and Jeff Bridges. The Golden Circle follows the members of Kingsman as they need to team up with their American counterpart, Statesman, after the world is held hostage by a new threat.

So off the bat I’m just going to tell you that the reviews that you’ve seen online are crap.. except this one of course. But so many people are destroying The Golden Circle (what I’ll refer to this movie as for the rest of the review) since they expected it to be better than the first. Granted it isn’t, but since when are sequels ever better than their predecessor? If you said Empire then that’s the only exception I’ll allow.. at least until Blade Runner 2049.. But anyways, this is by no means a bad film, nor does it deserve a 50% on Rotten Tomatoes. So lets get into this, shall we?

So The Golden Circle had some truly great moments, but lets talk about what it didn’t so well with first. The thing that really got me was the opening explosions of the Kingsman headquarters. The film just jumps right into it, and give the audience little to believe that the antagonist truly had a good enough reason to do so. It felt rushed and heartless, and I really wish the film would have added another 15 minutes to its runtime to explain itself a little more for us to feel that emotional strain. Speaking of emotion, this film does a pretty bad job at getting the audience to feel for some characters. I’m not gonna lie, this movie does kill off some main people. Sometimes the emotional impact is felt, and sometimes it isn’t, and that’s incredibly sad. If you don’t feel for characters, then the film isn’t doing a good job defining characters.

Another slight issue I had was with the film’s major twist of sorts. Yeah huge spoiler here (not at all a spoiler), there is a twist in this film that the audience doesn’t see coming at all. And although you probably think you know what I’m talking about if you haven’t seen this film, then you’re wrong. There is an actual twist in this film that just comes out of nowhere, and when the  film has time to explain where the information regarding the twist came from, it doesn’t! Like I understand if the writers want us to question the reasoning behind the twist, but they never thoroughly explain it in the first place leaving the audience to question the use of it.

As for my final real complaint, the antagonist is just.. meh. I’m not going to name the antagonist in this film, but they’re just not good enough. They aren’t menacing, the meat behind their intentions doesn’t have a good enough backbone for the audience to feel threatened by them, and they have no backstory which give us little reason to feel or hate them. The film definitely takes a step down when it comes to The Secret Service‘s villain, as Samuel Jackson had such great depth to his character that you almost rooted for him at times since he was so likable.

The Golden Circle featured an amazing cast that was well acted across the board, but most of the actors in this film were mainly used for marketing purposes. Half the time you never see any of the big names that the poster usually promises us with, and it honestly made me question why they even hired such big named actors to play such small roles. As for the actors that play a large part in the film.. well, they’re great. Taron Egerton hits a home run, yet again, and out of the entire cast I found myself loving Mark Strong and (I can’t believe I’m about to say this) Halle Berry’s characters the most. Both Strong and Berry had so much more weight and emotion put into their characters, that you really feel for the two by the end of the film. Colin Firth’s character was used in a surprising way, as his comeback provided a good amount of development for him as a person, and ultimately gave him more personality.. although some uses of his character felt kinda.. dumb..? I don’t know. I just didn’t like the way they used his character in some scenes.

But what I loved the most about this film was its action shots. Some hate it, some love it, and I’m one of those who thinks it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread. It is by no means a new technique as we saw it with The Secret Service, but the way the camera follows the action sequences through a digitally sliced together single take is beautiful in my eyes as a film lover. The shaky cam is annoying yet understandable, and I can accept why people might have an issue with Vaughn’s style of directing. But to me, I personally love it since it shows you the entire sequence without the constant need to use a million different cuts. Love it or hate it, Vaughn’s unique fighting sequences prove that the industry is not done innovating when it comes to cinematography.

Although it seems like I beat the crap out of this film, I honestly enjoyed it. Sure it had its issues and mistakes, but if you go into it knowing that it might not be a good as the first film, then you’ll end up having a great time. Yes the antagonist is poor, the opening exposition is rushed, and a lot of characters are just thrown into the background, but even with that Kingsman: The Golden Circle is still a pretty good time to be had. Contrary to popular belief, I really enjoy Vaughn’s unique style of directing, and although some might find it immersion breaking, I think it’s a great way to help differentiate the Kingsman series from other films within the genre. Egerton was great again as Eggsy, and both Strong and (surprisingly) Berry provided some great performances and character depth. Although critics might disagree with me on this one, I decided to give Kingsman: The Golden Circle a “Good” on theVade Review Bar. But with all that being said, The Golden Circle is still a sequel shadowed by its beloved predecessor. It’s not a film to break the sequel curse, but it does do a pretty damn good job at trying to.