The inevitable curse of sequels coming with a diminishing return is more or less expected by familiar moviegoers. For some reason, capturing lightning in a bottle can be as hard as it physically sounds. The original RED (2010) was a unique action comedy that was very much a lighter toned version of Sylvester Stallone's The Expendables (2010). A dangerous mission involving lethally trained old people who still pack a punch. Based on an obscure DC Comic of the same name, the film managed to be successful either way thanks to its leads and execution of the story. While three years is about average for sequel output, it is no surprise that RED 2 (2013) doesn't meet its original in the same way. However, considering the changes in crewmembers, the decline was not profound.
Continuing roughly where the last film ended, Frank Moses (Bruce Willis) and Sarah Ross (Mary-Louise Parker) are now together trying to live a normal life as intended. Until they are visited once again by their past, this time being Marvin Boggs (John Malkovich). It is there they are pursued by Jack Horton (Neal McDonough) looking to lock them down over a missing nuclear device. Apparently, the device was reported during an earlier time in Frank's career trying to protect a physicist named Dr. Bailey (Anthony Hopkins). Written again by Jon and Erich Hoeber, the screenplay is probably why the experience of watching this sequel doesn't feel like such a misfire; since they worked on the first entry. Directing this time though was Dean Parisot, known for his work on Galaxy Quest (1999), Fun with Dick and Jane (2005) and most recently after this film Bill & Ted Face the Music (2020).
For what it’s worth, the overall execution is fine. Willis, Malkovich, and Parker as the main three still work well off each other. What feels to be one of the drawbacks to this entry, is the relationship between Frank and Sarah. Even for the first film, old man Moses paired up with Ms. Ross just seemed like a mismatch in age. Here, Sarah continues to try and connect with her ex-CIA partner, which comes with very common tropes seen in other rom-com sub-genre movies. When traveling the world, it is revealed that Frank was swooned over by another field agent by the name of Major General Katja Petrokovich (Catherine Zeta-Jones). Want to guess where that subplot goes? Another problem with the story is that more characters were thrown in as well. There's also appearances from David Thewlis, Byung-hun Lee, as well as returns from Brian Cox and Helen Mirren. It just feels very cramped.
And with the amount of characters put into play, there's one scene that seems be edited in the wrong order. This actually messes with the execution when realized and it’s unfortunate. Instead of one character chasing the protagonists like in the first film, now there's almost three times as many. It's unfortunate when Neal McDonough is pretty much a copy of Karl Urban's character in the first film. Aside from this though, the actors still play off each other well. Some of the comedic lines are delivered adequately, while other times it falls flat. This is mainly due to the relationship plotline. Anything outside of that thread though tends to work better. The action still entertains though, featuring similar things that have been shown before such as gunfights, explosions and other goofy antics. There's a scene with a helicopter that's pretty hilarious.
As for visuals, this time camerawork was shot by Enrique Chediak. Sadly, this crewmember has well-known credits to this name like 28 Weeks Later (2007), 127 Hours (2010), Intruders (2011), The Maze Runner (2014), Deepwater Horizon (2016), Bumblebee (2018) and the Lady and the Tramp (2019) remake, but this sequel is not really one of them. Not to say it's shot badly,...by no means. But it's just nothing out of the ordinary, just like the first film's cinematography. Music though was an acceptable element to this sequel. Again, this also had a change in hands. Instead of Christophe Beck's clicky synthetic percussion based score from the first film, comes Alan Silvestri doing his best to mimic that style. While the sound is more organic using more classic orchestra, there are still jazzy motifs viewers will hear that keeps to the tone of the first movie. Not bad considering Silvestri isn't really cut from the same cloth as Beck.
For a sequel, it's okay. It's not an average follow up since the actors still have the chemistry, the music still fits the tone and action comedy elements still entertain; to an extent. Like the first film though, camerawork is still nothing to talk about, the romcom elements feel too familiar and the amount of characters packs the story more than necessary.
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