Expendables 3

Four years after Sylvester Stallone paid tribute to the action films of the 1970s and 1980s with The Expendables, the series’ third installment has been released. Directed by Patrick Hughes, the film features returning cast members Stallone, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture, Terry Crews and Arnold Schwarzenegger with Kellan Lutz, Ronda Rousey, Glen Powell, Victor Ortiz, Robert Davi, Kelsey Grammer, Wesley Snipes, Mel Gibson, Antonio Benderas, and Harrison Ford.

After Conrad Stonebanks (Gibson), former member and co-founder of the Expendables has surfaced and is determined to destroy the team, causing Barney Ross (Stallone) to recruit old and new allies to take him down once and for all.

As with the first two, Expendables 3 is not one of those movies watched for the plot, which is paper-thin. But, while the film has an even larger cast of talented actors offering no small amount of action, Expendables 3 just isn’t fun. There’s far too many characters to care about, which really overshadows Gibson’s somewhat enjoyable villainous performance as well as Banderas’ humorous acting as the manic Galgo. Furthermore, in an effort to top itself over the previous two films, it goes beyond overkill.

Gibson as Stonebanks is moderately enjoyable. He’s one of two new characters the film tries to give depth to with a backstory, by making him the disillusioned co-founder of the Expendables who betrayed the team to sell illegal weapons. He has just the right mix of smugness and insanity to make him an enjoyable villain, such as when he’s acting coy to a buyer for his weaponry about having nuclear weapons but not wanting to sell them. Banderas is the other new character with something of a past as the lone survivor of a botched mission with the Spanish Armed Forces. He joins Ross so he can make peace with his survivor’s guilt. The character is quite humorous and manic in his desire to be part of another team and love for killing enemies. However, with the film having nine new characters alongside nine returning characters, Gibson is overshadowed and Banderas is underutilized. To its credit though, the film does attempt to give Doctor Death (Snipes) and John Smilee (Lutz) pasts, but Death is just a former Expendable who spent eight years in a secret prison, making him a little loopy and Smilee is simply an ex-marine with an attitude problem.

The film also tries too hard to top itself from the previous two, but it goes horrendously overboard. “Expendables” had the team up against a dictator and his soldiers. In “Expendables 2” the team fought an arms dealer and his mercenary group. “Expendables 3” has Stonebanks setting a country’s entire army against the heroes. And they all manage to get through with everyone and everything completely intact. There’s nothing wrong with heroes facing insurmountable odds but when they don’t seem to have too a hard time facing them, the film becomes far less enjoyable. It should feel like there’s more of a challenge when 15 men and a helicopter go against multiple ground troops, tanks and helicopters. Yin Yang (Lee), Drummer (Ford) and Mauser (Schwarzenegger) showing up in the middle of the fight in the helicopter was also telegraphed a mile away and could have been a better moment had the film not shown them coming in two other scenes.

Expendables 3 isn’t awfully terrible. But by no means can it be considered good in any way. It’s one of those movies someone watches when there’s two hours to kill, but really nothing better to do. There’s a few good moments and a couple decent characters, but they can’t really carry the entire film. The first “Expendables” made sense. Stallone wanted to have fun with old action actors by making a pumped up nod to the action films of the 70s and 80s. But two sequels don’t make sense. And neither does a confirmed fourth one that’s expected to have Pierce Brosnan and Hulk Hogan.

Expendables 3 won't drop into the Edge of Dissatisfaction, but it'll barely miss it and come in at #6 under Jersey Boys.