You know what I want to see? A movie featuring Vin Diesel beating up a bunch of gun-wielding bad guys. That would be something novel and new, wouldn’t it?
The first trailer for Diesel’s upcoming Bloodshot is here and it features Vin doing what Vin does: smashing faces and punching dudes and getting mad at pencil-pushing whimps who want to tell him what to do. You can’t tell Vin Diesel what to do, Guy Piece! Vin is going to do what Vin wants to do!
Bloodshot, based on the popular Valiant comic book series, follows a soldier who is killed in battle and then brought back to life via nanobot technology in his blood. But the insidious corporation that grants him a second chance at life has some secrets and ulterior movies and Vin is none too happy when he finds out.
The plot for the film actually isn’t too bad and ironically resembles that of Memento, also starring Guy Pierce. The downside here is that director Dave Wilson is leaning into the Diesel aspect of the movie and is heavily relying on action-movie sameness. A clever story looks muddled by the big blow-‘em-up action and gunplay. Hopefully the promise of some intelligence in this trailer isn’t completely drowned out by the loud, typical explosiveness also on display.
Diesel has been hungry for another franchise to lead for some time. In my opinion, the man sees himself as a bigger cinematic force than he is. Don’t get me wrong, Diesel can be fun in the right environment but that environment is pretty much Fast and the Furious and ONLY Fast and the Furious. I just don’t know if Bloodshot is something audiences want and I definitely don’t know if it’s going to spawn a brand new series like Diesel is hoping for. Most importantly, I don’t know if it’ll be any good. It has some promise and some brains but it also has Vin Diesel being his usual action-movie self. We’ll see if those two sides can co-exist.
Bloodshot opens February 21, 2020.
