TAKEN 2 Trailer Shows Serious Promise Without Reinventing Wheel

• Tweet
• Pin It

More kidnappings, more joint-cracking, more improvised explosives.  So who’s complaining?

There’s a sort of novel, equal-and-opposite-reaction directness to the premise behind Taken 2.  Basically, the villains from the first film wake up to realize that Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) has just done a very efficient job of killing an entire gross of their closest friends and co-conspirators, and they are coming to terms with their feelings on the matter.  I guess if I went with six or seven of my closest buddies to knock off a liquor store, and the clerk mowed down everybody but me, I’d probably hold some resentment toward said clerk for killing off the bro brigade.  To the point that, like, maybe some revenge would be in order.

It’s kind of like the scene in The Three Amigos where the henchmen come crawling back to bawl to El Guapo, “They called us scum-sucking pigs!  Us!” Sure, they’re in the wrong, but they’re still pissed.  Right?  And in my book, any film that is worthy of a comparison to The Three Amigos is worthy of my nearly undivided attention.  Half-dressed girls clinging to a ledge don’t hurt, either.  Have a look at the trailer:

So right off the bat, you have to notice that the bad guys are going to kidnap one of Mills’ loved ones to get things moving.  Is it because “Taken” is still in the title?  Somebody has to be taken, is that it?  Still, it only bothers me a little bit, because it’s the same group of guys that are pulling off the caper, and their motivation comes as a direct result of events in the original film.  In other words, a true sequel.  A continuation.  If we get out to Taken 3 and suddenly Jeremy Irons shows up as Rade Serbedzija’s brother and kidnaps Liam Neeson’s dog, then we’ll have something to bitch about.  For now, I can suspend skepticism, if not disbelief.

Meantime, the producers seem to be promising a steady diet of broken bones and inappropriate behavior with heavy ordinance, presented with hypertension-inducing pace.

Taken 2 is set for release on October 5th.