*Premise spoilers.*
Despite my wild enjoyment of the Kingsman franchise, I didn’t rush out to see this prequel film. The biggest factor was simply 2021—during the pandemic, I’ve gone from someone who probably went to the movies at least twice a month, to someone who’s now seen seven movies in theatres in the last year. The King’s Man just didn’t make the list for me, and having now caught it on streaming, I’ve reaffirmed that waiting was the right choice.
As Europe teeters on the brink of the Great War, Orlando Oxford is at odds with his son Conrad. Orlando is a devoted pacifist to begin with, and in particular where Conrad is concerned, he’s rigidly protective after having lost his wife when Conrad was a child. So Orlando is vehemently opposed to Conrad enlisting, but that doesn’t mean that he isn’t doing his part in the war effort. As a compromise, he invites his son into a secret project collecting vital intelligence across Europe, investigating a consortium of nefarious pot-stirrers led by the mysterious Shepherd.
The biggest surprise of this movie, for me, is that Rasputin isn’t the main villain. The trailers prominently featured Rhys Ifans as the duplicitous monk, but Rasputin is actually just one member of the Shepherd’s cabal, albeit a prominent one. The conspiracy reaches multiple countries and sends our prequel heroes on missions to thwart an expansive plot.
Even though I was looking forward to this movie before it came out, I always knew it would have a difficult task measuring up to the rest of the series, especially the first film. I just love Eggsy, Harry, and Merlin as characters, and a prequel set before any of them were born was going to have an uphill battle. I was prepared to grade the movie on a curve allowing for that bias, but honestly? For the most part, it just doesn’t capture that magic. The plot, while less sloppy than The Golden Circle, is kind of bland. The central conflict between Orlando and Conrad is belabored, and I guessed a major twist almost as soon as its mystery was introduced. There are fewer jokes than I’m used to in this franchise, and there are criminally-few audacious action sequences.
I rewatched both Kingsman and The Golden Circle in recent months, and the action in those movies remains astounding. I get that this film is about the founding of the Kingsman, so most of their awesome, gentlemanly spy gadgets haven’t been invented yet. I also get that Orlando is a man who’s opposed to killing on principle, so he’s hardly likely to let loose the way Harry and Eggsy do. But I bet I could count the big action set pieces on one hand, and none of them get close to the inventive, stylish ultraviolence that defines the Kingsman franchise for me.
It's not a bad movie, but it’s a bit of a letdown. None of this is on the actors, by the way, who all do nice work. In addition to the aforementioned Ifans, who’s by turns menacing and hammy as Rasputin, the best comedic work comes from Tom Hollander doing triple duty as apparently identical cousins King George V, Kaiser Wilhelm, and Czar Nicholas II. Ralph Fiennes leads the film with his usual mix of proprietary and empathy, and Harris Dickinson is effective as Conrad (I tried to figure out where I recognized him from—turns out he’s Prince Philip in the Maleficent films.) I enjoy the performances from Djimon Hounsou and Gemma Arterton as proto-Kingsman (a.k.a. Orlando’s servants,) and the film also features the always-welcome Matthew Goode and Aaron-Taylor Johnson.
Warnings
Violence, language, sexual content, drinking/smoking, and thematic elements.
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