Gladiator II Review: Ridley Scott’s sequel is actually a shadow but an entertaining one

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Gladiator II Review: Plot: More than two decades after the events of Gladiator (2000), we now meet the grandson of Rome's former emperor Marcus Aurelius and son of Lucilla (Connie Nielsen) and Maximus (Russell Crowe), Lucius (Paul Mescal). Lucius lives with his wife and child in Numidia because he is sent away by Lucilla to be kept safe from the swords of the men who want him dead because of his claim to the throne of Rome. But destiny decides to give him his father's fate as he returns to the Roman arena as a Prisoner Of War and made Gladiator to fight not just the brutal beings, but the throne to save his mother and win what is rightfully his.

Gladiator II Review: Analysis

The art of making movies that can use their strong aspects to hide the flaws is quite remarkable because even when your job is not fully done well, you can cover up and be the winner. This art comes with fine talent and experience like Sir Ridley Scott has. The filmmaker, who now adds one more sequel to his list of limited part-twos of his film universe, has for years been a filmmaker who can captivate you with his visual brilliance and dramatic storytelling strong enough that you never question the flaws, if any. The filmmaker now moves on to making a sequel to his only Best Picture Oscar-winning movie after over two decades and many silent revolutions later to tell the story of the Roman Bros fighting for the seat of Rome, completely ignoring the fact that even women exist in the world and that both genders crashed on earth at the same time.

Enter Gladiator II. A movie that takes the politics of the Roman Empire, the vibe, and visual language two decades ahead where now we are watching the second generation of Maximus suffering the similar if not same fate he did in his time. Now, Scott has always had the ability to tell stories rooted in a certain time, be it historic, or future, or a genre-bending present with touches of reality. Or maybe with the Gladiator franchise, he has just been purely lucky. While men make decisions on behalf of the spectrum of identities and genders like the rest do not exist in the President’s office for real in certain parts of the world, the movie brings back the story of an age in history that did the same. Women were just easy baits, and they still are. So as much as Ridley shapes history on screen, there is also the uncomfortable present lurking through and in it.

Written by David Scarpa and Peter Craig (both also credited for the story), Gladiator II is an old bottle of wine with a new packaging. The blueprint of the film remains that of the old one but with drama that is probably notches higher than that of the Russell Crowe starrer. We meet the hero the same way we did the last time as the clan sings songs about his valor. He soon has to prove himself as he is thrown into the pit to become the Gladiator who will ultimately challenge the man (or men, in the sequel's case) to take over his rightful throne. It is always a story about how love wins, and family is everything, but told through different perspectives: those of the swords, the soldiers, and the kings (never the women or their absence).

But even when Gladiator II is a shadow of the original, it still works because it does the one thing that it has set out to do: entertain. Ridley Scott, like I said, is a man who cannot go wrong in captivating audiences for those odd two hours thirty minutes because he has done this a lot of times to pull it off again. He packages the replica of the old tale so well that it takes you some time to realize that destiny is repeating itself, and so are the writers and the director involved. That is the power of experience that knows how to brand and package well. The games are now updated because the oppressors got 20 years to think about new ways to entertain themselves by killing more slaves. Where swords and carnivores were not enough, they now have a pond with sharks, with Gladiators having to fight on ships. Where tigers were not enough, they have ape-like animals who directly pluck out bones with the flesh.

So you know the director in charge is up to something. What he is also up to is adding an empathetic man in Pedro Pascal towards the only consequential woman who has the privilege of being alive in the franchise. The rest are either dead to become motivation to the main man or standing in the background, looking into the oblivion of their very existence. So even if there is a man who has accepted a woman who still loves her dead former husband, and says he loves her a lot in his final moments, it is not enough when she is the only woman in your story. Similarly, it is not okay to drag a story until a point where you realize you now have to pace up things and rush to the climax and through it. Everything after a certain point feels like, “The audience knows what happens now, let's just do it quickly and run home.”

The performances make Gladiator II a spectacle that it aspires to. There is so much in Paul Mescal’s silence that his gaze pierces, and the actor knows how to use it. For the first good thirty minutes, the man has almost no dialogue, and he still captivates and holds you with his performance. Add to it, he has a stellar Denzel Washington by his side, who goes through a detailed character graph and a very fascinating and interesting one in the story. The actor proves why he is a Hollywood legend, and you should bow to him because he now also joins the Marvel Cinematic Universe with Black Panther 3.

The visuals are breathtaking as they serve as the perfect follow-up to Gladiator (2000) that created history with the use of technology and brains. The music fits correctly, and so does the production design that is so detailed and well-aged.

Gladiator II Review: Final Verdict

Gladiator II is a film that aspires to be a stunning sequel, and it also manages to be but cannot go beyond the boundaries of the original. It is entertaining regardless, and that makes it worth the watch.