Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Fistful of Vengeance’ on Netflix, a Feature-Length Continuation of ‘Wu Assassins,’ Bringing Back Iko Uwais for More Violent Action

Fistful of Vengeance is Netflix’s feature-length continuation of Wu Assassins, a 2019 martial arts fantasy series that lasted one season. The movie brings back stars Iko Uwais, Lewis Tan and Lawrence Kao for a revenge mission that quickly becomes a battle to save the whole of reality from going kersplat via the hands of an evil demigod. Don’t you HATE IT when that happens? But maybe it won’t be so terrible if we watch it happen to other people, especially when those other people can punch and kick folks like the dickens.

FISTFUL OF VENGEANCE: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: BANGKOK. Tommy Wah (Kao) is mad bummed because someone murdered his sister Jenny. He and pals Lu Xin Lee (Tan) and Kai Jin (Uwais) followed a lead to Thailand to find the killer and give them the thing in the title of the movie. You may remember from Wu Assassins that Kai has the martial arts power of 1,000 monks, which is nothing to scoff at – I mean, he can summon magic to help him punch and kick his way out of scrapes. Lu is just an average badass who can wallop people, but now that the guy playing him headlined Mortal Kombat in the time since the series debuted, he and Kai pretty much get equal billing here. Such is the way of the pop-cultural whim.

Anyway, their quest leads them to a nightclub where they brawl with not-quite-human foes right on the dance floor. Such brutally violent scenes must be commonplace, because nobody ever stops dancing as guys throat-chop each other to death and/or unleash mystical moves that banish each other to eternity and whatnot. (Or maybe everyone is just suuuuuuper stoned.) The brouhaha draws the attention of a magical rich guy named William Pan (Jason Tobin), who happens to be the virtuous yin to his sister’s evil yang – they’re demigods who’ve been alive for millennia. Pan’s sibling Ku An Qi (Rhatha Phongam) is bent on reshaping the world into a place that’ll be shitty for everybody, because, if I’m reading this right, CHAOS REIGNS, and order is for suckers. Apparently, Jenny got in Ku’s way and Ku killed her, but not before she gave a piece of a magic MacGuffin to Tommy, which he wears around his neck. This MacGuffin is very important, because people keep fighting over it by punching and kicking each other, sometimes with glowing fists.

But they can’t do it alone. Tommy’s old friend and a girl he once sex’d with, Preeya (Francesca Corney), joins the save-the-world squad, as does kick-butt Interpol agent Zama (Pearl Thusi). Ku is affiliated with Triad gangsters, so she has an endless supply of minions and chodes at her disposal, and dispose of them our crew indeed does, punching and kicking and kicking and punching, which is obviously the one and only means to battle such a mighty existential threat. (Remember, nobody in Kung Fu Theater ever bested bad guys via transcendental meditation or passive resistance.) It’s worth noting that Zama is the pragmatist of the bunch who’s “just trying to wrap my head around this supernatural shit and the world ending,” and therefore, when her new compadres are distracted from the inevitability of total annihilation, as one is wont to do, because one can’t survive in this life without a little compartmentalization, she gets them back on track by saying, “Do I need to remind you that we need to stop a god from destroying reality?” And then we sit back and watch the global population noticeably dip as they get back to killing the tar out of the bad guys.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Fistful of Vengeance mixes the cheapo production values of a CW superhero series – like, I dunno, Legends of Tomorrow? – with The Fast and the Furious crew-bonding scenes and generic mystical-ninja-crapola stuff along the lines of The Forbidden Kingdom or that forgettable Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon sequel. Frankly, this attempt to reinvigorate Wu Assassins into franchisedom probably wouldn’t exist without the popularity of Mortal Kombat or Shang-Chi.

Performance Worth Watching: Uwais, gifted martial artist and star of The Raid movies, fades into the wallpaper here, likely de-emphasized for Tan, who exerts a little more charisma here.

Memorable Dialogue: Kai meets Preeya’s wise uncle, who philosophizes in circles, and lives in a reality that recognizes the existence of Netflix’s streaming competitors:

Kai: You speak like Yoda, old man.

Uncle: Baby Yoda. I’m only 50.

Sex and Skin: Zama and Lu shtoink in one of the most awkwardly staged sex scenes since The Room.

Our Take: Fistful of Vengeance boasts three, maybe four nifty action sequences, and the rest is pointless and impenetrable plot sludge. Director Roel Reine (whose resume includes cheap sequels to Hard Target, The Marine, The Scorpion King, the Death Wish remake and other such crud) stages chases, shootouts, machetes and meat cleaver clashes, one-on-ones and one-on-twos with formidable chopsocky opponents and other episodes of violence with enough visual dynamics to almost make it worth sitting through the film’s grueling exposition dumps. Almost, because this overcomplicated plot never inspires any sense of drama or tension or psychological exertion, any investment in the characters or concern for whether they survive all this or not – and the outcome is inevitable.

Problem is, this is fantasy martial arts fodder, so Reine and the rest of the film’s creative braintrust seem to believe that we won’t be content with Iko Uwais speedbagging an evildoer’s breastbone or facing down a pair of foes clad in the outlandish leather and spikes of a Swedish black metal singer. That stuff is pretty nifty, but this is a “modern” movie, so it therefore must stir big viscous wads of neon CGI into the visual mix, and when such an instance fails to adhere to any sense of internal rules or logic, a character exclaims something along the lines of, “Wow! Damn! Magic!” Ergo, the big climactic showdown between Uwais and the big-boss villain doesn’t consist of parries and dodges, maneuvers and counter-maneuvers, well-placed blows and blocks, but green-screen nonsense: Our hero, dangling on a rope through a hole into another universe, trying to take out a berobed guru-type who’s also dangling on a rope through a hole into another universe. This is stupid, and it sucks.

Our Call: Because Fistful of Vengeance is stupid, and it sucks, it’s not a particularly good use of your time. SKIP IT.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com.

Stream Fistful of Vengeance on Netflix