The thinking man's schlock: Nobody

I was onboard for John Wick with Bob Odenkirk, i.e. Nobody, the concept of it at least. I liked what I saw of the John Wick series, but you can tell it's for a younger audience so to speak, despite Keanu getting a little long in the tooth at this point, he still appeals to "my" generation and younger, he's more recognisable. Odenkirk's become popular via Better Call Saul (I'm dying for the last season), and his character here's pretty fun, just I'm not a man and I don't know what it's like to be emasculated by robbers. Look, I get being pissed your daughter's had something stolen off her, that's your last straw, but this is kinda ridiculous in terms of me being able to root for a guy who couldn't let that shit go. I'm sure it's really clear to a family man who loves guns and can't handle simply protecting them with commonsense logic in the form of not fighting back. So this feels a little like parody, it's comedic but the drama's there it's just harder to really champion this guy's solutions to his problems. It's a romp. What do you do with a guy who's still got that blood-lust from the war, who can't change his stripes but wants to just settle down?

You have fun with it, I guess. And I'm having fun but I feel like this is supposed to be more cerebral than John Wick, the idea this is a shared universe movie absolutely annoys me, even if you have a writer in common, you trust that writer knows where to draw lines in the sand. Audiences sit and come up with "wouldn't it be cool if?", some indie movie sites pick it up as a clickbait article, you read it and roll your eyes. Yet Nobody's definitely got more going for it in terms of character and charm. It's more fun to say, "What if a guy like Bob Odenkirk had a bad day and went John Wick on a bunch of motherfuckers?" That's it. But this is still the thinking man's John Wick. You're exploring the consequences of toxic masculinity and grey moral values. This is Falling Down if Michael Douglas had access to more guns and questionable ex-military contacts, but managed to maintain his marriage and keep his kids. Oh, you also get Christopher Lloyd packin' heat. This wins.