Expend4bles Blu-ray despite stunning video and reference-quality audio falls short as an overall poor Blu-ray release
Armed with every weapon they can get their hands on and the skills to use them, The Expendables are the world's last line of defense and the team that gets called when all other options are off the table. But new team members with new styles and tactics are going to give "new blood" a whole new meaning.
For more about Expend4bles and the Expend4bles Blu-ray release, see Expend4bles Blu-ray Review published by Jeffrey Kauffman on November 20, 2023 where this Blu-ray release scored 2.0 out of 5.
An inordinate number of often incredibly noisy explosions have recurrently taken place throughout the Expendables franchise, but one of
the
loudest (if figurative)
"booms" may have
been from the bomb this film was at the box office. Cheesy jokes aside, what started out as a kind of fun exercise in employment for action stars
of a
certain age has degenerated into yet another completely formulaic action adventure enterprise that attempts to sustain momentum largely courtesy
of, well, explosions and other loud noises, sadly to little avail. When a very title which at least alludes to aging and a perceived "expiration date"
jettisons its "geezer" aspect for a more demographically appealing (relatively in some cases) younger cast, it may be a pretty potent sign that a
series
has run its course, which frankly may have already happened at least by the time The Expendables 3 came out, especially since that film didn't exactly set the box office on
fire. While Dolph Lundgren as Gunner Jensen, Randy Couture as Toll Road
and most prominently Jason Statham as Lee Christmas are still on hand, Sylvester Stallone's Barney Ross, arguably the "anchor" that held the first
three films together, is consigned to a glorified cameo here that apparently ends in catastrophe (the set up for a late "twist" is more than evident),
with the clear
indication that should this series continue (a highly debatable proposition,
based on this film's spectacular failure at the box office, though of course stranger things have happened in the wild and wooly world of Hollywood),
Statham will no doubt be the focal character going forward.
That perceived "transition" of a focal character is handled in almost spectacularly poor fashion in an often addle pated screenplay (credited to Kurt
Wimmer,
Tad Daggerhart and
Max Adams), with various "issues" actually keeping Christmas away from the brunt of the action for quite a while. This weird tactic may
make veritable "room" for the "new kids on the block" (and/or the ship, as the case may be, since much of the story takes place at sea), but it's
disjunctive at best and positively counterproductive at worst. The "team", which may or may not resemble previous iterations of the Expendables,
is
brought together by a CIA honcho named Marsh (Andy Garcia), on the hunt for an arms dealer named Suarto Rahmat (Iko Uwais), though anyone
with any "spidey sense" for quasi-stunt casting like Garcia may already be intuiting yet another one of this film's less than surprising "twists",
especially when
it's revealed relatively early on that Suarto is an underling of some unknown higher up.
The new if not necessarily improved Expendables consist of Gina (Megan Fox), Christmas' erstwhile girlfriend who of course also works for the CIA,
Lash (Levy Tran), another CIA agent,
Easy Day (Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson), and Galan (Jacob Scipio), supposedly the son of former member Galgo (Antonio Banderas). The film attempts
to globe trot a bit, even if repeated uses of green screen suggest "location" photography may have been minimal and consigned largely to second
units (Greece, Bulgaria and England are listed as actual filming sites),
beginning in Libya but then ventures into Thailand for the rather long sidebar involving Christmas, who ends up recruiting yet another new member,
Decha (Tony Jaa).
This is silly even by Expendables standards, with some needless interpersonal turmoil raising its ugly head only to be almost immediately
supplanted by the expected action adventure scenes, which themselves are kind of rote, even if they do often feature some adrenaline pumping
stunts and (lest it be forgotten) lots of explosions and gunfire. It's apparent this fourth installment wants to continue some of the quasi-
MMA aspects of some of the former entries ( Expendables 3 in particular), but even that aspect is never really fully exploited.
Note: My colleague Brian Orndorf had much the same reaction to Expendables 4 that I did when he assessed its theatrical run.
You can read Brian's thoughts here.
The Expendables 4 is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. Digitally captured with
Sony CineAlta cameras and finished at 4K, when some patently fake looking green screen backgrounds aren't employed, this is a really sharp and
appealing looking transfer. The kind of weird thing about some of the computer aided effects in this piece is that actual CGI tends to be rather well
detailed, with deficits tending to only accrue in background material, for whatever reason (even some scenes that seem like they could have
been shot on real sets, as in the early showdown between Christmas and Gina, look like the backgrounds were green screened). That niggling qualm
aside, the bulk of this presentation offers an often beautifully robust palette and some impressive fine detail levels, especially in the repeated use of
close-ups, where crags in the faces of the more, um, seasoned performers are well defined, and where more mundane items like textures on fabrics are
rendered very precisely.
The Expendables 4 features an expectedly raucous Dolby Atmos mix that provides simultaneous overhead and booming LFE effects in any
number of the film's big action set pieces, starting with the melee in Libya that kicks off the film. Even "smaller" moments like Barney riding his
motorcycle provide good opportunities for rumbly panning effects, and other moments involving everything from gunfire to some kind of disturbing
hand to hand combat (including knives to the neck and other methods of terminating with extreme prejudice) regularly engage the side and rear
channels. Dialogue (such as it is) is rendered cleanly and clearly throughout. Optional English, French and Spanish subtitles are available.
Bigger, Badder, Bolder: The Expendables in Action (HD; 16:57) proves that no amount of alliteration in a bonus item title can
disguise the deficits of a film, though joking aside, this piece wisely focuses on what is probably the film's chief asset, its set pieces.
More Than A Team: New Blood Meets Old Blood (HD; 19:07) offers a look at the cast.
Theatrical Trailer (HD; 1:52)
Lionsgate sent their 4K UHD release for purposes of this review, but it looks like this release offers a digital copy and a slipcover.
Expendables has been a manifest case in point for that oft repeated maxim of the law of diminishing returns, and those returns have
diminished so far by this point, including at the box office, that it's hard to see this franchise continuing, though as stated above, stranger things have
certainly happened in the film industry. There are a few genuinely exciting action set pieces in this film, but it's an often haphazard and almost
intentionally disjointed story that has little of the (relative?) heart and humor that its predecessors did. Technical merits are first rate and the
supplements are surprisingly enjoyable for anyone who may be considering making a purchase.
Expend4bles: Other Editions
4K
3-disc set $32.20
4K SteelBook
2-disc set
Best Buy
4K
2-disc set $18.25
Blu-ray Bundles/Box Sets with Expend4bles (1 bundle)
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