Review – Bad Boys: Ride or Die
Is there still gas in the tank, or should the Bad Boys hang up their cuffs?
After nearly 30 years, Bad Boys should be ready to ride off into retirement. True, Dom Torretto and Ethan Hunt are still kicking around, but their franchises have more movies and have cleverly reinvented themselves over the decades. Mike Lowrey (Will Smith) and Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawerence) are still tooling around Miami, trading quips and busting drug runners. It should be time to fade away.
And yet, Bad Boys: Ride or Die, the fourth entry in the buddy-cop franchise, suggests that Lawrence and Smith aren’t quite too old for this shit. The film, once again directed by Adil el Arbi and Bilall Fallah, hits the same beats and tells the same jokes that the series has been doing since 1995. But even if it’s not fresh, it’s often fun, and long-time fans will likely still consider themselves – appropriately – ride or die.
Picking up a few years after the events of Bad Boys for Life, the film finds Mike and Marcus investigating a corruption scandal involving their late captain (Joe Pantoliano, still entertaining even when literally phoning it in). Although ally-turned-boss Rita (Paola Núñez) advises them to let internal affairs sort it out, Marcus and Mike break rank and attempt to clear their dead friend’s name, an action that eventually finds them on the run — not only from their captain’s killer but from every gang in Miami and a U.S. Marshal (Rhea Seehorn) with a personal stake in the case.
Four movies in, you don’t go to a Bad Boys movie for the mystery and intriguing plotting and, once again, the script – credited to Chris Bremner, Will Beall and George Gallo – is the series’ typical mix of double-crosses, abrupt reversals, and excuses to spin Marcus and Mike into a series of shootouts, fist fights and chase. This story is particularly wafer-thin; as soon as the film introduced one side character with a little too much backstory in its first 10 minutes, I knew exactly that he’d be the one on the other side of a gun in the climax.
But the thing about long-running franchises like this is that, after a while, the plot doesn’t really matter. The series takes on the appeal of a long-running sitcom, where we audiences just want to see what trouble Marcus and Mike will get themselves into this time. And Ride or Die finds some new wrinkles to throw the partners’ way.
This is, of course, a bit of career rehabilitation for Smith following not only some high-profile box office stumbles but also an autobiography that struck many as angry and self-aggrandizing and The Slap. In past years, Smith’s position as the world’s biggest star was what prevented a Bad Boys movie from being made; now, it’s Smith who needs this franchise to keep his career afloat. And the film gives Mike a reason to be more emotionally vulnerable and dial back the swagger, pushing the character just a smidge off to the side and letting Marcus have the big arc this time out. Smith still brings it with the action and looks like he’s genuinely enjoying himself with the comedy, but the attempts to regain viewers’ sympathy – including an overt Slap reference late in the film – are very apparent.
Lawrence, meanwhile, seems to be having the time of his life back in Marcus’s shoes. One of the most enjoyable aspects of the franchise has been Marcus’s attempts to find some peace, which is usually thwarted by villains and his partner. Marcus just wants to come home to his wife, and some of the film’s funniest gags have seen the character trying out therapy and renouncing violence, only to be pulled back into the chaos. Ride or Die finds a new way to bring some peace into the character’s life, as Marcus suffers a near-fatal heart attack in the film’s opening and comes back with visions of the other side and a newfound confidence. While I never expected a Bad Boys movie to take a strong stance on the existence of the afterlife, Lawrence makes a potentially hacky joke funny with his misplaced serenity and his constant attempts to spiritually coach Mike. While Smith may be the series’ biggest star, Lawrence has transitioned into its MVP, delivering some of his funniest work.
Where Bad Boys for Life tried to add a younger crew as a bit of an insurance policy on its aging stars, Ride or Die finds a way to incorporate them more organically. Vanessa Hudgins and Alexander Ludwig are fun additions as squad members also carrying on a relationship on the sly. Núñez’s Rita appears to have undergone a personality rewrite between the third and fourth films; her previously badass squad leader is now a political, by-the-books captain, but she’s a used well in the film’s final act. Seehorn doesn’t get to rise to the occasion of her outstanding work on Better Call Saul, but she’s a fierce foil as the U.S. Marshal out to recapture Marcus and Mike. And I like the menace Eric Dane brings as the villainous military official behind the whole thing. At times, Ride or Die risks turning into The Fast and the Furious with all of its new characters and the soap opera additions from previous entries – the film’s big weakness might be the way the last film backed it into the corner with Jacob Scipio, who returns but has little to do as Mike’s imprisoned son – but it moves fast and has a sense of humor about itself, so it doesn’t get bogged down like those films often do.
Adil and Bilall, as they go by, infused a new energy into Bad Boys for Life, pulling back on the Bayhem while also experimenting with new ways to bring chaos. Ride or Die continues to benefit from their innovativeness. There are the du rigeur chases and gunfights; there’s a fantastic home invasion set piece – viewed by the characters via computer screens – that draws cheers for a minor character; and there’s a pretty thrilling plane crash sequence. The movie goes crazy in its climax, set at a defunct wildlife park and featuring a shootout that incorporates drone footage, constantly spinning cameras and first-person POVs (there are a lot more deaths by alligators in this movie than we typically see). It’s an exhilarating, thrilling capper to the film, and it sends the audience out on a high.
Is a fourth Bad Boys movie a high water mark of action cinema? Absolutely not, and I don’t know that it quite measures up to the last entry (my favorite in the franchise). But it’s perfect June movie fodder, a breezy, fun and exciting diversion on a hot summer night with two charismatic leads at its center. Am I ride or die on this series? Probably not. But I wouldn’t say no to one more go-round in a few years.