Subscribe to our RSS FeedBlog

Is the Boondock Saints sequel worth it? November 14th, 2009 Posted by Brian Bowler

To all Boondock Saints fans, as most of you know; two things make a great sequel: the same cast/crew, and a well thought out plot. It has been 10 years of expectations growing and I am here to tell you it was everything it was meant to be.

The plot? You would insist upon that, wouldn't you? Boondock II picks up where Boondock I left off, with the pious Brothers MacManus having reunited with their equally Lord-praising and ammunition-passing father Poppa M, who is implausibly played by the Scots comic Billy Connolly.

They've been pursuing quiet lives as sheep lovers in Ireland, having asked themselves What Jesus Would Do about gangsters, and having decided that Jesus would want them to shoot up a Boston courtroom.

The vicious killing of a priest back home in Boston seems to be linked to the unfinished business of that courtroom shootout a decade earlier, and it pulls the Saints out of retirement and on a slow boat stateside. Whereupon they meet trigger-happy Mexican admirer Romeo, who provides a handy whipping boy whenever a racist gag is needed. Collins also subs for David Della Rocco's clumsy comedian character from the first picture, which is reduced to a cameo this time.

So far, so predictable. But the one casting coup that Duffy couldn't pull off, rehiring Willem Dafoe to reprise gay psychic FBI sleuth Paul Smecker who so enlivened the first film, has been turned from a loss into a big win by Dafoe's replacement Julie Benz, a real firecracker. Her Special Agent Eunice Bloom, aide to Smecker, continues the Boondock Saints tradition of recreating the battles committed by Connor, Murphy and now Romeo. The very sexy Ms. Benz takes no prisoners, unless they're first filled with lead, and her over-the-top re-enactments of the latest MacManus mayhem make her seem like Annie Oakley on peyote.

All this, and Duffy still manages to pull it off, meet me back here in 2019 for Boondock Saints 3.
- Filed Under:
- Reviews
- Post a Comment