Guilty Pleasures #38 - Sequel Month - Now You See Me 2

Now You See Me was my first Guilty Pleasures review and of course in June of last year a sequel came out. Do I like it as much as I did the first one, in many ways, actually kinda more but I will explain that later.

Now You See Me was a dumb movie, dumb but extremely fun to watch because of character dynamics and spectacle. Now You See Me 2 was not as successful either critically or commercially as the original. So, what does the sequel have in store? Let’s take a look

We start with a look at the Lionel Shrike’s final trick, there is no plot whatsoever to anyone who’s seen the first one, so I’m glossing over it. Spoiler Alert: Lionel doesn’t make it. Though they know enough about the safe to attain why it went wrong but not enough to know he’d died, since the insurance company didn’t play out.

We cut to the present day, Thaddeus Bradley, who has the upmost luxury in his prison cell, is broadcasting to the world, something I didn’t know you could do in prison. He warns the Horseman they will get what’s coming to them. He believes in an Eye for an Eye.

We cut to J Daniel Atlas, now sporting very short hair thanks to having it shaved off for Batman vs Superman. He enters a secret room and places his phone down on a weird table rather than in his pocket like a normal person. They’ve been living in hiding for one year and he’s grown increasingly less interested in Dylan as their leader. A voice strokes his ego, telling him the time will soon be upon them.

At the FBI, we learn that Dylan has been sending the FBI on wild goose chases and they’ve all had enough, especially since his latest endeavour involves carrier pigeons. Not sure if he’s being deliberately stupid here or thinks that any of this is for a moment convincing. Hint: it isn’t. Also, I don’t know who the other two characters are, I think the jackass might have been in the original but I don’t care, he’s just a jackass.

J Daniel Atlas enters his apartment and finds a woman there, she uses a gag out of a Looney Tunes cartoon to fake her death, using a body double and a secret compartment in the sofa. Atlas ties her up but she escapes easily, one of her many, many talents. We find out here that Henley’s left the Horseman. Isla Fisher, who played her, was pregnant and couldn’t take part in production. Who knows if she’ll be in the third. She leaves

We cut to somewhere where we find out that Jack has been teaching Merrit the art of card tricks whilst Merrit has been teaching Jack hypnotism, neither are particularly good until the plot needs them to be. Atlas arrives, explaining about the girl who we find out is to be the new ‘girl horseman’ for the team. *Sigh* oh and her name is Lula. Come on guys, try harder than that!

So, the scheme is to expose a company called Outa, who plan to siphon data from their new phones in order to sell it to the black market. In this day and age, this would easily get leaked and the internet would do its job of punishing assholes who do stupid sh*t.

So, their plan goes like this. Jack poses as a security guard to steel a banana, seriously. J Daniel Atlas poses as a porter, then quick-changes into a Lawyer to get the CEO, Owen Case, to sign something, then quick changes into an electrician, snaps a mental health band on the actual electrician and steals his identity. Good job none of the security guys knew who the electrician was or this plan would’ve failed. He wants to call his lawyer but Jack swaps his phone for a banana to sell the illusion that he was crazy. Lula stages a scene where she gets her arm cut off, this serves some purpose I’m sure, meanwhile Merrit gets to Owen and hypnotises him. He does an intro on a video screen, something that could’ve easily been pre-recorded and scuppered this plan but anyway, welcome on stage, the 4 Horsemen.

It's here where things start to go awry, the FBI turn up, having been given an anonymous tip and someone appears on the screen, outing Jack as still alive and revealing Dylan’s part of the game. Because the FBI are willing to believe a guy whose face you can’t even see, they try and arrest Dylan, and Dylan decides to fight back, despite the fact the only evidence against him at this point is the word of a faceless nobody. The Horsemen head to the roof and head down a chute and the next thing we know, they’re in China, why? Because the Chinese audience is massive and this movie made more money in China than anywhere else.

Then we’re introduced to… oh joy, Chase, twin brother of Merrit and played by the same actor. As if he wasn’t annoying enough in one role. He captures them and tells them he hypnotised Merrit to gain information about their plan, which he had on his computer apparently. He takes the Horseman to the Sands Hotel and are taken up to Chase’s boss, Harry Potter, well, it's the same actor. This is Walter Nabry, a business tycoon who died a year ago, inspired by Jack’s faked death. He likes being off the grid, so he can be an anonymous shareholder in many companies, breaking a lot of laws. Look, in a world with security cameras, people with phones, the internet and basically everything being off the grid is impossible. At least a few people would’ve seen your face when you entered this hotel for example.

So, more info is revealed, they used hypnotic sounds and strobe lighting in the tube to make them fall asleep and hijinks ensued on the plane. Walter Wants a chip he and his former business partner Owen designed, he was kicked out of his own company after Owen exposed his private files. What was it, Porn? Harry Potter watches Porn, try keeping that image out of your head. He asks the Horsemen to get it. Offering to use his influence that he has somehow to give them a clean slate and of course, not killing them. J Daniel Atlas agrees on behalf of the team.

Meanwhile, Dylan gets a call from Thaddeus, who taunts him and says they need to speak face to face. He uses Cowan’s (the jackass) ID to enter the prison, a prison of guards that should recognise him, he’s been to the prison before. Thaddeus knows where the Horsemen are and wants to be released. Dylan breaks him out and finds out the Horsemen are in Macau, but that he wasn't directly involved.

J Daniel Atlas has a plan, they will pull of the robbery and give the chip, the mcguffin of the movie to his contact in the Eye. They head into Macau’s oldest magic shop to get some custom-made goodies for the trick. Chase takes his brother for a surprise so we can have the joy of listening to them talk, and by joy, I mean about as much as a drill to your testicles. Jack tries to hypnotise Chase but fails because the plot doesn’t need him to be able to do that yet yet. Oh and Lula and Jack talk about girls whilst she demonstrates she’s a good sneak thief. Strike two, movie

Now, the trick itself. By co-incidence the chip is about the same size as a playing card so they’ll have to brush up on card tricks. Naturally by the end of the montage, Merrit will be suddenly good at it. So, they enter a casino and hypnotise a South African gangster named Hannes Pike, so he’ll let his security detail and woman (for some reason) go in alone to inspect the chip.

The next morning at the science centre, the centre of all science, the Horsemen enter the building, Lula is thought to be a famous doctor and we see she has some astounding scientific knowledge, ok that’s strike 3. The actor who plays Lula I have no problems with, she’s charming and funny and brings a definite charm, but her character isn’t well written. She’s a bit of a Mary Sue, or at least we haven’t seen any definitive character flaws like we have with the others. Anyway, Jack “forgets” to take out his wallet passing through the metal detector, and they conveniently leave it on the wrong side so it can come into play later. Merrit feigns an allergic reaction to hermetic seals (because that's believable?) allowing Jack to steal the chip and plant a card in it's place, the convenience of that being possible is astounding. Having noticed his absence, the lead guard wants them searched but thanks to some card flipping and thank god the chip is flexible, they manage to avoid detection, they throw the card through the gate at the same time as the wallet coming back through to avoid detection.

Dylan and Thaddeus arrive in Macau and head to the magic shop to ask, the most likely way of finding someone I’m sure. Dylan receives a watch that belonged to his father and sees the prototype of the safe he did the trick in. Thaddeus uses a sarcophagus to make his escape. The FBI find out about Rhodes thanks to CCTV footage from the prison. That took its damned time!

Atlas is dropped off at the market to hand it over but is confronted by Dylan first, they argue but Dylan leaves until it’s revealed that it wasn’t the Eye Atlas was talking to, but Walter. Dylan takes the card and pushes him away, having snuck the card back into his pocket.

What follows is a pretty awesome chase scene through the market with Dylan using whatever tricks he has at his disposal to outwit Walter’s men. Also, Walter is out in public, which goes very much against his not being seen persona. Anyway, Chase arrives and knocks him out and we get two big reveals in quick succession. First off, Walter is the illegitimate son of Arthur Tressler from the first movie. They lock Dylan in the prototype safe and drown him (sure take the prototype safe from a magic shop rather than one that hasn’t been potentially tampered with) and we get our second reveal, that Tressler was the source of Thaddeus’ intel, that the whole scheme was intended to be a trap.

Dylan finds a lock pick in his watch and finds the area to pick glows under the water. He opens the safe but Atlas has to drag him to sure and resuscitate him. They discover now that the chip is fake. They head back to the magic shop, knowing that Walter will target them to get the chip back, Lula realises this could something they could use to their advantage. But to pull something like this off, they’ll need more resources and people. Thankfully the two store owners are in fact members of the Eye and can provide the resources and people, that was easy.

Now for the finale and this is where the first movie fell flat, the finale was short and kinda disappointing. Not so here. The Horsemen announce that they plan to expose Walter in London on New Year’s Eve, the FBI head there, seemingly without making contact with any British intelligence agencies or police. Chase verifies to Walter to they are serious.

Walter asks for his men to be checking out for any mention of the Horsemen on social media and has Tressler send out any resources he has to go out looking for them.

Jack is the first to come out with a trick, 3 card Monty, a famous street trick used by con artists, perfect fit for him. Lula begins her trick, promising to make something big fly into the river, but for now it’s just birds. With the FBI coming near, Walter calls Thaddeus, who promises to stall them and tells them to find the pattern. Atlas begins his trick and no, no, this is bullsh*t and clearly CGI. I get using strobe lighting to control water in a small are but across this distance, no, it would not be possible.

With that location, Walter has worked out the pattern and sends chase out to confront Merrit, who discovers the location of the final trick. Having been rumbled, Dylan tells them to end their tricks and regroup. They do so, each revealing some information about how their tricks were ‘accomplished’ but as they begin to get away on their motorcycles, Merrit’s poor driving skills (which we only learn about now) lands them as a victim of an ambush by Walter. They’re taken away in a truck and loaded onto a plane.

Under threat of violence, they give the chip to Walter, he verifies it and finds that it is the genuine article, much to the surprise of everyone. They take off and Chase suggests they throw the horsemen out of the plane, so they do so. Walter and Arthur are ready to enjoy a nice vintage but find it tasting off, the label falls off and they see the Horsemen outside the window. They soon realise the plane is staged, and the walls of the warehouse drop to reveal them to be on a barge on the Thames.

They switched out some of the drivers, like they did on the 3-card Monty, with some of their own guys to take them to the new location. They made the plane appear to fly using lighting, fans and rain machines, like with Atlas’ 'trick'. And then we reveal that Jack hypnotised Chase to make them throw them off the plane.

• When did Jack suddenly become good at hypnotism?
• In terms of order of events as presented to us, Jack was still performing his trick, he couldn’t have been there

Anyway, with Tressler and Walter exposed the FBI and police storm the barge, but the horsemen have disappeared. Dylan leaves some evidence behind to convict the duo and disappears along with them.

We cut to the Greenwich, where the Horseman have met up with the duo from the store. Dylan finds a picture of his father and Thaddeus together, Thaddeus was… is a part of the eye. So, this is their attempt to match the twist from the previous film. Honestly, it doesn’t, in that it makes a little more sense, but it does raise some questions none the less

• If the persona Thaddeus used was just a persona, why keep it up for 30 goddamn years
• Why were you still in the game in the first movie, recording a trick with a hidden camera?
• Why didn’t you let onto this fact at any point?
• Did Dylan’s mother not know, if not, why didn’t she tell Dylan? (And yes, his mother is alive, that was referenced in an earlier scene)
• Doesn't this sell that the Horseman were absolutely villains in the first movie.

But after you ignore these, frankly film-breaking plot-holes we see that the guy from the Macau science centre is also part of the eye and OH COME ON! Why? What purpose did that serve?

Anyway, they enter a spiral room that if you zoom out whilst twisting the camera looks kinda like an eye, and we get the speech from Freeman earlier in the movie. And as you, it’s custom to use this meme, every time Morgan Freeman is in a movie, so here you go.

So that was Now You See Me 2, and if you liked the first one, you should get a kick out of it.

It’s far from flawless, carrying many of the same weaknesses the first one had, the sequence of events being very contrived and the idea that magicians don’t need to control their surroundings in order to perform the trick is ludicrous. Also, whilst the actress playing Lola is fantastic, she really does need some character flaws too. You could also argue that it's absolutely necessary to have seen the first one to understand most of the plot.

But the movie is fully of snappy dialogue, and it feels more like Horseman were doing what we were maybe supposed to think they were doing in the first one, performing heists to help people and expose wrongdoers. The finale is a culmination of events leading up to their best trick, which is what a finale of a movie like this should be and main disappointment for me when it came to the first movie. It’s still a fun ride, Daniel Radcliffe did a great job as the villain, and Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman did their roles justice.

There’s also an added sense of scope to this sequel, as the action moves out of the US and moves into global territory, but it never forgets its roots with enough call backs to the first movie, including a more satisfying resolution to certain plot-points from the first one.

If you hated the first one, this one won’t sell you but it did sell me. Bring on Now you see me 3

Rating -75%