Starring: Logan Marshall-Green, Betty Gabriel, Harrison Gilbertson, Benedict Hardie, Christopher Kirby, Clayton Jacobson, Melanie Vallejo, Sachin Joab, Michael M. Foster
OUR RATING: ★★★½
Story:
Sci-fi action horror directed and written by Leigh Whannell, in which the story is set in the near future and follows Grey Trace (Logan Marshall-Green), who after his wife is killed during a brutal mugging, that also leaves him paralyzed, is approached by a billionaire inventor with an experimental cure that will upgrade his body. The cure is an Artificial Intelligence implant called STEM, this gives Grey physical abilities beyond anything experienced and the ability to relentlessly claim vengeance against those who murdered his wife and left him for dead.
Best Quotes (Total Quotes: 18)
Eron: [to Grey] As a quadriplegic it must be frustrating for you for someone who likes to get things done with their hands.
Grey Trace: Here’s the thing, four guys murdered my wife. If I could find those men, I’d do it.
Eron: [to Grey] What if I told you I could offer you something that it would enable you to walk again? I call it STEM, a computer chip that has the potential to change everything. It’s a new better brain.
STEM: May I point something out?
Grey Trace: Hello?
STEM: Yes?
Grey Trace: Okay, who’s saying that?
STEM: I am STEM. The system operating your body for you. Don’t be afraid.
Grey Trace: You fucking kidding me?
STEM: No.
Grey Trace: I’ve gone insane. I’m fucking insane.
STEM: Your psychological report diagnosed you with mild PTSD symptoms, but you are not insane.
Grey Trace: Wait, so… Okay, you’ve been sitting there this whole time since the operation?
STEM: I have been observing everything you’ve observed.
Grey Trace: Do you… do you have to talk?
STEM: If you don’t want me to, I will not.
Grey Trace: Okay. Yeah, don’t talk.
Grey Trace: So I’m not insane? You can talk again.
STEM: No, you are not insane.
Grey Trace: Wait, can anybody else hear you?
STEM: No, only you. I’m sending sound waves to your eardrum.
Grey Trace: Can you read my mind?
STEM: No. I can only discern speech when you talk out loud. Now that you’ve allowed me to talk again, may I point something out?
[shows Grey the footage of when the men attacked him and his wife]
STEM: In the drone surveillance footage. Can’t you see it?
Grey Trace: See what?
STEM: The man who shot your wife, there’s no gun in his hand.
Grey Trace: She was shot, that means he had a gun.
STEM: She was shot, but not with a gun he was holding in his hand. A gun implanted inside his hand. Freeze the screen at the moment he fires. The man who took Asha’s purse in the left of frame, there is a marking on his wrist.
Grey Trace: I don’t see it.
STEM: I do. I’ve rebuilt the image. With your permission, I can show you. Just relax and let me draw.
Grey Trace: This feels very weird.
STEM: You now have full control again, Grey.
[breaking into one of his wife’s murderer’s house]
STEM: You’ll need a plan.
Grey Trace: I’ve got this.
STEM: This doesn’t seem like a well thought out plan.
[after the murderer has caught Grey in his house, he attacks Grey]
Grey Trace: STEM, help!
STEM: I need your permission to operate independently.
Grey Trace: Permission granted!
STEM: Thank you.
[suddenly he is able to fight off the murderer with ease and expertise]
Grey Trace: What the fuck?!
[STEM continues to operate his body to beat the murderer]
Grey Trace: Stay down, man.
[the murderer comes at him with a knife]
Grey Trace: STEM, he’s got a knife!
STEM: I see that. We have a knife too.
[Grey quickly takes the knife from the murdered and uses it to kill him gruesomely]
Grey Trace: You now have full control again, Grey.
Cortez: If you are involved in this somehow, then you need to let me know.
Grey Trace: Well I was in the area, detective.
[to everyone in the bar]
Grey Trace: Can I have everybody’s attention. I’m looking for the guys who murdered my wife.
[he gets knocked down by Tolan]
Grey Trace: Are you one of them?
Tolan: Yeah.
Grey Trace: STEM, can takeover.
STEM: Thank you. I now have full control.
STEM: [to Grey] There is a gun implanted inside his hand.
Grey Trace: STEM, what do you think I should do?
STEM: Move, Grey.
Fisk: [to Grey] Man, you are persistent.
STEM: [to Grey] I cannot allow us to be killed. We are going to finish the job we started.
STEM: Alcohol impairs the signals from your brain. You will not be able to walk properly.
Grey Trace: I know. That’s why they can charge money for it.
STEM: It does not make sense that humans deliberately malfunction.
Grey Trace: Yeah, that’s because your memories are filled with ones and zeros, pal, and our memories are filled with every fuck-up we’ve ever made.
Grey Trace: So you thought I was an invalid, but you didn’t know that I’m a fucking ninja.
[he punches the thug]
STEM: While I am state-of-the-art, Grey, I am not a ninja.
Fisk: [to Grey] You upgraded. Now you’re stronger. Faster. Better than everyone else.
Pamela: [to Grey] Sit back and enjoy the ride.
[last lines]
Cortez: Grey, this isn’t you.
STEM: Grey’s not here anymore, he’s in a better place, in his mind, where he wants to be, I’ve taken over now. A fake world is a lot less painful than the real one. All I needed was for his mind to break, and he broke it.
Cortez: [sobbing] No.
STEM: Goodbye.
Total Quotes: 18
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Trailer:
Can anybody tell me why the ending was inappropriate?
Expectations:
Action… action… action.
The “Six Million Dollar Man” on steroids
Out of your hands with permission