‘Knives Out’ Sequel ‘Glass Onion’ Delivers Cutting Satire in Hilarious Whodunit

There is no thriller to why Knives Out deserves a sequel. The sharp 2019 whodunit killed on the field workplace, offering an ideal motive for director Rian Johnson and star Daniel Craig to return for the sequel, Glass Onion: A Knives Out Thriller. However even with Netflix money offering the chance, can they get away with homicide once more?

Followers of the primary movie can be primed for a thriller with a twist, which implies the sequel has to work more durable to shock — operating the danger of making an attempt too laborious, shedding audiences in complexity, or straining credulity. Fortunately, although, Johnson’s second stab is one other twist-filled deal with, having enjoyable with the whodunit style whereas additionally simply being very humorous.

Glass Onion streams on Netflix Dec. 23, however in a primary for the streaming service it should additionally play in main US theater chains. Be fast: It is on the large display screen for one week solely at Thanksgiving, from Nov. 23 to Nov. 29.

Craig returns as louche detective Benoit Blanc, and this time he is journeying to Greece to research a brand new star-studded ensemble. Edward Norton performs an ultra-rich tech bro gathering his buds (and hangers-on), performed by Kate Hudson, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr., Janelle Monáe, Madelyn Cline, Jessica Henwick and Dave Bautista with a gun in his Speedos.

Craig first performed suave sleuth Blanc in the course of the again stretch of his time as James Bond, whereas Knives Out was the palate-cleansing first movie for author/director Rian Johnson after his divisive Star Wars flick The Final Jedi. However now each are free and away from franchise baggage, and each appear to be glorying within the probability to play. Craig performs up Blanc’s comedic eccentricities, reveling in post-Bond flamboyance (have you ever seen his fabulous new vodka advert, by the way in which?).  

Johnson, in the meantime, delights in layering the flowery plot. The invitation to the sun-dappled reunion comes within the type of a picket puzzle field, and the entire movie is constructed from puzzles inside puzzles. This multilayered development provides as much as a massively satisfying homicide thriller. Among the many suspects, Norton is fiendishly bland, Hudson is on nice type as a loud-mouthed fashionista, and Bautista excels once more at revealing hidden depths enjoying a manosphere man-mountain. Monáe offers Craig a run for his cash as a personality who — no, I’ve mentioned an excessive amount of. You may should comply with the clues your self.

Layered into the whodunit is a blade-sharp satire skewering the wealthy people who are sometimes the topic of those sorts of mysteries. On the floor, you possibly can take pleasure in vicarious enjoyment of the golden solar and golden pores and skin, the opulent setting and glamorous outfits — the primary movie’s muted colours and comfortable sweaters appear positively dowdy subsequent to the dimensions and extra of the sequel. However as in different current movies savaging the existence of the wealthy and shameless, like Triangle of Unhappiness, Our bodies Our bodies Our bodies or The Menu, a part of the pleasure is understanding these fats cats are about to get their comeuppance.  

On the identical time, Glass Onion virtually, almost, only a tiny bit verges on being kinda happy with itself. There’s an compulsory Alexa joke and a few humorous however uncomfortable-if-you-think-about-it COVID gags, and simply an general vibe that sails dangerously near the territory of the later Ocean’s 11 motion pictures, the place large stars (and cameos) smirkingly swan a few high-priced trip and count on you to thank them for it.

However Glass Onion incisively invitations you to snigger (albeit bitterly) at these grotesque entrepreneurs and influencers. The place the primary movie took intention on the cloistered obliviousness of inherited wealth, the sequel turns its sights on the modern-day nouveau riche: determined social media experts, greedy politicians and deeply inconsiderate tech sorts. They’re the type of people that excuse their self-centered blundering as “disruption” and mistake their success as a product of their very own mystical “genius” reasonably than self-serving callousness backed by beneficiant helpings of different folks’s cash — and loads of sheer dumb luck. It is enjoyable to see them disintegrate when the knives come out, however greater than that it is a scathing critique of people doing issues with no understanding of penalties and lumbering everybody else with the fallout. Johnson might be watching Elon Musk’s Twitter meltdown with nice amusement (blended, in all probability, with abject despair).

The unique Knives Out was an affectionate tribute to the traditional homicide thriller style, with a twist. That is a tricky trick to tug off twice: Once you’re watching a whodunit roughly how it is going to be resolved, and now we’re primed to observe this movie for the twist.

The primary Knives Out may have been a unusual curio, however struck a nerve with audiences and earned Johnson a 2020 Oscar nomination for greatest unique screenplay. Whereas gently sending up the traditional whodunit, it impressed a minor revival within the style. (Sure, Homicide on the Orient Specific did comparable field workplace two years earlier, however do not inform me Kenneth Branagh’s Poirot would have been granted a franchise with out Knives Out’s success.) Netflix was definitely impressed sufficient to throw reportedly big quantities of money at Johnson for extra Knives Out sequels. Which leads us to the one unsolved thriller popping out of Glass Onion: Can Rian Johnson and Benoit Blanc kill once more?