Any Jason Statham fan knows the man is hardly above a sequel or two. He played The Transporter‘s Frank Martin three times, donned a beret for The Expendables trilogy, reprised the role of Deckard Shaw for the fifth time in Fast & Furious 9‘s post-credits scene, Hobbs & Shaw 2 remains in development and The Meg 2 starts shooting next year, even if it remains a crushing disappointment that we’ll never see Chev Chelios again unless Crank 3 rises from the ashes.
That’s an awful lot of franchise fare, but you could also make the argument that Mechanic: Resurrection is perhaps the Statham sequel that’s easiest to forget about. The opener was a remake of the 1972 Charles Bronson vehicle, starring the bald-headed martial artist as professional assassin Arthur Bishop, who takes Ben Foster under his wing as a protege.
It performed as well as most of the leading man’s output, earning $76 million on a $40 million and landing so-so reviews, although fans enjoyed it a lot more. Five years later, the second chapter arrived and performed even better by hauling in $125 million despite being a weaker film than its predecessor, thanks largely to a strong performance in China.
The plot finds Arthur forced back into action after an old rival kidnaps his girlfriend, and he’s blackmailed into killing an African warlord, a human trafficker and an arms dealer in exchange for her life. Naturally, things don’t go to plan and he’s forced to exact revenge on the bad guys in suitably violent fashion. It isn’t top tier Jason Statham, but Mechanic: Resurrection is performing well on Netflix like a lot of his back catalogue tends to do, having just cracked the Top 20 most-watched list.