Bullet Points: Escape Plan: The Extractors
I really have no reasonable explanation on how I have missed out on the Escape Plan franchise up until this point in my life.
I devote huge chunks of my free time to the action movie genre and 2013’s Escape Plan starred two of the biggest action stars of all-time, Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger… you would think I would have been all over it. But as I type this, I still haven’t seen it.
Not seeing the 2018 follow up, Escape Plan 2: Hades, makes a little more sense. If I didn’t watch the original, why watch the sequel!?! At least it did make more sense until I recently watched the third film in the franchise (after it was strongly suggested to me), 2019’s Escape Plan: The Extractors…
- Welcome to Mansfield: One moment Daya Zhang (Melise) is in Mansfield, Ohio looking at available real estate for a new Zhang Innovations facility… the next moment Daya is being abducted and taken to a mammoth prison in Latvia by a team of black ops types, led by Lester Clark Jr. (Devon Sawa, Extreme Ops). Lester is a man with a bone to pick with a number of people in the movie including Daya’s father, which explains the whole holding Daya for $700,000,000 in ransom money deal.
- Extraction Expert: Sylvester Stallone reprises the role of Ray Breslin from the first two Escape Plan films in Escape Plan: The Extractors. It is no surprise that a man with Ray’s set of skills is hired to bring Daya home safely. If he can break out of prison, he should be able to break into one, right?! But this job is about to become something very personal for Ray…
- Like Father, Like Son: Sawa’s Lester Clark Jr. is the son of Vincent D’Onofrio’s character, Lester Clark, from the original Escape Plan. Lester Clark and Ray Breslin (Sylvester Stallone, Cobra) were partners at one time, but things did not end amicably between the two to say the least. Now the junior Lester, with vengeance in his heart, is looking to take someone away from Ray, the way Ray took his father away from him. So Lester abducts Ray’s love interest Abigal (Jaime King) and throws her in Devil’s Station (the aforementioned Latvian prison) right along with Daya.
- Extractors Assemble: Ray assembles his team, which includes Jules (Lydia Hull, Marauders), Hush (50 Cent aka Curtis Jackson) and Trent Derosa (Dave Bautista, Final Score) but he also gets some unexpected help in the form of Daya’s bodyguard Boa (Harry Shum Jr, Revenge of the Green Dragons) and the mysterious Shen (Jin Zhang, Ip Man 3) who made a great first impression when he used an umbrella as a weapon and kicked some major ass. We find out that Shen was involved romantically with Daya at one time, but her father disapproved of the relationship and cast Shen out. But it is obvious that Shen still has feelings for Daya and this mission will be just as personal for him as it is for Ray.
- Expect the Unexpected: Escape Plan: The Extractors is one of those action movies that you pretty much know what you are getting when you start it and you just hope everything plays out in entertaining fashion… but with that said there are a few unexpected moments (like a portion of the movie being set and shot in Mansfield, Ohio of all places). I was definitely not prepared for just how effective Devon Sawa was going to be as the movie’s main villain. Sawa’s Lester Clark Jr. is a dastardly SOB and while he can’t match up physically with the tough as nails Ray Breslin, but Lester is fueled by his hate and he knows what buttons to push to get under Breslin’s skin… which makes you think Lester could win… Scratch that, this is an action movie so you know Lester is probably not going to win, BUT the nastier he is, the more rewarding it will be when he loses.
I know what button you should push if you are looking for a “popcorn movie” to entertain you with some physicality, a little bit of gore and some legit action star power and that would be the play button when you find Escape Plan: The Extractors on your favorite streaming app.
I know what you should do if you want some Bonus Bullet Points too. Keep reading…
- Best Fight: No question about it, the fight between Shen and Silva, one of the evil henchmen working with Lester. There’s a good reason this fight scene is so good, Silva is played by none other than Daniel Bernhardt of John Wick and Parker fame.
- Familiar Face: Russell Wong (Vanishing Son and Romeo Must Die) plays Daya’s tech mogul father.
- AKA: The movie was released as Escape Plan 3 in the UK, Escape Plan 3: The Extractors in Germany and Australia and in the Philipines it was Escape Plan 3: The Final Chapter. That means that if there’s a fourth Escape Plan movie, it will be released as Escape Plan 4: A New Beginning in the Philipines.
- More Like 5 Cents: Despite being on the poster, 50 Cent basically has a glorified cameo in Escape Plan: The Extractors as he stays behind in the tech support guy role while the rest of the team makes their way to Latvia to kick some ass and rescue some hostages.
