Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Expend4bles’ on Starz, the Latest Entry In A Franchise That’s on Life Support

Now that I’ve seen Expend4bles (now on Starz), I can walk away with one definitive assertion about its place in pop culture history: in 2023, nothing enjoyed a more significant revival than 50 Cent’s “P.I.M.P.” Its prominent placement in the most annoyingly titled movie of the year was (unwittingly, of course) paralleled by its prominent placement in multi-Oscar nominee Anatomy of a Fall, which used a hilariously grating instrumental steel-drum version of the hit track as key motivation for a woman to allegedly murder her husband, possibly because he played it way too much and way too loud. The jury should convict on that evidence alone!

And now I sigh as I get back on topic, since Expand4bles is notable for no other reason, because, let’s be blunt: Does anyone give a damn about this franchise, which is now 14 years old, on its fourth outing and famous for amassing scads of action stars past and present to participate in wholly forgettable action-movie plots? It’s reportedly the last time mainstay star Sylvester Stallone will be involved, but that apparently wasn’t much of an incentive for anyone to go see it, and it flopped at the box office. So maybe it’ll be worth a free Starz stream, he asked dutifully, knowing the chances of that being true are probably miniscule.

EXPEND4BLES: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: We open in LIBYA – GADDAFI’S OLD CHEMICAL PLANT. No, really. That’s what the subtitle says. “GADDAFI’S OLD CHEMICAL PLANT.” Three seconds into the movie, and it’s already dropping doozies. Anyway, shit’s going down at GADDAFI’S OLD CHEMICAL PLANT, because if it wasn’t, that’d be rather disappointing. Turns out the villain of this story, Suarto Rahmat (Iko Uwais of The Raid), needs some detonators, and the detonators are where? All together now: GADDAFI’S OLD CHEMICAL PLANT! This looks like a job for the Expendables, since the detonators at GADDAFI’S OLD CHEMICAL PLANT are detonators that will detonate a nuke. But before they leap into a gigantic plane and fly out to GADDAFI’S OLD CHEMICAL PLANT in an attempt to stop the bad guys from using the detonators to detonate shit, we have to gut out some hijinks between lead Expendable Barney (Stallone) and forever pal Christmas (Jason Statham), and those hijinks are lame. They couldn’t be more lame if they were a donkey with three broken legs. Llllllllllaaaaaaaaaaaaame. 

At this point, Barney and Christmas have to get the crew together, which means time for some inventory. The Expend4bles lineup includes mainstays Gunner (Dolph Lundgren) and Toll Road (Randy Couture), with newbs Galan (Jacob Scipio), Easy Day (50 Cent) and Christmas’ feisty girlfriend Gina (Megan Fox), who doesn’t get a cool Expendables name like Highheel or Minefield or Spittoon, possibly due to sexism. Eventually, they’ll be joined by Lash (Levy Tran) and Decha (Tony Jaa), with leadership by CIA honcho Marsh (Andy Garcia). And so, heretofore let it be known that this movie does not feature past characters played by Arnold Schwarzenegger, Harrison Ford, Terry Crews, Jet Li, Mel Gibson, Bruce Willis, Antonio Banderas, Wesley Snipes, Mickey Rourke, Chuck Norris, Kelsey Grammer or Jean-Claude Van Damme, therefore making it the least star-studded Expendables movie yet, and the series continues to deprive itself of the OTT camp stylings of one Steven Seagal, which is by far its greatest failing.

But at least it has the Beekeeper himself, Statham, right? Sure. And without getting into spoiler territory, heretofore let it be known that Expend4bles pulls a bit of a bait-and-switch by making us think we’re seeing a Stallone movie when it’s actually a Statham movie. If that seems preferable by modern standards, heretofore let it be known that Statham – who we love around here, because he’s game for anything, ain’t he? – is a powerful presence, but not powerful enough to make us care about any of this. I mean, sure, there’s baseline concern for a nuke blowing up and initiating war between the U.S. and Russia, that goes without saying. But this movie so blatantly lacks self-awareness, it thinks it’ll generate anticipatory excitement with a big slo-mo marching-into-action shot featuring the underwhelming assemblage of Couture, 50, Fox, Lundgren and Tran. At least Fox wears custom midriff-baring tactical gear, right? Seems highly impractical for black-ops combat situations, but she looks great, and here I am expending energy pointing out logical inconsistencies in an Expendables movie, so who gets the last laugh there, huh?

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Man, if you want to watch a dumbass winking hilarious violent action movie, pick The Beekeeper over this ineptly directed turd.

Performance Worth Watching: You can’t even criticize Statham for being in bad movies. Sometimes he makes them better, sometimes he doesn’t (the latter is true with Expend4bles, which puts him in a scene where he fires a rocket launcher at a helicopter instead of the bad guys standing near the helicopter, even though the bad guys will then subsequently shoot at him, and this happens only because a helicopter makes a big fireball and the bad guys don’t). That’s his thing, and we love him for it. He makes us remember why we love Bruce Willis so much, and therefore also deserves a role in a Tarantino movie that’ll show his range and maybe net him an Oscar nom.

Memorable Dialogue: An example of this movie’s inability to deliver a single decent one-liner, via Marsh: “You’re just like genital warts – always showing up when you’re not wanted, and refusing to go away!” 

Sex and Skin: Statham enjoys a postcoital snuggle from a lingerie’d Fox.

Our Take: So is the shit CGI part of the joke? How about the noxious dialogue, which doesn’t feature a single decent zinger or inspire any laughs, or even a half-bemused smirk? Or the blatant lack of star-powered charisma? I know, director Scott Waugh has Statham, but he manages to wet-blanket the guy’s usually endearing screen presence; the most entertaining thing Statham does is prompt us to imagine him getting into character by smacking himself in the face until he no longer feels the urge to bust out into laughter in the middle of a take. That’s Statham – best game face in the business, and I mean that in all earnestness, full stop, no joke.

I’ve gone on and on about Statham, because he’s Expend4bles’ only hope, although you won’t be shocked to learn that his efforts are for naught. He’s the only thing worth remembering about this scrap heap of a movie, which sells itself like a Craigslist ad for a sleek sports car when it’s actually a rusty Yugo. It reportedly cost $100 million to make, and looks like 90 percent of that got skimmed off the top by scammers: godawful FX, subpar fight choreography, action sequences pieced together in the editing room, an utterly DOA screenplay. I’m no prude who pooh-poohs violence-for-violence’s-sake movies, but this one executes that agenda with base competency at best. It has no visual style, no wit, no decent characters and no sense of what it takes to make a fun, diverting brainwaster of an action movie. 

The most apt metaphor for Expend4bles’ blatant stupidity occurs during the climax, when the good guys and bad guys exchange bullets and grenades and missiles aboard a ship with a nuclear warhead in its cargo hold. Is no one aware that a stray shot could permanently delete them from the hard drive of mortal existence, rendering their little kerfuffly conflict moot as a flea fart? Apparently not. But here I am again, applying logic like a fool. Guess the joke’s on me. But it doesn’t have to be on you, too. 

Our Call: Heretofore let it be known that Expend4bles is very sucky, thus defying all odds for a movie featuring scenes set at GADDAFI’S OLD CHEMICAL PLANT. SKIP IT. 

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.