Are you not entertained? Gladiator II’s very divisive reviews are here

The reviews for Gladiator II – starring our precious Paul Mescal – are in. The critics are all saying wildly different things.

Here’s a round-up of the most opinionated and contradictory reviews for Gladiator II, so you can make your own mind up about whether you can be bothered to see it in a cinema this week.

Paul Mescal *gasps* might not be perfect

A pic of Paul Mescal for purely journalistic purposes
(Image via YouTube)

The main pull of Gladiator II for people who weren’t alive when the first one came out is that Paul Mescal is starring as Lucius, the son of Russell Crows’s character in the first movie.

Alison Willmore from Variety was not a fan of the film. She called it “so underwhelming that you might leave thinking, ‘Huh, maybe masculinity really is in crisis‘.” Her critique of Paul Mescal’s acting was especially scathing.

She wrote, “The Irish actor, a usually intriguing presence, doesn’t hold the screen here so much as he vanishes into its tumult. Of all the ways in which he feels miscast, the most fatal may be his utter inability to seem like someone other guys would follow to their deaths.

“He’s terrible at giving the rousing speeches that were so iconic in Gladiator and that Gladiator II, which has a clunkier script written by David Scarpa, attempts to re-create. His instinct is to underplay these moments rather than bellow theatrically, which is a problem, especially when saddled with somewhat confusing slogans like ‘Where we are, death is not!'”

The plot copies the first film so much ‘it’s practically a remake’

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Paul Mescal and Pedro Pascal in little kilts
(Image via YouTube)

Wendy Ide’s review in The Guardian really praised all the “superbly choreographed, formidably executed” action sequences. But she complained about how similar the plot of Gladiator II is to the events of the first movie.

She wrote, “Sharks and rhino aside, fresh ideas are conspicuously missing. This sequel is so derivative of its predecessor, it’s practically a remake.” Apparently both movies literally open with the same “shot of a manly hand fondling grain” and Paul Mescal’s character is “essentially a cut-and-paste version of Crowe’s Maximus, with added angst”.

The action scenes sound so weird and I don’t know what to make of them

Men fight each other
(Image via YouTube)

Boyd Hilton’s review in Empire went into detail about the actual gladiatorial games. The movie features “demented primates” which “look more like evil little CGI aliens than actual monkeys”. Apparently one scene “involves a giant marauding rhino, and another somehow features… sharks. Yes, there’s a bunch of the blood-thirsty beasts merrily swimming around in the arena during a re-creation of a sea battle, which will have you Googling ‘Did they really flood the Colosseum?'” (Fyi, yes, they did).

The journalist describes, “Copious amounts of blood and gore throughout: gruesome decapitations, throat-slashings, and limbs lopped off left, right and centre.”

However, Boyd Hilton seemed extremely into all this. He wrote, “Here’s a fearlessness to its big swings that has to be applauded. It’s Ridley Scott Unleashed, and we’re here for it.” Alrighty, then.

The villains are ‘as buffoonish as they are vicious’

Rip generically evil Roman emperors. You’d have loved TikTok make-up tutorials
(Image via YouTube)

I don’t know how to feel about this. Maybe some people don’t care if the film is scary? Maybe the plot feels meaningless if the villains are too silly?

David Rooney from The Hollywood Reporter went into detail about the movie’s villains.

“Quinn and Hechinger are hilariously unhinged in their diabolical roles, making Geta and Caracalla petulant man-babies as buffoonish as they are vicious. Once you’ve read that Beavis and Butt-Head were among Scott’s reference points, it’s hard to unsee that.

“But even without the association, making the rivalrous emperors such demented clowns undercuts their danger. They’re almost too stupid to be sinister”

Gladiator II is already out in UK cinemas, so you can make up your own mind about the chaos.