"Just remember all the good the Purge does."
It’s kind of hard for audiences to do such a thing, seeing as how we haven’t been privy to a feature where the other 364 days of the year are showcased. We’ve only gotten to see the most dangerous night of the year, and it was something of a missed opportunity the first time out. But James DeMonaco’s sequel The Purge: Anarchy is taking the violence out of home security and into the street, where no one is safe. And that is precisely why this flick looks a million times better than the first one, just without the comfort of Ethan Hawke’s acting abilities to anchor it down to Earth.
Now that doesn’t necessarily mean this will be a fantastic movie in and of itself, as this trailer looks like it’s telling two different stories, barely calling back to the one we saw in the recent teaser. But there is a ton of horrific imagery to tie them all together, so I can’t really complain, as that’s mostly what I want to see in this sequel anyway.
Here we have Frank Grillo’s mysterious character, who is mourning the loss of his son (presumably) and wants to get some kind of revenge. Of course, the only time he can do that is when the New Founders of America commemorate the nationwide 24 hours of mayhem by closing down shop and allowing America to turn on itself. He appears to be tracking the person responsible for his son’s death, but gets caught up in helping two women (Zoë Soul and Carmen Ejogo) who have been taken from their homes and are being half-tortured. And then a bunch of guys start shooting automatic weapons. Yay!
In the more limited plot, Zach Gilford and his girlfriend are trying to get home when their car stalls out on a bridge, forcing them to run away from a group of motorcycle-riding mask-wearing whackos. And then there might be some other protagonists hiding in these quick flashes between gunplay and massive fires.
It apparently all comes down to "the last purge of the evening," in which all of our main characters are rounded up and presented to the attendees of a gala affair specifically meant to prey on those less fortunate, who are auctioned off to the highest bidders. Sounds kind of like the climax of the first film, just bigger, like everything else in this sequel. That woman in the blue dress will absolutely be haunting my nightmares tonight.
Regardless of whether this turns out to be a great flick or not, this trailer certainly has me more excited for it. My only questions are: where the hell is Michael K. Williams, and what’s the point in giving a trailer a five-second countdown? Read the last sentence of this story in 5-4-3-2-1.
Find The Purge: Anarchy in theaters on July 18, assuming that isn’t the night when our president decides to turn Obamacare into 24 hours of all-out warfare.
