Expend4bles: One Last (?) Round of Pyro, Casual Killing and Wrestling-Style Kayfabe

By Jim Slotek

Rating: C-plus

Having followed The Expendables franchise from its start 13 years ago to its supposed finale with its fourth instalment Expend4bles, one thought keeps popping up.

Okay, two thoughts. First, are we supposed to pronounce this movie “Expend-FOUR-bles?”

Second, is The Expendables the big-screen incarnation of the wrestling term “kayfabe?”

Basically, kayfabe is the suspension of disbelief required to accept that the hammy drama that precedes cartoonish violence is real (or in this case, at least realistic). I know by that standard, a lot of scripted performances could be called kayfabe, but, given its wrestling bloodlines, the word carries the connotation of blustery volume

Stallone as Expendables leader Barney.

The kayfabe is strong in Expend4bles, a series which has basically been a showcase for beloved long-in-the-tooth action legends. As preposterous as the plot invariably is, a movie that brings together Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren, and – my favourite – muay thai hero Tony Jaa of Ong Bak fame, and sets them to work as good guy mercenaries slaughtering bad guys in the bloodiest and most explosive ways, at least has goodwill going for it.

That doesn’t make Expend4bles a good film by any objective standard. The tender brothers/sisters-in-arms relationships we’re supposed to embrace consist mainly of bluster and bruises. Even ostensible lovers Christmas (Statham) and fellow Expendible Gina (Megan Fox) are introduced with her having a screaming fit and breaking things. Later, they have a knock-down, drag-out fight prior to lovemaking. Love ‘em or hate ‘em, you’ve got to fight ‘em.

The relationship between Christmas and team leader Barney (Stallone) is similarly based, their first scene together being a bar fight.

Anyway, there is a plot in Expend4bles. A military plant in Libya dating back to Gaddafi, is invaded by well-trained bad mercenaries, led by a secret character nicknamed Ocelot. They invade and kill at will, stealing nuclear detonators with geopolitical ill-intent.

But the real plot is revenge. The Expendables lose one of their own while failing to foil Ocelot’s plan. And Christmas is disgraced and fired for messing up.

Which is how the movie ends up in the North Pacific, on a freighter with an armed nuclear bomb, and a plot that, for a while, becomes Die Hard (see, there is a rat amongst them, and the whole gang ends up captured – with the exception of Christmas, who’s tracked down the ship and sets about surreptitiously killing terrorists with much higher efficiency than John McClain).

There are moments of self-aware humour, including Christmas punching out a misogynistic YouTube influencer on livestream, and the realization that newly-sober Gunner (Lundgren) can only shoot accurately when he’s drunk.

Otherwise, Expend4bles is an endless pyro/bang-bang show, with actors not mainly known for their acting (also including 50 Cent and UFC champion Randy Couture), sticking to the story as well as they can.

Expend4bles. Directed by Scott Waugh. Starring Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham and Megan Fox. Opens in theatres Friday, September 22.