Samaritan

At the end of August, Samaritan was released onto Amazon Prime Video. Samaritan follows 13 year old Sam, as he tries to figure out if the garbage man that lives across from him (Sylvester Stallone) is the thought to be dead superhero Samaritan.

This movie has two things really going for it, Sylvester Stallone playing a superhero and an original superhero story not by DC or Marvel. The premise itself of a beloved superhero of a broken city in hiding/retired is also really interesting. The action is also well done and is really fun to see Sylvester Stallone getting back in the action. Finally, the villain's motivation tied to societal issues was also really interesting. It was a good direction to go showing that different groups of people have different perceptions of who the heroes and villains in their lives are.

Unfortunately, the actual move does not live up to how exciting the premise sounds. Instead of exploring the character of Samaritan and seeing what makes him tick, the movie decides to treat him as a mystery to be solved. The movie should've solved the mysteries early on in the film and then focused on a character study of Samaritan instead of spending the whole movie trying to figure out who he is. A film with Sylvester Stallone as a superhero really should have spent more time with the Stallone character. I also felt that the Sam character was not a good choice to lead the story. Sam doesn't really change or grow throughout the film and having him share the focus really takes away from the development of Stallone's character. Finally, the twist at the end of the film really soured the experience of the movie for me. Early into the film, I had a guess about where the end of the film would go and really hoped it was not the direction they were going to take. When they did go in the direction that I was worried about I was very disappointed. Additionally, the twist doesn't even make a whole lot of sense and is not explained well.

Overall, this film shoots for a really cool idea with Sylvester Stallone as a retired superhero. However, it ultimately fails to live up to its potential and just delivers an underwhelming and disappointing story.

Score: 6/10 Grade: C+

Recommendation: Stream it you are a big Stallone or superhero fan