Kingsman: The Golden Circle
Kingsman: The Golden Circle is a 2017 spy action comedy film directed by Matthew Vaughn and written by Jane Goldman and Vaughn. Based on the Millarworld comic book series The Secret Service (later retitled Kingsman) by Mark Millar and Dave Gibbons, in-turn based on a concept by Millar and Vaughn, the film is the sequel to Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014) and the second installment in the Kingsman film series. The film features an ensemble cast consisting of Colin Firth, Taron Egerton, Mark Strong, Sophie Cookson, Edward Holcroft and Hanna Alström, who reprise their roles from the first film, with Julianne Moore, Halle Berry, Pedro Pascal, Elton John, Channing Tatum, and Jeff Bridges joining the cast. The film follows members of Kingsman needing to team up with their American counterpart, Statesman, after the Kingsman organization is crippled and the world is held hostage by Poppy Adams and her drug cartel, "The Golden Circle".
Kingsman: The Golden Circle
- Jane Goldman
- Matthew Vaughn
- Matthew Vaughn
- David Reid
- Adam Bohling
- Marv Films
- Cloudy Productions
- TSG Entertainment
- 18 September 2017 (London)
- 20 September 2017 (United Kingdom)
- 22 September 2017 (United States)
141 minutes[2]
- United Kingdom
- United States
English
$104 million[3]
$410.9 million[4]
Kingsman: The Golden Circle premiered in London on 18 September 2017. It was theatrically released in the United Kingdom on 20 September 2017 and in the United States on 22 September 2017 by 20th Century Fox. It grossed $410 million worldwide against a budget of $104 million and received mixed reviews from critics.
A prequel, The King's Man, was released on 22 December 2021, while a crossover film, Argylle, was released on 1 February 2024, with a direct sequel, Kingsman: The Blue Blood, in development.
Plot[edit]
One year after defeating Richmond Valentine,[a] Gary "Eggsy" Unwin has officially joined the Kingsman intelligence service, taking his late mentor Harry Hart's title of "Galahad", and begun a relationship with Tilde, Crown Princess of Sweden. He is ambushed by Charlie Hesketh, a former Kingsman trainee who lost his arm and vocal cords during the Valentine incident, replacing them with cybernetics. Eggsy evades Charlie and his henchmen in a car chase across London, but Charlie's severed cybernetic arm hacks into the Kingsman database through Eggsy's car. Charlie passes the information to Poppy Adams – leader of the world's largest drug cartel, the Golden Circle – who launches a volley of missiles that destroy the Kingsman headquarters and wipe out all its agents in Britain, aside from Eggsy and Merlin, Kingsman's tech support.
Kingsman's emergency protocol leads Eggsy and Merlin to Statesman, an American private intelligence service posing as a Bourbon whiskey distillery in Kentucky, as well as Kingsman's American counterpart. There, they discover that Harry survived his shooting thanks to Statesman nanotechnology, but is suffering from amnesia. They also learn about the Golden Circle from Statesman leader Champagne, and the two agencies agree to work together to bring the cartel down. Statesman agent Tequila later develops a blue rash and shows signs of mania, and is replaced by agent Whiskey as Eggsy's partner. Eggsy plants a tracking device on Charlie's ex-girlfriend Clara Von Gluckfberg during a sexual encounter at Glastonbury Festival, but his revelation of the mission to Tilde strains their relationship.
Eggsy cures Harry's amnesia by threatening to shoot a Cairn Terrier puppy that resembles Harry's late dog, shortly before Poppy broadcasts a message to the world about a toxin she has secretly added to all her drugs, which causes users to develop symptoms like Tequila's before paralysis and, ultimately, death. She offers the antidote if the President of the United States ends his country's war on drugs and grants her cartel immunity from prosecution. The President – who is revealed to be corrupt – decides to quarantine everyone affected, intending to let them all die to put Poppy out of business and rid the world of drug users, whom he sees as criminals.
Eggsy, Harry, and Whiskey track Clara to the Golden Circle's antidote factory in the mountains of Italy. Eggsy steals an antidote sample, which is broken by Whiskey during an ambush by the Golden Circle's henchmen, leading Harry to suspect him of working against them. Harry shoots Whiskey in the head, but Eggsy, believing Harry to be delusional as a result of his recovery, saves him with nanotechnology as Charlie destroys the antidote factory, killing Clara for unwittingly betraying the Golden Circle. Tilde calls Eggsy in a manic state, revealing she has been affected by the blue rash after taking drugs due to her stress over Eggsy's infidelity. Eggsy, Harry, and Merlin discover the location of Poppy's hideout, "Poppy Land", in Cambodia and fly there to steal the laptop which can deploy the drones carrying the antidote.
Arriving at Poppy Land, Eggsy steps on a land mine, but Merlin switches places with Eggsy and sacrifices himself instead. Storming the lair, Eggsy kills Charlie while Harry destroys Poppy's robotic attack dogs with the help of Elton John, who had been kidnapped by Poppy. They secure the laptop and inject Poppy with a concentrated dose of her own toxin-infused heroin. Poppy gives them the laptop password in a drugged state but dies from an overdose due to the heroin. Whiskey interrupts them before they can deploy the drones, revealing that he wants all drug users to die after his pregnant wife was killed in a robbery by meth addicts. Furthermore, the elimination of all drugs will cause the stock price of Statesmen Whisky to skyrocket since people will depend much more on alcohols, making Whiskey and his statesmen members rich. Eggsy and Harry fight and kill Whiskey by pushing him into an industrial shredder, then deploy the drones to release the antidote, saving the affected victims throughout the world.
The President is impeached for conspiring to commit genocide against drug victims, and Statesman purchases a distillery in Scotland to help rebuild Kingsman. Statesman tech support specialist Ginger Ale is appointed to Whiskey's position, Eggsy marries Princess Tilde, becoming a Prince of Sweden, and Tequila takes an exchange assignment at Kingsman, which acquires a new tailor shop in London.
Production[edit]
Development[edit]
Near the release of Kingsman: The Secret Service, Mark Millar and Matthew Vaughn said a sequel would be possible if the first film was to perform well at the box office, and Vaughn expressed interest in returning to direct.[5][6] Vaughn also noted that he had hoped to have Firth back in the sequel, though it was later stated that Firth would not be returning.[7][8]
On 29 April 2015, Fox announced that a sequel was in production, but that it was unclear if Vaughn would return due to his interest in directing a Flash Gordon film.[9] On 11 June 2015, Vaughn told Yahoo that he had begun writing the script for the sequel, and that he could return to direct.[10] In September 2015, Millar reiterated that the sequel was in development and that Vaughn was looking for ways to bring Firth back without sacrificing the integrity of the story. Later that month, The Hollywood Reporter confirmed that Egerton had also signed on for a new Robin Hood film, which was then set to begin shooting in February 2016; Egerton's schedule was thus in conflict with the Kingsman sequel. However, in mid-October, it was confirmed that scheduling issues had been settled between both studios. Lionsgate began Robin Hood's production right after Egerton wrapped filming on Kingsman: The Golden Circle, which began in May 2016.[11]
Reception[edit]
Box office[edit]
Kingsman: The Golden Circle grossed $100.2 million domestically (United States and Canada), and $310.7 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $410.9 million, against a budget of $104 million.[4]
Domestically, the film's opening weekend grossed $39 million, an increase over the first instalment's $36.2 million debut; it topped the box office, overtaking two-time defender It.[55] In its second weekend, the film again surpassed It to retain top spot,[56] continuing an eventual run of five weeks in the Top 10 at the box office.[57]
Critical response[edit]
Kingsman: The Golden Circle received generally mixed reviews.[58] On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 50% of 309 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 5.4/10. The website's consensus reads: "Kingsman: The Golden Circle offers more of everything that made its predecessor so much fun but lacks the original's wild creative spark."[59] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 44 out of 100, based on 44 critics, indicating "mixed or average" reviews.[60] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.[61]
Writing for Uproxx, Amy Nicholson called the film better than the first and wrote: "It's doubled down on the mayhem and hammered out the tone. Everything is sincere even when it's insane."[62] Writing for Rolling Stone, Peter Travers gave the film 2.5 stars out of 4 and wrote: "Even when Kingsman: The Golden Circle goes off the rails and it inevitably does, this cracked caper wears you down with action and giggles."[63]
Christopher Orr from The Atlantic said in his review: "The movie is too long, too violent, too silly – too everything. … To put it another way: First time satire, second time farce".[64] Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune gave the film 1.5 stars and said that "Kingsman: The Golden Circle offers everything – several bored Oscar winners; two scenes featuring death by meat grinder; Elton John, mugging in close-up – except a good time."[65] Wendy Ide, reviewing the film for The Guardian, gave it 1 star and called it "a knowing sneer of a movie that shrugs off its plot holes along with… a tendency to use female characters as the decorative punchline to jokes."[66] Writing for RogerEbert.com, Glenn Kenny gave the film 0 out of 4 and wrote: "As action-packed as the movie is, it feels like it's six hours. That's in part because… the movie lurches twitchily from set piece to set piece…"[67]
Accolades[edit]
Kingsman: The Golden Circle was nominated in four categories at the 2018 Golden Trailer Awards: "Team" (Create Advertising Group) for Best Action, "Poppy Dance" (Trailer Park, Inc.) for Best Action TV Spot (for a Feature Film) and Most Original TV Spot (for a Feature Film), and "Summer" for Best Radio / Audio Spot.[68][69] The film won the Empire Award for Best Thriller at the 23rd Empire Awards.[70] At the 44th Saturn Awards, it received a nomination for Best Action or Adventure Film.[71][72]
