First, there was a movie. Then two. Then three. Now, there’s Paris Has Fallen, an entertaining, if unremarkable action series that serves as a decent addition to the franchise, but that is unlikely to bring too many new fans to the previous installments. This is probably good, considering these characters don’t actually show up in the movies, and the characters from the movies don’t show up in this. Who knows, maybe general action fans don’t actually care about those things. Perhaps they just aren’t that picky.
If you need a reminder, back in 2013 there was Olympus Has Fallen, then came 2016’s London Has Fallen and 2019’s Angel Has Fallen. Now here we are. It’s another big city. And there are no familiar faces, no Gerard Butler as the United States Secret Service agent Mike Banning, or Aaron Eckhart as U.S. President Benjamin Asher, much less Morgan Freeman as the Speaker of the House (and eventual President) Allan Trumbull. But the idea is the same.
There’s a terrorist, Jacob Pearce (Sean Harris), going against government figures, starting with Defense Minister Philippe Bardin (Nathan Willcocks), and the heroes whose job is to stop him. In this case, that’s Vincent (Tewfik Jallab), the defense minister’s security officer, and MI6 agent Zara (Ritu Arya). Let’s consider Vincent the Gerard Butler equivalent.
It’s an unlikely team-up to be sure, but one that works pretty well on a show that doesn’t rely on them to have romantic chemistry, just to work together and to be our conduit to what we’re really here for—great action. And okay, yes, they have to be somewhat interesting, well-rounded characters too, but overall it’s hard to say that Zara and Vincent are the reason we’ll be demanding more from this franchise.
However, they’re unlikely to be the reason we drop the franchise, either. It’s all very serviceable and fun if you like to see things blow up and a lot of blood. Like, a lot. Way more than you see in action movies nowadays. What is this rated again? TV-MA? Yeah, that tracks. It’s probably why it’s on Hulu too.
Overall, this isn’t a show to be taken too seriously or one that will require you to dissect and overthink. Instead, it’s just fun, at times borderline silly, action fare. There’s a bit of “government good,” and “who really are the terrorists” to it all, but if the show isn’t going too deep into it, you don’t really need to. You can, of course, but you don’t have to. That’s probably not the point.
Instead, this is one of those you can just enjoy and then sort of forget until, inevitably, another installment of the Has Fallen franchise is announced, and then you start thinking… wait, what happened in the last one? Then you can just watch it again, no problem. It’ll still be as enjoyable and silly as ever.
Agree? Disagree? What did you think of Paris Has Fallen? Do you want to see more of the Has Fallen franchise? Share with us in the comments below!
All episodes of Paris Has Fallen are now available to stream on Hulu.
There’s a lack of chemistry between the President & Vincent, that’s my only qualm, besides it being a bit too long.