Kingsman: The Golden Circle - 4K Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Kingsman: The Golden Circle

Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score: ​

​

Movie
Matthew Vaughn has created himself a niche following of people as he makes some of the most unique and highly divisive takes on modern pop culture that I’ve seen. Sure, the man does do some “normal stuff” such as X-Men: First Class or Stardust, but he really made a name for himself by adapting a set of graphic novels from Mark Millar as well as Kingsman: The Secret Service. Both of which has Vaughn slyly lampooning the super hero and James Bond franchises with those films in an “over the top” and excessive way. Well, they always say that the job of a sequel is to outdo its predecessor, but how do you outdo a film like Kingsman: The Secret Service whose entire goal was to be over the top and excessive to begin with? Well, you get even MORE excessive, and more over the top than that one was of course! The Golden Circle certainly goes crazy with all the fun and action sequences, but it sadly feels like a step back from the really fun 2014 predecessor in some ways.

Eggsy (Taron Egerton) has gone on from becoming a junior agent in the Kingsman Secret Intelligence agency, to being a senior agent taking the place of Agent Galahad (Harry Hart, played by Colin Firth in the first film) after his untimely demise during the previous film. Not only that, but he and that Swedish princess Tilde (Hanna Alstrom) are living happily in England while everyone else lives their lives. But that is not how an action movie is meant to be, and soon Eggsy’s happy existence is turned upside down when a drug kingpin named Poppy (Julianne Moore) blows up the ENTIRETY of the Kingsman’s secret service agents to kingdom come. The only survivors being Eggsy, and the technical guru of the agency, Merlin (Mark Strong). With the whole agency destroyed, Merlin and Eggsy dig into the “doomsday” safe that was left for them and find clues leading them to America.

It seems that England is not the ONLY group of super spies, as the due come to face to face with their American counterpart, known as “The Statesman”. These wild and wooly boys are the epitome of modern cowpokes, just with lots higher technology and a love for good Tennessee whiskey. After being introduced to the top brass (including Channing Tatum and Jeff Bridges doing his “cowboy voice”), the british agents have one more thing to contend with. Harry Hart (Galahad Sr.) is alive and well in the Statesman’s lair, but the poor guy has lost his memory. Now it’s up to the Statesman AND the surviving Kingsman agents to unlock Galahad’s brain AND take down Poppy before she sends 100s of millions of people to their death after lacing her own drug supply with a reversible poison in an effort to become “legit”

The Golden Circle is a bit of a strange bird. It has the look and familiar feel of The Secret Service, but goes off in a fractured direction that leaves it less cohesive and more “flashy” than the original. Some of the changes are really good (the action scenes are superb), but the excesses that it takes tends to take away from the satirical flavor that the first film balanced so well. I enjoyed the inclusion of the American branch of the super spy business, and Channing Tatum was HILARIOUS as agent Tequila, but even though he is plastered all over the front of the cover and given top billing, the actor is only in the 2 hour and 20 minute film for a grand total of 8-10 minutes before he’s sidelined. Which leaves us with the replacement in the form of agent Whiskey, played by Pedro Pascal, and the movie is sadly remiss for that point.

Vaughn still has a bit of satire and commentary in The Golden Circle, as he attacks the famous “war on drugs” with a vengeance and even plays a bit with our ideas of the past as well. But he is so intent on outdoing the 2014 freshman effort that he goes just a bit TOOO over the top. In The Secret Service the violence is a wink and a nod to our love of action in Spy movies, as is many other tongue in cheek moments along the way. The Golden Circle gives up the poignancy and satire of the first film and instead uses over the top violence and action (such as Elton John going full kung fu master in a feather boa’d outfit) as more of a sight gag, limiting the punch of said action to anything more than appealing to the audiences desire to see more blood, guts and butt kicking.




Rating:

Rated R for sequences of strong violence, drug content, language throughout and some sexual material




Video:

Even though it was taken from a 2K digital master, once again the inclusion of HDR makes the majority of the difference in this 4K UHD discs. However, the uptick in detail quality between the two formats is quite noticeable at times. The Blu-ray almost looks “soft” in comparison, with long background shots showing of more detail than the 1080p discs do. Up close and personal it closes the gap a bit, but there is still a distinctly crisper image from the 4K and the HDR REALLY shines here. The stripes on Eggsy’s jersey just pop off his arm, and the white/blue snow covered slopes just look as visceral and vibrant as can be. Black levels show the biggest improvement with the gray tinge to the Blu-ray gone, replaced with silky deep blacks to enjoy. Even though the Blu-ray sports an amazing transfer, the 4K UHD disc is quite impressive in the visual department as well, and I give it a solid two thumbs up for the upgrade.





Audio:

I’ve noticed that when comparing two modern tracks together it really makes a difference depending on how many channels each one has. If you’re comparing a 5.1 track against an Atmos tracks the differences can be pretty large, but when you’re comparing to an already stellar 7.1 track like the Blu-ray of The Golden Circle has, then the differences start to get more and more minute in the A/B process. In this case I would say that the two tracks are much more similar than difference, and that is NOT a knock on the Atmos track, but praising just how well the 7.1 DTS-HD MA track holds up to its beefier counterpart. The same wonderful soundscape is present in the Atmos mix, with powerful and punch LFE, and great surrounds, but with the added benefit of some discrete overhead sounds to switch up the immersivenesss of the track. They are both fantastic mixes, and I will obviously give the nod to the Atmos mix as the overheads make some really cool scenes even cooler.





Extras:

• KINGSMAN: INSIDE THE GOLDEN CIRCLE (Multi-chaptered Documentary)
- Distilling The Story: Kingsman Returns
- Trafficker, Tailor, Southerner, Spy
- Poppy's Special Guest: Elton John
- Nefarious Lairs & High-Falutin' Headquarters
- Suited And Booted
- Weapons of Choice
- Brothers In Arms
- Doomsday Protocol: Visual Effects
- End Game
• Black Cab Chaos: Anatomy of a Killer Chase
• Kingsman Archives
- Concept Art: Sets, Costumes (36 Images)
- Stills: Behind The Scenes, Sets, Props, The Cast (52 Images)

Final Score: ​

With that being said, the movie is very stylish and the action IS a lot of fun. It’s just that the depth of the first movie (as much depth as there was) is replaced with more traditional guns, knives, explosions and beautiful women. I guess you could say, the sequel gave up what made its predecessor “special” and gave it the good old “style over substance” upgrade in an effort to outdo itself. The movie is vacuous, dumb, but gleefully over the top and full of some fun fight sequences with a killer audio and video track no matter if you choose the 4K UHD or the Blu-ray to watch (although I would give the 4K the upper hand by a decent margin due to the inclusion of Atmos and the uptick in quality in the video encode). Recommended as a fun watch for those who like over the top action movies.




Technical Specifications:

Starring: Tarog Egerton, Channing Tatum, Mark Strong, Colin Firth
Directed by: Matthew Vaughn
Written by: Matthew Vaughn, Jane Goldman
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 HEVC
Audio: English: Dolby Atmos (Dolby TrueHD 7.1 Core), Spanish, Polish, Czech DD 5.1, Spanish, French, German, Italian DTS 5.1
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Rated: R
Runtime: 141 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: December 12th, 2017

Image

• Michael Scott
• May 11, 2017

Recommendation: Decent Watch

 

[Jack]

Thank you Michael, your review was very revealing. I think I liked it a bit better than you but hey, we are all Bozo's on this bus right ?
I am torn here, I do not presently have the ability to watch 4K so that issue is a problem, for now. I think the cost of this disc is about a nickle more than the plain blu ray and it might make sense to start stocking up on the future of discs for when I become rich and famous.

 

[Michael Scott]

lol, everybody has their own tastes Jack, nothing wrong with liking it more than I or Todd. My opinion. Go for it. It's about he same price for either format, you get the Blu-ray in either one, AND you get the 4K UHD for when you upgrade, and 4K equipment is only getting cheaper and cheaper each year.

I never hesitate to tell people that if you're buying a brand new release, ALWAYS go for the 4K combo packs unless you NEED that DVD in Blu-ray combo packs. now when the price discrepencies are huge for catalog titles, that's when I might say to wait and hold off

 

[tripplej]

Thanks for the review. Will check it out.